Possible to get a "parent" link?

Continuing the discussion from Intentionally threading replies versus large combined replies:

I bet this isn’t possible, more like a feature request for Discourse but: (EDIT: it’s possible! Yay!)

… show a “parent” link/action to jump to or show the post that another post is a reply to? Just the exact reverse of the way Discourse lets you quickly see the replies to a specific post within a topic…

It definitely is possible. I’ll make a contrived example in this thread.

This one is just a top level reply to nobody in particular. FIRST!

This one is just a top level reply to nobody in particular.

SECOND!

This one is just a top level reply to nobody in particular.

Third!

This one is a reply to a specific comment…

Click my name in the upper right corner of this post (that indicates I’m replying to myself) to see which of my comments I’m replying to.

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This is also a top level reply, but I’m going to quote a few people:

Wrong! Click on @wolftune’s name above to show the full parent reply.

Maybe there’s a plugin or setting or something

This type doesn’t work like that, though.

Can you figure out which of my 3 posts I’m quoting here?

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Note that there’s also an up arrow to go view the actual parent comment, and a down arrow to expand (which does the same thing as clicking the name, or anywhere in between).

I’m not sure if all of this functions without js.

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Thank you, superb!!

So:

  • Even if we only copy/paste a short quote, as long as we mark it as a reply to the right comment, it’s workable
  • But using the built-in quoting gives extra options
    • And because you can expand to the whole post, we should really stick to the smallest quotes to make the context clear
  • This does reinforce my encouragement to post multiple replies so there’s some threading instead of enormous replies with multiple quoted bits all at once.

I think maybe this example topic should be highlighted / pinned or something so people can reference it even…

I don’t really think it matters one way or another; everyone can selectively quote and expand as they like.

I think it matters (although room for case-by-case judgment) because if you see an original comment with a “# replies” part and click that to see the replies, it could be better to see one short reply to that versus seeing a huge reply that is actually a reply to many different comments… or rather, if you quote-reply as a topic-level reply (as you just did), then there’s no indication at the original comment of the reply (that I can find).

EDIT: maybe it doesn’t show the reply indication if the reply is the very next comment?

Not sure, let’s see.

Edit: it does appear that way.

Good point. Specifically, I’m also realizing that a comment can only have one parent. Simply quoting a comment does not make it a parent; you have to click that comment’s reply button.

For example, if you go and show the replies of my first comment in this thread, it abruptly cuts off because I quoted you above instead of replying to your comment.

Right, so the quote function is nice in some ways, but it doesn’t provide the clean threading of actually posting smaller, separate replies that are actually marked as replies.

That said, if it were possible to get some “quoted below” link in the original comment that jumped to the quote, that would do it. Maybe that’s a feature that’s possible / plugin / request-for-Discourse?

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