PSA: You can (and should!) quote multiple people in a single post

[Xaser]

I've been noticing a whole lot of folks making multiple posts in a row in a thread lately -- for those who are new to forums (or are used to Reddit-style "threaded" comment sections), this is generally considered poor forum etiquette since it eats up a lot of vertical space and tends to push other folks' replies off to another page. Forums are pretty old tech, so there's a bit more housekeeping that needs doing when posting, but it's good for everyone to keep things tidy.

 

That said, there's one thing in particular that seems to trip up even veterans: replying to multiple people. Clicking the "Quote" button just kinda plops you in the text editor, and scrolling up to hit it again for a second or third post is a rather clunky procedure. There's got to be a better way!

 

Good news: DW's forum software has a sneaky little "MultiQuote" feature that makes this a whole lot easier -- it's just a bit hidden, unfortunately.

 

First, click the little "+" button next to Quote on all posts you wish to reply to:

 

Then when you're ready to roll, in the bottom right of the screen, click the "Quote [x] Posts" button...

 

...and it'll take you right to the text editor with all the quotes neatly in a line:

 

Add your replies, hit Submit, and voila. One post, multiple replies, all nice and clean.

 

This is probably old news for some of y'all, but I saw at least one person comment recently that they didn't know this feature even existed, so here it is just in case.

 

Happy Doulming!

[Edward850]

Pro tip: While you're already typing a post, you can also highlight text in someone's post and a "quote selection" button will appear, so you can add quotes that way too.

Edited June 13, 2023 by Edward850

[Lucius Wooding]

1 hour ago, Xaser said:

I've been noticing a whole lot of folks making multiple posts in a row in a thread lately -- for those who are new to forums (or are used to Reddit-style "threaded" comment sections), this is generally considered poor forum etiquette since it eats up a lot of vertical space and tends to push other folks' replies off to another page. Forums are pretty old tech, so there's a bit more housekeeping that needs doing when posting, but it's good for everyone to keep things tidy.

 

Amen to this! It's also very useful if you're breaking down a post point by point and responding to each using this feature, particularly responding to longer posts or multiple users, like this:

 

1 hour ago, Xaser said:

Add your replies, hit Submit, and voila. One post, multiple replies, all nice and clean.

 

It's good practice to shorten or slightly edit the text within the quote like this for formatting and readability (but don't misquote people (unless it's funny)). You'll notice, crucially, that I snipped out some of the images since they'd be redundant, or you could use spoiler tags nested in the quote for images or embedded videos to squish them down.

 

Also note that this feature will send users a notification automatically for your quoted reply, so even if they didn't sub to a certain thread they'll get the alert unless they disabled them. This is great for keeping a conversation going; it's far better than just dropping a reply and never looking at a thread again since it helps later viewers give feedback or get clarification that often makes everything better. Often you can pull one of these:

 

29 minutes ago, Edward850 said:

snip

 

This is enough to tell people who and what post they reply to, but without cluttering the post more. It will serve the purpose of giving them the notification as well so it can be worth it for this reason to let the person know that you're replying to them. As a result it's a bit more likely to get a response or at least get them to read/react your post.

 

This clean multiquote usage is a lot better than this cursed method I see people doing sometimes:

 

Spoiler

1 hour ago, Xaser said:

I've been noticing a whole lot of folks making multiple posts in a row in a thread lately -- for those who are new to forums (or are used to Reddit-style "threaded" comment sections), this is generally considered poor forum etiquette since it eats up a lot of vertical space and tends to push other folks' replies off to another page. Forums are pretty old tech, so there's a bit more housekeeping that needs doing when posting, but it's good for everyone to keep things tidy.

 

Then I write my own stuff inside the quote block responding to the first few sentences. It's impossible to spot unless you look carefully since it gets formatted the same, so you can't tell what points are mine and which you already spent your valuable time reading.

 

That said, there's one thing in particular that seems to trip up even veterans: replying to multiple people. Clicking the "Quote" button just kinda plops you in the text editor, and scrolling up to hit it again for a second or third post is a rather clunky procedure. There's got to be a better way!

 

See, you have to read everything a second time except even more carefully since some of the stuff is the quote and it looks the same as the reply, assuming the person uses halfway decent formatting or paragraphs at all.

 

Good news: DW's forum software has a sneaky little "MultiQuote" feature that makes this a whole lot easier -- it's just a bit hidden, unfortunately.

 

Worst of all you can really go tit for tat on a post and put a snippy reply after every sentence. Just don't, but if you must then at least use quote blocks to make it useable, please.

 

...etc

 

 

Or this even more cursed one with no quote blocks at all:

 

Spoiler

(Using no quote blocks but using "quotation marks" for other people's sentences:)

Spoiler

"I've been noticing a whole lot of folks making multiple posts in a row in a thread lately -- for those who are new to forums (or are used to Reddit-style "threaded" comment sections), this is generally considered poor forum etiquette since it eats up a lot of vertical space and tends to push other folks' replies off to another page."

 

Oh that's cool I didn't know that, I'll use multiquote all the time now.

 

"Forums are pretty old tech, so there's a bit more housekeeping that needs doing when posting, but it's good for everyone to keep things tidy."

 

Haha I'll leave the housekeeping to my mom, boomer.

 

This might be worst since it's not only unreadable, but doesn't push a notification either. For forum veterans this style often serves as a neon sign reading "illiterate". But it doesn't have to be like this; you too could use the quote function and take your place as a true user of culture.

 

Finally, the far right option on that menu, the magnifying glass, is the preview function. It's very useful to see if everything looks right and the quote/spoilers nest properly.

[houston]

@Lucius Wooding Invision PB supports mentions since 2015, it's much more terse and avoids the silly (some would call it endearing) "- snip here -" thing you often see in messageboards.

 

Personally I think it's bad form to quote-reply to any more than two posts at once, it just clutters the page with too much instant messaging-style bullshit. If you do, you should really aim to include no more than ten words inside a quote block, maybe twenty as a high limit. Always write assuming that at least thirty people are going to slowly read through every word of your post and make it worth their while, I think. Don't try to address messages to just one person outside of status updates or private messages.

Edited June 13, 2023 by houston

[Al-Faris M]

Thanks for the information, although I use copy + paste to quote multiple posts :P