Notice: Tildes has implemented native wikis. Visit individual groups' wikis for up-to-date information.

Tildes: A “how to” guide

DISCLAIMER: This article is a WORK IN PROGRESS in two ways.

First, this guide is not yet complete. It is being written progressively. Most sections are finished, but some sections are just stubs and some sections are not yet started. As the days and weeks go by, it will become more and more complete.

Second, Tildes is an alpha-testing website which is still under development. Features are being changed and being added. Therefore, even for the finished sections, this “how to” guide will be current only at a point in time. Right now, that’s 10th May 2019. Anything that has been changed on Tildes after this date is not yet reflected in this guide.

Here you’ll find information about how to do various things on Tildes, from posting topics to bookmarking them.

If you haven’t already read the background and motives of Tildes, you’ll find useful information on this introduction page.

The Tildes front page

When you view Tildes, you’ll see a front page that lists topics that have been posted in various groups.

Sorting the topics

You can change the order in which the topics are displayed.

There are four sorting options:

Most votes orders the topics so that the topics with the highest number of votes appear at the top.
Most comments orders the topics so that the topics with the highest number of comments appear at the top.
Newest orders the topics so that the topics posted most recently appear at the top.
Activity orders the topics so that the topics which have most recently had a comment posted under them appear at the top.

There is also a time-based filter. It shows as “from”, with a selection box. This allows you to limit the topics by when they were posted:

last 1 hour will limit the list to only those topics which were posted in the last 1 hour.
last 12 hours will limit the list to only those topics which were posted in the last 12 hours.
last 24 hours will limit the list to only those topics which were posted in the last 24 hours.
last 3 days will limit the list to only those topics which were posted in the last 3 days.
all time will not limit the list in any way: all posts which have ever been posted will be included.
other period allows you to select a custom time period to limit the list. You can enter a number of hours, or you can enter a number of days by typing a number followed by “d” (“6” = 6 hours; “6d” = 6 days).

By combining the sorting options and the time-based filter, you can customise which topics will be displayed, and how they will be displayed. For example:

“Most votes” + “30 days” will show you all topics posted in the past 30 days, with the highest-voted topics at the top of the list.
“Most comments” + “3 days” will show you all topics posted in the past 3 days, with the topics that have the most comments posted under them (the ones with the most discussion) at the top of the list.
“Newest” + “24 hours” will show you all topics posted in the past 24 hours, with the most recently posted topics at the top of the list.
“Activity” + “90 days” will show you all topics posted in the past 90 days, with the topics that have had comments posted under them most recently at the top of the list.

There is also a feature to set a sorting option as your default. If you change your sorting option, “Set as default” will appear. If you click on this, the new sorting option you have just created will become the default sorting option for the page you are currently viewing - whether this is the front page (including all groups), or the page for a specific group. You can set a different default sort for every group, and for the front page.

Filtering the topics

You can filter out some types of topics and prevent them from appearing on your front page. You do this using topic tags.

All topics should have tags. They’ll describe what the topic is about. Some of them will be geographic identifiers (“usa”, “china”, “india”), some will indicate the subject matter (“biology”, “social media”, “history”), and some will indicate the type of topic (“ask”, “introductions”, “casual”). If there’s a category of topic you don’t want to see on your front page, you can apply a tag-based filter to block those posts.

Go to your user page by clicking on your username at the top of the sidebar on the righthand side of the screen. In the sidebar of your user page, there is a link that says “Settings” under the Misc heading. Click on that to go to your User Settings page. Alternatively, click on this link.

On your User Settings page, there is a link that says “Define topic tag filters” (probably at the bottom of the page). Click on that.

The filter is a single text box. You type the tag(s) you want to filter out in that box. If you want to filter out news about the USA, type “usa”. If you want to filter out political topics, type “politics”. If you want to filter out introductions topics, type “introductions”. And so on.

You can have more than one filter: separate each tag by a comma, such as “usa, politics, introductions”. This will filter out posts which are about the USA or which are political or which are introductions. Each tag in your filter is independent of all other tags.

Then click on ‘Save filtered tags’.

You can change this list at any time, by adding or deleting tags.

Reference: You can now define topic tag filters, which will hide topics with certain tags by default in your listings

Tildes groups

Subscribing to a group

To see topics from a group on your front page, you must subscribe to it. There are two ways to subscribe to a group:

On the front page, look in the sidebar for the button that says ‘Browse the list of groups’ (at the bottom). The ‘Browse groups’ page lists all groups on Tildes. At the right-hand side of the screen, each group has a ‘subscribe’ button if you’re not subscribed to it; this shows ‘unsubscribe’ if you are already subscribed to the group. Click on ‘subscribe’ to add this group to your list of subscriptions. .
Navigate to the group you want to subscribe to. In the sidebar is a button that says ‘subscribe’ (next to the number of subscribers); this shows ‘unsubscribe’ if you are already subscribed to the group. Click on ‘subscribe’.

Unsubscribing from a group

To no longer see topics from a group on your front page, you must unsubscribe from it. There are two ways to unsubscribe from a group:

On the front page, look in the sidebar for the button that says ‘Browse the list of groups’ (at the bottom). The ‘Browse groups’ page lists all groups on Tildes. At the right-hand side of the screen, each group has an ‘unsubscribe’ button if you’re subscribed to it; this shows ‘subscribe’ if you are not subscribed to the group. Click on ‘unsubscribe’ to remove this group from your list of subscriptions.
Navigate to the group you want to unsubscribe from. In the sidebar is a button that says ‘unsubscribe’ (next to the number of subscribers); this shows ‘subscribe’ if you are not subscribed to the group. Click on ‘unsubscribe’ to remove this group from your list of subscriptions.

Creating groups

It is not currently possible for users to create their own groups on Tildes. All groups and sub-groups must be created (for now) by the creator/founder/god Deimos. Even in the future, the ability to create groups and sub-groups will be greatly restricted. It will not be open to all and sundry.

Groups and sub-groups will be determined organically, as the site grows and as the need arises. The way to demonstrate the need for a group or sub-group is to post topics with the appropriate tag in a relevant existing group or sub-group. If a particular tag gets a lot of use, that is an indication to Deimos and possible group creators that there is a need for a group for this subject.

For example:

If you want a group for baking, post topics in ~food with a tag of “baking” (to indicate the need for a sub-group ~food.baking).
If you want a group for horror movies, post topics in ~movies with a tag of “horror” (to indicate the need for a sub-group ~movies.horror).
If you want a group for esports, post topics in ~games with a tag of “esports” (to indicate the need for a sub-group ~games.computer.esports).

These previous discussions provide context for this:

Posting on Tildes

Posts on Tildes are called “topics”. There are two types of topics:

Link topics, which are links to an offsite article or video.
Text topics, which contain text that is written and hosted on Tildes.

(Note: you can use text topics to post links, if you want to provide an introduction or some context for what you’re posting. Simply include the URL in the text field as part of what you type.)

Creating a topic

To create a topic on Tildes, you must first navigate to the group you want to post the topic in. All topics must be posted in a group or sub-group. (It’s okay if you’re not sure which group to post your topic in. Just pic the group or sub-group you think is most appropriate. If there’s a better place for your topic, someone else will probably come along and move it for you.)

In the sidebar of the group, click on the “Post a new topic” button to create a topic. There are three fields to complete: Title, Link, and Text.

For a link topic, complete the Title and Link fields. Type a title for the topic: this will usually be the title of the article or video you’re posting. Paste the URL of the article or video into the Link field.
For a text topic, complete the Title and Text fields. Type a title for your topic. Enter your text in the Text field. Use this option if you’re asking a question, or presenting your own topic for discussion.
If you want to post a link topic, and simultaneously post the first comment under your topic, complete all three fields: Title, Link, and Text. Type the title for the topic from the title of the article or video you’re posting; paste the URL of the article or video into the Link field; type your opening comment into the Text field.

To submit your topic, click on the “Post topic” button under the entry fields.

Reference: Daily Tildes discussion (and changelog) - “new topic” page and process updated

Tagging topics

You can apply tags to your post, which can be used by people to filter their front page. Tags are not compulsory, but they are extremely useful and helpful. If you don’t enter tags on your topic, someone else will probably come along and add some for you!

Tags go in the ‘Tags’ field.

Tags should describe what the topic is about. They can be geographic identifiers (“usa”, “china”, “india”), or they can indicate the subject matter (“biology”, “social media”, “history”), or they can indicate the type of topic (“ask”, “introductions”, “casual”).

Tags are hierarchical: there can be sub-tags. For instance, a geographical tag can include the country and the state/province/county. Or a tag for the type of topic can show the sub-type as well. To include a sub-tag in a tag, use a full stop / period (“.”) character between the top-level tag and a sub-level tag. They can go to multiple levels.

For example:

“canada” shows that this topic is about something in the country of Canada.
“canada.qc” shows that this topic is about something in the province of Quebec within the country of Canada.
“canada.qc.montreal” shows that this topic is about something in the city of Montreal in the province of Quebec within the country of Canada.
“ask” shows that this topic is asking a question.
“ask.recommendations” shows that this topic is asking for recommendations.
“ask.survey” shows that this topic is asking for people’s opinions (“best”, “worst”, “favourite”).

Tags can include only letters, numbers, and the space character. No special characters are permitted. “smartphones” and “smart phones” are valid tags; “smart-phones” is not a valid tag.

Tags are not case sensitive: any uppercase letters you enter will be converted to lower case letters.

As you start typing a tag, you will see a list of suggested tags starting with the letter(s) you have typed. This list of suggestions is taken from the most popular tags in the group you are posting to. With each extra letter you type, the list will narrow to match your typing. For example:

When you type “s”, you will see a long list of tags starting with “s”.
When you type “so”, you will see a medium list of tags starting with “so”.
When you type “soc”, you will see a short list of tags starting with “soc”.

You can apply multiple tags to a topic: separate each tag with a comma.

Reference: Topic tags

Reference: Autocomplete for topic tagging is now available

Commenting

Making a comment

There are two types of comment:

Replies to a topic.
Replies to another comment.

To reply to a topic, scroll to the bottom of the page to find the ‘Post a comment’ text box. This is at the bottom of the page by deliberate design: it’s intended to make you read the other comments before adding your own. It reduces duplication: if other people have already said what you want to say, then you can add your vote to their comments. It increases engagement: if you see other interesting comments as you’re scrolling down, you can join in the conversation.

To reply to a comment, click on the ‘Reply’ link just below it.

While writing your comment, you can apply formatting using a variant of Markdown: Text Formatting.

Labelling comments

You can apply labels to other people’s comments (but not your own). These labels affect the sorting and display of those comments.

To apply a label to a comment, click on the ‘Label’ link below the comment, and choose one of the 5 labels:

Exemplary.
Offtopic.
Joke.
Noise.
Malice.

You can apply more than one of these labels to a comment (for example, you might label a comment as “joke” and “noise” if that’s appropriate).

“Exemplary” label

The “Exemplary” label is for recognising excellent comments, which are of high quality and which add something significant to the discussion.

It is only available to users with accounts more than 7 days old. You can’t apply an “Exemplary” label during your first week on Tildes.

You will need to type a brief note when applying an “Exemplary” label to a comment. Your note will be visible to the comment’s author (but noone else). Your note can be as short as “good comment”, or as long as you like. The note is anonymous: the comment author will not know who wrote it (although you can type that information in your note if you want).

After applying an “Exemplary” label to a comment, you must wait 8 hours before being able to apply another “Exemplary” label.

The “Exemplary” label is visible on comments as a cyan stripe on the left side of the post. Only the person who wrote the comment will be able to see the number of times a comment has been labelled “Exemplary” and the accompanying messages from the labellers.

Each “Exemplary” label applied to a comment increases its weighting in vote-based sorting: each “Exemplary” label adds a factor of 1 to the comment’s voting weight.

A comment with 0 “Exemplary” labels will have its vote weight multiplied by 1 + (0 x 1) = 1
A comment with 1 “Exemplary” label will have its vote weight multiplied by 1 + (1 x 1) = 2
A comment with 2 “Exemplary” labels will have its vote weight multiplied by 1 + (2 x 1) = 3

… and so on. The effect of “Exemplary” labels is cumulative: the more “Exemplary” labels a comment has, the higher its voting weight will be.

“Offtopic” label

The “Offtopic” label is for identifying comments which have veered away from the main subject of discussion in a thread. They might be good-quality or bad-quality comments, but they’re about a different subject.

The “Offtopic” label is not visible on comments.

The presence of any “Offtopic” labels on a comment decreases its vote count by -1. The effect of “Offtopic” labels is not cumulative (applying 2 or 3 “Offtopic” labels will still result in a total decrease of -1).

“Joke” label

The “Joke” label is for comments which exist only to make a joke. They’re not adding anything to the discussion, they’re there just to deliver a punchline. The “joke” label should not be applied to an otherwise good comment which happens to include a minor humorous remark, only for comments where humour is the only ingredient.

The “Joke” label is not visible on comments.

The presence of any “Joke” labels on a comment decreases its weighting in vote-based sorting by a factor of 0.5: the vote weight on any comment labelled as a joke will be halved. The effect of “Joke” labels is not cumulative.

“Noise” label

The “Noise” is for comments which make no difference to the discussion. These might include remarks such as “This^” or “Thanks.” or “Good news!” or “This sucks.”

The “Noise” label is not visible on comments.

The presence of any “Noise” labels on a comment decreases its vote count by -2. The effect of “Noise” labels is not cumulative (applying 2 or 3 “Noise” labels will still result in a total decrease of -2).

The presence of any “Noise” labels on a comment also automatically collapse the comment, so that it is hidden (all its child comments will also be hidden). Collapsed comments can be manually expanded and viewed.

“Malice” label

The “Malice” label is for comments which contain negative language. This includes:

Personal attacks on other Tilders.
Bigoted language (such as racism, homophobia, transphobia, misogyny, religious slurs, and so on).
Incitement to violence.
Hate speech.

The “Malice” label is not visible on comments.

Each application of a “Malice” label on any comment will send a notification to the moderator/s, who will review the comment and take appropriate action.

References

Reference: Comment tags now affect sorting, more changes coming

Reference: Many updates to The Feature Formerly Known as Comment Tagging

Reference: Comment labels

Navigating

Viewing links and comments

When you’re viewing the front page, you can click on topics to view the linked item, or to view the comments on the topic.

To open the linked item in a topic (article, video, blog), click on the big bold title. Depending on your user settings, the linked item can open in either a new tab or the current tab.

To open the comments on a topic, click on the small link that says ‘X comments’ below the title. Depending on your user settings, the comments page can open in either a new tab or the current tab.

Sorting comments

When viewing a topic page, you can sort the comments in four ways:

most votes sorts the comments by the highest number of votes. Top-level comments with the most votes appear at the top of the page, and top-level comments with the fewest votes appear at the bottom of the page.
newest first sorts the comments so that the most recent top-level comment is at the top of the page and the oldest top-level comment is at the bottom of the page.
order posted sorts the comments so that the oldest top-level comment is at the top of the page and the most recent top-level comment is at the bottom of the page.
relevance sorts the comments by the highest number of votes, including any effects from comment labels.

Finding new comments

There is a user setting which will allows you to highlight new comments in a thread (comments which have been posted since the last time you looked at the thread). You can find more information about that in the ‘Marking new comments’ section of this guide.

Collapsing replies

At the top of the comments on a topic page, there are two buttons: * Collapse replies * Expand all

If you click on “Collapse replies”, all reply comments will be hidden, leaving only top-level comments visible. You can restore any old comments by clicking on the “+” button on the comment stub.

If you click on “Expand all”, all comments will be restored to normal visibility.

Added buttons to collapse all reply comments and expand all comments

Viewing a group

To view a group on Tildes, go to the front page, and look in the sidebar for the button that says ‘Browse the list of groups’ (at the bottom). The ‘Browse groups’ page lists all groups on Tildes.

If you’re already subscribed to the group, it will appear directly in the sidebar of your front page. Click on the link in the sidebar.

Replying and messaging

Your inbox

Marking notifications as read

Sending messages

Tagging users

You can send a notification to another user and draw their attention to a comment, without replying to one of their topics or comments. To do so, type @username in the comment. /u/username and u/username will also work. This will send a notification to the other user’s inbox. There is no limit on the number of users you can tag in a single comment.

User tags do not work in topics, only in comments.

Reference: Username mentions in comments now send notifications

User settings

Passwords

Two-factor authentication is now available

Selecting a theme

You can now set a default theme for your account (and still override on individual devices if you want)

Opening links

You can choose to always open a page (linked item, comments) in either a new tab or the current tab. This is determined by your user settings.

On your User Settings page, look for a heading that says “Open links in new tabs”. This has three options under it: * Topic links to other websites * Links to text topics and comments * External links in topic, comment, and message text

If you tick the check box next to an option, this will automatically open those items in a new tab every time (if you tick next to “Topic links”, all links will open in a new tab when you click on them). If the the check box is not ticked, those items will open in the current tab every time. You can set each option independently, or all the same.

Reference: User settings are now available for opening links in new tabs

Marking new comments

You can choose to highlight new comments in a thread (comments which have been posted since the last time you looked at the thread). By default, new comments are not marked in any way.

On your User Settings page, look for a heading that says “Configure marking new comments”. Click on this link to open the settings page for marking new comments.

There are two settings here:

Track my last visit to each topic’s comments and mark new comments
Collapse old comments when I return to a topic

If you tick the “Track my last visit to each topic’s comments and mark new comments” option, new comments will be identified in two ways: * On your front page, under each topic, there is a description which says “X comments”. Next to this, an extra description will show “(X new)”, to tell you how many new comments have been posted under that topic since you last viewed it. * In the topic page, new comments will be marked with a red line on their left border.

If you also tick the “Collapse old comments when I return to a topic” option, all old comments will be collapsed, so that only new comments are visible. You can restore any old comments by clicking on the “+” button on the comment stub.

Reference: If you have the “mark new comments” feature enabled, old comments will now be collapsed when returning to a thread

Bookmarks

You are able to save topics and comments for future reading and/or reference. You do this by bookmarking them.

Under every topic and comment, you will see a ‘bookmark’ link. Click on that to save the topic/comment to your bookmarks list.

To find a bookmarked item, go to your user page by clicking on your username at the top of the sidebar on the righthand side of the screen. In the sidebar of your user page, there is a link that says “Bookmarks” under the Misc heading. Click on that to go to your bookmarks list. Alternatively, click on this link.

The bookmarked items are separated into two categories: Topics and Comments. Note that bookmarked items are displayed in the order in which you saved them (not in the order they were posted): the first item you bookmarked is at the bottom of the page, and the last item you bookmarked is at the top of the page.

Reference: "Topics and comments can now be bookmarked (aka “saved”)

User bios

Reference: User bios added: you can write a short bio that will be visible on your user page

Mobile devices

There is no Tildes mobile app, and there is no plan to make an official app for Tildes.

To use Tildes on your tablet or smartphone, simply open your internet browser and navigate to https://tildes.net. The Tildes website will automatically adapt its display settings to fit your screen, whether large or small. Some browsers also allow you to create a shortcut on the device’s home screen, which will take you directly to the website.

Reference: The site is the main mobile interface, not an app