What would be the simplest way to enable visiitors’ comments under a published page on bss.design?
My use case would benefit from enabling just the most basic feature of commenting.
I publish a draft of my web novel on bss.design, then I allow a few friends with passcodes to input their feedback on the pages.
I don’t need much, if they could copy words onto the textbox and write their own opinion that would be great.
Probably something like https://disqus.com/ could work on bss, there is a free (ad based I think) option if you scroll down the pricing page
What about the sticky notes-like thing on the sidebar like what you’d find on Google Docs? I’m curious to know if it is difficult to allow a visitor to select a few words on my page and then leave their criticism on a popup sticky note like that.
It would be possible, but not on the bss.design self hosting as it would need access to a database and a backend of some sort to store the comments and then display them
I did a quick search and I found out about this on page annotation tool:
There are some paid tools as well with only 15 days of trial, but this one is free, not sure it works, or how it works.
Try also: Get started. : Hypothesis
But for simple comments you can try a git based:
Down side is that your users need to use a GitHub account to comment.
I have a client also that is wanting comment blocks for her books. I’ve looked all over the place for good information on how to put one on a static site, but man it’s like pulling teeth to get something for a site that isn’t wordpress.
Has anyone implemented one on a static site that’s willing to share? I need something that can handle multiple boxes on one page if possible, if not well then her books are getting separate pages lol.
I looked over Disqus which seems to be the obvious choice, but implementation documentation is awful for static sites.
Thanks for any assistance anyone can give on this.
To add disqus to a static site is as easy as adding a div with the Id of diqus_thread and adding a few lines of js.
When you are logged in to disqus look for “Universal Code”, it will appear under the list of platforms
Hmm maybe I’m reading their instructions wrong then? It all sounds like it’s having one link show up on the page, whereas I need it to be a commenting setup so people can comment on her books.
It tells you to get the link to the comment and that’s where it loses me. Lemme go back and read it again lol,
I use Disqus on a number of sites. It’s not that bad you will end up putting something like this in your code for the pages you want it to show up on.
If these pages are static you will have to add this.page.url and this.page.identifier on each page (or modify the javascript to grab the info for you). In the example here this is done when Pelican generates the page.
<div id="disqus_thread" class="py-5"></div>
<script>
/**
* RECOMMENDED CONFIGURATION VARIABLES: EDIT AND UNCOMMENT THE SECTION BELOW TO INSERT DYNAMIC VALUES FROM
YOUR PLATFORM OR CMS.
* LEARN WHY DEFINING THESE VARIABLES IS IMPORTANT:
https://disqus.com/admin/universalcode/#configuration-variables*/
var disqus_config = function () {
// Replace PAGE_URL with your page's canonical URL variable
this.page.url = '{{SITEURL}}/{{article.url}}';
// Replace PAGE_IDENTIFIER with your page's unique identifier variable
this.page.identifier = '{{article.url}}';
};
(function () { // DON'T EDIT BELOW THIS LINE
var d = document,
s = d.createElement('script');
s.src = 'https://{{DISQUS_SITENAME}}.disqus.com/embed.js';
s.setAttribute('data-timestamp', +new Date());
(d.head || d.body).appendChild(s);
})();
</script>
Color me stupid today lol *well most days where js is concerned lol). I understand most of “how to put it into the page”, but what I don’t understand is what it wants for the URL and Identifyer. The URL I’m assuming would be the full URL to the page itself? If so that’s easy enough, or the relative one which is fine too, but I’m not sure which it wants.
I have no idea what it wants for a Page Identifier variable.
Sorry for so naive about this stuff, but javascript and it’s siblings have never been something I grasped all to well. One of those things I’ve told myself for years now that I was going to tackle, but …
Thanks much for your help too @apowell656, most appreciated!
The page identifier can be anything unique. I use the page url for simplicity because they will always be unique.
The URL of course is the one for that page - https://example.com/example-page
Ah ok, I’ll see what I can do then, thanks much for your input!
You have told me that you can code, now you’re saying this:
but javascript and it’s siblings have never been something I grasped all to well
What happened Jo?
I did check the documentation of Disqus and everything is explained there clearly, lol.
I actually making 4fun small “miniblog” project in bss, and will showcase it prolly tomorrow to show that nothing like comments arent hard to implement at all in bss.
Code HTML, CSS and Sass @dickykreedz , but definitely not JS in any way. I can visualize what a script might do, but to edit or create one, nope.
Oh bruv, I thought that you meant “coding” as a coding in programming languages, no writing css or html D:
Hmmm, you’re not bored of making static websites for that long? At certain point I decided that I have to learn js cause I was bored of the lack of functionality in my projects, nowdays I’m capable of something else than just a static website.
I can’t thank you guys enough. I was totally overthinking it all. It’s working! And now I can move on to other things lol. Thanks!
@dickykreedz Nah I’m good, at my age the fact I can do all I’m doing still is just fine by me! lol. Besides there are so many people that share their javascripts and such all over the internet, it’s usually not hard to find something I need. Usually I end up with maybe a question or so trying to fine tune something or missed something to get it to work, but people here have been super helpful in that situation so I think I’ll give my poor brain a pass on learning it for now. Still working with the Sass and getting that down yet and loving it so it’s all good. 
U can dm me for any js related questions if u want to also if ure still working with sass etc i highly recommending checking subgrid for components like cards etc, it gives amazing results, its not really sass related, but css related altho its cool option in grid still isnt fully supported cause its supported in firefox and safari browsers, but it could be implemented pretty soon to other web browsers!
GL with other things!
Thanks I’ll look into that, I’ve been working with Grid a little bit more lately so ways of using it are always helpful! Thanks for your offer for help as well, we’ll hope I don’t need it from you or others for a while now LOL. 
@jo-r I really recommend this guy on youtube. He takes you through every step at a workable pace and doesn’t assume that you know everything already. I’ve not watched any of his Javascript playlists but if they are as good as some of his other stuff then a great place to start.
P.S. you might have to get used to his accent
Thanks @richards I’ll give it a go and see how it works out. I have done tutorials with Net Ninja before so no need to get used to the accent lol.