How To Use Insanejournal - An (Occasionally) Illustrated Guide
Hey guys! So, there's few a people who are new to a) insanejournal, b) online RPing, or c) both. And that's awesome! I've been doing journal-based RP for around four years, and online stuff for maybe eight or nine. It's a lot of fun, and I hope that you all have fun!
There is, however, one mistake that I see people make now and then: Slipping up when responding to a post or responding to a comment. Everybody makes mistakes--and this is one that I did for about my first year of livejournal and whatnot. Rather than let those who are newer at this fumble through the dark, I thought that I'd whip up a quick illustrated guide to this.
Okay. So, unfortunately, the screenshot I took cut off the post, otherwise everything would be small to the point of unreadable. We'll have to make do, so just imagine a post up above everything.
So, what we have are two threads, based from two comments: Reply x1 and Reply x2. Reply x1 then has three comments following it (Reply x1.A, Reply x1.A.I, and Reply x1.B), and Reply x2, sadly, is all alone.
Now. When you're RPing, or leaving comments on a journal, or whatever, you want something to look like the Reply x1-Reply x1.A.I thread. It's organized, it looks nice, and it's just sort of all-around shiny. Now, say that I wanted to reply to Reply x1.A.I--all I have to do is click 'Reply to this' directly under the post, type something up, and voila! It's all done! You'd have, I dunno, Reply x1.A.I.a, or something. (I ran out of bits of organization).
Likewise, to comment on Reply x2, you'd click the 'Reply to This' button under Reply x2--that would give you (an unseen) Reply x2.A.
Now--and here's where trouble is caused: This is not the same as clicking 'Post a new comment.' In the above example, clicking 'Post a new comment' would create Reply x3--an entire new thread. When RPing, nine times out of ten, you want to be replying to comments, and not replying to the post. The only exception is, of course, if you're wanting to start a new thread.
So, why does this matter? There's two reasons. 1--As said before, it looks nice, and it's organized--if Rose is threading with, say, Equius and Jade, it makes sure that all of the Rose/Equius posts will be in one thread, and the Rose/Jade posts in another. 2--Insanejournal automatically sends notifications when somebody replies to your posts or your comments. Say that Rose posted something, Feferi comments, Rose comments back, and the two keep on threading. Every time Rose comments, Feferi will get a notification. Everytime Feferi comments, Rose will get a notification. Now, say that Doc Scratch (creeper that he is) responds to one of Feferi's comments. Both Feferi and Rose will get a notification: Feferi because it's her comment, and Rose because it's her post. Okay. Now, let's say that Feferi accidentally slips, and hits 'Post a new comment' instead of 'Reply to This,' thus started a new thread. Rose will still get an Email, because it's her post--so nothing's really lost there, just a bit of organization. If, however, Rose slips and hits 'Post a new comment' while trying to respond to Feferi, she will not get a notification--because it's Rose's post.
Again, this is a fairly minor thing, and it's also a common mistake for newcomers and first-time journal users.
SO! Let's use this as a place for questions. If you're having trouble with something about Insanejournal--be it comments, HTML, icons, notifications, or anything? Feel free to ask here! This is a place of no judging, but much hugging. Because hugging is awesome, and so are you!