Anyone else find Conversations a bit confusing?

[bigPaws]

I just upgraded from 2.x to 3.x and found that all PM system has changed a lot.

The conversations system looks good, but I think it might be a bit confusing for less technically minded people?

For example I see a lot of deleted messages in my inbox - this is where a user has deleted it from their side to remove it from their 'inbox' - which is obviously wrong. What they meant to do is hide it from their view until the other person replies. Because they've accidentally deleted their message to me I can no longer reply to it.

I just find this a little awkward. I expect to be shot down (most replies on here seem quite defensive of all things IPB?) - but that won't stop me giving my feedback :)

[Lewis P]

On the initial 2.x -> 3.x upgrade, the system was a little confusing for some of our members, yeah. We had quite a few questions about it.. In my eyes though, that was simply due to the way the system was before the upgrade, it meant that there was no "conversation" element to it, so a lot of messages were marked as deleted because there was no knowing either way.

Any messages made after the upgrade are a lot more logical, and we've had no questions or queries about it.

[Wolfie]

What Lewis said above. When the upgrade is done, there's no true way to know which PM's were actually part of a conversation or which were part of the same conversation. You'd think that going by the title would make it easier, but what if someone has two or three PM's titled "Hey" or "Hey there" with the same person but consisting of different discussions? It'd make for a huge mess if it were all squished in together.

Even though it's been out for a few years, you might try asking for a hook or app to be made that would allow members to pick-n-choose PM's to merge together into one collective conversation. Then members could do that (for themselves) and after doing that, read over the newly made conversation to make sure it reads right. Once done then they could delete the source PM's. Since it's been awhile (a few years) since it was first an 'issue', I doubt you'll get anyone to take you up on it unless you offer an incentive (money). Just really comes down to how important it is for it to be done.

Instead what I'd recommend is to just make an announcement addressing the issue and just encourage everyone to use the archive feature for any they want to retain a copy of, then go back and purge them so that they don't have them tying up their PM space. The stock archive feature only allows one-at-a-time, but there's a hook that will allow multiple PM's (conversations) to be archived much easier. Your members might appreciate it greatly, because then they can retain the older messages while cleaning out their PM's to make way for the more modern conversations. :)

I just find this a little awkward. I expect to be shot down (most replies on here seem quite defensive of all things IPB?) - but that won't stop me giving my feedback :smile:

Nah, only time people tend to get defensive is when someone is suggesting something that doesn't make sense on some level. It's all good. :)

[bigPaws]

Hi all,

Thanks for the replies and comments. I think you're absolutely right that this confusion is mainly caused by the upgrade from 2.x to 3.x - which is what I've just gone through.

As mentioned, there were a lot of deleted messages showing up in the conversation list.

One quick newbie question - if I send someone a message and then delete the conversation (before they reply) - does it remove it from their message list?

[bfarber]

For example I see a lot of deleted messages in my inbox - this is where a user has deleted it from their side to remove it from their 'inbox' - which is obviously wrong. What they meant to do is hide it from their view until the other person replies. Because they've accidentally deleted their message to me I can no longer reply to it.

Actually, this is not necessarily the case. When a user "deletes" the message, it is considered deleted for them. Initially when the system was built, we deleted it for all other users, however it was determined through client feedback that this was not desired. If you and I are in a conversation and you delete it because you are done, I may still want to refer back to it - I didn't delete it after all. Thus, it was decided NOT to delete the conversation for the other user automatically, but to prevent them from replying to it so that if you delete it, I can't keep replying and reopening it on your end. Controls like this become more important given the fact that you can control how many messages each user is allowed to retain in the conversations system.

Hopefully that clarifies what you are seeing a little bit.

[bigPaws]

In that situation, what about a quote button which can then trigger a Compose New Message? That wouldn't re-open the conversation (as you're trying to avoid that for reasons stated) but at least it would make it easier to refer to something previously said by the other user?

[Wolfie]

In that situation, what about a quote button which can then trigger a Compose New Message? That wouldn't re-open the conversation (as you're trying to avoid that for reasons stated) but at least it would make it easier to refer to something previously said by the other user?

Highlight, copy, paste into new convo. ;)

[bigPaws]

Err thanks?

It was a feature suggestion rather than a query on how to use copy and paste... ;)

[Wolfie]

It was a feature suggestion rather than a query on how to use copy and paste... ;)

I know, just pointing out an easy alternative. Sounds like a nice suggestion, my concern would be it being abused. Even though it's not that hard to start a new convo, making it a step easier could let someone carry over a convo that the other person was trying to end.

[bigPaws]

Yeah no worries, I'm doing the CTRL+C/V at the moment, but because we had a lot of old messages which are now marked as deleted it's just a bit time consuming and you have to manually wrap in quote tags etc.

[Wolfie]

Don't get me wrong, not against the idea. Just saying it's a concern that comes to mind. I wonder how easy/difficult it would be to make a hook that would do that. Click reply on a 'deleted' convo, it quotes the selected message into a new convo to the same person with the same title. Obviously title and the 'to' fields could be altered. Hmmm.

[Wolfie]

Yeah no worries, I'm doing the CTRL+C/V at the moment, but because we had a lot of old messages which are now marked as deleted it's just a bit time consuming and you have to manually wrap in quote tags etc.

I've created a hook that you might be interested in trying out. *IF* you do, please do NOT use it on your live site (use it on a test/development install).

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