Solved Thread Mod

General project discussion. NOT for help questions.
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Ted
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Solved Thread Mod

Post by Ted »

One of the features that we added when we switched to phpBB was an easy way to make a thread as "Solved". This way there is a consistent way of handling this, and it also makes it painless to do. Here's the steps.

1. Make a thread asking a question or explaining a problem. It should be polite, non-repetitive (use the search!), and give enough information. See http://forum.cmsmadesimple.org/viewtopi ... =40&t=2661 if you don't know what I mean. (*waits for tomatoes to be thrown*)

2. Wait patiently for friendly community members to answer said question or give advice for said problem.

3. Scroll down through all the friendly responses. If/when you find the best answer, mark this thread as solved. There's a little green checkbox. Click it.
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4. The page will refresh. Now all those green checkboxes will change to red ones, and a [SOLVED] tag will be displayed after the topic. If you click on the [SOLVED] text, it'll go right the most appropriate answer as well. Neat!
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Now the beautiful thing is that we actually have a link in the front to search for Unsolved threads. If we get people to use this on a regular basis, then it'll make the people who like to do support have a much easier to time to find threads that are in desperate need to help and to weed out the ones that have already been helped.

Go off and help (or be helped)!
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M@rtijn
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Re: Solved Thread Mod

Post by M@rtijn »

I like that feature! Makes it even more clear which questions are answered and saves us from constantly asking to add [solved] to the topic title :)

I only see one little drawback and that is, that it is pretty usual that people who have a question which was already answered, also have related questions. In the 'old' forum, one could still keep those questions together in one topic, while in this new situation people have to open new topics all the time. Doesn't this flood the board with small questions and makes searching for a certain subject more difficult (more results, some extensive answers, some very basic)?
Ted
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Re: Solved Thread Mod

Post by Ted »

I'm not sure I see how it's different. Because they can't put Solved in the search?
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M@rtijn
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Re: Solved Thread Mod

Post by M@rtijn »

No, if a user has a problem, uses the search, finds a topic which is marked as solved and then wants to ask a small related question, he now needs to open a new topic to do that.

Before the user could still ask his -simple- question in the same topic the answer to the main problem was in.

IMO it will lead to a lot of separate, dispersed topics with the same -simple- questions.
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Re: Solved Thread Mod

Post by Ted »

Ok, because it's getting locked. Yeah, that's a good point. Let me see if that's configurable...
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Re: Solved Thread Mod

Post by Wishbone »

I just tried to comment on a [SOLVED] thread, but couldn't.. I don't think that this mod is helping much. It's pretty easy to edit the original post and change the title. Or modify the mod to not lock it. :)
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M@rtijn
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Re: Solved Thread Mod

Post by M@rtijn »

@Ted: yeah, the locking the topic part was a pretty important detail I failed to mention in my previous posts :D

What's the plan with the solved function?
Are we going to continue editing the first post and add [solved] to the topic title?
dtgriscom
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Re: Solved Thread Mod

Post by dtgriscom »

I posted a new thread at http://forum.cmsmadesimple.org/viewtopi ... =3&t=52555. I've tried to mark it SOLVED, but have been stymied.

First, I couldn't see the checkbox button, myself (perhaps because I'm a forum newbie, and don't have full privileges yet). I then tried to edit the subject to append "[SOLVED]", and due to limit on subject length had to trim the original subject to allow it to fit. Then, when I submitted it, the entire thread disappeared.

... ideas?
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Re: Solved Thread Mod

Post by M@rtijn »

Because you edited the first post, the whole topic was in the moderation queue again.

It's back now ;D
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dtgriscom
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Re: Solved Thread Mod

Post by dtgriscom »

... but what about the checkbox button mentioned in Ted's original post? It sounds like a nice idea, but I don't see it anywhere. (I thought it might be that I was still being moderated, but I've now passed that threshold into the Promised Land, and still no button.)
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Dr.CSS
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Re: Solved Thread Mod

Post by Dr.CSS »

This style used for the forum doesn't have a [SOLVED] button, we may be able to get it going in the future but for now we will have to include [solved] by hand in the subject line, and yes if you haven't posted more than 10 times it will go into the moderation mode and hide the post...
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Re: Solved Thread Mod

Post by dtgriscom »

Not to beat a dead horse, but you might want to un-sticky this thread if it isn't currently relevant.
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Re: Solved Thread Mod

Post by Dr.CSS »

Or lock it so no more comments, beating dead horses ;)...
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