Simon WillisonDec 22, 2022

My least favourite sharp edge of Mastodon is the fact that when you view someone else's post you only see replies to it that are known to your server - so there's actually a good chance there will be replies that are completely invisible to you, especially if you run your own instance

I'd love it if tapping a post kicked off a request back to the original server that fetched the current reply count and provided a "view all replies" button if there were replies not yet visible to me

Show threadSimon WillisonDec 22, 2022

My hunch here is that very few people see even aware of this Mastodon feature

So, a poll: prior to reading this thread, did you know that Mastodon by default will only show you public replies to a post if those replies have already been fetched into your server somehow?

(This only affects you when you view a post that originated on a server other than your home server - if the original post author is on the same server as you then you'll see all of the replies)

Yes I knew about that
24%
No, I didn't know about that
70%
I don't understand the question
6%
Poll ended at .
Show thread🅺🅸🅼 🆂🅲🅷🆄🅻🆉:~$ ▓Dec 22, 2022
@simon
Fedilab app does a pretty good job fetching them for you
Show threadjohn r red-horse
@kimschulz
Are you suggesting that this characteristic is app based and not protocol based?
@simon
Dec 22, 2022 at 9:50pmWeb
Show thread🅺🅸🅼 🆂🅲🅷🆄🅻🆉:~$ ▓Dec 23, 2022
@jrredho
More that fedilab has implemented functionality to fetch the remote messages in threads started locally (or something like that)
@simon
Show threadAtropa BirdpersonDec 23, 2022
@jrredho @kimschulz @simon It definitely is app based, the ActivityPub 2.0 spec specifies pubs should retransmit any public replies they receive to all followers who could have seen what is being replied to, specifically to avoid this issue. It's not mandatory, but pretty much nothing is in the AP spec. Mastodon isn't following the spec, that's why you're seeing brokenness.
Show threadSimon WillisonDec 23, 2022

@phx @jrredho @kimschulz I don't think that's the case here - Mastodon does implement the thing where everyone who follows me gets sent any replies to my posts

The problem I'm describing occurs when I browse to a post by someone who I don't follow (eg because it was boosted into my timeline) and then can't see all of the replies to that post

I don't think the ActivityPub spec covers that particular case

Show threadAtropa BirdpersonDec 23, 2022
@simon @jrredho @kimschulz Ooh right. There is a loosely specced functionality for activities to include a replies collection, so it is possible for AP servers to expose replies in this way and consume them from each other, and I think Mastodon usually does? from my own poking at server endpoints. But like mastodon not normally iterating and loading posts from remote user's profiles when you view them, it seems like it doesn't usually load the replies collection either. https://ryanatkn.github.io/corpus-activity-streams/#replies
corpus-activity-streams