Provide "Answer" functionality in Threads

Several forums provided by software companies allow for marking a post within a thread as "the answer."  And you can see in the thread list the status such as a check mark indicated it is solved. 

I can't get into the support forum yet, so maybe that functionality is there?

If not (or maybe even if anyone is interested), here are some examples from other software companies:

ADOBE. This is how adobe does it: http://forums.adobe.com/thread/470669?tstart=0
You can see that the OP is "answered" but not which post was the answer.

SALESFORCE. http://community.salesfor...tor&thread.id=1371
This is very nice. On the OP, it says it is solved, and there is a link to go to the Answer.
(Note that it appears these forums are broken with IE right now!!)

MSDN: http://social.msdn.micros...4977-a75d-17e0b387441f
This one allows for multiple answers, which is cool, and the ability to vote on them.  They are also "copied up" under the OP, but also remain below in threaded order for continuity. Very nice.

INFRAGISTICS: http://forums.infragistics.com/forums/t/29393.aspx
My favorite! On the list, it's easy to see which are answered, and there's a nice green/yellow/red format.  This is a heavily modified version of community server.

I really need this functionality in the forum that I'm going to buy. We will mainly use it to support software applications.  Thanks for the consideration.

JustBob

Also, I can see that in these forums, there is an option to mark a post as "helpful." The functionality I'm asking for is an enhancement of that, I would say.

Thanks for your suggestion.

The answer functionality is available if you post "Reward point post" in our software. This means the author of the original question attaches a certain points to his question and he can award (at the same time, mark it as answer) the author who provides the best answer.

so, we have "helpful" and "answer" in our software.

Thanks Samuel. Could you upgrade my "permissions" (even temporarily) so I can see what this looks like in aspplayground forums?

Thanks, Bob.

Take a look at the screenshots

I don't have reward point enabled for this forum so it is hard to show you without using pictures. The second photo was taken after points had been awarded to the best post. The link in the original question will take you to the post that received the points.

Attached Image(s)

This looks pretty good. 

What shows up in the forum list so that you can see at a glance that this thread has been "answered?"

Also, I really like how you  show the attachment images above.  It doesn't look like I can paste a message inline in a post - I have to use the attachment or picture symbol and give it a file name.  Are  you planning on letting people insert images directly at some point?  Or in some fashion grab an image from the paste buffer?

I attached a file just so I can see what it looks like.

Thanks in advance Samuel, great support!

Bob.

Attached Image(s)

JustBob

This looks pretty good. 

What shows up in the forum list so that you can see at a glance that this thread has been "answered?"

Also, I really like how you  show the attachment images above.  It doesn't look like I can paste a message inline in a post - I have to use the attachment or picture symbol and give it a file name.  Are  you planning on letting people insert images directly at some point?  Or in some fashion grab an image from the paste buffer?

I attached a file just so I can see what it looks like.

Thanks in advance Samuel, great support!

Bob.

I think I found my own answer for "what shows in the list."  In this forum: http://www.aspplayground...forum/tt.aspx?forumid=3
a previous thread I started has a little "medal" symbol for "helpful answer received."  I guess I'd still like to know if there is an icon for "solved."

Thanks.  On the images, that process is a little non-intuitive.



Probably just changing the literal "Attachment(s):" to "Attachment(s), click to insert into message" would let regular users figure it out.

I'll see if I can figure out the Answer part.

JustBob.

Attached Image(s)

Samuel

1. Answered thread will have a different color medal as an indicator.
   for helpful response, and for rewarded (Answer)

I marked your post as helpful. I don't see how to "reward" it.  I did some searching, specifically on "reward," there's not much info on it.  I sorta got an idea that when I do my OP I can specify how many points someone will get for answering, so I tried this with a new thread, and I don't see anything.

Hopefully I'm not being too picky.  The more I use this forum, the more I like it.  But I'm also a software designer, and I know the kinds of things that trip people up.  If I cannot figure out how to give you the green medal for your post, most people will not be able to.

In order to use points you need to write a "Reward Point" post, meaning the original question must be a reward point based question. This thread is just a regular post.

I mentioned that I did not enable this feature in my earlier reply - this is why you can't use such feature here (this was also why I provided the screenshots). I have now enabled the points system for this forum and you can now edit your original question to attach points. Then you will see the button to award points beside the Mark Post as Helpful button.

And no, you are not being picky at all. It is perfectly ok to communicate here to straighten out questions. If you need to test the functionality for the forum more thoroughly, you can use the demo forum where you can configure everything.

Samuel

I mentioned that I did not enable this feature in my earlier reply - this is why you can't use such feature here (this was also why I provided the screenshots). I have now enabled the points system for this forum and you can now edit your original question to attach points. Then you will see the button to award points beside the Mark Post as Helpful button.

Interesting. I had to close the browser tabs and get a new one before I could see the Award Points when editing my post or creating a new thread.

But now, look above.  Your post, which I marked previously as helpful, does not have an option to "Award points to this post."  All the other posts do?

Thanks. Bob.

It is either "helpful" or "the answer". You can unmark it  as helpful and then award point to it.

Samuel

It is either "helpful" or "the answer". You can unmark it  as helpful and then award point to it.

I see.  This forum's usability is really very good!  Little things like that could use some help though.  [Keep in mind I have ten programmers that work for me so I know how they think.]  You made it a binary switch whereas most people don't think that way.  I would leave the choice there, and if someone clicks it, you take away the helpful part and do the reward part.  The less you ask users to think and remember, the more they like the product. 

IMHO I am picking nits here, like I said, I think the usability is excellent and this is a very good piece of software at any price.

You are now 25 points richer BTW.

On the inline image part, my suggestion would be to have a Paste button that grabs the image from the paste buffer, and it does the attachment and inserts the code text for the user.

Or add a bit more functionality to the "Insert an Image" button in the editor.  Right now, you can only enter a url.  That takes a very savvy user.  Have an option on that dialog to utilize the image in the paste buffer.

I plan to implement the forum in a way that to our end users, it is totally integrated with our application.  I would like them to be able to press a button on one of our screens, to capture that screen, and then they come to the forum, initiate a thread, and be able to paste in the screen image with one click.

[BTW I know how you feel, we have nearly 1,000 feature requests for our system, and we just keep it even, I.e. we get as many new requests as completed ones we push out the door].

Bob
http://www.escapetech.com