I’ve been tracking the #chat tag now for a while, but new topics are still showing up as “Normal” for me.
I thought perhaps that it was due to the tag being added after the topic was created initially, but I don’t see any evidence of that being the case in these three recent topics, which all show up as “Normal” for me:
Just to confirm, I added the chat tag to those three topics during the initial ‘create topic’, and not afterwards.
Did those three topics show up in your New list? I think Tracking only keeps an Unread count for topics that you’ve seen already. Do the notifications work properly if you set it to Watching/Watching First Post?
I haven’t opened those topics yet except or one of them to check it’s tracking state. The tracking state shows up as “Normal”. They do show up in my “New” list, but they are new enough to show up there with or without tracking. I haven’t tried changing to “Watching” or “Watching First Post” yet.
On the tag page, here’s the text for Tracking, which makes me think these topics really should be “Tracked” before I open them.
Have you changed any manually since? I’ve just done a data-explorer query and it seems to suggest that you have a notification level of 2 (Tracking) for all the topics with a #chat tag.
To test I’ve not muellered the data-explorer query somehow, would you mind changing a random chat one to something different and I’ll see if the query picks it up?
It has so far still not turned up in the query results, which is leading me to think that you may need to open it for it to gain a notification level. It does show up in the same query run with my user_id, which would make sense for various reasons.
Go ahead and open it and see what the visible notification level looks like, and I’ll run the query and see what the database says.
Went forward to topic (cmd +]) - topic says Tracked
So it looks like it probably got “tracked” right when I opened it, but that only was visible to me on the 2nd open.
We could try another topic where I only do steps 1-2 to confirm.
My goal is to follow along with all topics that get tagged with #chat. I just enabled the sidebar theme here, which I think will also significantly help to address that need.
I can set another one up I can also confirm that the topic now shows up in the query with a notification level of 2 (tracking).
I have to admit that the magic of notifications still has a patina of mystery for me, so I’m not sure what is expected behavior here. Would it be fair to characterise it as something like:
Expected Behaviour: When setting the #chat tag to Tracking, new #chat topics should be tracked the same as seen ones
Turns out: Topics gain tracking notification on open
OK, for this one, I just opened it real quick and then hit the back button. I only ever saw it say “Normal”
Yes, at least, that’s what I was expecting
As we hinted earlier in the topic, it may also be worth characterizing what expectations we have for topics that get tagged after they are created.
Expected Behaviour: When setting the #chat tag to Tracking, and the #chat tag is added to an existing topic I have never opened, that topic should be tracked for me.
Expected Behaviour: When setting the #chat tag to Tracking, and the #chat tag is added to an existing topic I have opened… ? that topic’s tracking state should not be changed ?
So, for this one I’m going to create a topic, wait 10 minutes, then add the #chat tag and see what happens.
Update: It has been politely mentioned that we should maybe use a test tag for this so as not to be so noisy to the people who are genuinely watching the #chat tag. Sorry everyone.
I will go and make one.
Update Update:
Thinking about it, I may give this a run-through on my test site a few times first so as not to create any more of a ruckus
I moved over some more chat feedback into a standalone topic this morning and took the opportunity to create it without the #chat tag, and then waited 10 minutes before adding it:
I haven’t opened the topic yet. In the sidebar and on the topic list, it shows up as “New” not “Unread”, and there is no unread count next to the topic (even though there’s been a reply).
Oh, I also just noticed it does show up as the “1 new” topic under “Tracked” in the sidebar. Maybe that’s some evidence that something is working as intended here
Given that this is the case, and that it sounds like we’re headed towards a world where the sidebar becomes the default, I’m not sure this is really a bug anymore. Perhaps it’s eventually how we want things to work (in which case, I think the copy in the menu is what will really need adjusting).
But if folks think it is a but, then I’d say the expectations we captured above are what needs to be met.
I’m personally OK pausing the conversation here since the sidebar is meeting my need and letting this topic serve as a reference for future discussions if it comes up again.
A suggestion probably a little too late, but there’s also the https://meta.discourse.org/latest?state=tracking view that might be worth checking as well if you still want to keep an eye on it.
Would it be fair to characterise it as something like:
