Anyone else annoyed by all the nested quotes?

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41

I’d still like to find a thread or two complaining about nested quotes from before Vbulletin broke the functionality. Some people have mentioned that there was grousing, but no threads or concrete hint of it.

There is the difference that the multi-quote button works, and I think the on-screen display is a bit tighter (i.e., less space between quotes, but I’m not sure about that), but this is how the board worked before Vb broke it. As mentioned upthread, without the novelty of the quotes and a general context/atmosphere of deleting unnecessary bits things are fine.

42

Previously, if I cared enough to construct a multi-quote, I did it. Usually multiquote is not what I want. Making multiquote the default behavior has forced me to dick around with technical fiddly bits much more often than I used to. Plus, when the thing doesn’t work right, it now produces misleading output, rather than simply incomplete output.
If a user wants to do something complex, such as a multiquote, that complexity should be the responsibility of that user. Thrusting complexity on the everyone makes the posting experience more intimidating for the many, for the benefit of a few.*

*Que STTOS theme.

43

How often does that happen, though, in contrast to how often a quote contains an unecessary nested quote?

I’m going to choose to believe that you’re going to require the offenders to spank porcupines. Which is cruel to the animals, but hopefully the spines in the hand will deter the spanker from further posting.

Even if people didn’t particularly like the feature before it was removed initially, why would they have any reason to think that bitching about it would do anything? Absence of evidence of discontent, in this case, is not evidence of its absence.

44

Unnecessary nested quoting is no different than unnecessarily excessive quoting in general. The same people who are inclined to do the latter are inclined to do the former. In fact, in the former case, the unnecessary quoting is at least likely to be relevant to the post.

45

First, it happens a lot. A quote with non-contiguous posts, for example. Or any post that quotes material that didn’t originate on the board.

Second, the lack of bitching beforehand is very relevant to the question of whether or not this is an actual problem or a collection of bitching because of a perceived change. People complain about almost everything here. People are complaining that nested quotes are ruining the board. That there was no rejoicing at Vb breaking the functionality (though there were several threads asking for it to be returned), and that there were no complaints about too many nested quotes beforehand strongly suggests that the chatter now is made up of a mix of earnest discontent that would have been there beforehand and resistance to perceived change–perceived in this case because it was/was not part of the board.

It’s also relevant because as has been mentioned, as people get used to its return and learn to highlight/delete unnecessary chaff, the impact will be lessened. Already we’re down from its reintroductory spate of super-nested posts trying to make a point.

46

I was undecided previously, now I don’t like them. People are screwing up the coding far too often making threads difficult to read and sometimes quite misleading. I do think we should give them more time though before condemning them completely.

47

Rhythmdvl said:

Which doesn’t mean that this is how the board should work.

Squink said:

Exactly. Suppose a poster knows zero about coding posts. That person would either not quote, manually quote, or copy/paste text, maybe set it off with bold or italics (via the buttons).

Now there’s a handy “quote” button. Fine, it makes it easier to quote a post, but at the expense that that same person who knows zero about formatting doesn’t know how to edit down, or how to be careful in attribution when editing down. Ergo, they quote everything. Instant thread clutter. Or worse, they attempt an edit but mess up the attribution because they don’t get the quote tags parsed right. Not only clutter, but error as well.

It’s far easier to use the buttons and be bad at editing and leave everything a mess than to screw up because you are manually trying to code something and don’t know how. Because if you know you don’t know how, you’re far less likely to try and therefore screw it up, rather than rely on a button that quotes everything.

Rhythmdvl said:

That’s largely due to mods limiting nested quotes, not from any learning on the part of posters.

48

That this is how it should work is based on it’s ease of use compared to manually creating posts. That some posters are that slow that they can’t figure out what parts to cut means they certainly couldn’t figure out what parts to manually add.

The idea that no one complained before bolsters the proposition that there is the appearance of a problem and that once the novelty wears off (and it has been wearing off; the cutdown on nested quote battles and assorted whatnot is due to more than just mod intervention) the board will function just as well as it has been. Breaking them improved nothing.

49

I see two contradictory things stated (by different people) in this thread:

  1. It’s not that hard to get rid of the nested quotes if you want to, only an idiot can’t figure it out;

  2. Building nested quotes manually is difficult, we need the board software to help us.

My response to 1: since it’s now the default to quote not only the post I’m responding to, but also the post that that person was responding to, I have to do a lot more editing of quotes than I used to, because in 90% of the cases I only want to reply to one user, not two. It’s more work for me, and I’m gaining nothing by having nested quotes.

My response to 2: oh come on! It’s a piece of cake to build nested quotes! Suppose I am replying to a post that looks like this:

— begin post —
/quote=user1 —
I love Barney the purple dinosaure
/end quote

I, user2, heartily disagree with user1.
— end post —

If I wanted to multi quote those in the days before mutli-quote was reintroduced to the board, it was childishly simple.
You click the “multiquote” button under user2’s post. Then, using the “blue arrow link” handily provided next to “/quote=user1”, I click the multi-quote button under that post. I then use the “Post Reply” button, and in my edit box I have:

— begin edit window —
/quote=user1
I love Barney the purple dinosaure
/end quote

/quote=user2
I, user2, heartily disagree with user1.
/end quote
— end edit window —

I move one line (the “/quote=user2” line) from the middle to the top, and there you have it, nested quotes.

50

Again, I have to say, I think you are exaggerating the difficulty.

If I want to include inside quote tags some text that can’t be quoted by using the multi-quote button, all I have to do is copy and paste, and put the quote tags around it.

If this is too difficult for the posters at this board, then it seems clear that asking them to remove nested quotes is also going to prove to be too difficult.

51

The problem is that the board default now is set to produce unnecessary excessive quoting. Before, it was set to quote only the post you were responding to, unless you made an extra effort. That was better. Now the default is to include unnecessary quoting unless you made an extra effort.

52

I’d like to find a thread or two complaining when the nested quote feature was replaced by the mutli-quote feature. I’m sure that all the people complaining were just complaining because they reflexively grouse when a new feature is introduced.

53

Well, that leaves it that. I disagree. In most cases, I’d rather the default be to have the nested quote even if it is unnecessary rather than the other way around.

54

That is your privilege, but please keep in my mind that by stating such a preference, you are indicating a wilfull disregard for everything that makes the SDMB noble and true.

55

Especially the reflective grousing!

56

There ain’t no such thread :). Nested quotes were removed at least 4 years before multi-quote was added. Two completely separate events.

57

I wasn’t sure about that. Since the SDMB doesn’t always do vBulletin upgrades every time a new version is released, and we sometimes skip versions, I thought it might be possible that the two events were simultaneous.

OK then, I’ll rephrase my statement:
I’d like to find a thread or two complaining when the mutli-quote feature was introduced, saying that the nested quoting feature was so much better. I’m sure that all the people complaining were just complaining because they reflexively grouse when a new feature is introduced.

58

I remember major griping when vB broke the original nested quotes–there was universal unhappiness that the feature was gone*. I can’t find any of those threads–the original vB upgrade that broke nested quotes may have occurred around the same time as the time the hacker fried the SDMB for like 3/4 months and Tuba and/or Lynn paid for hosting space on that weird board that didn’t like swearing and had the smashie smiley. vBulletin broke nested quotes around 2004-ish.

There was (IIRC) pretty much universal happiness at multi-quoting being introduced (say, 2006?), in large part because it added functionality back that had been missing for like 4 years (IIRC the upgrade took a while to happen-2007 or 8?). There were a number of “I don’t get how it works” posts too–but that was because the original vB instructions on how to multi-quote were gibberish.

I recall a few people saying they preferred the old, now-broken nested quote feature, but since there was no way (at the time) to bring back nested quotes, it was just general nostalgia…not a backlash.

So–I agree that Dopers don’t always reflexively grouse when a new feature is introduced–heh case in point, the quick reply box was universally loved once it was introduced. But at the same time, I feel like there’s some pushback against nested quotes because they’re not what people are used to and the alternative exists. It’s really just personal preference. One isn’t really all that much “better” than the other.

I prefer nested quotes because I think they make the thread look more conversational and readable. When the nested quote depth is limited to two, you get the original comment and the person you’re going to respond to’s comment. Context/comment/response. For me, that’s ideal.

Yes, you can do the same thing in multi-quote, but many people don’t…I’d even suggest that most people don’t multi-quote.

That means that as a default an interchange that in nested-quotes defaults as this:

============================================================

Post #75 of 100–Will it be lollipops?

would, by default, under the multi-quote system be rendered as

============================================================

Post #75 of 100–Will it be lollipops?

I think the nested quote version conveys the conversation better. Yes, the multi-quote can be used to create a similar context, but it often isn’t and doesn’t by default.

*Remember, it went from nested quotes to only one quote. And it may have (at first) even been that you could only have one quote box period…nested or otherwise…in a given post in that original upgrade. I think it quickly changed to “You could have multiple quotes but not nested quotes–you had to do multiple quotes by hand” though

59

I remember being mildly peeved the first time I noticed that I had quoted someone who had quoted someone else and the first quote, which was relevant to what I wanted to post, wasn’t included. Fortunately, the first quote was recent enough that I was able to find it and include it in my post (although I can’t remember whether I tried to nest it, or just stuck it in front of the later quote. I wasn’t annoyed enough to complain about it to TPTB, though. When multiquote was later added, I saw it as a less convenient, but usable, solution to the lack of nested quotes.

But then, I don’t post enough to get my panties in a twist about it. Particularly since I seldom get involved in discussions where quoting multiple posts hampers my ability to clearly make a point.

I am amused by the people who screw up their editing and then complain about how it makes them look stupid. Don’t they preview their posts?

60

I have the embedded quotes blocked on my system. I have yet to run into a problem with understanding the thread. For one, I actually read the thread all the way through, so the quote only serves as a reminder for what was already said. I’ve yet to use the blue button.

Furthermore, it is trivially easy to write your post in such a way that you don’t need a previous quote for context. The hypothetical examples always offered up could easily be written better. And that’s something anyone can do–not just those who understand the coding.

I do want to point out that, even when we didn’t have this feature, people still “overquoted” by the definitions here. Now you’re just making the posts longer, so that people who overquote will be even more annoying.

The Quote button is a convenience. If you have to do extra crap to make it presentable, a lot of people are not going to bother. And no amount of bullying is going to change that. In fact, by pointing and laughing, you reveal that it really bugs you, and thus give the person ammunition to use against you without violating the no personal attacks rule.

And, again, I still think it’s funny that there are more people against this than there were people against images.