I would like a reply to the "Reply" issue

[DappledThings]

Just thought I'd start another thread to get more attention on this again as there has been no answer as to whether it is even being looked at.

A few comments on MNHQ's recent thread about the new feature pointing out nobody asked for that but a lot of us have asked you to fix this.

To summarise: The button marked Reply does not do what it says. It adds a post, it does not do a reply. MN has no reply feature but, bizarrely, chooses to have a button that pretends it does. This leads to threads full of "replies" that have no context and are impossible to follow. Plus posts saying "sorry, not sure why my reply didn't work, I clicked reply"

And thanks, didn’t know quote was under the 3 dots.

I've had a very positive response when I've told people that the Reply button doesn't do anything, and go on to tell them how to Quote.

Most people post and say thank you, and they often say they'd been wondering why Reply didn't seem to be working.

@DappledThings thank you for your tireless work campaigning on this issue. I came here to find out what the fuck MN are thinking with this non-Reply button and was both glad to see it was not just me but disappointed to see that it had been raised so long ago with no real acknowledgement fr MN that it is an issue.

I see you as the “Mr Bates” of Mumsnet, seriously. Do you think we could convince Tony Jones to play you in an ITV drama?

Mind you, a couple have paid no attention, and continued their incomprehensible posting - at which point, I hide the thread.

I haven't had anyone moaning at me again, though.

One related question that has been bugging me.

I’ve been a MN user for decades. Always use the mobile site and generally like it. Never got on with the app.

I remember when the only way to quote was to copy and paste and bold using asterisks.

I remember when you had to copy the name of the person you were replying to in order to paste their name at the top of the post of theirs that you were quoting.

THEN the quote function was born! That was GREAT. Quoted whole post and the username.

However, in my memory the quote button when first introduced was right under the message, not hidden in a drop down. I also for the life of me can’t remember that bloody Reply button being there before Quote was brought in. And now even I, a very very seasoned MNetter who knows exactly how to quote still sometimes find myself absent-mindedly clicking “Reply” when I meant to quote.

So my question is, has the quote button always been hidden in the drop down? Have I created a false memory because I was eagerly waiting for it to be introduced?

What did the bottom of a message on the mobile site look like, say, 3 years ago?

The Quote button was visible until Thanks was introduced.

I will also use it. However I don’t think I’ll include the reference to PSA at the bottom as a lot of new/occasional users are intimidated/annoyed by acronyms and it’s not all that well known.

People might think it has to do with PA. (Passive aggressive) or PITA (pain in the arse) and feel it’s a dig at them.

Aha! I like Thanks but that was a BAD decision to sacrifice Quote for it. I mean, Quote must be hundreds of times more useful and popular than “Thanks”.

And Reply was there too? With its duplicate in Add Post, so could have been easily sacrificed?
what on earth were MNHQ thinking?

That explains why I find myself hitting reply by mistake when I mean to quote, my muscle memory is taking me there.

I can’t be the only one.

What baffles me if how various OPs read their threads and are not totally bewildered.

Can't they see that none of it makes sense?

Totally agree with this. It makes threads very hard to follow. And anyone wanting a response to the poster they 'replied' to wil be waiting a long time. It's a completely pointless button!

What baffles me is why MNHQ created the button in the first place. It's absolutely pointless and I can't imagine how it ever made it onto the site.

Does anyone know when it was brought in?

I honestly can’t remember what I was using to reply without quoting (say) 5 years ago.

I’m not sure how long Quote’s existed, but before that people just copied & pasted whatever they wanted to quote, then bolded it.

I'm old enough to remember when we bolded something we wanted to quote, but I can't recall when the Reply button first appeared.

Was it always there?

I'm old enough to remember when we bolded something we wanted to quote

I still do this. As it annoys me that you can't quote part of of a post and I hate quoting a long post and cluttering the thread.

OK, so I had a bit of a dig in old site stuff threads to see if any screenshots posted there have a snapshot of how things used to be (mobile site).

This from 2020 shows that individual posts only had bookmark or ellipsis on them. (Open image and you’ll see the full blue toolbar).

Therefore, anyone who wanted to add a post to the thread would go to the blue “add post” at the bottom of the thread.

What has obviously happened is that somewhere along the line the new “toolbar for individual posts” has come in. Someone has decided at this point that it needs a “Reply” button on it, without thinking through the fact that this function was already served by “add post”, which was not being got rid of.

It makes much more sense to have “add post” as an option on the THREAD toolbar as you are adding your post (aka reply) to the whole thread.

The buttons on the individual post toolbars are actions you do to that post . Therefore the logical conclusion is that “Reply” is a reply to that post not a reply to the thread generally, especially if the post you have clicked “Reply” on is not the most recent post on the thread. And, indeed, if it’s not the most recent post on the thread then its text HAS to be quoted for the reply to make any sense.

Hang on so this was added in the last couple of years?! Wowsers

I vaguely think quote has always been under the 3 dots but that the dots used to be at the bottom but not sure...

Certainly since Feb 2020 @Papillon23 .

According to someone upthread, Quote began life on what I’m now calling “The Post Toolbar” but was shunted off to make way for “Thanks”. I have no screenshot evidence of that, but that was my gut feel too.

That screenshot I just posted does confirm that the three dots (aka ellipsis) were at the bottom though.

I've just found a screenshot from 2022 which has quote in 2022 within the 3 dots but no more "post toolbar" than in 2020.

Will go back and locate screenshots shortly.

So the mainly green one shows that quoting existed by then (but was in its early days as you couldn't quote anything with a quote then, and the one that's not mainly green is from around the same time (slightly later) and shows that the "post toolbar" didn't yet exist in the same way it does now at that point, so this madness has been introduced within the last 2 years.

I had assumed it was a relic of bygone days but feel like the absurdity is amplified given this was presumably designed at the point of the site redesign? Not sure when that was, but fairly recently I think.

I’ve just found this from when “Thanks” was introduced in September last year.

MnHQ said that “Quote” was always behind the ellipsis! Are we being gaslighted @betterangels or is it all false memory ? It’s funny that someone else on that thread thought it had been moved…

I'm sure that Quote was where Thanks is now.

I can't recall seeing Reply until quite recently.
I'm going to do some digging.

I can’t believe this thread was started in early November, and it’s now mid-January, and no resolution.

MN really don’t give a shit, do they?

I have long been of the opinion that the tech department of MN is powered off two old, asthmatic hamsters half-heartedly wheezing around an ancient, rusty wheel, and this just confirms it.

I mean, MNHQ - you have one job: to run a website….?

Just copy and paste the code for ‘Quote’ into ‘reply’. It’s the work of seconds.

Quote definitely moved. It never used to be hidden behind the dots.

Here's a thread to prove it.

https://www.mumsnet.com/talk/site_stuff/3920629-First-crack-at-a-new-quote-feature-please-check-it-out

I think that shows it wasn't on the desktop site but was on the mobile site?

But everything on the mobile site was under the 3 dots except bookmark.