I noticed a little while ago that Flickr added an "Invite to group" link under the comment boxes. Clicking it loads in a list of groups you are an administrator in, you can choose one and inserts some text into the comment box.

What's interesting is how closely this functionality mirrors this popular greasemonkey script. Now perhaps it's just a total coincidence that the flickr developers had exactly the same idea. But it's much more likely that they saw the script in use, looked at the interface and the feedback of it. Perhaps it's also worth noting that they didn't reuse the group list popup from the toolbar over the image and went for a simple combo box instead, just as the gm script uses.

This looks like a pretty good example of greasemonkey leading the way in improving the usability of an application, prototyping the interface and testing the market. I'm sure flickrs usability team pay a lot of attention to the greasemonkey scripts on the hacks group. I wonder if they'll implement my comment tools?

Labels: flickr, greasemonkey

Flickr Comment Tools is a greasemonkey script that adds a number of editing and image inserting features to the standard comments box on flickr photo pages, discussion pages and flickr mail. Along with removing YUI I've updated a few other things since the first release.

• Streamlined popup code for image chooser
• Added indent and outdent buttons for blockquotes
• Is now compatible with other greasemonkey scripts that add or remove text from comments

Get the new version here, feedback welcome.

Labels: flickr, flickr comment tools, greasemonkey

This is a simple greasemonkey script that gives you a nice familiar rich text editor for the comment boxes on flickr. It will work with comments and group discussions. It also lets you quickly and easily reference one of your own pictures straight off your photostream. You will need greasemonkey and firefox. FlickrCommentsTools.user.js

Labels: flickr, flickr comment tools, greasemonkey