Need input on Archives folder(s)

[Carol/Bonadie]

Over in the "who's missing" folder we were talking about archiving posts, and I've been thinking about how that might be done. Unfortunately the moderators cannot move individual posts out of topics, only whole topics. So the idea of moving posts once the topic went multi-page won't work.

I thought it would be good to move a topic to the archives once it had been inactive for a period of time, say 2 or 3 months.

Now here's the question I need input on. I can move topics into a folder but i can't organize them within the folder. So we have two choices it seems to me. One is to have one Archives folder, and the moderators just move stuff into it as we notice topics are inactive. This means they won't be sorted in any way, a Happy Birthday Carol topic might be next to an Ann's Monthly Read topic which might be next to a Spoiler Talk on Shutter Island topic, for example. Don't know if anyone cares, I would imagine people would be searching to find anything there in any event.

The other choice is to create several folders, maybe even duplicating each current folder with its own Archive folder. So Archive-Monthly Reads, Archive Spoiler Talk, etc. I can move folders around, so it would be easy to group these at the bottom of the list. There is just the potential to have lots of Archive folders over time, but maybe not.

Thoughts? If we are undecided I can always start out with one Archives folder and then break it out if it gets too confusing.

[Sherry]

let's try one folder and see what happens. seems that it would be easier for you! if it gets too cumbersome, it can always be modified, right?

[Ann]

Carol:
I agree with the idea of starting with one archive folder and moving topics over when they are inactive. Perhaps we can just try to start new threads for JF NR or other popular threads that get heavy which will encourage us to migrate and make the older ones ready for archiving. The good news is that the archived posts are still just as visible and searchable.

Sherry wrote: "let's try one folder and see what happens. seems that it would be easier for you! if it gets too cumbersome, it can always be modified, right?"

[Dan in AZ]

One folder to start sounds good. In the future, can a year be added so that we could have, say, a JF NR - 2009? Or a Happy Birthday - 2009? At least this would break it down somewhat. It's not that big a deal if you just click on unread topics, but if you're looking for some specific post, I'm sure it will eventually become unweildly. Dan/AZ

[Ann]

That's a good idea, Dan. - Carol can we change the topic name of a thread that is already started to add an identifier like the year or is it only what is originally created as the name?

Daniel wrote: "One folder to start sounds good. In the future, can a year be added so that we could have, say, a JF NR - 2009? Or a Happy Birthday - 2009? At least this would break it down somewhat..."

[Donnajo]

Or even it might be good if the busy threads if they can be divide as 1/2 a year.

[Carol/Bonadie]

Ann wrote: "That's a good idea, Dan. - Carol can we change the topic name of a thread that is already started to add an identifier like the year or is it only what is originally created as the name?

..."

Ann, the moderator can change the name of a thread. I did this very thing on Gail's Upcoming releases threads, adding "2009" to the month. We just can't do any editing or moving of responses, we can only delete them (which we've agreed we would not do). I think Dan's suggestion is a good one.