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Adding a comment (topic view)

You can add a comment to a topic to communicate information about that topic to the content author.

Before you begin

This procedure assumes that a topic is open

You must have the appropriate group permissions, which govern the actions that you can perform in commenting.

About this task

Comments become associated with inline text (or graphics) using the cid (or id) attribute, which is attached to the element or an ancestor element of the selected text, graphic, or multimedia object. If the DITA element associated with the text selection does not contain this attribute, the comment is created as a topic-level comment. If the comment spans multiple elements, only the first ancestor of the selected elements is used.

You can comment on a conref (content cross reference) in a topic. The comment follows only the topic to which the comment was made; it does not affect other topics that may include that same conref.

Procedure

  1. With a topic open, do one of the following to create a comment:
    Comment TypeAction
    Topic-levelIn the Comments pane, to the right of an open topic, click Add Comment.
    Inline

    (text only)

    Drag across the content in the topic to select that content. When the Add Comment balloon appears, click it.

    The content you select can contain text, graphics, tables, table cells, and multimedia objects. Text-only selections can span multiple block-level elements. If you select text and graphics together, only the highlighted text appears in the Comments pane.

    Inline

    (Graphics/Multimedia)

    Hover over the image or multimedia object. When the Add Comment balloon appears, click it. The graphic is selected (a thick border appears around it) and the new comment opens in the comments pane.

    The value of the title or alt attributes appears in the comments pane.

  2. In the Post a comment field that appears, enter your comment.
  3. Click Post (or press Enter) to add the comment.

    When the comment is added, it appears in all subsequent revisions of the topic.

    The initial comment status is New, and the comment appears at the top of the list.

    Inline comments are located relative to the position in the topic. If there are multiple inline comments on the same element, the most recent one appears at the top.

    The Comments indicator, located in the upper right of the topic, indicates the total number of comments for the topic. Replies are not counted.