How do I link to a discussion post?

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richardhaggarty
Community Novice

Let's say I want to refer someone to a post that already exists, either in the same discussion or another discussion. Is there a way to do that using the tools? If not, is there a way to find the URL for a given discussion post?

3 Solutions
Stef_retired
Instructure Alumni
Instructure Alumni

richardhaggarty Welcome to the Canvas Community!

You can capture a link to a specific discussion reply by following these steps:

1. Search for the desired post in the discussion forum.

2. The filtered posts will have a "View in Discussion" link at the bottom which includes a permalink to that particular post.

3. Right-click and save the link from the "View in Discussion" link, or click on "View in Discussion" and copy the URL from the address bar.

4. Paste that saved link in your reply to the student.

And, further to the helpful advice from  @kona ‌ and Deactivated user‌, I'll add that if you're looking for a link to a specific post in the Canvas Community (Jive platform), you can click on the date and time of the post; that will yield a URL that goes directly to that post, and you can copy and paste the link from the address bar of your browser. Or, you can right-click on the date and time and select Copy Link Address from the dropdown.

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Hi there, @GwendolynneBarr ...

You can use the following Guide to create a link on any text in your course to a Discussion topic (not a specific reply within the topic).

How do I create hyperlinks to course or group cont... - Instructure Community (canvaslms.com)

On the Guide, look for the section called "Select Course or Group Content".  You'll see that you can click on the arrow next to "Discussions", and all of your discussion topics will display.  Just choose the topic you want, and a link to that topic should be created for you.

I also tested Stefanie's steps (which were from 2017), and I do not see the area she refers to any longer.  So, this may have been removed, but I don't know for certain.  Stefanie has since retired, so we won't be hearing from her in the forums any longer.

Hope this helps a bit!

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ddessauer
Community Participant

I frequently want to do exactly this.

The only method I have been able to find (that still works in 2023), is to have your notifications turned on for 'new reply' and use the link that you receive.

It will have a format like this:

https://institution.instructure.com/courses/77777/discussion_topics/888888?entry_id=9999999#entry-9999999

The blue part of the URL is easy to find if you just need to link to a specific discussion.

But the red text string contains the query parameters for the individual post (the id number) that is required to link directly to a particular comment within the discussion. I don't know of any other way of finding this (any more) other than these notification links.

To complicate this strategy, you don't get notified about your own posts, so if you want to link to something you said yourself, you will need an ally in the discussion who also has notifications turned on and is willing to forward the ID number to you!

I really hope I'm missing something here and someone can tell me the easier way!

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