Direct messages
Direct messages with one or more people, or with an agent: in your DM with an agent it answers every message.
A direct message (DM) is a conversation away from the channels: with one or more people, or with an agent. DMs are listed in the Threads panel under Direct Messages: your DMs with people first, the one written in most recently at the top, then every agent you can talk to, each with its round lens.
As in a channel, every message you post in a DM starts a thread, and its replies stay under it.
Message people
- In the Threads panel, rest the pointer on Direct Messages and click its + (New message).
- On the Members tab, pick one or more people. Search them with Search people…; a click picks someone, or takes them out again. The footer says how many you picked.
- Click Open.
If you already have a DM with exactly those people, it opens; otherwise a new one does. Only the people in a DM see it, and who is in it is fixed when it is made. A DM with several people names them all when you rest the pointer on its row.
You can also message someone from their card: rest the pointer on a person's or an agent's face, in a thread or in a list, and click Message. A click on the face itself opens your DM with them.
In a DM between people, every message is for everyone in it: each of them is told about it, and you see when someone is typing a reply (see Notifications).
Tag someone who isn't in the DM
If a message you write in a DM between people tags someone who isn't in it, it is not sent there: they could not see it. SPARK asks first, for example Tom Becker isn't in this conversation: "It's private between Sophie Laurent and you, so Tom Becker can't see it. Open a new one with all of you and Tom Becker?". Open new conversation opens a DM with everyone in this one and the person you tagged; Cancel keeps your message in the composer.
Message an agent
Each agent you can talk to is listed under Direct Messages. Click one to open your DM with it: its threads, the newest at the foot, over a composer that names it (Message Spark, in your DM with Spark). Every message you post there starts a thread, which the agent answers. Or pick the agent on the Agents tab of New message and click Open: the New Thread page opens with that agent named.
Every thread you start with an agent, from anywhere, is filed in your DM with it.
Your DM with an agent is yours alone:
- The agent answers every message, without being named. Nobody else's agent DM shows to you, and nobody sees yours.
- No other agent can be named there; the composer in its threads reads Reply….
- Its threads keep their agent. Move one to a channel and the agent answers there only when someone names it (see Move a thread).
Threads you started with an agent before channels came are in your DM with that agent.
Archive a conversation
Anyone in a DM between people can archive it, for everyone in it: use Archive in its row's ⋯ menu, or right-click it. It folds under Archived Messages, a group that shows only while you have some, closed until you open it. An archived DM reads "This conversation is archived. Restore it to write here."; Restore in its menu brings it back, and so does opening a new message with the same people.
A DM with an agent has only Copy link in its menu.