Just wanted to suggest an option to sort comments by date alone - displaying them linearly in a 'flat' rather than nested/threaded view, perhaps with a reference to the post being responded to where applicable.
At the moment, it's difficult to follow the most recent comments in a deal. Unless, of course, something like this is already available but which I've completely overlooked :D
I like the way it is..
So the two responses so far are based on the suggested flat view:
a) containing no references to posts being replied to, and
b) replacing the existing view rather than being an option.
Thanks for reading what I wrote, guys :-/
Not at all, I understand you are proposing it as an option on a per-user basis. I personally wouldn't use it, but that's not important. I merely said I think it would be difficult to follow. I also pointed out that it can be delivered to you in this linear fashion already if you subscribe to the post, and replies will be emailed to you in the format you requested, hinting at something already available that you may have overlooked. I even find reading through those emails a bit tedious because I'm reading the same thing quoted over and over again, and hunting for the "new bit". You'd be familiar with the "me too" replies posted in many forums — 50 lines of quoted text followed by a pretty useless "me too" response. Only to have the next troll come along and quote the last 51 lines of text and add "me too"… Quite tedious to read. It would be a great thing to have — provided every new post was a stand-alone new idea — but a great deal of the replies are responding to an idea raised in the discussion and not to the original post. They'd require quoting the post they were replying to. If you can get the site admins to code that in for you and implement this as a feature, then congratulations.
Yeah threaded vs. flat comments… I think what you want is putting all the latest comments to the end of the post, and each of them with reference to the comment they are replying (if there is one). The benefit is easier to find new comments + everything is sorted in chronological order. HOWEVER replies without context make them hard to read. Even with reference links you are still jumping all over the place.
I am planning some comment navigation enhancements (still in the drawing board) to help users finding various "special comments" easier (OP, rep, mod, new, etc) especially in a multi-page thread. Hopefully that will get implemented later this year. We'll see.
I think this would be difficult to follow, replies would be out of context, especially is someone posts a reply like "Me too, the same thing happened to me." You have no idea what it refers to, short of quoting the original comment. This sort of happens the way you want if you subscribe to the deal, and get the new comments posted emailed to you. That way they are sorted by date in your email program, and they include the original quoted message.