General > General Technical Chat
How to tag someone in a post?
metebalci:
--- Quote from: Nominal Animal on February 27, 2024, 10:19:27 am ---
--- Quote from: abeyer on February 27, 2024, 02:28:52 am ---(I'd love to have seen your high school history teacher's face when reading your essays where every single historical figure's name is accompanied by a quote of theirs ;D)
--- End quote ---
(I'd love to have seen your high school history teacher's face when you told them you needed to send every one of the historical figures you mentioned a letter or postcard to tell them you referenced them in your essay.)
No, really. If you want to refer to someone, just use their username in the text. Why do you insist they need to be notified you used their username in a post?
--- End quote ---
I have asked this to tggzzz because:
--- Quote from: tggzzz on February 24, 2024, 11:41:44 am ---
--- Quote from: metebalci on February 24, 2024, 05:10:42 am ---Just trying to understand. If I want to say in a post something about you wrote, you prefer me to write "tggzzz said ..." rather than "@tggzzz said..." ? You mentioned "quote" should be used but independent of its use, there is a need for a "mention"=reference to someone in a text.
--- End quote ---
None of that, as I have previously and explicitly stated.
If you want to say something about one of my posts, quote that post. Don't make it about me. Do make it about what I said.
--- End quote ---
It was like he insisted to use quote's (and not call just by name). English is not my first language, and I have not stayed in an English speaking country more than a month, so probably I misunderstand the point here.
--- Quote from: Nominal Animal on February 27, 2024, 10:19:27 am ---If you want to refer to someone, just use their username in the text. Why do you insist they need to be notified you used their username in a post?
--- End quote ---
I do not care about notifications at all (edit: I mean I dont need this feature, if it exists, there has to be an opt-out). I do not care if there is a separate page that you can see all the places you are mentioned. I understand for some these could be useful, not much for me. My main reason is partly aesthetics partly correct usage. In mailing lists, at least the ones I was following years ago, people usually were using the first names, or signing the posts by their names, so when replying, it was obvious how to address someone. I actually started doing the same here as a habit, but then I see it is not a custom, almost nobody signs the posts with their names, so I also do not anymore. Also, the usernames here either do not represent the (real) names or even if it represents many may not guess if it is a real name or a nick name (e.g. my username).
Aesthetically, I do prefer to mark a username in a text (and at symbol works for me), because the username is not part of the language (I am not saying this for English, as it is not my native language, but I do think the same for my native language as well) and also it has a special function (like a URL), it is like using single or double quotes or italics (depending on the language) when using a foreign word in a text, or using url markup here or in other platforms.
For the correct usage, I do have unnecessary difficulty writing the nicknames. It is hard to remember (so I have to go back and check) if Nominal Animal has a space, how many 'z's tggzzz has, was it toki or tooki (I guess some would have difficulty with my username as well). So writing @Nomi and seeing Nominal Animal there is very quick and eliminates any mistake. I do not see autocomplete works here in this blog, if there are mentions, I would like to see this as well.
Nominal Animal:
--- Quote from: metebalci on February 27, 2024, 12:21:04 pm ---English is not my first language, and I have not stayed in an English speaking country more than a month, so probably I misunderstand the point here.
--- End quote ---
Ah. Me fail English often too. My native language is Finnish.
The key is that when you refer to another member, it is okay to use their name in the text.
When you refer to what that member has written, you must quote them exactly.
Because a person is not their opinion or output –– those are what they have and do, not what or who they are –– the two cases where you can use their name without quoting them are basically
* When you direct a tangential question or statement to another member who is already participating in the discussion
(If they are not, you send them a PM linking to the thread, with that tangential question or statement and a bit of context in the PM text; never just "could you take a look at [this thread]?")
Example: (tggzzz: I hope this does not look like I'm putting words in your mouth!)
* When you refer to the member in general, and not to any specific statement, question, or post they have made; nor to your understanding of what they have expressed before or might express in the future.
Example: I like the way David Hess helps beginners in the Beginner and Projects forums. I wish I could be as concise and calm.If it ever involves any kind of statement another member has made, it does need to be a quote. Aspersions, hints, implying stuff is Not Okay, no matter how common in social media. We're here for the underlying logic, reasoning and experience; and not to score personalities or see whose opinion is most popular.
--- Quote from: metebalci on February 27, 2024, 12:21:04 pm ---Aesthetically, I do prefer to mark a username in a text (and at symbol works for me), because the username is not part of the language (I am not saying this for English, as it is not my native language, but I do think the same for my native language as well) and also it has a special function (like a URL), it is like using single or double quotes or italics (depending on the language) when using a foreign word in a text, or using url markup here or in other platforms.
--- End quote ---
Yeah, I can see how support for @ -mentions that turns them into links to the user profile page can be useful in the post editor, especially for those who have dyslexia. I don't mind such mentions becoming a link to that member's profile page at all. I don't like them, but because I can see how it could be useful for other members, I'd have to accept it. (Just like I accept the animated emoticons, even though I find them distracting. I can work around it.)
I only object to the automatic and unavoidable notification sent/delivered to the mentioned user, because that is the part I don't see any use for, and which actually bothers me, and which I claim is just social gamification. I could be wrong, of course, but this is my current opinion based on what I have observed thus far, and how an "evil version of me" (with a goatee) might misuse the mechanism just to annoy others and to try to get others to focus on me.
I've already prepared, so that if they do become common enough to bother me, I can always use an extension in my browser to edit the notification out so I'll simply never see them. I already have to do that for most ads here, which I do not like to do, because it can affect Dave's income (a tiny bit, but nevertheless).
I do believe the possible downsides –– misuse by newbies, and misuse by trolls who use the mention mechanism to ensure the targets of their snide remarks will see them, hopefully before the moderators have time to react and remove the post –– are vastly greater than any upsides.
tggzzz:
--- Quote from: Nominal Animal on February 27, 2024, 02:41:24 pm ---We're here for the underlying logic, reasoning and experience; and not to score personalities or see whose opinion is most popular.
...
I do believe the possible downsides –– misuse by newbies, and misuse by trolls who use the mention mechanism to ensure the targets of their snide remarks will see them, hopefully before the moderators have time to react and remove the post –– are vastly greater than any upsides.
--- End quote ---
As you say, this isn't social media.
soldar:
--- Quote from: Zero999 on February 27, 2024, 08:28:36 am --- I wonder if it's possible to implement this, with the facility for users to opt out, so they can prevent others tagging them?
--- End quote ---
I like in other forums where when I log in or open the main page the first thing I see at a glance is (1) unread private messages, (2) tags and (3) quotes. That way I can direct my attention first to these things. They are all there very visible.
I find tags very useful, for example, newbie comes and asks about topic X, he gets an answer or two but someone tags the resident expert on the topic so his attention is called to the thread. Of course he can just ignore the call if he so wishes.
And, just to reiterate, I also find the mouse over feature very useful.
ebastler:
A tagging mechanism already exists on this forum; it is called "mentioning". It seems that every member can be "mentioned" and will get notified, but only some accounts can create mentions. See this thread for some discussion on this.
The notification one gets when being "mentioned" is very unobtrusive. I have shown a partial screenshot here. I don't see the need for an opt-out mechanism; the little indicator is very easily ignored if you don't care about mentions.
Also, I don't see how this could be perceived as an addicitive, social-media-style mechanism. Nobody else sees your mention list; there's no scoreboard or anything like that. Personally, I certainly don't get an endorphine boost out of seeing that little "[1]" indicator. ???
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