RIVER COMMENTS and LIKES/DISLIKES PLUGIN Wishlist

I had been testing river_comments plugin for several weeks and I think it still has room for improvements.

IMPROVE NOTIFICATIONS

The page owner or the item/object owner is the ONLY one notified when comments are made on them.  When the page owner or the item/object owner replies to the comment posted, the others who also posted comments are not notified.  Comments will be hard to follow when it is only the item/object owner who is notified.  I will give you a scenario below in hopes that it will be much clearer.

E.g. :  A1 is friends with B1 and C1.  B1 is friends with A1 only.  C1 is friends with A1 only

• A1 creates a blog and a river item of that action is created on the river activity.
• B1 comments on the blog.  (A1 is notified).
• A1 replies to the comment posted by B1.  (Since blog item/object is owned by A1, B1 is NOT NOTIFIED.  This is what's happening in the current version of the plugin.  B1 SHOULD also receive a notification telling that A1 has posted a reply in order to keep track of conversation.)
• C1 also posts a comment on the blog.  (A1 is notified.  B1 SHOULD also be notified even though they are not friends so that conversation is clear among the comment posters.  If B1 is the previous poster then he should receive a notification like: "Someone has replied to your post" (Someone because C1 and B1 are not friends but if they are friends, then the display name should be used).  If  B1 is not the previous poster then a notification like: "New comments have been posted on itemname".

          Note:  If he has not viewed the notification, he should not receive new notifications on each newly posted comments so that he will not be flooded with notifications if there are a lot of people commenting on the item/object.  The unviewed notification should be deleted and should be replaced with an updated notification saying like: "8 new comments have been posted on itemname".  So it means that it will just count every new comments made instead of having new notifications on each comments posted.

All of the above should also be implemented on the Likes/Dislikes plugin.

RIVER UPDATES ON COMMENTS AND LIKES/DISLIKES

An update on the river should also be made when comments are made or likes/dislikes are made.  For example Pedro reads  a blog titled “Blog101”  and comments on it through Elgg’s generic comment system, a river update is created saying “Pedro posted a comment on this blog post Blog101”.  But if you post a comment through river_comments plugin, no river update is made.  Also, when someone LIKES or DISLIKES an item, a river update should also be made.  This will make it consistent with the generic comment system of Elgg.

A feature (AJAX) should also be implemented wherein comments, either from Elgg’s generic comment system or river_comments plugin,  on the same item (e.g. blog) are aggregated in a given time frame.  This should also be implemented in Likes/Dislikes plugin.

For example Blog101 is created and comments are posted:

• Pedro posted a comment on this blog post Blog101
• Mark posted a comment on this blog post Blog101
• John posted a comment on this blog post Blog101
• Pete posted a comment on this blog post Blog101
• Josh posted a comment on this blog post Blog101

And after a time frame of 5 minutes it should aggregate all comments in a single line in the river:

• 5 comments on this blog post Blog101 (5 minutes ago) View All

This will help prevent flooding the river when there are lots of comments being made.  The View All will show all the comments when clicked.

FILTERS FOR RIVER COMMENTS AND LIKES/DISLIKES

A filter should also be included in the filter drop-down menu on the riverdashboard so that all comments made or likes/dislikes made can be sorted out and can be followed easily whether made by ALL by FRIENDS or by me(MINE).