Approving new threads should automatically post them as recent

[420]

We have a forum set up where all posts need to be approved by staff before being published. It takes time for staff to manually review these threads and approve them. When they do get approved, they're buried in "what's new" and don't get the attention they should be getting.

When a thread in the approval queue is approved, it should automatically post as recent rather than the date it was posted.

I understand why approving new posts shouldn't change the date, but that shouldn't be the case for new threads.

Right now Change Date (addon) helps with this, but we'd rather have this in core and to cut down on the work that needs to be done.

 

[BassMan]

I agree. Sometimes we are not quick enough to approve the threads, and when they are approved, they can sometimes be found somewhere down the list of new threads.

 

[Kirby]

I disagree with this suggestion for three reasons:

1. A thread awaiting approval is not necessarily a new thread - it might as well be an old thread that was unapproved. It would be pretty confusing if such a thread got its timestamp updated when if is approved.
2. The first post of a new unapproved thread might contain relative time references. This could be confusing as well
3. In case the thread / post does get legally relevant in any way at some time or in case of technical issues, accurate timestamps might be important

I therefore think the suggested functionality would be better implemented as an Add-on rather than core functionality - at least it should be optional.

 

[420]

And I disagree with you, for these reasons.

We have one forum for our sponsors who pay our bills to allow us to operate.

We allow them to post their own threads, but we have to send them to queue so our staff can fix/edit them to be sure they are proper for SEO and guidelines before posting. Sometimes we can't get to them for a few hours, sometimes for a couple days.

However, it makes no logical sense whatsoever to post something in a queue and then once it gets approved a day later, it gets posted to the tenth page in the archives, never to be seen by anyone. It's a missing component to make the functionality logical.

Plus every time we load that add on, we have all kinds of weird issues in our forums, that nobody can seem to trace, but when we remove it, the problems disappear. We've invested probably thirty hours or more with half a dozen developers and still can't figure it out.

So we either need a more solid add on or a core feature.

It should be a standard core feature, it's only logical.

 

[Kirby]

However, it makes no logical sense whatsoever to post something in a queue and then once it gets approved a day later, it gets posted to the tenth page in the archives, never to be seen by anyone.

It normally makes no logical sense to give a thread a different timestamp than the time it was originally submitted.

Why do you think an older thread would not be seen by anyone?
The thread would be unread, so unless you require more time for approval than the read marking cut-off you should be fine.

It's a missing component to make the functionality logical.

[...]
It should be a standard core feature, it's only logical.

We can agree to disagree
IMHO XenForo is not missing anything here.

 

[Mr Lucky]

It normally makes no logical sense to give a thread a different timestamp than the time it was originally submitted.

Time of publication (ie approval and being made public) makes a lot more sense than time of submission.

If a thread is unapproved then reapproved the time stamp should not change.

It should be only on first approval.

In an ideal world posts would get approved as soon as they are posted, but it is not an ideal world. I find myself sometimes having to bump approved posts just to get them visible in new posts.

It’s a good idea.

 

[Kirby]

Time of publication (ie approval and being made public) makes a lot more sense than time of submission.

From a user point if view - maybe (though that might still be confusing in some cases like outlined in my initial reply).

From an operations point of view it's not a good idea

If a thread is unapproved then reapproved the time stamp should not change.

It should be only on first approval.

Yes, that might be more acceptable than the initial suggestion.
Still not ideal though.

 

[420]

From a user point if view - maybe (though that might still be confusing in some cases like outlined in my initial reply).

From an operations point of view it's not a good idea


Yes, that might be more acceptable than the initial suggestion.
Still not ideal though.

Maybe you have endless time, energy and money to be spending weeks and months on finding problems from a thousand conflicting add ons, but we don't. The feature is not working logically, we respectfully request it be fixed.

Thank you.

 

[Mr Lucky]

1. In case the thread / post does get legally relevant in any way at some time or in case of technical issues, accurate timestamps might be important

From a legal point of view, time/date of copyright, ie first publication, may actually be the most relevant.

 

[Mendalla]

It should be a standard core feature, it's only logical.

No reason it can't be a core feature but be optional for those of us who do not need to have it. Have it prompt when the thread is approved as to whether to modify the time. Or have an option in Setup to turn it off and on. Lots of core features work that way, including the new cookie management.

 

[420]

No reason it can't be a core feature but be optional for those of us who do not need to have it. Have it prompt when the thread is approved as to whether to modify the time. Or have an option in Setup to turn it off and on. Lots of core features work that way, including the new cookie management.

Agreed 420%

 

[Mr Lucky]

it. Have it prompt when the thread is approved as to whether to modify the time. Or have an option in Setup to turn it off and on.

Makes most sense in the approval window itself, that would deal with the possible re-approval issue mentioned above.

 

[VBX Co]

Perhaps clarify the suggestion title? Something like:

Thread Approval - add an option to use the approval date & time (so thread shows at top of What's New/Recent Posts)

 

[Wildcat Media]

Time of publication (ie approval and being made public) makes a lot more sense than time of submission.

It certainly does make more sense. One of my largest boards has an issue with this same problem.

We have our approval system set up so that some new users who are flagged for potential trouble (janky e-mail address, possible spam flags, suspicion of a banned member returning, etc.) automatically have their first posts put into the moderation queue, so we can keep an eye on their early activity. We've caught a few problems that way.

The problem occurs when approving legit posts or threads since in the busiest forum on our board, looking at the page at this moment, the oldest activity on the page is 13 minutes. If staff isn't online or is tied up with other issues for an hour, and we approve that post, it would be buried on the third page of the forum--few would see it. (I counted 48 posts in the forum within the past hour, just now.) Even worse is when the post is in a long thread, and by the time staff can get to it, that post would be buried a page or two back, where again, few will see it.

I've been trying to encourage staff to bump the post by quoting that approved post with a welcome message ("thanks for posting"), but I don't think anyone has ever bothered to do that.

The staff is volunteer. Nobody sits on the board 24/7 just waiting for moderation queue items to show up--they have jobs, lives, etc.. Many on the staff joined with good intentions but rarely visit the forum now, so we don't always have a fully active staff either. Some days, the reports are coming in fast and furious, and it's all they can do to keep up on those days. In other words, we can't sit on that moderation queue at the expense of everything else.

The only way to fix this is a way to somehow bump the post/thread to a newer timestamp. I'm good with changing the time/date to match when it was published. It would be nice to have that option in the moderation queue--update timestamp to when the post was approved. It would solve that problem for many busy forums out here.

 

[AndyB]

You might like this add-on:

https://xenforo.com/community/resources/approval-queue-thread-date.9010/

 

[420]

You might like this add-on:

https://xenforo.com/community/resources/approval-queue-thread-date.9010/

Thank you @AndyB you're the man!

 

[JordanH]

And I disagree with you, for these reasons.

We have one forum for our sponsors who pay our bills to allow us to operate.

We allow them to post their own threads, but we have to send them to queue so our staff can fix/edit them to be sure they are proper for SEO and guidelines before posting. Sometimes we can't get to them for a few hours, sometimes for a couple days.

That seems like a very specific thing to your forum. Again, probably better suited as an addon. To which @AndyB has provided