Solution validation: commenting on multiple lines in a diff
Problem
Commenting on a range of lines is a common desire when feedback relates to more than a single line. It is also a favorite feature of customers who previously used Phabricator, Crucible and the like.
The UX and frontend needs to be planned in quite some detail to make sure this can be implemented in a comfortable way.
Proposal
Design interactive mockups for:
- interaction of leaving multi-line comments
- overlapping multi-line comments
- multi-line comments in combination with multi-line suggestions
Conduct user tests to validate discoverability, and usability of the proposed solution.
Competition
| Name | Comment | Docs | Screenshot/Video |
|---|---|---|---|
| GitHub | Click-and-drag, scrolls view. Doesn't allow commenting over collapsed regions. Doesn't highlight the comment range when viewing, but indicates range in text at top of comment. Comments are attached to the bottom of the range. | Docs |
Usage Onboarding 
|
| Gerrit | Select a code block or line with mouse or keyboard and press 'c' or click on the popup comment icon. Allows commenting over collapsed regions. Comments are attached to the bottom of the range. Highlights comment range when hovering. | Docs |  |
| Phabricator | Click-and-drag, scrolls view. Comments are attached to the bottom of the range. Highlights comment range when hovering. | Docs |  |
| Crucible | Click-and-drag, scrolls view. Highlights comment range when hovering. | Docs | |
| Review board | Click-and-drag, scrolls view. Allows commenting over collapsed regions. Comments are attached to the top of the range. New comments made on the 1st line of an existing multi-line comment will apply to the whole range of the existing comment. | Docs |  |
| Azure DevOps | Not supported | ||
| Bitbucket | Not supported | ||
| Reviewable | Not supported |
Links / references
Edited by Pedro Moreira da Silva