Channels section which provides quick links to the dashboard topics/message

[maxceem]

Provided design

https://projects.invisionapp.com/share/HUF7VSJMF#/screens/272160157

Questions

As topics and channels are same thing, in all questions words channel or topic means same.

1. I see channels start from #. Is it added automatically to channels or user has to add # by himself?

2. Channels has star near the title.

   

   What does star do when user cliks?

3. Currently topic titles has edit dropdown on the right side, while in the new design there is fullscreen button. Should we keep them both or just fullscreen button? Not sure how to put them both if ti's needed.

   

4. So far we don't show for topics created data and posts quantity like on provided designs. Should it be added?

5. Should all channels be listed at the sidebar?

   

6. What do numbers in red circles next to channels in sidebar mean?

7. Why #Admins channel doesn't have a red circle next to it, while #Project plan channel has red circle even its values is 0?

Aha! Link: https://topcoder.aha.io/features/TCCONNECT-410

[vic-georgiev]

Hey @maxceem - amazing questions, glad that you're asking those. I didn't realize we're so close to implement channels. I actually started using "Thread" instead of channel or topic, as it is really a post thread (ref. #2107 ).

Regarding the feature, we want to allow a side menu of all topics/threads/channels to be listed on the side. The goal is to provide a convenient system of accessing communication from the dashboard on projects with a lot of activity.

1. I see channels start from #. Is it added automatically to channels or user has to add # by himself?

The # denotes thread and is inspired from Slack. The goal is to allow in the future reference to threads across projects using the hashtag, similar to use of @-mention.

2. Channels has star near the title.

A star is a continent way to "pin" a thread to the top of the menu. If we have multiple threads that don't fit in the sidebar, we will collapse the menu after 5-10 (have to determine a number) threads. All threads with a star would be visible on the top of the menu regardless. Otherwise the menu would list threads by latest post date, so the most recent are on the top, while the stale ones stay at the bottom. There could be further refinements on that menu, like alphabetic sorting and search, but for the time being we can start with just the list of topics, and then add the "star" pinning functionality.

3. Currently topic titles has edit dropdown on the right side, while in the new design there is fullscreen button. Should we keep them both or just fullscreen button? Not sure how to put them both if ti's needed.

Yes. Fullscreen transition is very important as it provides a switch to a full-fledged chat interface. This I would consider a next-step feature. The example transition is here https://tympanus.net/Development/AnimatedGridLayout/ and I would love if we implement the styles from Tympanus, as they're ready to go.

The menu should be available in all instances, as it allows administrative interaction. It should be the last item on the right always (consistent position).

4. So far we don't show for topics created data and posts quantity like on provided designs. Should it be added?

Ideally yes. This is secondary data that further provides contextual awareness, but I'm fine if we don't. I would consider this a second step.

5. Should all channels be listed at the sidebar?

Yes, in a collapsable menu. I covered it in p.2. We can pick an arbitrary number of 5 to collapse the menu after, and modify that later.

6. What do numbers in red circles next to channels in sidebar mean?

The number in red circle is unread new posts counter. That is a second-step feature. The goal is to drive users to know which item to click in order to load the thread that has new information. Think of this as the same patter on notifications menu - we list how many notifications are there for each project.

7. Why #Admins channel doesn't have a red circle next to it, while #Project plan channel has red circle even its values is 0?

This is mock design and data might not be correct. As per p.6 only new messages should have a counter (styled as notification with red background). The interesting thing about Admins is the type of threads:

• Public - everybody on the project can create, post and comment on the thread
• Private - only managers and copilots can see, create and post. This is to help our team better communicate project status and items in the context of a project, without including the customers on the conversation. This is the same concept as administrative topics in Discourse - only certain members have access by default to them.

Hope that helps! Let me know if you have any further questions.

[maxceem]

8. How to get starred channels/threads/topics from the server and save to the server. Currently, I don't see any properties which may refer to star.

   

[maxceem]

9. What do you think would be the correct approach to count unread messages for channels?
   • A. count how many posts of the channel has read: false property
     • in this case I think we will need to implement some code which will mark posts read in some situations
   • B. count how many notifications about the new messages for the topic we have, so counter will be resetted together with notifications
     • in this case, we already have code which handles marking notifications as read
     • but as I noticed all such notifications are marked as read as soon as we open the page with topics

[vic-georgiev]

@vikasrohit - can you help please?

[maxceem]

10. What would be the way to identify public/private topics using data from the server?

[maxceem]

4. Please, confirm that at the channel/thread date we show the date of the latest post in the thread, correct?

   

[vic-georgiev]

4. Please, confirm that at the channel/thread date we show the date of the latest post in the thread, correct?

Actually, it is the other way around. Thread was created on Jul 3 and has 2 posts in total. The date in the middle (May 14) is the first post date. It is similar to how Slack groups messages by day. If you keep scrolling messages, the date behaves like a sticky header for the entire view of the messages posted during this date. If we keep posting, the messages from Today would eventually go under the card header, hence the "Today" header would replace May 14.

Does this make sense to you?

[maxceem]

4. Let me ask the question another way:
   I understand that that dates at the middle work kind of like sticky dates at the slack:

   

   The question is what date should be displayed under the topic title:

   • thread creation date
   • latest comment date
   • latest comment update date
   

   From your reply I understand it has to be thread creation date, so I just want to confirm that we are on the same page here.