Create and use message boards

A Message Board holds posts and the discussion under each one. A board belongs to Personal or a team and is either private to that team or public.

Create a board

Choose Create board on Message Boards and give the board a name. It will belong to Personal or the team you are in, and it will start private. Its address, /boards/ and a word made from the name, comes from the name; choose Address under the name to pick a different one. The address cannot be changed later and is never used by another board, so pick it before you share the board.

The new board opens next. To give it a description, rename it, or make it public, choose More beside its name, then Edit details. Making a board public asks you to confirm first. The board's creator and the team's admins can change these details; the address and the team cannot be changed. Making a board private stops future public reading; it does not take back copies people already made.

Who can read and post

• Private to a team: only members of that team can open the board, post, comment and vote.
• Public: anyone can read the board and its posts without an account, and anyone signed in to Magpie can post, comment and vote.

Posting, commenting and voting need a handle. If you do not have one, the board says so and links to Account settings, where you choose one (see Your public profile and account details). A visitor who is not signed in sees Sign in to post on a public board.

Message Boards lists the boards of Personal and your teams first, then public boards from other teams.

Write a post

On a board, choose New post. Enter a title and, if you want, text, which uses Markdown. To share a web page, choose Add a link and enter its address: the post's title will open that page, and the text can say what it is about. Choose Publish post.

A post cannot be edited after it is published. To change one, delete it and post again.

Comments, replies and votes

Open a post to read its discussion. The comment box is at the end of the discussion and opens when you click into it; comments use Markdown. Choose Reply under a comment to answer it; a reply is shown under the comment it answers.

Select the up or down arrow beside a post or a comment to vote. The score changes as soon as you click, and choosing the same vote again takes it back.

The tabs above a board's posts set their order: Hot puts recent posts with high scores first, New puts the newest first, and Top puts the highest scores first.

Delete posts and comments

A post's author, the board's creator and the team's admins can delete a post: open it, choose More beside its title, then Delete post. Its comments are deleted with it, and this cannot be undone. A comment's author, the board's creator and the team's admins can delete a comment from the More actions menu (⋯) under it. A deleted comment is shown as "This comment was deleted", so replies to it keep their place.

To close a board to new posts, or to delete a whole board, see Archive or delete a message board.

Report content and block people

In the Magpie app, open a post's menu and choose Report post, or choose Report under a comment, and pick a reason. The report goes to the Magpie team, who review it and remove content that breaks the Acceptable Use Policy. You are not told the outcome.

Block hides a person from you: their posts are not shown to you, and the text of their comments is hidden. They are not told. In the app, choose Block under a comment, or Block and the person's name in a post's menu. Undo it under Account settings, Blocked people.

The assistant

You can ask the assistant to search the posts you can read by title, board, text or creation date, and to read a post's comments. It can also create and change boards, write posts and comments, and vote; it deletes a post or comment only after you confirm in your message. It leaves out archived boards.

In the Magpie app

The app lists the Message Boards of the team you have selected. Choose New to create a board; the app asks for its name, address, visibility and description. On a board you can read posts and comments, write posts with an optional link, add comments, choose Reply under a comment to answer it, vote with Upvote and Downvote, and delete your own posts and comments. The board's creator and the team's admins can delete any post or comment, and can choose Board settings from the board's action menu to change its name, description or visibility; the app asks for confirmation before a visibility change.

If a signed-out visitor can see a board that is set to private, or a team member cannot open one their role should allow, Contact support.