I noticed that sometime users get confused by the "reply" link displayed below every comment.

On most of the website I worked for I found comments inserted as replies to a comment which were clearly related to the node contents instead of the contents of the comment the user replied to.

This make me thinks that often users get confused by the reply link which is understood as a reply to the main comment.
Probably with big nodes and lot of comments the user miss the "add new comment" link in the node and then he uses the reply link.

What about changing the reply link text to "reply to this comment" or "reply to comment" or something like that?

Fabio Varesano

CommentFileSizeAuthor
#7 comment_reply_to_comment.patch772 bytesfax8
#6 comment_form_title_screen_shot.jpg128.53 KBfax8
#4 comment_reply.patch.txt781 bytesAnonymous (not verified)
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Anonymous’s picture

Anonymous (not verified) CreditAttribution: Anonymous commented

Or maybe a variable changeable in the admin settings for comments?

fax8’s picture

fax8 CreditAttribution: fax8 commented
Version: 6.x-dev » 7.x-dev

Is there anyone still interested in this one? My users still get confused by the reply link on the comments.

This happen also on drupal.org. eg: first comments on http://drupal.org/drupal-6.0#comments
(and note that drupal.org have a pretty good theme.. users will be more confused if the theme is badly designed)

I think this would be a good improvement.

Going to submit a patch if anyone is interested.

Susurrus’s picture

Susurrus CreditAttribution: Susurrus commented

+1 here as I could easily see this happening to users. I would think changing the "reply" text on the comments to "reply to this" would work...

Anonymous’s picture

Anonymous (not verified) CreditAttribution: Anonymous commented
Status: Active » Needs review
FileSize
comment_reply.patch.txt781 bytes

"Reply to comment" matches the comment_menu. Patch attached.

Susurrus’s picture

Susurrus CreditAttribution: Susurrus commented

I'll test it later today, but it's a small straightforward change and the code looks good.

fax8’s picture

fax8 CreditAttribution: fax8 commented
FileSize
comment_form_title_screen_shot.jpg128.53 KB

@earnie: maybe I'm missing something but looks like your patch modify the comment reply form box title. We were talking about the "reply" link generated on comment_links(). With your approach there is a duplication of content: the "Reply to comment" text is both printed as page title as well as comment form title. See screenshot attached. Personally I think this is pretty ugly.

fax8’s picture

fax8 CreditAttribution: fax8 commented
FileSize
comment_reply_to_comment.patch772 bytes

Rolled out a patch to change what I was talking about: "reply" links generated by comment_links() are now changed to "reply to comment".

Please review.

Susurrus’s picture

Susurrus CreditAttribution: Susurrus commented
Status: Needs review » Reviewed & tested by the community

Still applies to head. Simple change, tested and it works fine. Straightforward, so setting to RTBC.

fax8’s picture

fax8 CreditAttribution: fax8 commented

@Susurrus: what did you test? #4 or #7?

Susurrus’s picture

Susurrus CreditAttribution: Susurrus commented

#7. #4 is incorrect as it modifies the form box title, not the comment reply link.

catch’s picture

catch
he/him
Primary language English
CreditAttribution: catch commented
Status: Reviewed & tested by the community » Needs work

I'm not convinced this is a usability win. There are already "edit" and "delete" links for any user with the "administer comments" permission - which is going to crowd that area out (and shouldn't they be 'edit comment' 'delete comment' for consistency if we're changing 'reply'?)

I agree there's often confusion between replying to comments and replying to nodes, but I don't think this is the way to fix that. Could we just change the title of the link to "reply to comment" maybe?

fax8’s picture

fax8 CreditAttribution: fax8 commented

personally I think that really few persons reads links titles.. the link solution shouldn't change the situation.

About the consistency of the links... well that's a good point...
but personally I think that really few persons have the administer comments permissions and are only administrators... so personally I think that those 2 other links might stay as they are.

Susurrus’s picture

Susurrus CreditAttribution: Susurrus commented

So does the patch in #7 work for people or what are the problems here?

Sutharsan’s picture

Sutharsan CreditAttribution: Sutharsan commented
Component: comment.module » usability

Moving all usability issues to Drupal - component usability.

ajayg’s picture

ajayg CreditAttribution: ajayg commented

Why not allow to theme comment links? That way each webmaster can theme comment links with whatever way they want. I think that would be a better generic solution.

mErilainen’s picture

mErilainen CreditAttribution: mErilainen commented
Component: usability » user interface text

+1, I second this
Having a hard time just trying to change the "Add new comment" link to something else.
Has something changed in the ticket system? It's forcing me to change the component, and I cannot see usability anymore.