Ajax was a horse, and horses are like ponies, right? July 2, 2015 2:20 PM   Subscribe

Suggestion for the process of completing an Ask question with 'Mark as Resolved'.

Right now clicking 'Mark as Resolved' navigates you to a second page which explains what this does, with a confirmation button that sends you to a third page, and the third page has a link back to the question page.

It works, but could be simpler from a user perspective.

My thought is that clicking 'Mark as Resolved' could create a box under the byline and above the comments, similar to how the new comments dialog displays after the last comment and above the comment area. This dialog would have the same wording as the current second page above, and the same accept/cancel links, and once accept/cancel has been clicked it simply says the third page's Thank You without the need for a link back to the question since the user is already there.

The framework for changing the status of answers with 'best answer', adding favorites, and other things that change content without reloading the page make me think this would also be relatively painless. I'm not a codeologist, though.

I would guess that bandwidth savings would apply, but be negligible. Browsers that don't support Ajax/Javascript would just fall back to the current link process.
posted by Evilspork to Feature Requests at 2:20 PM (16 comments total) 2 users marked this as a favorite

Sure, we can think about this one. Thanks for the suggestion.
posted by pb (staff) at 2:21 PM on July 2, 2015


If you're a pro Ask user, you can always just add the tag 'resolved' via the ajax-y add-a-tag feature. You don't need to run through the 'mark resolved' process every time.
posted by pb (staff) at 2:25 PM on July 2, 2015


Yeah, I mean I didn't even know what you were talking about; I just go ahead and add the 'resolved' tag once I feel it's - over.
posted by joseph conrad is fully awesome at 2:38 PM on July 2, 2015


I just go ahead and add the 'resolved' tag once I feel it's - over.

And when it's over, it feels like putting one of your babies in a basket and putting it the river and pushing it downstream, not knowing if you'll ever see it again.

I use the resovled tag, too.
posted by SpacemanStix at 3:05 PM on July 2, 2015


If you're a pro Ask user, you can always just add the tag 'resolved' via the ajax-y add-a-tag feature. You don't need to run through the 'mark resolved' process every time.

You have to do all the steps if you're doing it on your phone (at least on Classic which I still use). I can see the point of the request in theory, but as it is it only takes a few seconds to complete the process even if you're going the long way around.

*feeling slightly like I just kicked a pony*
posted by billiebee at 4:01 PM on July 2, 2015


So there's an Ask Pro® now?
posted by double block and bleed at 4:21 PM on July 2, 2015


If you're a pro Ask user, you can always just add the tag 'resolved' via the ajax-y add-a-tag feature. You don't need to run through the 'mark resolved' process every time.

Is that, uh, written down anywhere besides in this metatalk?
posted by Going To Maine at 5:50 PM on July 2, 2015


I hope not, life's too short and it can't possibly be a FAQ. You don't write "for a slightly different user experience try xyz," that's weirder than not being 100 percent whiz bang Ajax IMO
posted by aydeejones at 6:05 PM on July 2, 2015


Life might be too short, but having secret website features in the most popular part of Metafilter seems kind of uncool.
posted by Going To Maine at 6:15 PM on July 2, 2015


Yes, how much do I gotta donate for Ask Pro?
posted by Evilspork at 7:58 PM on July 2, 2015


If you have to Ask...
posted by ctmf at 12:24 AM on July 3, 2015


Is that, uh, written down anywhere besides in this metatalk?

If you click the 'mark resolved' link you get to the confirmation page. The first line is, You are about to tag your question [question title] as resolved.

I can understand the confusion around the word tag here. We don't literally say, "this process adds the tag resolved to the list of tags already on this post." We'll think about how we can make that clearer. In the meantime, yeah, that process just adds the resolved tag.
posted by pb (staff) at 6:50 AM on July 3, 2015 [1 favorite]


It's somewhat understandable to be confused about the Ajaxes, but AFAIK none of the two was a horse.
posted by Dr Dracator at 7:19 AM on July 3, 2015 [1 favorite]


I just assumed that was a brony reference I didn't want to know about.

Can you ask a new question while an old one is not marked resolved? 'Coz you shouldn't be able to.
posted by Segundus at 7:18 AM on July 5, 2015


Can you ask a new question while an old one is not marked resolved? 'Coz you shouldn't be able to.
(in case you are not kidding) I don't think this a good idea!
posted by soelo at 10:56 AM on July 7, 2015 [1 favorite]


"It's somewhat understandable to be confused about the Ajaxes, but AFAIK none of the two was a horse."

I told you, Ajax was a horse!
posted by Evilspork at 12:07 PM on July 10, 2015 [1 favorite]


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