Forum threading for mailing lists is broken

The forum does break threading since the references do become replaced by other message IDs.

Itā€™s caused by messages which are sent to the forum via direct -mail replies.

The main concept is ok - it used e.g.

format: thread msg-id in-reply-id
1 topic/851.
1.1 topic/851/2747. topic/851
1.1.1 ee76eed4-a255-6d1c-0f5b-59da9772f230@gmx. de topic/851/2747.
1.1.1.1 topic/851/2749. ee76eed4-a255-6d1c-0f5b-59da9772f230@gmx. de
1.1.1.1.1 07289952-0e88-c08a-ea66-b34774c8554e@gmx.de topic/851/2749.

However, when I do reply in msg-id ee76eed4-a255-6d1c-0f5b-59da9772f230@gmx. de to the previous topic, I reference

References:ā€¦ <topic/851/2747.bae9c8af72f1f7ef599f1bcd@community. openstreetmap. org>

But my own message is sent back to me with
References: ā€¦
<topic/851/2747.ae42d62b1252f1572b2a9a07@community. openstreetmap. org>

Do you notice the difference within the message id?

The forumā€™s system does break message ids within references.

This results in broken threads with
1.2 topic/851/2748. topic/851/2747.
1.3 topic/851/2751. topic/851/2749.

where 1.2 is the forum version of 1.1.1 (new message-id topic/851/2748.e6be773dbcc599ad5f35bae5)
and 1.3 is the forum version of 1.1.1.1.1

ā€¦and I have to break the message IDs again manually because message IDs become interpreted as links to E-Mail addresses with a mailto:, which also is wrong.

Iā€™m not sure what you expect use to do about this? We donā€™t write the discourse softwareā€¦

I donā€™t generally use threading but I did have a quick look at another discourse instance that Iā€™m subscribed to in mailing list mode when somebody asked before and it looked to be threading OK at first glance.

Itā€™s hard to comment further without having a full thread in a mail client to look at but my guess is that youā€™re misunderstanding what itā€™s trying to do in some way as I know this is something that discourse developers have spent considerable effort trying to get right.

Are you talking about something like Mailing list mode: get rid of long prefixes - #9 by traut here? That has been posted as a top level reply so will be threaded below the original message.

In the web interface you can choose whether to reply to the topic (the blue Reply button at the bottom) or to an individual message (the Reply button on the message) and that affects how it threads judging by the chef discourse instance that I am subscribed to in mailing list mode.

Iā€™m not sure how that works when replying via email. I would have assumed it would be treated as a message level reply but maybe it is treated as a topic level reply?

Dou you read the forum via mail or online only? Itā€™s easy to verify Use the maillng list mode and you will be able to verify the problem. I donā€™t know about discourse and their developers. I was invited to this forum here on OSM-Talk my Amanda. You canā€™t start thrads by email (yet?) and the threading is broken - so as far as Iā€™m concerned those developers are not ready yet. And personally, Iā€™ll stick to the mailing lists.

No Iā€™m not using this instance in mailing list mode currently though I am subscribe to the chef one that way.

The message Iā€™m replying to here is a message level reply by email to my first comment on this topic - did it thread correctly in your mail client?

Yes, thatā€™s my first thread here. But the problem that I describe here has nothing to do with the prefixes annoyance, but a bug within threading itself. The examples that I named are from this prefix thead. I did reply via email - since this is supposed to work if the mailing list mode is supported properly. I donā€™t know what the difference here would be. But usually a reply is within a certain topic on a certain message.

It did, as stated before. The problem appears especially with own replies

Might be worth checking upstream with the discourse folks in case itā€™s a bug or just an issue depending on if you have the mailing list mode on-off?

@traut let us know if you want help to report this, I think it would be good if you report the issue yourself since Iā€™m not able to fully explain how to reproduce the problem and discourse devs might have additional questions for you.

@traut just checking on this one in case you need additional guidance.

Thanks!

For me thereā€™s no need - I abandoned the forum and stick to the mailing list.

OK, Iā€™ll mark this request as solved. If anyone else experiences the same problem and is able to reproduce it can be re-opened and supported to report it upstream.

For me, threading was broken prior to the most recent Discourse upgrade but now seems to be working OK. Iā€™m using Thunderbird 102.6.1 on Windows as an email client; Iā€™m asking around to see if it is also fixed for other people who reported it broken (different clients and platforms).

As an aside, I donā€™t think that ā€œI abandoned the forum and stick to the mailing listā€ is really a ā€œsolutionā€, is it? :slight_smile: