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"New Posts" idea

Chuck(G)

Chuck(G)

25k Member
Joined
Jan 11, 2007
Messages
44,458
Location
Pacific Northwest, USA
I'm still not getting along with the "New Posts" feature; I'm still losing track of what I've read and haven't.

Would it be possible to disable the "expiration time" feature of the new post finder (optionally) and allow me to dismiss the new posts manually by using the "Mark Forums Read" button?
 
If you're talking about the "What's New" button, I think you can search all new posts made in the past 24 hours. I would like to dismiss posts that I have already read too so I can only view newly made posts. I agree with everything. Wonder what Erik thinks??
 
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I'd love a bit longer expiration on that setting too although that's more of a personal preference. Wonder if that COULD be under personal settings? Another way to also view threads you've responded too is under Forum->Quick Links->Subscribed Threads. Any time you reply to a thread you "subscribe" to it (that's the little green blot you see in the thread summary). It'll at least show you the last update if you want to view them that way.
 
For me the problem would be solved by not clearing the cookies when I log out since I only log in to post then log right back out so I can see all the posts again.
 
There may be a way, but, I haven't found it yet, to prevent getting timed out when I'm replying to a post.

A number of times, when replying to a post, by the time I'm finished typing, I've been timed out, have to copy the post I just made, sign back in and post it then.

Problem is, I lose all the New Posts and have to go through the last 24 hours worth of posts manually.

If someone knows how to prevent this, I'd appreciate knowing where the setting is.
 
Dru--exactly. By the time I'm through searching for a manual or piece of hardware to answer a question, the "New Posts" have all expired. Sometimes I don't even get to see the reply to a post just before the current post I'm replaying to.

Maybe the "auto expiration" feature is useful on political fora or other special interest fora where posters are just belching out whatever pops into their minds, but some of this stuff takes research.

It's very frustrating.
 
Druid6900 said:
A number of times, when replying to a post, by the time I'm finished typing, I've been timed out, have to copy the post I just made, sign back in and post it then.
Click to expand...

Interesting that your experience is different from mine in that respect. It often times out for me, and no matter how long I wait, logging back in puts me in the exact same place with my unpublished post still in the editor. It's worked that way since I joined here.
 
Actually I just found a good solution. Use one browser for reading and another for posting.

I keep different browsers open on my various desktops so thought I'd give it a try. It works! When I logged out and clicked "What's New" in the "reading" browser, all the posts were marked correctly.
 
What I do in most forums is:
1. I log in with the 'log me in automatically on every visit' option.
What this does is keeping me logged in, which is more important than the 'every visit' part.
2. Click 'new messages'. On this forum there are usually two pages of active threads. On some other forums there are nine or more..
3. If there's more than one, as there usually is, I click the middle mousebutton on page 2 through N. With my browser that opens each of them in a new tab.
4. Go to the tab with the oldest content, look through it, click middle button on the 'go to first unread' field on each interesting thread, this opens more tabs.
5. On this forum there are usually just two pages, so sometimes I read through all threads, replying to some and closing the tabs as they are done
6. Or I go through the next newer page(s) first and open new tabs for the threads there.
7. In any case I read and close from the right (won't work with chrome because it opens new tabs in between and not to the right) as I'm done.
8. Eventually I'm back at a tab which lists the first page of active threads, which I have now read.
9. Some time may have gone, so I click 'view new messages' again, if there are updates I mid-click their 'go to last unread post' on each of them, then click 'mark forum read' and then I read the final ones.
10. If I end up opening all new threads in their tabs right away, which I sometimes choose to do, then I click 'mark forum read' right away (possibly with a quick check on 'view new messages' before I start to read the first one.
11. The above is totally unfeasible to do when I read the forum on my phone, as I'm doing now. :)

-Tor
 
Middle mousebutton? :huh:

The new tab thing doesn't work for me because it doesn't allow me to refresh the list of new posts to see what someone may have posted since I started reading the list of new posts. So I hit "reload" and all of the posts that were marked are gone without me having read them.

This is basically a human interface issue. I shouldn't have to learn to scratch my back with my left great toe to get around a software deficiency.
 
I totally agree with you. I too can't seem to follow the postings for anything I've tried to sell or even ask a question of.

Some one up stairs needs to take a real good look at this format...
 
DOS lives on!! said:
Haven't tried it out yet, but on the "What's New" page, on the top, there is a "mark forums read" button.
Click to expand...
There used to be ;-)

With my browser, since the latest "update" now it just says "Mark Forums" and the "read" is below the line but invisible.

I must say, for a product as mature as this it sure seems to have a lot of nagging little issues, and every update seems to bring some new ones; I don't envy Erik...

FWIW, I just click on 'What's New' when I check in; as I read and/or reply that particular topic loses its highlighting, and when I'm done (or if it's reset New Posts in the meantime) I just ask for the last 24 hours and scroll through in case I missed some. Seems to work for me.

And if I'm composing a lengthy post in any forum I've learned to either periodically copy my text to the clipboard or actually compose it off-forum in Notepad and paste it when done, in case I time out and lose it before I get to actually post it.
 
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MikeS said:
There used to be ;-)

With my browser, since the latest "update" now it just says "Mark Forums" and the "read" is below the line but invisible.
Click to expand...

Now "Mark Forums Read" and "View last 24 hours' posts" seem to be gone completely, or is it just me? A real PITA if they are indeed gone.
 
Both links are still there for me. It makes me wonder if Chuck(G) (URL problem) and MikeS (link problem) are having gremlins in their computers?

The link to mark forums read requires a dynamic timestamp to work, but here is the other link:

View last 24 hours posts
 
No, the behavior is very consistent. Spend long enough writing a response to a post and you'll find that all those "New Posts" have gone away.
 
Ah, that is not what I'm questioning. It happens for all of us, just that the links to retrieve the posts you missed still are available even if they're a bit hard to find sometimes. Actually I think it should be a setting in the forum configuration, or possibly this forum software defaults to clearing read markers after a set time of idle unlike other forum softwares that rely on each user to clear those manually.
 
I suppose only Erik and a few more know which administrative configuration options the forum software supports, if it at all is selectable or if the developers of this software have hard-coded a time limit per session before read markers are cleared. Just because it doesn't work right now does not mean it is possible to get it to work without major modifications.
 
carlsson said:
Both links are still there for me. It makes me wonder if Chuck(G) (URL problem) and MikeS (link problem) are having gremlins in their computers?
Click to expand...
Thanks for the tip, Anders; the "Mark Forums Read" link didn't appear in another computer (with a later browser) either, but after I selected "Today's Posts" and returned to "New Posts" it magically appeared, with the word "Read" even visible and on the same line!

Oh well, ya just have to think of it as an adventure game, "The Quest for the Hidden Options"... ;-)
 
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