Hi !
So, when creating a post with tags on a Piefed instance (feddit.fr), I noticed that the results shown in Mastodon by searching the tags are not always the same: some posts are not shown with an excerpt in Mastodon, when some others do have an excerpt (along with a Read More link).
I would like to know how can one ensure that the excerpt appears, because a blank message with only a link is not great to Mastodon viewers, especially when the posts are short fictions.
Exemples
You can see 2 different behaviours here, where posts appear differently in a Mastodon timeline. This is before clicking on them, and they used the same hashtag (#microfiction):
- This one has no excerpt:
(The post is here: https://feddit.fr/c/microfictions/p/261665/nouveau-date )
- This one has an excerpt (with markdown formatting even!)
(The post is here: https://piefed.social/c/playground/p/1619496/ligne-de-titre-premiere-ligne-du-message-sans-separation-par-une-ligne-vide )
Can someone point me to precise documentation or tell me if this just need improvement in a future release ? Thanks !
EDIT: I tried to edit one of the posts that weren't properly getting an excerpt, and after publishing my change (one line break at the end), I noticed that following my editing it does NOW have an excerpt when viewed in Mastodon. Strange thin is it doesn't have a link to the post, only a "Read More" link, but the link to the feddit.fr post is linked in the full message after you click Read More:
https://feddit.fr/c/microfictions/p/261665/nouveau-date
EDIT 2: Now the link below the excerpt has arrived, it was just a matter of time.