Discuss a document

About Web discussions

The Web Discussions feature enables anyone with discussion permissions to attach comments to a Web page or any document that can be opened with a browser. Comments appear with the document but are stored on a discussion server. The discussions are threaded. 

Note   The term Web page is used generically here to refer to any file you are viewing with a browser.

Anyone reviewing your Web page can use the Web Discussions toolbar to view and reply to any discussion. The Web Discussions toolbar is available in Microsoft Internet Explorer (4.0 or later) to users of a SharePoint Team Services-compatible client program, such as Microsoft Office 2000 and later.

Discuss a whole page or a paragraph

You can discuss the whole page, using general discussions, or insert comments in a particular part of a page, using inline discussions.

• General discussions   When you discuss a page in general, discussion comments appear in a Discussion pane at the bottom of the window. If the page you are discussing is a frames page, the Enter Discussion Text dialog box presents a list of the frames so that you can specify which frame a discussion refers to.

• Inline discussions   When you use inline discussions, discussion insertion markers appear at the end of every paragraph consisting of more than 30 characters, in every table cell that contains more than 5 characters, and at the end of every graphic that has a height or width of at least 30 pixels. These insertion markers indicate where you can start a discussion.

  Note   For pages that you view in a browser, inline discussions are available only in HTML-formatted files.

Show or hide discussion information

You can filter discussionsfor example, view comments that are from a particular person or posted on a particular date. You can also show or hide discussion information so that you can focus only on the information you want to see:

• Show and hide individual discussion comments or entire discussions.

• Show and hide the Discussion pane.

• Drag the top border of the Discussion pane to make it larger or smaller.

• Close a discussion once the issues have been resolved. The discussion is not deleted; you can choose to view closed discussions, and you can reopen a closed discussion.

• Show or hide the subject, user name, or other header information.

  Note   Discussion header information includes two names for each participant: Display name and User name. Display name is the name that participants set in a client program, such as Office programs; User name is the logon name that a system administrator sets.

Storage of discussions

When you add discussion comments to a Web page, your text is stored in a database on a discussion server. The Web page you are discussing may or may not be located on the same computer as the discussion server where your comments are stored in fact, the page you are discussing can be anywhere on your LAN or the Internet.

If the page you are discussing is located on a discussion server, your discussion comments are automatically stored on that server. However, you can override this behavior by specifying a particular server to use for all your discussions. You may need to switch to a different discussion server to view discussions that someone else creates.

You can use the Discussion Boards page as entry point for using the Web Discussions feature.

1. On thetop link bar, click Discussion Boards.

2. On the Discussion Boards page, click Discuss a Document.

3. In the Document URL box, type the Web address of the document you want to discuss, and then click Discuss.

4. Do one of the following, depending on which Web browser and client program you have.

   SharePoint Team Services-compatible client program, such as Microsoft Office XP or later, using Microsoft Internet Explorer 4.0 or later

   • Use the Web Discussions toolbar to add discussion comments.

   Another client program, such as an earlier version of Office or no installation of Office, or another Web browser

   1. In the frame at the bottom of the Web browser window, do any of the following.

      Add a discussion comment

      1. Click Insert Discussion.

      2. Type the subject and body of the comment in the Discussion subject and Discussion text boxes.

      Reply to a comment

      1. At the end of the comment, click Reply .

      2. Type your reply in the Discussion text box.

      Edit your comment

      1. At the end of the comment, click Edit .

      2. Edit the subject and body of the comment in the Discussion subject and Discussion text boxes.

      Delete your comment

      • At the end of the comment, click Delete .

      Close a discussion or reactivate a closed comment

      Do one of the following:

      • To close a discussion comment, at the end of the discussion comment, click Close .

      • To close the entire discussion, at the end of a comment in the thread you want to close, click Close All .

      • To reactivate a closed comment, at the end of the closed comment, click Activate.  

      Show or hide discussions

      1. Click View.

      2. Do one of the following:

         • To show or hide header information in discussions, select or clear the check boxes for the information you want to show or hide.

         • To show or hide closed discussions, select or clear the Show closed discussions check box.

      Filter discussion comments by person and by time frame

      1. Click Filter.

      2. In the Created by box, select the name of the person whose comments you want to read.

      3. In the Creation time box, select the time frame you want.

   2. When you are finished using Web Discussions, click Close.

      Note   You can use your the Back button in your Web browser to reopen the Web Discussion frame.