[RFC] Ability to @mention specific users in posts

[leschek]

Can we just accept that some usernames aren't mentionable, move on, and use an at sign like every other website ever?

I guess that this applies to all BBCodes and we still use them...

[Mess]

Can we just accept that some usernames aren't mentionable, move on, and use an at sign like every other website ever?

Agreed....

[AmigoJack]

Just because BBCodes suffer from the same issue it't not a solution. It would just be consistent to be finally able to escape BBCodes aswell. And no, only using @ without alternatives would just fail too often.

[JoshyPHP]

using @ without alternatives would just fail too often.

How would it fail? Can you offer a realistic scenario where it would "just fail"? How often would that occur in your estimation?

[AmigoJack]

more simply, the spaces are a problem: when does we stop to search for the username? Does we search for @Hi@Hi Oh@Hi Oh Great@Hi Oh Great Conflict or @Hi Oh Great Conflict with spaces?

And this board alone has 2498 usernames with spaces.

And 2 with even more problematic names.

[JoshyPHP]

Both of which easily solved by using quotation marks around their name, as mentionned previously. You seem to be arguing in circle.

Also, you forgot to answer my question about your claim that it would fail "too often". How often do you think that would be?

[callumacrae]

more simply, the spaces are a problem: when does we stop to search for the username? Does we search for @Hi@Hi Oh@Hi Oh Great@Hi Oh Great Conflict or @Hi Oh Great Conflict with spaces?

And this board alone has 2498 usernames with spaces.

That's 4%

And 2 with even more problematic names.

That's 0.003%

[Pony99CA]

You could always preload the Disallow User Names in the database with things like "*" or [/mention] to avoid people creating those names.

That might not help existing boards, of course, but maybe the admin could reassign problematic user names.

Steve

[AmigoJack]

4% is too often to me - I was referring to just using @ without alternatives (whereas quotation marks or BBCodes are an alternative).

[Mess]

We are talked about adding auto complete to mentions right?
So if someone adds an "@" phpBB will then start trying to auto complete after for example 3 additional letters are typed. Just like on smartphones and tablets. Then it shouldn't matter if someone wanted to use a name made up entirely of @'s and spaces.

Am I missing something obvious?