MediaWiki provides a discussion page for each content page in the wiki. This allows users to coordinate any questions, changes or ideas regarding a wiki page "behind the scenes". BlueSpice 4 has a slightly different discussions concept which does not use the actual talk page content, but relies on the extension BlueSpiceSocialTopics instead.
Configuration
Administrators should check the setting for automatic Talk-page creation. To provide a seamless user experience, the setting "Automatically create all discussion pages" should be activated in the Config manager. This ensures that a user is not redirected to the talk page first for saving it to the wiki before the actual discussion topic can be created.
Adding a discussion topic
Discussions about a page are listed directly below the page content on the wiki page itself.
When a user starts the first discussion topic for the page, the wiki still generates a corresponding "Talk"-page. This means that when the first discussion is added to the page Main Page, the page Talk:Main_Page is also created. It shows the same discussion topics that are shown below the page content itself. Because of this duplication, the BlueSpice 4 skin Discovery does not show a direct link to the discussion page anywhere on the content page. (If a link should be shown on pages in a specific namespace for example, this could be achieved with the extension HeaderFooter).
To create the first discussion topic on a page:
- Click the
+button in the Discussion area at the end of the page. This opens the talk page. - Click
Start a new topic.... - Enter a title and the content.
- Click Post.
After posting your topic, you have the following options:
- Edit: the post by clicking on the edit icon
- Unwatch: when you post a discussion topic, it automatically gets added to your watchlist. You can remove it manually here.
- Delete: a post can be deleted by its author as well as any wiki admin. Admins see a deleted post with a red background. Other users cannot see a deleted post.
- Unresolved: the author and any admin can mark a discussion topic as resolved. Click on unresolved to switch its status.
- Linked pages: discussion topics are always linked to their content and talk pages. You can link additional pages here if you need them for filtering purposes.
- Recommend
Commenting on a discussion topic
Users can comment on a discussion topic by clicking the Answer here... button.
Permissions
All users with edit rights can create discussion topics and comments. If users with read permissions want to create discussions, they need to be added to a user group that has the role commenter assigned.
