The Shift + U key is advertised on the Keyboard Shortcuts pop-up to “mark topic as unread”, but how is it supposed to work? I tried it in three situations:
while actually reading a topic
on the home screen (“New” for me) while scrolling up / down with j / k
on the home screen in selection mode (after hitting Shift + B and making selections with x)
it doesn’t do what it says in any of these. It seems to do something in the first case but that looks more like a bug.
My questions:
what is the correct way to use this key
maybe I can achieve my goal in a different way? my goal is to pick a few topics from either New or Latest to read in a later session, without having to go through the whole list again
is there a more detailed doc for the shortcuts? in particular, explaining the context in which each shortcut is to be used?
Btw, same behavior on Meta and 2 other sites, so I don’t think it’s an upgrade issue.
Any time you have a topic open on your screen, its status is set to “read”. If you want it to have the status “unread”, the topic needs to be not displayed on your screen.
What happens when you press Shift+u on a topic is that it sets the topic as “unread” and redirects you on the home page.
If you scroll the topic list to the topic you just unread, you’ll see it doesn’t have the lighter color of the “read” status.
Before
After
But I agree that the behavior feels strange. A quick popup mentioning we have unread a topic could be a good addition.
my goal is to pick a few topics from either New or Latest to read in a later session, without having to go through the whole list again
I guess the Unread concept doesn’t really apply to this situation. But then, how to do it?
Also, sometimes I enter (ie. start reading) a topic, but then I have to stop reading and start working I want to come back to the topic later, even if there are no more posts in it. I don’t know how to do this, now that I understand Unread better: the topic won’t show on my home screen (New) even if I do make it Unread.
You can bookmark the topic. Also, if you are tracking the topic and use the “mark unread” feature, the topic will appear in your “unread” list, like a topic where you haven’t read the last post.
I assume you mean the Unread list reachable from the home page, with the key sequence G U. But for me, that list only ever shows topics with new posts since I’ve visited them.
That is why I put the “even if” in my previous post into emphasis. When I do Shift + U on a topic, which throws me somewhat abruptly back to the home page (I thought this was a bug but now I understand it is by design), firstly the Unread button isn’t shown unless there have been other topic qualifying as such, and secondly even if I try G U anyway, I get a page saying there are no unread posts.
I want to come back to the topic later, even if there are no more posts in it. I don’t know how to do this, now that I understand Unread better: the topic won’t show on my home screen (New) even if I do make it Unread.