SharePoint 2013: Discussion Board reply Alerts

Question

I'm wondering if there is a way to set up an alert that lets me know if someone has added a reply to one MY posts on a discussion board.

I can set alerts for the discussion board in general (new item added, item modified, etc), but can't seem to find a way to do this.

Is there an OOTB solution for this? If not, can I configure a workflow instead?

Note: I'm looking to avoid using Event Receivers if possible.

Answer 1

I thought there may not be an easy way to do this seeing that you didn't get a response but have now done this myself and it's not too bad. Hopefully you're aware of SharePoint Designer and Workflows? Basically you want to create a workflow following these steps:

1. Add an Action for Send an Email and click on the "These Users" link
2. Click on the address book to the right of the To field
3. Select "Workflow Lookup for a User" in the list and click Add
4. In the "Field from source" dropdown select "Created By" and in "Return field as" select "Email Address", click OK twice
5. Specify a chose Subject and in the body you can perhaps add in the URL to the item bu clicking on "Add of Change Lookup" and in Field choosing "Encoded Absolute URL" and clicking OK. Of course you're welcome to customise the email further. Click OK
6. Click the Workflow settings button (top-right) and in Start Options select "Start Workflow automatically when an item is changed"
7. Hit Save and Publish (top-left)

That should do it, good luck!

Answer 2

Wasn't this an OOB feature of SP 2013? I remember receiving an email once someone added a reply to one of my posts (might have been only when I marked it as a question, though).

I'm missing this in SP 2016, actually.