I feel like a don’t-notify character, no matter how well it’s documented, would realistically be kind of a hidden feature. Power users would make use of it but the average forum-goer might not ever discover it.
Clicking the generated link to see an option would be pretty hidden too. If there was going to be a UI affordance, it would be nice if it improved discoverability too.
Perhaps an icon on the generated link to encourage a click. Or a popup upon selecting a name from the autocomplete list. Or mcwumbly’s idea from above:
…an element similar to the address list in the direct message composer that would make it explicit which people and/or groups are going to be notified:
Yeah, and not forgetting that in most communities the norm likely is the opposite of what we want here on meta.
What if there were some magicks and a site setting could be enabled to make notifications less noisy by default for members who are mentioned that are not actively involved in a topic already. There could be a popup that lets the poster know and give them the option to notify them anyway:
You mentioned @toddz@tobiaseigen but they are not active in this topic. Are you sure you want to notify them? yes/no/edit post
I imagine that simple yes/no/edit would take less code to implement than mcwumbly’s dialog with per-user selection.
I wonder about the word “active” though. Would it just mean present in the topic?
Like, I’m mentioning mcwumbly without an @ because, while he’s up there, he hasn’t been active in the thread since 2018 and I figure you’ll loop him back in if appropriate. Would a typical user think to drop the @? Or just default to it because of habit or perceived norms, then face an all-or-nothing choice?
Me neither! But when clicking on the @ username seeing a little menu with options (similar to selecting and quoting/editing/explaining text) would be pretty cool.
