In a support thread titled ‘Needs tips on Private Message,’ sjmscott asks how to efficiently send a private message (PM) in Discourse in response to a post — especially for off-topic replies — noting that unlike Yahoo Groups, Discourse doesn’t expose user emails. elijah explains that users can click the user icon and select the message button to start a PM, and can invite others to create a group message. pfaffman clarifies that replying via email directly to the sender is more complex. codinghorror recommends modifying the email footer to guide users on how to reply privately, linking to a guide on email notification footers. Later, codinghorror notes that tapping the response arrow in the composer previously allowed toggling to a PM, but JammyDodger updates that this ‘New Message’ option has since been retired, as per decisions by Isaac Janzen and sam, who removed the feature along with the confusing ‘Reply as linked topic’ action in PMs. The current recommended method remains clicking the user icon to initiate a PM.
I am transitioning my community away from Yahoo Groups and some of my community has this concern:
When you receive a message from yahoo groups, you can reply to just the individual user or to everyone in the group.
In discourse you don’t have access (that I know of) to reveal user emails. What is the most efficient way to send an PM in response to a post? For example, you might have an off topic response that you want to communicate directly to a poster.
Are there any shortcuts, buttons, or tricks that I might be missing?
