Tip: For collaborative threads, post TWO initial messages

As most of you know, a post be in “wiki mode”, i.e editable by other board members (if you have been given the rights to apply this feature to your posts). This can be used to collectively develop something, e.g a piece of documentation. Here is just a little reflection (and guess!) on how this is used most effectively:

Make TWO posts to start your thread. The very top one is the wiki post. The second one is your main discussion message including comments about the initial post.

It is otherwise a problem for yourself and others to modify that first post. Not only might someone mistakenly modify something that you intended to remain intact, but the modifications may also make bits in your introductory message irrelevant which confuses readers. If, however, the first post is totally modifiable, then it is more obvious that your succeeding post may no longer fully “match it”.

@admin - might there even be a way to post inject a top post in a thread? The realization that “we need a collectively modifiable post for this thread” might only come after the fact, for example when people kindly post improvements on provided code etc.

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Good tip!

Yes, people with sufficient permissions can wiki-fy OP. You have the correct level of permissions for this.

And, you can even wiki-fy a comment I believe. Give it a try!

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Boris: Wikifying comments is not recommended, one should start a new thread with the comment body instead. But it is possible.

Yes, people with sufficient permissions can wiki-fy OP. You have the correct level of permissions for this.

Hm, no I mean if it is possible to inject a totally new post before the first one if you, for your “own” thread, realize that “oh, it would make sense to collect the knowledge in this thread into a separate and initial post”. I’d be surprised if this was possible but who knows…

I did switch to admin-mode and there seems to be no possibility to “inject” posts. …

I think the best way would be start a completely new thread and let the “old one” die. … Admins can lock those old posts, so they can’t be resurrected anymore.

So users can ask admins that they should lock an old or outdated thread.

OK, thanks for investigating.

And tag them “archaic” or similar.