How to view forums by date, not "Trending Questions"

Report · Jan 18, 2013

I used to be able to view forums by date, now they appear in order of "Trending Questions" so that a discussion that has been inactive for three months now appears before a discussion from a day ago.

Is there a way to get back to the way it should be (by date), or must I live with this poorly conceived "upgrade?" I searched in my preferences and profile, but can't find a way to change this.

Report · Mar 22, 2013

+1 for that change. We field quite a few posts, where the OP has become highly confused by that wording, think that they are creating a post, only to get the query results, and confusing them even more.

Hunt

Report · Mar 22, 2013

+1

"Ask a question" is about as idiotic and meaningless as anything; I cannot imagine in what soggy brain this was conceived.

Mind you, this started just about ½ year ago; before that it was called Forum Search or similar - something that people could understand.

Report · Mar 23, 2013

And we have already complained about this in another thread, but I am too lazy to try to look for it.

Report · Mar 23, 2013

It has been up quite a few times over more than a year. Here is probably the first and (one of) the last.

http://forums.adobe.com/message/4266832#4266832

http://forums.adobe.com/message/5107954#5107954

Report · Mar 23, 2013

Thanks, Jacob; I know that you keep an eye on all those things and would therefore come to my rescue. On reading back those old threads, I still like my own suggestion, made with apologies, for the renaming of those tweo fields...

Report · Mar 23, 2013

I was refering to this post of mine:

http://forums.adobe.com/message/5010547#5010547

Report · Mar 23, 2013

The link I posted doesn't take me to message #10 in that thread, as intended...

Report · Mar 23, 2013

Your link ought to work, Claudio, so this is one more thing that is off somehow.

Report · Mar 24, 2013

Claudio González wrote:
The link I posted doesn't take me to message #10 in that thread, as intended...

Does this work for you?

<http://forums.adobe.com/message/5010547#5010547>

The trick is to copy and paste the link into a new browser window.

Good luck.

Report · Mar 24, 2013

Both links work for me but, why should we have at hand a large "book of tricks" to be able to use these forums? As far as I can remember, right clicking on the number of a message and choosing the right option used to work here as it does everywhere else except in these forums...

Report · Jan 27, 2013

4. Change "Trending Question" to "Current Discussisons in XXXX Forum". Change to look like Discussion format.

The easiest fix for this is to get to to the discussion page directly. This is achieved by changing the links. The current process is is this:

1) Users type: <http://forums.adobe.com>

2) They go to a page where all the products are listed which have their own forums;

3) They click on a link and they are currently taken to a trending questions page (this is not consistent on all the forums because some partial changes have already been made so trending questions have something else but its usefulness is still debatable).

Now at three, they should be taken to the discussion page. for example if you click on the Photoshop Elements, you should be taken to:

<http://forums.adobe.com/community/photoshop_elements?view=discussions>

NOT: <http://forums.adobe.com/community/photoshop_elements>

This way we are avoiding an intermediate link that nobody likes or that is helpful to anybody!

Report · Jan 27, 2013

The easiest fix is to scrape it altogether. It’s a waste of time.

Report · Feb 01, 2013

I agree with Curt's 5 ideas, renames, and especially the part with system information in the how to ask a question.

Ditto for John W's. But, the modify date is useful in that it can show when a mod changed something.

I don't think that the default view should be discussions for everyone while it is useful for non-admin power users, but newcomers SHOULD be facing the FAQs, and see more info before posting.

Report · Feb 01, 2013

Pierre, in other forums I frequent, everytime anyone changes an existing post, the following info is automatically added at the bottom of the post:

Modified Jan 31 2013 at XX:XX by YYYY

also stating the reason for the change if the person making it so choses. Thus the posting date remains unaltered, but participants know of later modifications. Another nice related feature is that one's message isn't immediately posted but some 3 minutes after submission. This is most useful for those of us that notice typing and wording errors once the message appears on its final form.

I agree, presenting the FAQs and some posting tips can be very useful for newcomers, although we all know that most of them come in a hurry to have a problem solved and do not read any of that stuff (and that more often than not do not even check if they are posting in the right forum). However, and as I have said several times, it is completely beyond me what good can be the Trending Questions for them, even if the ever stopped to take a look at them. And the case is worse when they become the Popular Discussions; the ones right now in the main page of this forum include two archived discussions, one of them to the previous Spam report thread...

Report · Jan 22, 2013

Carey Burgess wrote:
With the knowledge that they should be listing exactly the same threads in the same order, is there anything that you specifically prefer about the Discussions tab over the way the threads appear in this pod?

Layout - ?view=discussions ("Discussions") is more compact and efficient with its use of screen real estate. One line per entry in Discussions instead of 2 lines + whitespace in Trending.
Discussions is easier for me to quickly scan and decide which questions to contribute to. Everything's on one line.
I don't see the point of both Last Post and Modify Date columns in Discussions view. Modify Date is superfluous.
Cosmetic issue: I find the Re: prefix in the Trending Questions (when it's a reply) is merely clutter and slows down scanning (however marginal). I'd prefer to just see the Subject Header without the Re: prefix. 0 replies or 1 reply indicates if it's an original question or a response. The subject headings in Discussions are cleaner and easier (therefore faster) to scan.
In Discussions, bold text in the Subject column for unread threads (or updates since I last read the thread) is an indispensable feature for me. Not available in Trending as far as I can see unless there's a different way of doing the same thing.

Report · Jan 27, 2013

Forum participants and internet denizens we all are, yet...

Does anyone beside me find the term "trending" somehow childish and irritating? Maybe it's the spin on the word that we see from television commercials that's causing it.

-Noel

Report · Jan 27, 2013

I would venture that many non-native English speakers won't even understand the word. Not to mention the fact that I am one of those who cannot understand the utility of displaying them...

Report · Jan 27, 2013

Yes I do. I think it’s a dumb idea designed by someone twiddling their thumbs with nothing to do. If there is no activity on a Subject within two weeks it should moved to a Archive. Then deleted. the less stuff you have to deal with the faster Forums will be. If the subject needs to be covered again bring it up again.

Report · Feb 01, 2013

That's completely counter to the ethos behind the forums. Our goal is to build up as many previously-answered questions as possible, so as to reduce the need to ask the same thing over and over (which is immensely annoying for those who have to keep answering it!). In a perfect world, searching via Google, Community Help or the forums tool itself should always bring up an answer to any customer's questions regarding the use of Adobe products.

For info, the current database size in Jive is not an issue in terms of the user experience - the SQL queries run by a typical user/page session execute many times faster than the data itself can be sent across the networks.

Phillip Jones wrote:
Yes I do. I think it’s a dumb idea designed by someone twiddling their thumbs with nothing to do. If there is no activity on a Subject within two weeks it should moved to a Archive. Then deleted. the less stuff you have to deal with the faster Forums will be. If the subject needs to be covered again bring it up again.

Some postscripts for previous replies in this thread:

"Trending" was taken from Twitter, where it refers to hashtags with high levels of recent use.
The "Trending" pod on the overview page for a discussions space is not identical to the first items in the 'discussions' tab, as it includes activity on the other content panels (documents, ideas, polls, etc.) where those are present. If we sent everyone to the discussions tab, users would never know there's a new document posted (e.g. an FAQ) and would have no way to reach it.
If you prefer a different layout of your set of regular forums, try the Personalized Homepage feature (using the "Your View" button on the forums homepage).

Report · Feb 01, 2013

Dave Merchant wrote:
That's completely counter to the ethos behind the forums. Our goal is to build up as many previously-answered questions as possible, so as to reduce the need to ask the same thing over and over (which is immensely annoying for those who have to keep answering it!). In a perfect world, searching via Google, Community Help or the forums tool itself should always bring up an answer to any customer's questions regarding the use of Adobe products.

...

I fully agree. However, the pocess would be a lot more efficient if correct answers were marked as such, which is not common in the Reader forums, where graffiti, Pat Willener and others, myself included, post the same answers to the same questions at least once a day...

Report · Feb 01, 2013

If the OP doesn't return to mark an answer as correct, then the moderators for each space should be doing it. With Reader, I suspect that the type of users we get mean they are less likely to bother returning. I'll keep an eye on the activity.

Report · Feb 01, 2013

Dave Merchant wrote:
If the OP doesn't return to mark an answer as correct, then the moderators for each space should be doing it. With Reader, I suspect that the type of users we get mean they are less likely to bother returning. I'll keep an eye on the activity.

I think that the average newcomer to the Reader forum never finds his/her way back. And yes, it would be great if a mod kept an eye on those repeating questions.

Report · Feb 01, 2013

Dave Merchant wrote:
If the OP doesn't return to mark an answer as correct, then the moderators for each space should be doing it. With Reader, I suspect that the type of users we get mean they are less likely to bother returning. I'll keep an eye on the activity.

Don't have any data, but get the feeling many users use the e-mail option. With this option OP does not see Helpful or Correct Fields to mark. They would have to go back to the Forum specifically to do this task, and I am sure that is too much to expect.

THe Helpful and Correct Fields would somehow have to be included with e-mail sent to OP. Is this possible?

Also, a pet peeve of mine is that they do not see any edits. I like Claudio's idea that the response would not be sent for immediately so edits could be made. THink even 5 min. would be OK. I see the mistakes or think of omisssions shortly after I hit Post.

Report · Feb 02, 2013

Unfortunately there's not an option to drive the answer-marking system using the email connector in Jive.

I know that some first-time posters will subscribe to their thread and then converse via email (hence the fun when they don't realize they are talking to world+dog, and start including private information), but it's a minority. What I don't think the new users realize is quite what the "Correct" and "Helpful" buttons are for, and that they're supposed to press one. A lot of times they'll come back and post a thank-you, but won't mark the thread. After waiting a couple of days, the moderators are supposed to do it - but only if there's actually a solution.

For example:

John Doe asks "Why can't I install Reader on my iPhone?" in the Adobe Reader forum
Alice Smith replies, directing him to describe the problem in more detail in the Adobe Reader for iOS forum.
John Doe doesn't return.

Was he helped? No - not in the sense of being given a solution, as we don't know if he ever installed the app, nor what was stopping him from doing it in the first place. So the mods could assign Alice a 'Helpful' but not a 'Correct', and the thread will not be flagged as being answered.

Report · Feb 01, 2013

you haven't thought of the possibility that often people ask questions and get a bunch of answers but doesn't help their problem, so they give up.

Even I have received answers that didn't help. They could be helpful, but when tried they just didn't.

For instance in the the creative cloud forum I have a question going. about I am unable to sighn in. for I go to Web site and you it I can sign in using the same email address. I've tried changing my Password and changing it back. But the CC application on my computer just won't let me sign. Some are suggesting to remove browser cookies. That isn't the issue it’s the app on computer that doesn't function.

So far I haven't received a satifactory answer. And don't foresee ever getting one so I will leave unmarked.

Adobe Community

How to view forums by date, not "Trending Questions"