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Comments

Comments below articles are part of the Comments and ratings extension, which is turned on after installation. An administrator turns it off and on under Extensions in the main menu. Moderation takes place in Readers → Comments; an editor and an administrator have access.

Where comments are allowed

Comments are shown below an article when all three conditions are met:

  1. the Comments and ratings extension is turned on,
  2. the option Comments below articles is on in Settings → General,
  3. the article has Allow comments ticked in the More settings → Options panel (it is ticked for a new article).

So for a sensitive topic it is enough to turn comments off for a single article.

Moderation modes

Settings → General → New comment:

OptionHow it behaves
publish immediately (suspicious ones wait for approval)a comment is visible at once; a comment with two or more links waits for approval
publish only after newsroom approvalevery comment waits for approval

After sending, the reader sees either a thank-you or a message that the comment will be shown after approval by the editorial team.

Who may comment

By default anyone can comment. They fill in a Name, an optional E-mail (it is not published) and a text of at most 5,000 characters.

With the Readers and locked content extension turned on, the option Only signed-in readers may comment is added in Settings → General → Readers and locked content. A reader who is not signed in then sees a prompt to sign in instead of the form. A signed-in reader comments under the name from their account, and their comments carry the mark ✓ (registered reader).

Spam protection

The form is protected by built-in antispam. It does not use CAPTCHA or cookies for verification and does not call any external service:

  • the form carries a signed timestamp – it cannot be sent sooner than after a few seconds or later than after a few hours,
  • a hidden field that a person does not see and a robot fills in; such a comment is discarded and the robot does not learn that it failed,
  • at most 5 comments per 10 minutes get through from one address,
  • a comment with several links waits for approval even in the immediate publishing mode.

Moderation

Readers → Comments has two tabs: All and Awaiting approval with a count. For every comment you see the text, the sender's name and e-mail, a short fingerprint of their address (the same fingerprint = the same sender; the IP address itself is not stored), the article, the date and the status (published or pending / hidden).

  1. Tick the comments.
  2. Below the table choose Approve, Hide or Delete.
  • Approve publishes the comment and resets its reports.
  • Hide takes it off the site but keeps it in the administration. It can be approved again later.
  • Delete cannot be undone and also deletes the replies to the comment.

The text of a comment cannot be edited. The number of comments awaiting approval is also shown on the Dashboard.

Replies and notifications to readers

A reader can reply to a comment with the Reply button. The reply is shown indented below it; threads have one level.

Whoever fills in an e-mail when commenting and ticks E-mail me when someone replies gets a message as soon as a reply to their comment is published – so for moderated comments only after approval. The e-mail contains a link to the discussion and a link that turns off further notifications for this comment. The message arrives in the language of the site version under whose article the reader commented.

Reporting a comment

Every comment has a report link. The reader uses it to alert the editorial team to an inappropriate post:

  • from one address, a report of the same comment counts once a day,
  • after three reports the comment hides itself and waits for the editorial team's assessment,
  • in moderation a reported comment has the mark reported 2×.

Approving resets the number of reports and the comment returns to the site.

E-mails to the newsroom

Settings → General → More options → E-mail the newsroom about comments:

  • when a comment is waiting for approval (default),
  • on every new comment,
  • do not send.

The message goes to the Newsroom e-mail from Settings → General, at most once every 10 minutes. It contains the article, the author and the beginning of the comment, the number of comments waiting and a link to moderation.

Star ratings

The same extension adds star ratings (1–5) below articles. The system does not accept a repeated vote on the same article for 30 days. It is turned off in Settings → General → More options → Star ratings of articles.