Wall of Mouths

Ah yes, the ever growing to-do list. Both MTACT and Scopophobia will be added to the discography, but I don’t know when yet. Sorry to be so vague, but you probably saw it coming ;-)

Now that you’re used to it, it suddenly seems a lot more appealing to make some more changes.

Anyway, I’m not completely happy with the way the boards are linked to the rest of the site as well, but I don’t know when I will be doing something about it.

I’ve just added ‘Best of 2007’ lists for Andy, Michael and Neil.

Folks, it is now possible to search within a single discussion. If you’re reading a discussion the search box is automatically set to only search posts in that discussion.

Earlier in the week I made some changes to the menu and navigation, and relocated the search box. Please let me know if there’s anything unclear or not working properly.

Finally, I’ve turned DST off in everyone’s account.

Your account was still on DST, but I’ve changed it for you now. See my earlier post about the subject for more info.

Ci?, I’m happy to give it a try at some point, but doing any work on the smilies is not a priority for me right now.

mrs h, we currently use a thing called natural language search which doesn’t search for exact phrases when you add quotes around them. Searching for exact phrases is one of the planned improvements to the search feature. I am, however, currently working on a different project (not related to Therapy?/WoM), so there won’t be any updates to the boards for a while.

The code at the end of the quote was missing a forward slash, like this: [/quote]

The “mark as read” link has returned. It is available on the homepage, and on the bottom of the lists under the discussions tab.

On the homepage and on the “All discussions in all categories” page it will mark all discussions as read.

If you’re viewing a list of discussions in a single category, of a certain type (flagged, joined, etc.), or started by a specific person it will only mark those discussions as read.

It’s not a mistake, there just aren’t any birthdays today. There are five birthdays tomorrow, so they’ll be visible on the homepage then.

I’ve added a “Go to the homepage” link after the last post in a discussion. Thanks for the suggestion, I like the way you think :-)

The homepage contains a maximum of 10 new/updated discussions, with a link to all new/updated discussions if there are more. The discussion overviews we already had are still available under the discussions tab, so you can continue to use those if you prefer them over the new homepage. The only things missing from those pages are who’s online and today’s birthdays, which have moved to the homepage.

At least temporarily, chr1s. On the new boards, individual discussions are automatically marked as read when you read them. I had the impression that some people were using the “mark as read” link even though they had read all new/updated discussions, which introduced the risk of them missing new posts added during their visit. I will probably reintroduce the link for people who don’t want to read all discussions, but I need some time to figure out how to do this while preventing unintended side effects.

Sorry for the short interruption, folks. I ran into a technical issue while installing a software update.

I’ve added a new homepage, which helps you keep track of new/updated discussions, new messages, who’s online and today’s birthdays, and it also displays some statistics on the message boards. The new homepage should hopefully make it easier to stay on top of what’s happening here, all in one page. Please let me know if you have any questions, comments or suggestions.

The_Squall wrote:

Is there any chance of putting a link in a thread which will take you to your first post in that thread ?

Each discussion you’ve joined now has a “Go to your first reply” link directly below the first post in the discussion.

Guys, can you do the testing in the Test the Message Boards category please?

I’ve just replaced the smilies with a different set, which includes a few new smilies as well. You can view all available smilies in the help section.

…and we’re back! Sorry about the service interruption, folks.

The boards have been unavailable for the day due to the installation of a software update. Besides many tweaks, the primary new feature is highly increased moderation transparency. Sarah and I have always tried to act in good faith when moderating the message boards. However, our edits and deletions were not marked (or at least not in an automated way), and this has occasionally caused confusion and disagreements, and it’s not in the best interest of the community and its members.

What has changed?

- If a post is edited by a moderator, a note will be displayed saying when, by who, and for which reason it was last edited.
- If a discussion or a post is deleted by a moderator it will no longer disappear, but it will be replaced by a note saying when, by who, and for which reason it was deleted.
- Post/discussion counts for members now reflect all posts and discussions, including the deleted ones.

A couple of important notes:

- Previously edited/deleted posts and discussions may not say when, by who, and/or for which reason they were last edited or deleted, as this was not recorded at the time.
- Some previously deleted posts and discussions have been removed permanently, due to merging discussions, and the use of different software in the past.
- If one of your posts or discussions is edited or deleted, do not publicly post about it on the message boards. Contact either hoochalobster or Teethgrinder about it by sending an e-mail or a private message, and we’ll be happy to further clarify our decisions.

If you have any general questions or comments about the changes, I’d love to hear them in this discussion.

I agree, and it will be changed soon(ish). What you saw today must have been a technical hiccup, as I didn’t change anything.

An individual thread is automatically marked as read when you open it, also by using the last post link. So if you first read all new/updated threads by clicking the last post link (which I think you do?) and then click the title of one of those threads it (correctly) takes you to the beginning. Could you try clicking the title of an updated thread before clicking anything else next time you return, to see if it takes you to the first unread post?

To read a thread you should click on its title. If you’re signed in, this will take you to the first unread post in the thread so you can easily continue reading where you left off. If you click on the date/time of the last post you are taken to the last post, even of there are new posts before it. I agree the intuitiveness of this needs improving, but it’s a good thing that the last post doesn’t stand out, as it should not be the first choice to open a thread.

Squall, when the boards were first launched there was a link to your first reply at the start of each discussion you had joined, but it got cut during one of the later updates. I think it will return at some point, but I don’t know when.

LOL @ Hooch

Sorry d, nice work on the icon that was stolen from you by that thieving bastard ;-)

I’ve been making some changes under the hood to speed things up, so I’m happy to hear that. And nice work on your new icon, mate :-)

I’ll keep posting to this thread if I have something new to report about the boards, but I decided to ‘unstick’ it because it’s been five weeks since the launch.

Sure Simon, I’ll add that to the todo list right away ;-)

I agree with soul doubt on the size of the buddy icons, I think they’re just right. Showing a bigger picture on the profile page has crossed my mind, but it’s not something I will do soon.

*Ahem* Can we not turn this discussion into GM’s little sister, please?

I think I like it better when the number of replies are centered, mrs h. And you only see “x seconds ago” or “x minutes ago” until an hour has passed.

The signatures were removed a couple of days ago. I cleaned up and simplified the posts when I introduced the reply/quote option.

The two date columns are now left aligned instead of centered.

I’m working on a completely pink version of the boards, mrs h, just for you! *feels pretty confident she won’t remember this in a day or two*

Grant, I tend to agree on the main page looking a bit overcrowded. Nothing’s set in stone, I’m just trying out a few things so I can test them in a live environment myself, and gather feedback from you guys - you are my test chimps, after all :-)

*Sigh* Some people are just never happy.

The last post was 37 seconds ago.

The current time in Poland is 5:25:01 PM CEST.

No, it’s not - it’s already done :-)

Received messages now have a link to your sent message that went before it, so you can easily refer back in case you don’t remember what you wrote.