Lack of interest Conversation Display Options

[Floyd R Turbo]

This has been slightly improved with XF2 but it still bugs me how this is designed. I wouldn't qualify it as a "bug" but rather, unexpected functionality.

In XF1 when you set the Option to "Show all conversations" it allows you to enter a username. My expectation here is that it would filter down the convos to only those that contain/involve that user. But, it doesn't filter at all in that case.

The other 2 options are available in both XF1 and XF2 but to me, I don't quite understand why it's done the way it is. Some explanation of the logic might help.

"Started by" is pretty explanatory - filter it down to only convos that a specific user started with you

"Received by" - is this the opposite? Convos you initiated with a specific user?

I guess I'm not sure how useful either of these options really are. What seems to me to be the most useful is actually both of these. So this functionality has always been a real head-scratcher for me.

I think that a better way to filter conversations would be to change these from a radio button option to a check box - you can check both, and see all conversations involving a specific user. That would still allow you to filter down further to who started it if you wanted to.

Still, I'm interested in who actually uses this feature, and how you use it. So if you have an opinion, please post it in this thread. I might not be understanding why it is designed the way it is....

Myself, whenever I do have to find a certain convo, I find that I enter in the username and then select "Started By" and look at the list, and then go to "Received By" and check that list too. Every time. So for me, it would make more sense to either A) not filter at all (default whenever convos are loaded) or B) filter to all convos involving a specific user.

Since this is in the suggestion forum, if you agree at any level that the current design needs some kind of improvement, please "like" this post so that it gets bumped up on the list of desired suggestions for XF1 and/or XF2.

 

[Martok]

There is no search conversations facility in either XF1 or XF2 (unless I'm completely blind and you can point out where it is to me on this site?) If that's the case then you will need to post your suggestion in the add-on's discussion thread.

In the mean time, you can like this suggestion to implement conversation searches in the core software:

https://xenforo.com/community/threads/personal-conversations-need-search-and-labels.844/

 

[Mike]

Those are filter options -- they exist in XF1 and 2.

"Received by" is just any conversation the user is involved in (with you). They could have started it, you could have started it, or someone else could have started it and added both of you. "Started by" is a subset of this so there's no reason to check both.

 

[Mr Lucky]

"Received by" - is this the opposite? Convos you initiated with a specific user?

I think this should mean the user is the recipient. It seems pointless that it means any conversation that they are in.

What I think makes more sense.

• All conversations in which x user is involved
• Conversations that you started with x
• Conversations that x Started with you

 

[Floyd R Turbo]

There is no search conversations facility in either XF1 or XF2

I didn't misunderstand the function - I know it's not a search feature. It's a filter, I'm aware of this

"Received by" is just any conversation the user is involved in (with you)

If this is the case, then "Received by" is not really the best description - and that might explain why it doesn't work as I expected. This is actually more correctly explained by using the term/phrase "Involving" or something like that. "Received By" implies that they initiated it with you.

"Started by" is a subset of this so there's no reason to check both.

This one seems to function as described. I might want to filter down to only convos that I started with a specific user

So it seems that all that really need to change is the description of "Received By" so that it's clearer. Looking back on this, I kind of wondered why "Received by" worked the way it did (it did seem to include convos I started)

 

[Martok]

I didn't misunderstand the function - I know it's not a search feature. It's a filter, I'm aware of this

Apologies, I misinterpreted what you were saying, because you said this

Myself, whenever I do have to search my convos

I wrongly assumed you were actually using a search function for conversations rather than the filters.

Still, I'm interested in who actually uses this feature, and how you use it. So if you have an opinion, please post it in this thread. I might not be understanding why it is designed the way it is....

Personally I have never used the feature. IMO though if a search is needed of conversations, a full search implementation should be added as has been mentioned in the suggestion I linked to.

 

[Floyd R Turbo]

I wrongly assumed you were actually using a search function for conversations rather than the filters.

Corrected, sorry for the confusion