Give all comments full posting functions via threads

Alpha1

Well-known member
The current discussion system does not allow addons to use forum posts for comments.
For example if we want to have a page, blog, resource, with comments below it then we need to build a commenting system instead because its not possible to make use of the discussion function.
This leads to duplication of functionality and also gives addon developers the dilemma whether or not to add a 'new comments' tab to /find-new/ on top of their normal implementation of find-new.

It's just not handy the way it is and it would be useful to implement an improvement.

Having a more flexible discussion function would make it easy to create things like this:
https://xenforo.com/community/threads/embeddable-blog-page-comments-like-disqus.70135/
https://xenforo.com/community/threads/comments-replies-for-pages.9503/
 
Upvote 19
Actually, this would also help things like Reports - if someone reports something the moderators often want to have an actual discussion about it before action is taken.

Right now we have a very limited comment based system in the report center, or else you have to turn off all the tracking facilities if you want to use an actual forum thread to discuss reports.

@Alfa1 's suggestion would potentially allow us to have both - a report becomes just another type of content which can be associated with a thread and thus automatically gets all the other abilities that threads do, such as being able to subscribe to them, get notifications of replies and so on.
 
This would also allow us to create one big 'New Posts' function that has all new content in it. This would make content discussion so much easier on XenForo. Currently comments stay hidden in a lot of cases.
 
The default Report System is very poor when it comes to allowing moderators to discuss and maintain alert of new activity. Hope that is addressed at some point in XF 2
 
If we had one comment handler in core, then 3rd party functionality added to comments would work for any addon.
it would also be much easier for developers to add comments to their addons.
The effect of this would be quite significant.
 
This discussion about discussion tabs in addons explains a lot about the current suggestion:
https://xenforo.com/community/threads/calendar-paid.149500/page-2#post-1279213

Addons often need to have a discussion tab for threads. This includes the XFRM. Without a discussion thread in forum members will miss new replies, because it doesn't come up in new posts. So we have addons that offer both comments and thread replies. (Duplication of functionality)
From within the thread very few users notice that there is content to be found hidden behind the tab. This is especially so for mobile users.
From within the entry, very few users notice that there is a discussion to be found hidden behind the tab.
The duplication of content also means that the discussion thread gets posts that have the sole purpose of informing about what is happening in the other content type.

If we have one 'new posts' stream that includes all discussions and comments, then users would be instantly aware of all new discussion and we would not need such duplication. A content type can simply have comments without a discussion thread.
 
I would rather remove reviews from XFRM and integrate post level ratings. This way you could rate with a post - no duplicated content needed.
As a next step I would simply integrate the thread view into the XFRM overview page - and all the tabs.
Lastly, I would integrate a sticky navigation in the left sidebar similar to https://xenforo.com/community/members/, but just.. sticky.

Take for example any article from XenPorta - there's no duplicated content there afaik, yet it would perfectly work as XFRM.
Another example could be the https://xenforo.com/community/whats-new/ What's New page itself.

Long story short, I would simply combine thread view into any addon view to avoid duplicated content. Views are customizable, you could even have multiple views for the same content (article view, thread view, grid view, you call it). XFRM should be an example for that, but as it stands, addon developers have the freedom to do as they wish.
 
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