Add explicit +1 feature for issues that isn't a comment

[isaacs]

Often people post github issue comments like 👍 just so that they can get notified when there are updates, and to indicate that they are also interested in an issue.

It'd be nice if they could just click a thing to do that, without posting a comment that emails everyone else uselessly. It could even put the 👍 comment on the page for cute factor if you feel that's important, but without emailing everyone.

For bonus points, let the project maintainers sort the issues list by the number of votes.

Then the 👍 behavior would be useful, rather than spammy.

---

Update: (there's a Change.org petition for this now](https://www.change.org/p/github-inc-add-voting-functionality-for-github-issues)

[ericf]

+1

[isaacs]

@ericf I see what you did there. ;P

[sarahhodne]

Such a button already exists:

It might be made more prominent, though.

[polotek]

@henrikhodne I'm not sure if people think of watches as an indicator of importance on issues. To me it just means I want to get emails about new comments. It can probably be repurposed to have more meaning though.

[imakewebthings]

@henrikhodne I think what @isaacs wants is a distinction between watchers and a vote of support for the ticket. The Chrome bug tracker does this with "starring" an issue. They may be an interesting case to study because despite that feature they still get a ton of +1 style comments. I think in part because the star is not featured prominently, not explained in any way inline, and generally is not a good representation of what it means.

[sarahhodne]

Ah, sorry, I missed that there were two parts to the issue, I only read "make a button so we don't have to comment 👍 to get notifications".

[isaacs]

@henrikhodne Yeah, also, there's no way to sort the issues list by the number of watchers, and maybe it could be set up so that the watch link is closer to the "comment" button, and a sort option in the issues list, or a variety of other potential approaches. It would also be nice to not send us all an email for comments that are just an emoticon, maybe. I'm not sure the best way to do this, but it seems like the functionality and data is there, and some relatively minor adjustments could make it much more useful.

[dresende]

+1

[jsocol]

Is there any way to expose the number of watchers? "Participants" only includes people who comment.

+1 to the 👍 button, though if nothing else, at least in the short term, saying "6 participants and 18 watchers" would be helpful.

[jzaefferer]

On Chromium, maintainers are suspicious of issues that get a few dozen stars within a day, blaming the reporter to have a "huge twitter following".

[polotek]

Ha, does that somehow make the data less valid?

On Tue, Jun 11, 2013 at 3:15 PM, Jörn Zaefferer notifications@github.comwrote:

On Chromium, maintainers as suspicious of issues that get a few dozen
starts within a day, blaming the reporter to have a "huge twitter
following".

—
Reply to this email directly or view it on GitHubhttps://github.com//issues/9#issuecomment-19296086
.

Marco Rogers
marco.rogers@gmail.com | https://twitter.com/polotek

Life is ten percent what happens to you and ninety percent how you respond
to it.

• Lou Holtz

[zwn]

👍

[patcon]

Can we separate this out into separate issues? As it stands, I want to express my support for some things mentioned here, but some of it feels like feature creep.

Here's what I see for issue candidates:

• I want a way to watch a thread without needing to comment/+1 DONE
• I want a way to +1 an issue without inflating comment count (and presumably without notifying others)
• I want a way to sort issues by watchers.
• I want the option to not get notifications on +1 comments (or comment below a char threshold?)

Did I miss anything here?

[fgrehm]

We used to have "upvotes" or something similar in a remote past but it ended up getting removed.

From http://blog.leahculver.com/2009/04/github-issues.html

[carols10cents]

I want a way to sort issues by watchers.

OR sort issues by 👍 votes, if that functionality is made independent from watching. People might want to leave a 👍 to indicate that they're experiencing that issue too, or they agree with the idea, but don't want to get notifications-- I suppose it's up for debate which number would be a better metric for user pain/need.

[patcon]

Someone could write a simple service and create a browser extension/userscript:
http://developer.github.com/v3/search/#search-issues

I feel like particular approach as passionate github users who want niche features :) (see #93 (comment))

[ndarville]

👍

[captn3m0]

A Chrome extension for GitHub, Zenhub offers a plus-one feature. Screenshot:

[constantx]

hey @isaacs, +1 feature – and a kanban-like board for GitHub Issues – are implemented in ZenHub Chrome Extension

Give it a try :) http://www.zenhub.io/beta

* Disclosure: I work on ZenHub :)

[roham]

We made a quick screen-cast showing ZenHub in action:

• http://www.screenr.com/fWiH

Note the +1 buttons, the customizable Boards, and file uploads to S3, all injected into GitHub via the ZenHub browser extension. The link @constantx shared will allow anyone interested in this thread to sign up (for free): http://www.zenhub.io/beta

Take us for a spin and let us know what you think on our public repo. Sorting by +1 is coming 🔜

Most of all: thanks for bringing us up, @captn3m0 - it's great to see our early users evangelizing the product! Makes us want to work even harder

[Mithgol]

People would still use traditional 👍 comments because they are spammy. To nag over stuff so the developer would notice.

[juliangruber]

good point, but the community will likely take care of that as it would be considered very rude.

[felipesabino]

@Mithgol @isaacs may be something like stackoverflow comments minimum characters restriction could work to prevent spammy comments

[rlidwka]

may be something like stackoverflow comments minimum characters restriction

"+1, I like that"

[diosney]

+1 :)

I like very much the Bitbucket voting feature.

[lexoyo]

👍

[roham]

... have you seen ZenHub? This thread - and the annoying notifications we are getting from people's +1s - are perfect examples why everyone should be using ZenHub.

We have now made the decision to make ZenHub free, forever, for everyone. So don't be shy, check it out: http://www.zenhub.io

And then come back to this thread to see all the glorious +1s already populated here!

[impaler]

+1 for an optional voting system for issues. Almost every other issue system I use has it and users sure love it. I would love to hear some rationale as to why it was removed or why it wont be added other than feature bloat.

[joffrey-bion]

I would not say this is solved. There is still no actual issue upvoting. Just reactions to comments. I don't need reactions, I would like a voting system by issue. I'd like to sort my issues by upvotes minus downvotes count. What is preventing such a simple thing to happen? Is it much more complex than it sounds like?

[mitar]

Are those reactions exposed through the API? If so, then you can create any dashboard computing and sorting you want.

[sergei-ivanov]

@TPS: I am afraid, it still does not cut it. Hence the petition will remain in place.

1. When sorting by reactions, the number of reactions is not displayed in the list.
2. It is still unclear whether the sorting takes into account the reactions on the headline comment only, or on all comments in the issue. If it is the latter, then it is pretty useless.
3. I am still failing to see the point of using reactions as a pseudo-voting functionality. In my view, they provide a social aspect that is orthogonal or complementary to voting. I am still struggling to understand why a simple up/down voting system on the issue level cannot be implemented.

[howardroark]

This project could help satisfy this want in the short term ... https://gitsup.com/isaacs/github :)

[TPS]

@sergei-ivanov & all other gripers: If you have a problem with closing this issue as solved, I'll bet y'all will hate #640. Check it out & let me know what you think. 😜

[vsiegel]

I'm clearly opposed to per comment voting, because of the clutter;
But it seems useful to be able to state that an issue is important to one person more,
i.e. me, experiencing it too.

For this, the way launchpad.net does it seems to be brilliant:

Assuming you are logged in and have at least minimal write access
to the system, directly after registering:

There is a link text
This bug affects 109 people, but not you. (Edit)

with a pop up
Does this bug affect you?
Yes, it affects me
No, it doesn't affect me

Selecting "Yes...: adds one and changes the link text to
This bug affects you and 110 other people (Edit)

The UI when logged in is shown in the next two screen shots:

If you are not logged in, the message reads:

This bug affects 109 people, but not you

which is not linked and has no edit button - but somehow suggests that you may
edit it when logged in.

I think it's important that all this does not even resemble a "+1" or "like".
It's technically very similar, but the psychological model is quite different, which makes me hope it does not provoke the same unwanted behavior by analogy.

For full context, see example top left, either logged in or not.

[dmitshur]

@vsiegel That link results in 404 for me. Perhaps one needs to be logged in to see it. Maybe should post a screenshot too.

[vsiegel]

@shurcooL
Right - first, I was logged in, which changes that part of the UI; I will extend the above comment to explain.

Also, - second part -: I somehow had added an additional character "l" (small L) at the end of the of the URL, which broke it, sorry. Corrected.