What does the Activity column exactly refer to?

Support
1

I already searched. Couldn’t find it. Also, asked AI. AI says:

The Activity column in Discourse indicates the most recent activity on a topic. Activity includes a variety of actions, such as new replies, likes, edits, bookmarks, and other interactions with the topic.

But that’s where the confusion comes from. I have this Reference category. The topics don’t have any replies. They are wikis. But they might be edited from time to time.

You can find two topics there:

  • Web Activity
    • For this, the Activity matches the last edit on the wiki. I applied the last edit myself.
      This topic is created by myself.
  • Carry Forward Responses
    • For this, the Activity goes back to a time on the same day the topic is created. But we have newer edits on the wiki. That time matches the last time a user other than me edited the wiki.
      This topic is created by someone else.

Would anyone please elaborate on what “Activity” refers to and whether this is a bug or not? Note that if I reply, my action will update the Activity field. But it doesn’t seem to be the case for all my edits.

I need to sort topics based on the edits on the wikis, so I can regularly (e.g., weekly) review the changes others apply to them, and share what we (including me) have done/changed, for example, in the last week.

2

IIRC the Activity column shows the date/time of the last post.

3

Thanks. But it won’t be the case for the first topic I linked above. It was created on Jun 16, but it was edited yesterday. And the Activity shows yesterday. Note that the last edit on that page is done by me.

1 Like
4

The Activity column always refers to the activity on the latest post in the topic.

In “Web activity”, the first post is the last post, so when it’s edited the activity date is changed. In “Carry forward responses”, the last post is “listed”, so an update on the first post is not an update of the last post and because of that the activity date doesn’t change.

You could delete those small action posts.

5

Thanks. But even if we consider that, for Carry Forward Responses, the Activity should’ve been Jul 29 (for the Listed action), not Jun 25. And the Activity exactly matches the last edit by a user other than me, not those small actions. Hope this clarifies.

And I assume by “deleting those small actions”, you mean if I delete those, from that moment on, edits on the first posts will affect the Activity. Please let me know if I misunderstood you.

6

Small action posts don’t change the activity date (so closed or unlisted topics aren’t bumped just because of that).

  • topic created → first activity
  • edit on first post → activity date updated
  • unlisted → activity date not updated (because small action post)
  • edit on first post → activity not updated (because first post is not most recent post)
  • …

Yes, that’s what I expect. You can also create a test topic to see if this helps before trying on the real topic.

1 Like
7

Thanks. It’s clear now.

I think it’s not a consistent product design, or at least I don’t understand the reasoning behind it. Because those small actions don’t affect the Activity, while they block the last “real” post from affecting the Activity. On the other hand, even listing/unlisting, or basically any edit on any post of a topic is an “activity” to me. But that’s another topic, I guess.

Thanks again.