At the beginning of Apple Discussions pages I see "Branched to a new discussion". How does this work? What is it for?
The reason I ask is a discussion I initiated five years ago in the Snow Leopard community is ongoing, and relevant to El Capitan as well as all other OS X versions since 10.5. Should this Snow Leopard discussion be branched to an El Capitan discussion to keep it current?
It means that a host split part of the thread into a different one; this is usually, but not always, because that part broke the board rules.
(142094)
Niel, of course, is right when he says "usually" = those go POOF from the public forum
The rare ones are the ones that a second NEW thread is created from some post, or group of posts - here's an example:
this one has " Branched from an earlier discussion. " above the OPost [emphasis is mine]
There must be some private forum somewhere that houses all of those "disappeared" posts. I wonder what that Leaderboard looks like. 🙂
When you have a fairly good reply to an ongoing issue, you could save a link to that
discussion (perhaps the specific rely within a thread) and place that link into a newer
one, so those who may benefit from the related information could view it there.
Some of those 'branched' blue linked allegedly relocated replies to an existing thread
go to a notice or warning that essentially implies the item has been vaporized into ether.
A few curious quirks have resulted from a reply being removed, in that others who had
contributed to an old thread may see recent reference to a thread where a recent reply
has been vacated by a host's intervention. In other views within a user's activity record
that may appear as "reply deleted" which brings up a thread from a year ago.
A rare one indeed; as I see it, this resulted from a 'branched' yet deleted addition; and
the thread does not say branched, this is totally unlike any other in this regard... The
above image is from an internal user accessed page, & the actual link to discussion is:
how to identify fake macbook air
So there are 'branched' &/or "Branched" or there may be branched parts without evidence. 😉
K Shaffer wrote:
When you have a fairly good reply to an ongoing issue, you could save a link to that
discussion (perhaps the specific rely within a thread) and place that link into a newer
one, so those who may benefit from the related information could view it there.
Some of those 'branched' blue linked allegedly relocated replies to an existing thread
go to a notice or warning that essentially implies the item has been vaporized into ether.
A few curious quirks have resulted from a reply being removed, in that others who had
contributed to an old thread may see recent reference to a thread where a recent reply
has been vacated by a host's intervention. In other views within a user's activity record
that may appear as "reply deleted" which brings up a thread from a year ago.
A rare one indeed; as I see it, this resulted from a 'branched' yet deleted addition; and
the thread does not say branched, this is totally unlike any other in this regard... The
above image is from an internal user accessed page, & the actual link to discussion is:
how to identify fake macbook air
So there are 'branched' &/or "Branched" or there may be branched parts without evidence. 😉
YIKES!
The last post where I posted a picture like that went POOF!
Granted, I also used the term "My Subscriptions" - which is a "feature" of which many are aware for one reason or another - standard feature for all in JiveSoftware Community, for instance.
Let's hope that your "one more DOT" protects your reference👿
Thanks to all who replied. I have been slow to comment because I have been trying to read the various instruction pages and examples suggested, and figure out how this applies to my case. Seeing that there appears to be some variability in how this works, I think that I should provide the specific example that brought up the question for me.
This discussion Mail edit drag n drop bugconfirms an issue with Mail. It was started in 2011 in the Snow Leopard community because to me Mail seemed to be part of the System. However, apparently the same bug existed before Snow Leopard and continues unchanged today, as confirmed by posters in that thread. To me it seemed inappropriate to continue posting about what has become an El Capitan issue, in a thread in the Snow Leopard community. IIRC what I did was start a new thread in the El Capitan community which restated the issue, and included a link to the original thread. That post mysteriously went POOF. I did not violate any terms of service or agreement that I know of. In the new thread as a brief explanation I explained that my intention was to bump the discussion to the El Capitan community, since it was a ongoing issue. Perhaps "bump" is a key word that triggers dismissal.
I would think that if the moderators found something objectionable they would have sent me an email explanation. That way I would know what happened, and be advised to not make the same mistake in the future. But I got nothing from them. I was puzzled. A few days later I noticed the "Branched to new discussion" at the beginning of the thread. I thought that made sense, since branching to new discussion was what I was trying got do in the first place. However, it seems the new discussion which is branched to is not open to the public nor to its author, me. Clicking the link leads to a page which says "Unauthorized Access to this place or content is restricted. If you think this is a mistake, please contact your administrator or the person who directed you here." I do think this is a mistake, but I have no idea who my administrator or the the person who directed me is.
That led me to ask here what is going on. I thank you all for your answers. Putting my experience and the answers above together leads me to the impression that there is no good answer. Apple Support Communities are still a work in progress, now better than in the past, but still having some rough edges to be polished.
Sometimes an effort to share information, say if done through a new thread that refers to an older answer,
this may now be seen as an effort to 'game' the system because a new thread can gain points or allow one
to advance. So if you start a new thread in a different section of ASC and include a link back to different
section with older content (as a reference, such as a footnote as it were) the general view may be for some
to remove the post and avoid an apparent source of controversy or non-compliance with these newer rules.
{Especially if the old thread topic brought forward was one authored by you, this may be a gray area now.}
Of course, you could perhaps hope to gain the attention of a Host in such a thread as this; they may or may
not choose to respond in such a venue. You could try Apple Feedback, see support or website feedback, etc.
• Apple Feedback: (as viewed from http://www.apple.com/contact/ )
Tell us how we’re doing. Select the appropriate feedback option
(we read everything, but can’t always respond):
Some areas could be vague to the end user of how rules work.
There are several sections that could apply, some specific to
these Apple Support Discussions.
To supply information in an existing thread in El Capitan, as a
suggestion for the original poster to follow, is better received;
links to older topics work in that scenario more often than not.
And to make short reply of long answers, it would appear Niel
said the most with the least... LOL !
Good luck & happy computing! 🙂
Lastly, one additional note: if you did not get an email from the hosts, then it was not anything you said or did - your post might have been considered irrelevant when the other post was removed. You'll know it was you if you get an email......
How does "Branched to a new discussion" work?
