We all know threads on any BBS tend to drift off topic occasionally. Even us regulars do it quite a bit around here. It's healthy, it's good, but sometimes it can get annoying for someone who's following the real thread.

So why haven't I ever seen BBS software which would allow "reparenting" of a certain sub-thread? Like, as an example, the USB-over-Ethernet thread over in Technical has (mainly due to my post about silly english phrases like "that's pants") drifted into a bit of an aside about the differences between American and British slang.

Now, I *could* have just taken my post to Off Topic and been a responsible citizen, but that's got a few drawbacks:
1. It takes time, and I'm lazy.
2. There's no built-in reference to the original context because it would be a brand new thread.

So I was thinking it'd be neat if there was a little drop-down on the "new reply" screen which would let users select a second forum to duplicate that reply to. It would become a new parent thread in another forum where it's more on topic, and also exist as a reply to the original thread. All replies to that thread (in *either forum*) would be put in the proper forum, and not in the original forum where those replies are bound to be off-topic.

In this case, I would reply in Technical, but designate the post to become a new parent post in Off-Topic. Then I could quote the original message in technical, but my post would get all of its replies in Off-Topic.

This would allow one to follow the context of a given post, and re-parent "tangent" discussions so that they get their own little sandbox to play in without adversely affecting the original thread's continuity.

It has the drawback in that the reply which gets parented would be duplicated in two forums, maybe there'd have to be some kind of "symbolic link" enabled for such a thing.. I dunno, I just got to thinking there must be a better way to do things, and I haven't heard of this ever being implemented. I've seen entire topics moved, but never seen software which can "prune off" large tangential posts. I think it'd be a neat thing to see.

These are the ideas you think up when you have about 45 minutes of downtime at work.

We should just put all threads in off-topic. because if they last longer than 3 posts, chances are it is going to go off-topic anyway.

There was a thread the other day that started off-topic and then within 3 or 4 posts had wandered back on-topic. That was a shock.

There was a thread the other day that started off-topic and then within 3 or 4 posts had wandered back on-topic. That was a shock.

Yeah... Apparently even a blind pig finds an acorn once in awhile.

It'd actually be easier if there were a threaded mode on the board that was worth anything. Right now, it's either ``threaded'', which mean that you can see the thread structure, but only one post at a time, or ``flat'', which shows all the posts, but no thread structure. There also needs to be an ``exploded'' mode, which would have indentations (or something) to show thread structure, but also show all the posts on the same page. That way, it would be easy to skip subthreads that don't interest you, but still read the borad quickly.

I don't think it makes much sense to go switching posts and forums and whatnot. It just gets annoying and confusing. If the conversation strays off-topic then the new off-topic topic is the topic. See what I mean? It's like if you're in a grocery store and you start talking about car parts to your friend and the store clerk tells you to bring your conversation to the AutoZone across the street.

Furthurmore, diverting off-topic comments and the like only creates more unneeded threads- like there aren't already enough!

But I do agree that the original post should be in the appropiate section.