Threaded Conversation View Design

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Reasons: hamishwillee (08 May 2012)
The threaded/non-threaded images below aren't very good - they show only a view with messages associated with a particular user. A good image would be the conversation view on a phone where sent/received messages are displayed adjacent to each other, in order. Alternatively, a facebook view.

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Created: prakash.raman (21 Jun 2009)

Updated: hamishwillee (07 May 2012)

Last edited: hamishwillee (09 May 2012)

Introduction

Threaded communication is where messages are presented as a "conversation"; associated messages are grouped, ordered according to when they are sent or received, and clearly identify the sender(s) and recipient(s). In some implementations the messages may simply be grouped by the recipients; in others, the grouping might be at a further granularity of "subject".

As users are often connected across a number of mechanisms, including SMS, MMS, email, instant messaging, phone calls, VoIP, facebook, twitter, blogs, the threaded view is becoming an even more important tool to help users remember where they are in their conversation.

Design Images

The images below contrast a non-threaded and threaded view. Both images show a communication manager which displays both calls and SMS messages. The first image displays a non-threaded view where messages are sorted by arrival order. The second message shows a threaded view, where events associated with a user are displayed together.

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  Traditional communication where messages are sorted by arrival time

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  Threaded view, where events associated with a user are grouped

Points to be notice

• Tracing and managing communications is easy.