[RFC] Personal notes about other users

[Jules.LT]

Hi,

Forums are about what we talk about, but they're also about communities. Often large communities.
So you come across people again and again but don't always remember who they are.

I've been wanting to be reminded that this one is a libertarian, this other one is a physicist and that last one shouldn't be engaged because he derails conversations...

The feature I'd like is, as a user, to have a private "Personal Notes" area about each other user. Probably to be filled out on the other user's user page, and ideally displayed below their name and avatar at the side of each post (make that optional if you will, or maybe have a button to display it, like a spoiler).

What do you think? Does something like that already exist?

Thanks!
Jules

[callumacrae]

I like this idea! I don't think that it should be included in the core, but it's certainly an extension I'd like to see (and it would be pretty easy to develop, too).

[Pony99CA]

Could the Moderator user notes capability be expanded to support this? (I've never tried it, so I don't really know how it works.)

However, user notes about another person should only be displayed to the user who wrote them, of course (otherwise it would be more like a Facebook "wall"). I also wouldn't want them in the mini-profile when viewing a topic; there's already a link to see the user's profile, so just middle click that to open the profile in a new tab and display the user notes there in an appropriate place.

I would guess that it's doable with one new table mapping the current user to the viewed user and having a comments fields (and possibly a last edited field if you wanted to track when a note was written or updated).

Steve

[wintstar]

Something similar like that already existed User's notes.

[callumacrae]

Could the Moderator user notes capability be expanded to support this? (I've never tried it, so I don't really know how it works.)

However, user notes about another person should only be displayed to the user who wrote them, of course (otherwise it would be more like a Facebook "wall"). I also wouldn't want them in the mini-profile when viewing a topic; there's already a link to see the user's profile, so just middle click that to open the profile in a new tab and display the user notes there in an appropriate place.

I would guess that it's doable with one new table mapping the current user to the viewed user and having a comments fields (and possibly a last edited field if you wanted to track when a note was written or updated).

Steve

Custom profile fields would be better. If I leave a note (or "tag", which I would prefer) your profile, it is stored in an object in a "tags" custom profile field on my profile. Then it would just need a very simple API to save and display them.

[Senky]

Something similar like that already existed User's notes.

No, it is something absolutelly different. My MOD allows you to write personal notes - independantly to board's members.

[wintstar]

Ok, I thought this could be an approach.

[Pony99CA]

Could the Moderator user notes capability be expanded to support this? (I've never tried it, so I don't really know how it works.)

However, user notes about another person should only be displayed to the user who wrote them, of course (otherwise it would be more like a Facebook "wall"). I also wouldn't want them in the mini-profile when viewing a topic; there's already a link to see the user's profile, so just middle click that to open the profile in a new tab and display the user notes there in an appropriate place.

I would guess that it's doable with one new table mapping the current user to the viewed user and having a comments fields (and possibly a last edited field if you wanted to track when a note was written or updated).

Custom profile fields would be better. If I leave a note (or "tag", which I would prefer) your profile, it is stored in an object in a "tags" custom profile field on my profile. Then it would just need a very simple API to save and display them.

I have two problems with that proposal.

First, it's not really a custom profile field; CPFs are generally things that the user enters about himself. It could perhaps be implemented as a CPF, but special coding would be needed to access only the viewing user's notes about the other user.

Second, a "tag" implies a short (one or two word) phrase to allow finding something (in my opinion, of course). This feature is more likely going to be used for longer notes than tags ("Has a son that goes to school with my daughter") and probably won't be searchable, just like signatures aren't searchable (although it would be nice if both were searchable).

I think that "User Notes" sounds more reasonable. I would display something like "My Notes About [Member Name]" in the profile.

You would also probably need a permission to allow saving User Notes. You could also extend this into providing a "wall" with a permission like Allow sharing User Notes with others and an option in the User Notes field like Allow others to see my notes (which would display the names of the users who posted public notes). Two birds, one stone.

Steve

[keith10456]

I like this idea! I don't think that it should be included in the core, but it's certainly an extension I'd like to see (and it would be pretty easy to develop, too).

Ditto

[Pony99CA]

Why not put it in the core? As long as you only display the User Notes on the profile page, not on the viewtopic page in the mini-profile, there's almost no bloat. The only performance hit is when somebody views a profile page and that should be minimal.

Displaying user notes in the mini-profile should be an extension, but the table and profile part should be in the core.

Steve