The user interface of the threaded discussion areas has been carefully designed to encourage thoughtful, focused, deep knowledge building. The note that is currently being read is at the top of the screen. With it are a number of buttons for building further knowledge, such as adding a reply to this note. The background color of this part of the display corresponds to the note's thinking type. The different thinking types are described on a help page reached with the Thinking type descriptions button; the corresponding background colors can be seen there. Below the current note is a display of all other notes entered in the same knowledge building area. The display of the content of these notes can be toggled on and off with the View/Messages menu item. The notes can be displayed as indented threads, indicating which notes reply to which other notes. Alternatively, the notes can be sorted by author, date or thinking type. Sorting by author shows quickly who is contributing the most; by date shows the order in which ideas were written; by thinking type indicates which parts of the knowledge building process have or have not been emphasized so far.

To write a reply to the current note, select the thinking type of your reply in the menu of the Reply to this note. This will show you a form where you can specify the subject and the message of your reply. Below the text area you will see the note to which you are replying.