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1. Embed this notice
   FediTips has moved! (feditips@mstdn.social)'s status on Sunday, 28-Aug-2022 03:18:12 JST FediTips has moved!

   Looks like a lot ofpeople are confused/annoyed by Mastodon and many other Fediverse platforms not backfilling old posts when an account is followed.

   This complete lack of backfilling means that many new accounts or those with few followers may appear completely blank, even if they've posted lots of interesting stuff.

   If you agree and think Mastodon should backfill at least some posts when people follow an account, please give this issue a thumbs up:

   https://github.com/mastodon/mastodon/issues/34

   If you're not comfortable using github, let me know and I can try to post on your behalf.

   #Mastodon #Fediverse #Backfilling

   • Embed this notice
     FediTips has moved! (feditips@mstdn.social)'s status on Sunday, 28-Aug-2022 03:25:33 JST FediTips has moved!

     in reply to

     • ecdysis

     @changeable

     If you backfilled all posts from a prolific long-running account (potentially thousands of posts), that could use a lot of pointless resources.

     But backfilling for example the last five posts wouldn't use much resources at all.

     For me, the main aim of backfilling is not to leave any profile blank after people have followed it, especially new profiles that may have posted their best stuff as first posts.

   • Embed this notice
     ecdysis (changeable@social.linux.pizza)'s status on Sunday, 28-Aug-2022 03:25:35 JST ecdysis

     in reply to

     @feditips

     For the uninitiated, are there any downsides to doing that? I mean, was it a philosophical decision not to do it in the first place or just a technical / administrative choice?

   • Embed this notice
     FediTips has moved! (feditips@mstdn.social)'s status on Sunday, 28-Aug-2022 03:40:33 JST FediTips has moved!

     in reply to

     • ecdysis
     • Talya (she/her)

     @changeable @Yuvalne

     Well, you can already manually backfill one post at a time if you copy-paste the URL of a post into the search box on your server.

     For example, if you copy paste the URL of a PeerTube video in a search box on Mastodon, that video will become visible to that server (if it wasn't already).

     There's no limit on manual backfilling as far as I know. It's only a question of what kind of automatic backfilling there could be, because most don't want to manually backfill posts one at a time.

   • Embed this notice
     ecdysis (changeable@social.linux.pizza)'s status on Sunday, 28-Aug-2022 03:40:35 JST ecdysis

     in reply to

     • Talya (she/her)

     @feditips
     Ah. Got it, thanks.

     If you chose to backfill up to a capped limit, say ten or twenty posts, would it be possible to have a means for users to get to older posts if they wished (like a More... link), or would that effectively just be the same thing as backfilling all?

     Also, I second @Yuvalne 's suggestion.

   • Embed this notice
     FediTips has moved! (feditips@mstdn.social)'s status on Sunday, 28-Aug-2022 03:50:28 JST FediTips has moved!

     in reply to

     • Sophie Jane

     @ghost_bird

     That makes total sense, backfilling everything an account has ever posted, even if it's thousands of posts, would be a bad idea especially for smaller instances.

     But if it was just backfilling a small number of posts would that be ok?

     Like, backfilling 5-10 posts when you follow someone?

     Or if there was an option for the instance owner to set how much backfilling there is, so they could adjust it according to their available resources?

   • Embed this notice
     Sophie Jane (ghost_bird@mythago.space)'s status on Sunday, 28-Aug-2022 03:50:30 JST Sophie Jane

     in reply to

     @feditips Going to go against the grain here and say I’m pretty pleased not to have my feed choked with re-posted “backfill” whenever there’s a big migration. Not to mention what it would do to performance on my small single-user instance

   • Embed this notice
     FediTips has moved! (feditips@mstdn.social)'s status on Sunday, 28-Aug-2022 03:53:31 JST FediTips has moved!

     in reply to

     • Sophie Jane

     @ghost_bird

     So, some kind of admin control for how much backfilling happens would be the best option?

   • Embed this notice
     Sophie Jane (ghost_bird@mythago.space)'s status on Sunday, 28-Aug-2022 03:53:32 JST Sophie Jane

     in reply to

     @feditips I’d be wary - multiply that 5-10 posts by, say, 20 accounts I follow migrating and it’s still a lot of repetition

   • Embed this notice
     FediTips has moved! (feditips@mstdn.social)'s status on Sunday, 28-Aug-2022 04:07:10 JST FediTips has moved!

     in reply to

     • Sophie Jane

     @ghost_bird

     I've added a post about this in the issue.

   • Embed this notice
     Sophie Jane (ghost_bird@mythago.space)'s status on Sunday, 28-Aug-2022 04:07:12 JST Sophie Jane

     in reply to

     @feditips As long as backfilling’s off by default and I have the ability to filter backfill from my end, I guess? Otherwise it’s not going to make much difference

   • Embed this notice
     FediTips has moved! (feditips@mstdn.social)'s status on Sunday, 28-Aug-2022 05:27:55 JST FediTips has moved!

     in reply to

     • Jan Wildeboer 😷:krulorange:

     @jwildeboer

     It's a good point for resources, but the "original profile" link is sort of confusing as it takes people to another server and they end up having to do interactions remotely.

     It might be easier to understand if they could see something within the server they're on now? Where they don't have to do remote interactions?

   • Embed this notice
     Jan Wildeboer 😷:krulorange: (jwildeboer@social.wildeboer.net)'s status on Sunday, 28-Aug-2022 05:27:57 JST Jan Wildeboer 😷:krulorange:

     in reply to

     @feditips IIRC pinned tweets are backfilled now. And to avoid needless traffic, that grows exponentially (that's one of the drawbacks of decentralised/federated approaches), a far simpler solution would be to prominently place the "Browse more on the original profiler" link more prominent on the top.

   • Embed this notice
     FediTips has moved! (feditips@mstdn.social)'s status on Sunday, 28-Aug-2022 05:29:24 JST FediTips has moved!

     in reply to

     • Marius DAVID

     @marius851000

     I'm not personally suggesting backfilling hundreds of messages, but just having at least something backfilled. Even backfilling one post would be better than leaving followed profiles blank?

   • Embed this notice
     Marius DAVID (marius851000@mastodon.mariusdavid.fr)'s status on Sunday, 28-Aug-2022 05:29:28 JST Marius DAVID

     in reply to

     @feditips
     Are you aware of the performance cost of this? Backfilling a few hundreds message doesn't seems to be costly, in particular on single user instances, as they would be performed only occasionally.

     I really appreciate the experience of backfilling in Synapse. (althought I'm not sure if it either try to backfill on the fly or if it sync the whole discussion in background after initial sync, which include the 20 last messages)

   • Embed this notice
     FediTips has moved! (feditips@mstdn.social)'s status on Sunday, 28-Aug-2022 05:30:48 JST FediTips has moved!

     in reply to

     • ecdysis
     • mergerg

     @mergerg @changeable

     By the way, just to be clear, this wouldn't be for all accounts, only for accounts which someone on your server follows.

   • Embed this notice
     mergerg@tech.lgbt's status on Sunday, 28-Aug-2022 05:30:52 JST mergerg

     in reply to

     • ecdysis

     @changeable @feditips well there's definitely a downside to having the posts in the first place, because getting posts from all accounts on all servers you federate with would be way too many resources used for something that might not benefit the experience of people on your server
     But, as OP said, backfilling the most recent posts wouldn't be resource extensive
     And neither would backfilling pinned posts, which I believe they should do

   • Embed this notice
     FediTips has moved! (feditips@mstdn.social)'s status on Sunday, 28-Aug-2022 05:33:20 JST FediTips has moved!

     in reply to

     • Jan Wildeboer 😷:krulorange:

     @jwildeboer

     I totally agree, I do look at remote profiles myself, but I've noticed novice users really don't like it.

     They tend to get confused when they suddenly have to start entering their password again, when the server may look completely different (e.g. on a PeerTube or PixelFed account).

     Just seems easier for new users if everything seems to happen seamlessly within their server, without any more logins required?

     But yes there's no perfect solution for this because even a backfill would only give a limited view compared to the remote copy.

   • Embed this notice
     Jan Wildeboer 😷:krulorange: (jwildeboer@social.wildeboer.net)'s status on Sunday, 28-Aug-2022 05:33:21 JST Jan Wildeboer 😷:krulorange:

     in reply to

     @feditips That's quite a philosophical question ;) My approach would the other way round. That person is on another instance for a reason, so the profile on that instance is more relevant than the local incomplete copy :)

   • Embed this notice
     FediTips has moved! (feditips@mstdn.social)'s status on Sunday, 28-Aug-2022 18:58:14 JST FediTips has moved!

     in reply to

     • mld :archlinux:

     @mld

     It's not an all or nothing situation.

     Obviously backfilling thousands of posts going back years would be a waste of resources.

     But backfilling one old post would prevent completely empty profiles.

     Maybe the instance admin could have a control where it says how much backfilling is allowed (including zero)?

   • Embed this notice
     mld :archlinux: (mld@norden.social)'s status on Sunday, 28-Aug-2022 18:58:16 JST mld :archlinux:

     in reply to

     @feditips

     Don't know, sounds like both a lot of bloating the existing TL and technically a huge waste of bandwidth to me (especially having accounts with a lot of pictures in mind)...

     I see there's demand for users coming from different platforms, but make it opt-in when implementing it.

   • Embed this notice
     swansinflight :antiverified: (swansinflight@mastodon.nz)'s status on Sunday, 28-Aug-2022 19:14:49 JST swansinflight :antiverified:

     in reply to

     @feditips I think this adds unnecessary load/traffic. Perhaps lazy loading over time... but social media posts are ephemeral really so meh.

   • Embed this notice
     FediTips has moved! (feditips@mstdn.social)'s status on Sunday, 28-Aug-2022 19:14:49 JST FediTips has moved!

     in reply to

     • swansinflight :antiverified:

     @swansinflight

     Backfilling doesn't necessarily mean having to backfill everything an account has ever posted. It can just be the last five posts (for example).

     This would prevent people seeing blank profiles from newer servers.

     It should be up to server admins to decide how much backfilling there is, rather than preventing backfilling completely.

   • Embed this notice
     FediTips has moved! (feditips@mstdn.social)'s status on Monday, 29-Aug-2022 00:10:55 JST FediTips has moved!

     in reply to

     • SapphireDrew

     @SapphireDrew

     Backfilling is not a general fedi issue, you can already backfill posts manually by copy pasting the URL of a missing post into the search box on your server.

     It should be possible to automate this process.

     As for the age of issues, the follow hashtags issue was opened in 2017 and has just been added to Mastodon (you can try it already on mastodon.online and it will be in next general release). Old issue doesn't mean "won't fix".

   • Embed this notice
     SapphireDrew (sapphiredrew@mastodon.online)'s status on Monday, 29-Aug-2022 00:10:56 JST SapphireDrew

     in reply to

     @feditips Seeing as the issue has been open for 6 years, I can't but feel discouraged about the prospects of it ever being resolved. Plus if it's a fedi issue and not just a Mastodon issue, then addressing it here won't solve the root of the problem which is probably API level (ActivityPub) and should just allow backfilling, and the depth of which each profile is backfilled, to be controlled by the instance owner.