New Posts

[Dean Hougen]

Can we get two options for the "New Posts" button? One would be "Posts Since Last Visit" (which is what we have now) and the other would be "Unread Posts."

Right now I will come to the forum to do some tiny thing, squeezed in between other matters, then come back in the evening to catch up with the forum for the day. The current "New Posts" button doesn't show me the posts that happened between yesterday evening and my quick visit earlier today, so I have to manually browse the forums, one by one, looking at their dates to make sure I don't miss anything.


Dean

[fishmaven]

Dean,
I think if you log-out after a short visit the cookies are reset. When you come back the forum thinks you've read all the posts that were there at your last visit. If there are NO new posts it will ask you if you want to see the posts of the last 24 hours.
Dan

[fishmaven]

I think Dean is asking for an "unanswered posts" link.
Dan

[freesoul]

I am a member of ACA but can not get into any members only chats, and can not get anybody to replay to my e-mails, such as How to I get some Pungu Maclareni cichlids and I would like to try some volunteer work.

Thanks Freesoul

[Dean Hougen]

Dan,

The forum is quite likely going on time of last visit versus time of post to determine "New Posts" ("Posts Since Last Visit") which is easy for the software to record but not helpful for me to ensure that I see everything. There is a vBulletin setting that allows the forum to record which posts you have actually read and which you haven't in its database. When that setting is turned on, a "Unread Posts" button is very easy to provide to users. I provided the "Unread Posts" functionality on the OKAA forum when I set it up using vBulletin and many of our members commented that they liked that function much better than "Posts Since Last Visit" function (which we had on our old phpBB forum) for exactly the same reason. No one said that they preferred the "Posts Since Last Visit" function, although we could keep it around if some people actually do prefer it.

Note that what I am talking about is NOT an "Unanswered Posts" link. I want to see all posts that I have not read. I don't care if those posts are singletons to which no one has replied or posts to which 100 other members have already provided answers. If I haven't seen them, I want the forum to tell me about them. By "Unread Posts" I mean "Posts I Have Not Read."


Dean

PS. Henry, it looks like you just joined the forum today. It will take a bit of time to verify that you are an ACA member, since our system is not automated in that regard (yet) and I think our membership coordinator is traveling right now. How long ago did you join the ACA? How did you join (in person at an event, remotely through PayPal, etc.)?

[fishmaven]

So when you log-out, resetting the cookies doesn't mark all posts as read? OR, is that another setting they we set automatically too? If "mark the forum as read" is a requirement to properly get a "posts since last visit" list, it'd be nice if we knew that.

I guess, set me up as one of those that's okay with what exists now. If I didn't read it previously, I chose NOT to read it. I don't wish to be reminded of it again and again until I click just to erase the reminder.

On the other hand, an unanswered posts link might be of use to anyone wishing to make sure no one is neglected when they make a post. At the very least a mod should make sure the post is in the right section and area for a proper response, hopefully within the first 24hrs of the post.
Dan

[glaive]

Dean,

There is a reason why most vB forums do not enable the database method. It greatly increases server load. This would be one to bring up with Li.

Henry,

I'll see what i can do to verify your membership tonight.

[Mrfiremouth]

Dean, the current method to achieve your goal is to "Mark All Forums Read" at the end of each session. This way the next time you come to the site only real New Posts will show. It is an excellent habit to form. :)

[Dean Hougen]

Dan, yes, that is a fundamental difference between how we approach the forum. If you didn't read a message when visiting the forum, it was because you chose not to. If I didn't read a message when visiting the forum, it was because I didn't have time right at that moment but I would like to come back to it later. You see, I read every message and respond to those about which I feel I have something worthwhile to say. I actually see this as one of my responsibilities as a BOT member and a member of the web team. When the forum makes it hard for me to figure out which messages I have read and which I haven't, it wastes a lot of my time.

In fact, the current setup often puts me in a bind. There are times I would like to pop in to the forum and deal with a single message (maybe I get an email from Mo asking me to look at and comment on something urgent for the BOT) and it would only take 10 minutes to do that, so I would love to jump in a do it the first time I have 10 free minutes. However, if I do that, when I come back to the forum at night, a bunch of unread messages will not show up as new and I will have to manually go through the forums, looking at each section to see when the last post was made in that section, click on that section and manually look at each topic in that section, etc. Gad, what a waste of effort. Or I could just miss some messages and hope that they were not important. Fortunately, there is a relatively easy fix, which I have just suggested.

Alex, you are right that it does increase the server load. This is one of the factors I considered before setting it up this way on the OKAA forum. However, I did some back of the envelope calculations and decided that the load increase would actually be imperceptible. Maybe if we had many orders of magnitude more registered users, messages per day, visits per user, etc., and the site were hosted from a smart phone, then I would be concerned. As it is, I don't think there is anything to worry about now and never will be in the future (as computing power increases will continue to greatly outpace the growth of the ACA forums).

Rich, what you describe is very much NOT what I want. In fact, that is pretty much the opposite of what I want. I do not want to have the system pretend that unread messages have been read and hide them from me. I want the system to acknowledge that unread messages really are unread and show them to me.



Dean

[fishmaven]

Dean,
As soon as you stated you wanted to read EACH of the posts, I got it.

When I was a mod I too wanted to read each of the posts. Now that I'm not a mod I don't feel I have to. I agree, it's important for someone to do it. Thank you for taking that on.

I don't know if the option you want can be isolated to just the moderators or if it would have to be offered site wide. If it could be offered to mods they could just add you to the list.
Dan

[Lisachromis]

I deal with this issue in an easier manner. If things are hectic and I cannot give the proper time to any particular forum, I go to the sections that I am most interested in and read any of the posts with new replies (or new posts). When I am done with the forum, I click mark all read. That way I don't have any posts showing as unread when I don't want to deal with them.

[bobrfish]

I am a member of ACA but can not get into any members only chats, and can not get anybody to replay to my e-mails, such as How to I get some Pungu Maclareni cichlids and I would like to try some volunteer work.

Thanks Freesoul
Contact membership coordinator to ensure your membership was recieved and credited to you and not someone else. Membership coordinator is Claudia Dickinson
POB 5078, Montauk, NY 11954. 631-668-5125.
IvyRose@optonline.net (IvyRose@optonline.net) | Forum Name : Claudia (http://www.cichlid.org/forums/member.php?u=4)


Place a want ad for P. maclareni once your membership is active.

[glaive]

cc me on that email and I'll see what I can do to get the info from someone. Claudia is still in Africa I believe.

[Dean Hougen]

Lisa,

Thanks for your suggestion. Unfortunately, your suggestion (which is the same as Rich's), is the opposite of what I want to do. When I am busy, I want to deal with a few time-critical posts, then come back later to find the rest marked as UNread. Marking them as read does not achieve this.

The only real solution to this is the one I proposed previously and Alex has informed me that I need to contact Li for that change, so I will do so.


Dean