Suggestion Notify users that "someone else is posting"

lugita15

I don't know whether this would be difficult to implement, but it would be nice to have a feature where you can somehow know that someone else is in the middle of writing or editing a post in a thread, so as to avoid "stepping on their toes". For instance, if I've just written a post, and then I see a need to edit it, I may write a follow-up post instead if I know that someone is writing a post, because there's a chance they're responding to what I originally wrote. Or I may hesitate before deleting a post. Or there's a chance that someone's editing a post that I was planning on responding to, so I might hold off on it. Various things like that.

The feature wouldn't need to say which users are in the process of posting, or even what is occurring, whether it is composing a new post or revising an old one. I would just like to know "something's going on here right now."

Pengwuino

That would probably get really screwed up with posters who sometimes start a reply and for some reason or another, have to leave their computer with the reply still in progress (aka people like me :P). I've occasionally left a reply sitting there for hours on end.

lugita15

I've done that too. The same problem occurs in chatting as well, where a person leaves in the middle of a chat and it says that he's typing for all eternity. Still, some indication, even if it's sometimes inaccurate, would be better than no indication.

And by the way, one loophole to what I'm proposing would be that quick replies obviously wouldn't be covered, because there's no way for PF to know that someone's doing one. And the same might be said for quick edits as well, since I don't think just clicking the edit button on the desktop version of the site causes any data to be sent to the server. But it would still be nice to know that someone has opened the full-blown posting interface for a particular thread.

Fredrik

I wouldn't worry about any of that. The person who's working on the next post can see the latest version of your post when he previews his own, and change what he's saying if necessary. As long as no one has responded, I think you should just keep improving your post for 11 hours and 40 minutes or until you think it's good enough, whichever comes first. If someone has responded, it's still OK to edit, if you make it clear what exactly you changed. I prefer to just add things in this situation, and if I feel like I have to change something that was wrong, I'll make a note like this:

Edit: I edited the formula above after the correction by lugita15 below.

There's also a problem with what you're suggesting. When you made your post, it moved the thread to the top, so it will now be read by people who wasn't reading it before, and they will often want to reply to posts made earlier by someone else, possibly about an entirely different topic. The feature you're suggesting would discourage you from posting in those situations too.

lugita15

But having more information can't hurt, can it? At worst I can just choose to ignore it and proceed anyway.

Fredrik

Sure. But that's also an argument for not worrying whether someone else is writing a post, because when you edit yours, you're making more (or at least more accurate) information available to that person.

jetwaterluffy

In other boards I post in, it shows at the bottom which other users are veiwing the thread. A bit like what's on the bottom of forum displays here. It's nice to know, but it is only really useful in convo threads and the like.

lugita15

Yes, that would also be a good idea, if it's feasible on the technical side.

Pythagorean

Just be glad you're not limited to snail mail.