Voting vs Likes for feature requests

[mtan]

We have a feature request category and I would like to hear personal experiences in using voting vs likes. Here’s what I have:

Voting

• controlled
• can be more accurate
• but can add friction, no sort by, less visible

Likes

• more flexible
• more common UX
• built in sort and column view
• but not accurate and true voting representation

Did you find that going with the more strict voting feature worked especially if you are doing roadmaps?

[Falco]

@mtan

no sort by, less visible

Our voting plugin has sort by votes, eg: https://community.infinite-flight.com/c/features/l/votes

Also, we do have a good write up on this subject:

https://blog.discourse.org/2018/10/discourse-as-an-ideation-platform/

[mtan]

This is nice. Did you have this from the beginning or did you switch at some point? What do you think of switching at some point? This design is not built in and will take time.

Also - I tried looking for this functionality to sort by votes but I can’t find it. What’s the best way to integrate this?

[Falco]

That is the Discourse Voting plugin.

We can get it installed for you, just say the word.

[mtan]

Please do. Thanks!

The Inflight Community example is spot on, exactly what we had in mind. My assumptions, please correct me if I’m wrong

• This can be configured at the category level
• This can be sorted by vote or the other fields (recency, views, etc.)
• Tags can still be used and will appear beside the total number of votes (“development”, “research”)
• Likes will be disabled based on what I’ve seen. Can we enable or disable this along with Voting?

[jomaxro (Joshua Rosenfeld)]

@mtan

This can be configured at the category level

Correct.

@mtan

This can be sorted by vote or the other fields (recency, views, etc.)

Incorrect. Sorting has not yet been implemented. See Topic List Sort By Votes in voting plugin

@mtan

Tags can still be used and will appear beside the total number of votes (“development”, “research”)

Correct. Looks like this by default:

@mtan

Likes will be disabled based on what I’ve seen. Can we enable or disable this along with Voting?

Incorrect, likes should be unaffected by the voting plugin.

[mtan]

@Falco / @jomaxro So the example about Infinite Inflight which is sorted by votes required additional work and doesn’t come with the plugin. I thought this is the one which can be installed.

@jomaxro

Incorrect, likes should be unaffected by the voting plugin.

I just tried to enable voting and the Likes got removed, see screenshot. Is there a different setting to enable both features?

[Falco]

@mtan

@Falco / @jomaxro So the example about Infinite Inflight which is sorted by votes required additional work and doesn’t come with the plugin. I thought this is the one which can be installed.

There is a bit of miscommunication here.

Yes, you can sort by votes. Just check the top of the categories page:

Clicking on Votes will sort this category by votes.

What is not implemented yet is sorting the category by votes by default. But it’s just 1 click away .

@mtan

@jomaxro

Incorrect, likes should be unaffected by the voting plugin.

I just tried to enable voting and the Likes got removed, see screenshot. Is there a different setting to enable both features?

The plugin will hide likes in the OP by default, so people don’t get confused.

It’s possible to re-enable the like button if you want it using CSS in the Customization panel. If you want it, just say the word.

[mtan]

@Falco

The plugin will hide likes in the OP by default, so people don’t get confused.

It’s possible to re-enable the like button if you want it using CSS in the Customization panel. If you want it, just say the word.

This make sense. However, the likes column is still there so disabling this column as well whenever voting is enabled will make it clean (only when voting is enabled).