From e9f07f105e50fbad7882b7ade00e6580a21a7a26 Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001 From: =?UTF-8?q?Maxime=20=E2=80=9Cpep=E2=80=9D=20Buquet?= Date: Mon, 16 Jul 2018 14:07:46 +0100 Subject: [PATCH] New post: IM Threads MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: text/plain; charset=UTF-8 Content-Transfer-Encoding: 8bit Signed-off-by: Maxime “pep” Buquet --- content/posts/im-threads.md | 72 +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ 1 file changed, 72 insertions(+) create mode 100644 content/posts/im-threads.md diff --git a/content/posts/im-threads.md b/content/posts/im-threads.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000..09f0932 --- /dev/null +++ b/content/posts/im-threads.md @@ -0,0 +1,72 @@ +--- +title: "IM Threads" +date: 2018-09-22T22:00:00+01:00 +draft: true +--- + +I have had the opportunity to use [Mattermost](https://www.mattermost.org) for +over a year, and I thought I would give some feedback on a feature I still +have troubles dealing with: **threads**. + +A bit of a disclaimer, Mattermost is the only solution of its kind +(centralized, non-standard, one blessed client) that I have used extensively. +I do not use Slack, Gitter, Discord or what have you. I generally use XMPP and +IRC (via XMPP), in my terminal. + +I haven't gone through all the stages of grief yet concerning this topic, so +please bear with me. This article addresses usability issues with the web +client. I do not have solutions to offer, but I hope that my criticism will be +taken into account, and I would be happy to work with the project to try and +improve the feature. + +## What I understand people want + +- A way to group discussions by topic. +- Being able to talk without having to state context all the time. +- Being able to refer to these discussions in their integrity, (via some URI, + or else), to even read days later. +- Not having to highlight every concerned party in every message. +- Not being highlighted if you are not part of it + +Out of context this feels like people just wanted _channels_, because this is +exactly what I described, but certainly details are important here. What I +think people want is _fine grained_ all-of-the-above, that is, have usual +channels set a common topic, e.g., "programming", and be able to split +discussions happening in this channel even more, with some kind of nested +channels, or threads. + +--- +WIP + +This last bullet point is actually the most important part. + +## Implementation case study + +Mattermost, as other IM solutions, regroup most of these features under what +they call __threads__. + +I'll try to report a couple of things to upstream if possible, in the +meantime here's what I think about it: + +- In MM: missing fork feature: after 3 messages in a thread it's already + diverged from the original discussion, and might get back to it at some + point later on. What changes from a normal channel? + +- In MM, UI is unintuitive: + * Not easily accessible. You have to move your pointer to the small icon at + the far right of your screen. + * No keybindings to navigate between threads, that makes them a hard to use. + * Thread messages appear in the channel, that makes the whole thing + unreadable when there are multiple threads active at the same time. + * Bug? threads window not scrolling down automatically. + * possible resolution: change into short-lived channels? + * Can only have one thread opened at a time. That means if I want to follow + a thread, I can't reply to/follow any other threads. + +- Too much micro-management to get right + + +- Mattermost should allow users to attach anything (Direct Messages, Channels) + where the current thread UI lives, so they don't have to start a "fake thread" + just to be able to counter the limitations of the tool. Especially in 1:1 + Direct Messages, where most of the benefits of threads are moot.