Stickies
TappedOut forum
Posted on Nov. 15, 2014, 1:10 p.m. by Jay
So I've noticed that lots of other forums use stickies (for those unfamiliar, "stickies" are threads pinned to the top of their appropriate forum(s) so they are seen by everyone who passes them). I was thinking perhaps these could be implemented well here to stop some of the redundant posts. I'm assuming it would be doable because the Community Discussion is essentially a temporarily stickied post. I think it would be helpful to have 1 or 2 relevant stickies at the top of any forum that needs them. Some examples of sticky material, in my opinion:
-How to customize username master thread
-Main spoiler discussion thread during spoiler season (so as to allow simultaneous CD)
-Important notes or updates related to the forum
I'm not sure if this is just unnecessary complication, but if it wouldn't be difficult to add I can't imagine any negative impact.
-Jay
(tagging yeaGO and Epochalyptik)
Epochalyptik says... #3
Last I checked, we don't have a functional sticky feature. That's something yeaGO would have to add.
November 15, 2014 2:15 p.m.
Is there no one of making a thread just remain at the top of a forum?
November 15, 2014 2:17 p.m.
Nope :) but please start drafting things we will figureit out
November 15, 2014 2:23 p.m.
Epochalyptik says... #8
I wonder if we could just give threads a status kind of like answered/unanswered in the Q&A (we'd need to visually separate stickies and non-stickies), but maintain sort by recent post date.
November 15, 2014 2:25 p.m.
Epochalyptik says... #9
I think there's actually already a sticky status for each page, but it doesn't do anything right now.
November 15, 2014 2:26 p.m.
what about a master threads section. Or allow comments on help pages.
November 15, 2014 2:30 p.m.
Master threads section would be a good start. My thinking was just that it would be reasonable to have the modern primer at the very top of the modern forum. That would make it SUPER easy for everyone.
November 15, 2014 2:42 p.m.
vampirelazarus says... #12
I second (fourth?) implementing a sticky feature.
My issue with a master threads section is that it's one more place for people to check before posting their question.
With a sticky, all they need to really check is the forum itself.
November 15, 2014 2:50 p.m.
Epochalyptik, yeaGO - I think porting somethign similar to the Q&A section over to the forums could work? You know how when you press 'choose answer' or whatever it is in the Q&A the thread starts descending? Could there be something that does the exact opposite in the forums? A button you press that STOPS the thread descending? Obviously only you two should have access to this button though!
November 15, 2014 3:14 p.m.
Epochalyptik says... #14
@yeaGO, comment #9:
Stickies are useful for things other than formatting tips, though. I don't see the need for comments on help pages.
@ChiefBell, comment #12:
See comment #7.
November 15, 2014 3:48 p.m.
Epochalyptik says... #16
Ah.
So here's my five-minute brainstorm on this so far:
- Have the option to designate existing threads as stickies through the admin interface
- There's already a field for this option on thread pages, but I don't think it's hooked up to anything after that. We can use this.
- Physically separate stickies and keep them in a section on top of the forum.
- Add an option to order stickied threads
- Could copy the sort order that exists for manually ordering forums.
- Non-stickied threads should operate as they currently do.
November 15, 2014 4:03 p.m.
This is an interesting brainstorm but what if we went big and surfaced a modern hub in the website a la 90s Yahoo portal
Let it be known yeago hates forums conventions like stickies
November 15, 2014 4:05 p.m.
Epochalyptik says... #18
As for what kinds of threads might be worth stickying:
- A directory of links to formatting guides, etc. (TappedOut)
- The massive deck help thread (Deck Help)
- Directory of primers (format forums)
- Directory of helpful format information (format forums)
- Official spoiler discussions (SRS; thread would change seasonally)
Two other notes:
- I'd like a dialogue box at the top of the forum page that reminds people of and redirects people to the Q&A for rules questions.
- I'd like to be able to feature up to three threads at a time. Sometimes there are several important announcements/discussions that should be going on simultaneously, but we can only spotlight one.
November 15, 2014 4:11 p.m.
Epochalyptik says... #19
Hate them or not, they are useful. We'd only be stickying one or two threads per forum anyway.
November 15, 2014 4:12 p.m.
It is something that would really add to the site, and hopefully smooth out a lot of unecessary issues and questions people have
November 15, 2014 4:15 p.m.
what if we brought some of these things, community and information, to pages like this modern deck hub i wonder if it would be too cluttered
November 15, 2014 5:24 p.m.
Epochalyptik says... #22
I think it would certainly be helpful to list some links there, but the main advantage of stickies is that you reach everyone going to the forums. I'd wager that the format forums get many times the traffic that the format pages get.
November 15, 2014 5:27 p.m.
That's quite a hard part of the site to access. I think what we wanted was to make things as easy to access as possible. I don't think most people look at the deck builder to find information, but just use it to add their own decks? I've certainly never even seen that page before, but that might just be me. The argument for pointing them in the forums is that its somewhere that the majority of the users can find easily and use regularly.
Unsure.
November 15, 2014 5:31 p.m.
the modern deck hub gets more traffic than the modern forum and all its posts. :)
just checked
...brainstormin..
November 15, 2014 5:40 p.m.
Hmmm. Interesting. Maybe then?
It just seems a bit weird......
I'll take your word for it though!
November 15, 2014 5:42 p.m.
It is worth noting that using the deck hub area wont help if you wish to sticky things like 'how to customize usernames'. It would help with some topics like primers, but it wouldn't help with others (those about the site in general etc.)
November 15, 2014 5:48 p.m.
Fellas, head on over to the pauper hub to see a sample.
from there we can just extend similar concepts from the homepage, such as featured forum threads and decks.
dig?
November 16, 2014 7:45 p.m.
Under where it says "Pauper MTG Decks" would it be possible to link to important threads? This would essentially be like stickying, but without the label of "sticky" so it's still cool and rebellious B)
But I do think that's an improvement.
November 16, 2014 7:49 p.m.
So should we make it like the Featured Thread on the front page?
Or are we talking about immortally featured threads. I would kinda-rather have like articles and the help pages for those kinds of things. That doesn't mean we can't link them.
I am still trying to narrow in on exactly the problem we are solving.
November 16, 2014 7:52 p.m.
Not necessarily immortal, just the ability to have multiple more specific featured threads. So if there's something that's important, but only to Pauper, it's there on the Pauper Page until it's irrelevant.
November 16, 2014 7:57 p.m.
vampirelazarus says... #33
I still think the original idea of implementing stickies is the way to go.
I wasn't aware until now that the hubs have pages.
November 16, 2014 7:57 p.m.
okay cool, well i will enable the sticky thing. but i don't want to call it sticky. haha.
featured discussions i can certainly do. we can have them pop up on the hub page and within the forum itself.
ChiefBell says... #2
I would like to flag this up with yeaGO and Epochalyptik because the massive modern primer (a really long article about like... most of modern) is nearing completion and I think it would be nice to sticky it at the top of the modern forum.
November 15, 2014 1:17 p.m.