[uf-discuss] Threaded Comments

[David Janes]

This will be an excellent time to mention, for the purposes of FYI to
all, the Atom Threading  extensions [1]. Someone else can jump in and
mention The Process.

Regards, etc...
David

[1] http://www.ietf.org/rfc/rfc4685.txt

On 10/11/06, Ashley Kyd <ashkyd at gmail.com> wrote:
> Dear The List,
>
> I'm in the planning stages of writing a piece of software that's going
> to depend heavily on microformats. Ideally I'd like to implement a
> threaded comment system, which by the looks of it hasn't been discussed
> under the comment discussion on the wiki.
>
> I can see issues with a microformat that covers both threaded and
> non-threaded comments, however.
>
> Take the following non-markup example of a threaded conversation (as
> seen in vBulletin & DeviantArt):
>
> Mary: Hello
>   Tom: Hello, Mary!
>     Mary: Hi, Tom.
>   Betty: Welcome.
> Joe: Completely unrelated to the above.
>
> Compare this to the linear version, in use by most software today:
>
> Mary:   Hello
> Tom:    Hello, Mary!
> Mary:   Hi, Tom.
> Betty:  Welcome.
> Joe:    Completely unrelated to the above.
>
> The issue comes when you try to create a microformat that encompasses
> both styles.
>
> Ideally, a threaded conversation would include nested elements (for
> example, lists) to show a relationship.
>
> <ol>
>   <li>Mary: Hello
>     <ol>
>       <li>Tom: Hello, Mary!</li>
>     </ol>
>   </li>
> </ol>
>
> However, a linear discussion would be better suited with just the one
> list.
>
> <ol>
>   <li>Mary: Hello</li>
>   <li>Tom: Hello, Mary!</li>
> </ol>
>
> The problem is that just a single list shows no explicit relationship to
> the last comment. So if the microformat was going to include some method
> of determining a comment's parent (who the comment is replying to,)
> there will have to be two meanings - one for nested elements, and one
> for linear elements.
>
> Concise version:
>
> * Threaded comments have a semantic relationship with the last comment.
> * Linear comments have an _implied_ relationship with the last comment.
> * Any microformat is going to have to have two modes: one threaded, and
>   one not.
>
> Is what I'm saying making sense?
>
> Regards,
>   Ashley Kyd
>   Making trouble for everyone.
>
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