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General discussion

subject lines on replies

Mar 27, 2008 12:46PM PDT

It sure would be useful if you could managed to automatically fill the subject field or not require it on a reply to an existing post.

The extremely frustrating part is that seems to be a uniqueness requirement!? In a forum single topic usually covers a single subject why should they need to be unique?

Discussion is locked

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Subject lines...
Mar 27, 2008 1:11PM PDT

The option of having the subject field auto-filled is certainly promising. However, the subject field cannot be left blank because the Cnet forums support Tree View, in which only a 'tree' of subjects are displayed along with one the contents of the currently-viewed post. Up until November 2006 that was the only view available, and it's still the preferred view of many.

As to the uniqueness requirement, no member can submit a post with the same subject or body two times in a row. This is designed to deter spammers from simply copying-and-pasting a message repeatedly or using an application to auto-fill the fields with a particular message. Personally, I try to include something specific to the particular post I'm replying to, making it more recognizable to others reading through the thread. (It gets hard to follow a thread that has 50+ replies, all of which use the subject "RE: My Topic.")

John

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Subject lines
Mar 27, 2008 8:06PM PDT

I agree entirely with John's comments.

I use Tree view all the time and the last thing I want to see is a list of replies with all the same subject line. In this reply I have used the same Subject content as John on purpose but in a full discussion this would annoy me no end.

Even in Threaded or Flat view I would want to see an appropriate heading to what the poster has to say. It gives an instant visual guide to what the reply is likely to be about.

I also intensely dislike those replies where the poster has just used ... (periods) or 'Reply' or similar non-helpful subject lines. I wouldn't be so bold as to say such things are lazy. Or would I.......?

Mark

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Back in the day,
Mar 29, 2008 9:09AM PDT

I remember that the subject line was filled in for you based on the subject line of the post that you were replying to.

It could be changed, if you felt like it.

It was only around for a short while, it was just after I started answering Mac stuff, and then it went away. I kinda missed it at first, I thought it was handy.

P

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(NT) Yeah I agree. I liked that option
Mar 29, 2008 9:14PM PDT
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What I would like...
Mar 30, 2008 12:38AM PDT

Most auto-fills simply take the preceding subject and add an RE: in front of it, which just adds to the complication if posters don't change the subject line. What I would like is for the forum software to automatically create a subject upon submission, if the subject field was left blank, containing the first XX characters from the body. From that readers could generally differentiate between posts and tell what each one is about without requiring user interaction.

John

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Subject Title Line Information
Apr 4, 2008 4:56AM PDT

I agree as well as to the subject title line. This would be most helpful to track.