@SearchVoatBot scans posts (submissions and comments; "linker" posts) for links ("crosslinks" ) that refer to other posts on Voat ("linkee" posts), and posts an informational comment ("notification") to the linkee post.

Why?

If someone is talking about my post, somewhere, I'd like to know about it. Also, it might help discourage downvote brigading. (Although, see below for ways to hide the notification).

What's a crosslink?

A crosslink is the url of a Voat post (submission or comment) and might be the url target of a link post, or might appear in the body of a text post, or in a comment. You can include a crosslink by simply pasting the url, eg https://voat.co/v/SearchVoat/3192750, or by using mark-up such as [post description](https://voat.co/v/SearchVoat/3192750) which is displayed like this: post description.

You can find the url in your browser address bar, or by right-clicking on discuss or n comments in a list of submissions, or link below a comment, and selecting Copy Link Location (or the equivalent in your browser).

What does the bot post?

The bot posts a notification comment to the linkee submission, or a reply to the linkee comment, looking something like this:

This submission was linked from this v/whatever submission by @linker.

^{Posted automatically (#12345) by the SearchVoat.co Cross-Link Bot. You can suppress these notifications by appending a forward-slash(/) to your Voat link. More information here. (@linkee: Click here to suppress your crosslink notifications from @linker)}

In the first line of this example, this links back to the linker post.

Who gets notified?

Both the linkee user and the linker user get notified by the notification comment. The linkee user, because they will see a reply to their submission or comment, and the linker user, because they will be pinged in the notification.

I want to link to a post without notifying them

Two ways to accomplish this:

1. On a one-off basis, append a slash to the link. Use e.g. https://voat.co/v/SearchVoat/3192750/ instead of https://voat.co/v/SearchVoat/3192750. The link will still "work" when anyone clicks on it, but the bot will ignore it and won't post a notification.

2. DM me @SearchVoat and ask me to suppress all notifications where you are the (non-anonymous) linker.

I don't want to be notified when someone links to my posts

As I mentioned above, the linkee gets notified when the linker posts a crosslink. This can be a nuisance, particularly if the linkee has blocked the linker. Blocking the linker does not, of course, block @SearchVoatBot, so notifications are still posted.

Three ways to suppress notifications as linkee:

1. Block @SearchVoatBot (but then you'll miss all @SearchVoatBot posts, including e.g. the daily v/VoatStatistics).

2. Follow the link in a notification, e.g. (@linkee: Click here to suppress your crosslink notifications from @linker). That will pre-fill a Send message to the bot. Once received and acknowledged, the bot will not post notifications when @linker links to @linkee's posts. Note however that this won't suppress @linker's posts if they are anonymous. You can, separately, suppress all anonymous linker notifications to your posts by following the equivalent link in the notification for an anonymous linker post.

3. DM me @SearchVoat and ask me to suppress all notifications where you are the (non-anonymous) linkee.

I think that about covers it. Comments, questions, suggestions, objections welcome.