vBulletin bug: orphaned reply posts

[Snaxster]

Hello. Please see this sub-thread for a description of the bug.

Thanks,

Snaxster

 

[paul]

Switch your display mode to "linear". Readability of hybrid and threaded display modes rely on users hitting the 'reply' button exactly on the post they want to reply to - something very few users on TalkBass do. Switch to "linear" and you'll see the replies ordered by date, as they came in (the 'default' vbulletin display mode).

 

[Snaxster]

Hello, Paul. I just saw your reply; months later.

Thanks, but in my case I always use the "quick reply" button that is uniquely contextual to the post to which I want to reply. Yet the bug I reported persists.

Best,

Snaxster

 

[bongomania]

Snaxter, I don't know what browser/skin/other context you are using, but in the browser/skin I'm using, the "Quick Reply" button is not at all associated with any one post. It's a generic "reply to thread". The only button I have that is uniquely associated with a specific post is the "quote" button.

Edit: Maybe we're talking about the same thing--I thought it was a "feature", but actually it's a bug?

 

[Snaxster]

Snaxter, I don't know what browser/skin/other context you are using, but in the browser/skin I'm using, the "Quick Reply" button is not at all associated with any one post. It's a generic "reply to thread". The only button I have that is uniquely associated with a specific post is the "quote" button.

Hi, bongomania. That's interesting.

Do you think this is true because of your knowledge of the vBulletin functional spec or because of your observation of the software's behavior?

I ask because when I hover over a 'quick reply' button, the phrase "Quick reply to this message" appears in the 'alt text'-type popup.

The meaning of that phrase seems clear to me: it confirms that by clicking that button you will be replying to the message with which it is uniquely associated, not to the parent (post or thread.)

Thanks,

Snaxster

 

[bongomania]

I suspect it's something where the pop-up text isn't a good description of what it actually does. I'd agree with your interpretation of the text, it's just that I'm on a few V-Bulletin forums and they all work more or less the same.

 

[Snaxster]

I suspect it's something where the pop-up text isn't a good description of what it actually does. I'd agree with your interpretation of the text, it's just that I'm on a few V-Bulletin forums and they all work more or less the same.

That's what I thought.

Then it seems likely to me that you simply are seeing the same bug manifest on multiple installations of vBulletin.

This is a bad usability bug. At best, the hover text completely misrepresents the intended functionality; in any case the behavior and the instruction do not agree.

In my opinion (and I usually get paid a lot of money to offer such opinions), in this context there is no common sense interpretation of the 'quick reply' button that would have it intentionally place the post (that results from its use) directly underneath a parent of the child post (that is, any post that is not the original post in the thread) that is its immediate parent, since to do so in a thread of any complexity would result in an ongoing lack of heirarchical continuity among posts in the thread. And this is exactly what I see everywhere at TB.

Snaxster