Can't customize All Activity, but new stream can't add Likes

[chilihead]

Let's say I want to use All Activity as the default but remove a political forum. That forum is browsable only. In 3.4 we could do this in the VNC, in AA we can't because it is not configurable. You may say, that is because it is "All" Activity, okay point made, but then if I create a new stream and remove it, I miss out on "all" of the activity of Likes, etc. because those actions only appear in AA.

• So I suggest you make the AA stream configurable and let admins decide what "all" is, or...
• Allow us to add the "actions" to other streams, so we can replicate AA but also customize to our needs.

Thanks!

[chilihead]

IPS, regarding the "actions" in new streams, if you are not adding this due to server load, how about the ability in admin defaults only. That seems like a logical solution. That would certainly take care of this. One could simply recreate AA and replace it in the menu and still have the actions, but the stream would be configurable. I could see it as beneficial in admin streams in general. Thanks again.

[chilihead]

One more point, since you can't change anything in All Activity, it means you can't change it to "Content items only" which may work better for your members. It is still "all" activity you are just changing how it is listed. So you'd have to create a new stream for them, make it default, but then you lose the actions/Likes. So is there any thought to being able to add actions to other streams since we can't edit AA?

[Lindy]

We are considering this for the AS update. It will largely depend on performance implications, but if that passes the muster, I think we can allow greater flexibility and again, our goal is to allow you to customize elements of the live stream without having to actually create and save one. 

[chilihead]

Very cool. Thanks for the update!

[Lindy]

We utilize a search index, as you may know by now, which is what allows us to aggregate content across half a dozen applications within a fraction of a second. That search index doesn't contain every detail of every content type (like 'likes') so it has to join other tables to get relevant information. If we added infinite flexibility that allowed you to put whatever you want in any order, you could potentially kill your site, your host would hate you, puppies would die, etc. Our challenge is finding that key balance between good performance in "normal" environments and flexibility. So, there will be some elements that just can't be tinkered with, but we can definitely allow more flexibility in what content you're trying to discover and how. 

It will be all good.