Website comments

[Whisht @whisht]

Hi all – if we are to close tNotD thread, may I suggest that we give everyone the weekend to add whatever they want?

It might be a good way to tease out any remaining theories but also some bonkers from any lurkers (nothing like a countdown to increase activity!)

[Timeloop @timeloop]

There seems to be a problem with the link to the main site (the one when you click on the banner on the start of each site). Sometimes there is no link to get back, sometimes there is…

[Whisht @whisht]

btw @craig – just a suggestion, but on the homepage, the description of the 50th show thread includes the word “rumours”

As we’ve had postings before of spoilers on non-Spoiler threads, we could hardly blame anyone new for posting spoilery rumours if that’s how we invite people in!

😉

(but if I’m being paranoid, ignore me!)

[Craig @craig Emperor]

@whisht Yes, you’re right, will remove that. Cheers. I’m still learning 😀

[Whisht @whisht]

to be honest @craig – you say “learning” but the Spoilers thread was a stroke of genius.

Spoilers are the antithesis of speculation and can’t co-exist in a single thread (a “fact” kills speculation cold dead).

But spoilers are fan-nip and are gonna be around any fan-site, so setting up a quarantine zone for this hazardous material was brilliant.

(and don’t say you hadn’t thought it through/ took a punt etc – enjoy the backslap!)

;¬)

[ScaryB @scaryb]

Agree with @whisht, Spoiler thread is great (I was hanging around this site most of the pre-NotD week, confident of avoiding spoilers, while I could see other people were madly discussing on that thread)

@craig – asked this a while ago, and I don’t know if it’s just not possible – any chance of a “like” option (similar to Facebook). Sometimes  you don’t need to add a comment but you just want to indicate agreement with someone else’s post. I know you can “favourite” on here but it’s not that easy to do and it doesn’t show on the main thread. It’s not about gathering trophies btw, but it adds to the arguments sometimes, and shows the poster who’s in agreement with them, without needing an extra post.

If it’s not possible, no worries, it’s just a detail.

[ScaryB @scaryb]

@craig This is a very small detail but just to let you know. The links in the Recent Forum Posts lists take you to the first pages of the threads, instead of the end. (On the Sofa and Name of the Doctor – rest seem to be fine)

[Anonymous @]

@scaryb, @craig – yes, I noticed that too.  Did something change, Maestro?

[Craig @craig Emperor]

@scaryb and @Shazzbot Yes, seems to be a problem with the Sofa thread. Didn’t notice it with Name of The Doctor. Will look into it. Maybe we’ve broken the program with too many posts! 😕

Hope not…

[PhaseShift @phaseshift Time Lord]

@craig

Actually I just noticed “On the Sofa” that when I post, I get taken to the first page (not sure if this is the problem others are seeing). I’m using FireFox latest upgrade on Windows.

If it is a size issue on the threads, maybe we should just open a replacement, close the other one and link it to the new?

[Whisht @whisht]

Hi @craig – looks like 20 pages of comments could be the ‘max’ that the system allows for returning to the page you were on, or linking to the latest link (the word “indexing” springs to mind, but I really have no odea what I’m talking about!).

When I just posted on the 21 page tNotD, I ‘returned’ to the first page (ie not seeing my post).

probably the right time to close tNotD thread then!

;¬)

and run a book as to how long the 50th thread will last until its 20th page!

At least it doesn’t break though – ie we’re not losing posts (at least I don’t think we are) so it is a robust system – thank you!

[Craig @craig Emperor]

@whisht Yeah, it’s either 20 pages or 1000 comments. I’m looking in to it. It runs on WordPress/Buddypress/BBPress and I have asked on the Buddypress forum if anyone has a fix as it should be able to cope with any number of pages and comments.

Hopefully will have a fix soon. But thanks. 😀

[Anonymous @]

@craig – you shouldn’t have to work on this site on a bank holiday!

One other point about renaming threads – I went to my ‘mentions’ and clicked on the time for someone’s post in the old sofa thread.  It took me to the new sofa thread.  Is this because the link in the header for the comment still says ‘On the Sofa’ not ‘On the Sofa Part One’ ?

Hopefully, you can find the max issue (posts or pages) then coalesce the two Sofa threads.  Otherwise, all of the header info in comments needs to be updated as well.  🙁   (But not today, give yerself a day off fer cripes sake!  🙂 )

[Timeloop @timeloop]

@craig Still something wrong with the “The Doctor Who Forum” banner on the top. Wont work continuously… Hope you had a nice bank holiday  and thanks for all the hard work;)

[Anonymous @]

Hi @timeloop – if you’re talking about what I think you are, I’ve noticed that when I move my cursor over the main title, it doesn’t turn into a hand until it’s closer to the tops of the words.   Can you try that and see if that is what your problem is?

[Timeloop @timeloop]

@Shazzbot Is the described problem hard to understand? Anyway I did not have it a while ago so I just wanted to bring some attention to it (maybe a wonky format?)

[Craig @craig Emperor]

@timeloop Thanks, I’m aware of that issue but just haven’t had the time to fix it yet. Am a bit budy with few other things at the moment. But yes, it works if you hover over the very tops of the letters. I’ll hopefully have it fixed this week.

[Timeloop @timeloop]

@craig just give me a shout if you need any help at all.

[Anonymous @]

@timeloop – you always have the alternative of clicking on the ‘Home’ tab (at the far left of ‘Forums’, ‘Blog’, ‘Activity’, etc.).  In my experience, there is no tricky placing of the cursor on these tabs; they always work.  🙂

[Timeloop @timeloop]

@Shazzbot Thanks, but not my initial point ^^ I can think of work-arounds, but thanks again for your help

[Craig @craig Emperor]

@ Everyone. So after posting on support forums and hours of hunting in the code for a bug that might be causing the links to fail to work on long threads after 20 pages, I finally had a moment of inspiration and the cause was so simple I feel like a proper numpty. My database limits returned rows to 1000, and the links stopped working at post 1000. The function that did the query needs the exact number of posts in the topic to build the URL and was unable to count them because of the limit, so WordPress thought any new ones were posted on the front page.

Now, I could increase the limit to say, 10,000, but I like to think of this as a feature (now I do anyway 😀 ), as it will keep the forum topics fast and help keep CPU usage down as well, which has also been a bit of a problem for me recently. So, if you don’t mind I think what I’d like to do is what I’ve already done and start a part 2, part 3 etc. when they get to near 1000 posts.

Hope that’s alright with everyone. Normal service can now be resumed, thankfully!

[Anonymous @]

@craig – what about the renaming issue of On the Sofa Part 1?  (re comment headers)

PS  sorry you had to spend so long on this problem!  Remember to pass ’round the hat if you like; most people have already said they’d be glad to chip in.

[ScaryB @scaryb]

@craig Well done! Sounds like a good solution. (is the traffic still at the same level or has it settled down a bit?)   Recommend you check out my Dalek movie posters post on news thread – it’s very funny. (just realised it would probably be better On the Sofa or in In the Pub – feel free to move it)

[Craig @craig Emperor]

@Shazzbot I’ve fixed that, but at the expense of early comments on The Sofa part 2, but there’s much less of them!

I’ll get it right next time 😀

[Craig @craig Emperor]

@timeloop Heading link now fixed, I think, you’ll be glad to hear.

[Anonymous @]

@craig – thanks.

<pedant> surely, it’s ‘far fewer’  not ‘much less’?  </pedant>  😀

You have been fatally corrupted by ’10 items or less’, haven’t you?  😆

[Craig @craig Emperor]

@Shazzbot Yes, for someone who writes for part of my living I sometimes make very stupid mistakes 😀

@scaryb Yes, loved the Dalek posters, great find! Traffic has dropped to about 500 or 600 visits a day, which is understandable. But we’ve still had almost 8000 unique visits since 10th May and almost 90,000 page views!

And last time I checked and searched for Doctor Who Forum on google.com we were top! google.co.uk is a bit different as there a few forums with .co.uk addresses so Google deems them more relevant to someone using google.co.uk , but we’ll probably get there eventually. That’s why I’m desperate to sort out any issues now so that we’ve got scalability, just in case.

[Anonymous @]

@craig – hey, you made the time in the comment headers look like a link!  Ta v much.

Now I’m sorry I pedantically corrected your grammar.  {chastened face}

[Craig @craig Emperor]

@Shazzbot no problem, am catching up on some of my jobs tonight.

Have also just posted a new comment to you from @htpbdet in the blog.

[Timeloop @timeloop]

Thanks Craig for all your work.

[Anonymous @]

@craig , @scaryb – can I please put in my vote against any sort of like/recommend/green-red-arrow thingies on this website?

ScaryB says:  “It’s not about gathering trophies btw, but it adds to the arguments sometimes, and shows the poster who’s in agreement with them, without needing an extra post.”

You my Scary friend, are so refreshingly positive about humankind in general that it hurts me to be the horrible cynical one.  That whole ‘liking’ thing is ripe for gaming by every drive-by viewer and their cohorts of winged friends.  And even if it were initially established as being ‘not about gathering trophies’ it would most certainly instantly descend into just that (human nature really isn’t very laudable in general).  We have a lovely site, full of lovely commenters, and that whole ‘liking’ thing is honey to the … erm, not-so-lovely people who infest t’interwebs.

What makes this site so wonderful, to me, is the absence of any kind of ‘rating’ of posts.  If you agree with another commenter, then you write a post expressing why you think that was a good post – and hopefully, with further theories to build on the original post.  If you disagree, then you write a post detailing why you are in disagreement.

The very DNA of this site is thoughtful, detailed posts, full of imagination, wit, and conviviality.  Adding a rating system for posts, I feel, is anathema to its very purpose.

But with that last ‘purpose’ in mind, please feel free @scaryb to rubbish my arguments!  😀

[ScaryB @scaryb]

@Shazzbot

Re a Like button (friendly one, LOL)

It’s not something I’m desperate for and I’d only see it as available to people who are members. I just like the way it works on Facebook – it’s not about rating, just a quick way of showing agreement, especially if you only have time for a fleeting site visit.

 

But as I said I’m not sure if it’s even possible in this format and if people feel strongly against it, not a problem (And it makes @craig‘s life easier if he can cross another thing off his list)

 

<starts to worry if new avatar makes her look too soft – people thinking she’s refresingly positive indeed! Harrumph!>

 

[Anonymous @]

Hiya @scaryb – “a quick way of showing agreement, especially if you only have time for a fleeting site visit.”

I know, I know … perhaps my thoughts are tied up in the interminably long time until the 50th.  If any point in time is suitable, then certainly this hiatus is conducive to well thought-out, explanatory posts.  And especially on this site.  And @craig, I have made my feelings clear repeatedly, I think the site you have created is marvellous and unique in that it practically demands that people engage more deeply than ‘fleeting site visits’.  That is its USP.  (imo; enough of the non-grammatical acronyms, though, eh?!  🙂  )

[Bluesqueakpip @bluesqueakpip]

@scaryb – I think it’s the fez.

🙂

[Craig @craig Emperor]

@Shazzbot @scaryb

A “like” or “vote up or down” button is not top of my list. I’m not ruling it out, but it would have to operate like Facebook and not be anonymous, and only for logged in users.

Anyway, tonight’s couple of hours have been spent on something much more important. This goes out to @whohar as well. I think I have got the rich text editor working for the blog comments 😀

It doesn’t quite look right, and currently asks if you want to log out. But I’ll fix those things later, tomorrow, the weekend maybe 😕

Now I’m going to have a large glass of wine and my dinner. 😀

[ScaryB @scaryb]

Thanks @craig Absolutely agree NOT a priority! And also ” it would have to operate like Facebook and not be anonymous, and only for logged in users”. A quick way of making a comment basically (and def no dislikes 🙂

Well done on the blog edit, and for solving the other wee glitchy things. I’d say this site’s had a really good test run in the last few weeks with all the suddeb  extra traffic, and it seems to have held up incredibly well.

And it’s still the most fun little nest/aquarium on the interwebs <note to self: get a life, LOL>

@bluesqueakpip – you may be right, but it’s my thinking fez 🙁

[Craig @craig Emperor]

Thanks @scaryb

I’m hoping to do some sort of poll thing next, you’ll be glad to hear!

[ScaryB @scaryb]

@craig WooHOO! Polls

PS Cheers

[Timeloop @timeloop]

@Shazzbot Do you really think this site would even be interesting for trolls who would need to log in for that? Anyway, I’m with @scaryb on this one. No top priority, but a nice thought ^^

[Anonymous @]

@timeloop – other websites have people signing up simply to immediately trowel on spam all over the site.  Yes, I’m cynical enough about humanity to think that there could well be people who would sign up to this site simply to run around clicking ‘like’ and ‘dislike’ buttons.  It happens at the Guardian every single day.  And there are multiple links to this site from the Guardian.

Sorry @scaryb – but I really don’t think a simple ‘like’ button fits the ethos of this site, which was built on solid foundations of detailed, thoughtful analysis which seems antithesis to the idea of a ‘like’ button.  But for argument’s sake, how do you think such a feature would enhance the overall pleasure of this site?  Your previous comment mentioned ‘fleeting site visit’ – is that how you would prefer this site to be viewed, as a ‘drive-by site’?  Especially in light of the drought of weekly episode theorising until November, we will become stronger with considered posts and blogs which are rich in analysis and provide fertile ground for people to respond in kind.

@craig, I await Scary’s response, but until then, I’m firmly of the belief that such a ‘feature’ would cheapen the richly textual site you have developed.

[ScaryB @scaryb]

@shazzbot

Like button’s no big deal!! (but I think we get very little trolling on here, from what @craig‘s said; Was only suggesting a “like” though, not a “dislike” (that would be waste of time))

<hangs head in shame and slaps wrists @ all the frivolous posts she’s done when she should’ve been bonkers theorising >

 

[ScaryB @scaryb]

I also confess to occasionally ducking in for a quick lurk! 😯

[blenkinsopthebrave @blenkinsopthebrave]

My five cent’s worth on like buttons. I oppose them, and, to be honest, I oppose the smiley faces as well. The beauty of this site is the argument (in the best possible and civilised sense). That means talking, and well-thought out discussion. The type of posts that @phaseshift and others do so well. More talk, less visual replacements for discussion

[ScaryB @scaryb]

@blenkinsopthebrave

😛

[Timeloop @timeloop]

In some of my posts the @ dont turn blue after posting – I assume the linking is not working? Does anyone know why? I did  copy and paste the names as always….

[ScaryB @scaryb]

@timeloop Re @… links.  A few people are disguised! ie @screen name doesn’t link as you’d expect. eg IAmNotAFishIAmAFreeMan can only be called up by @pedant  If you click the link under the avatars it will take you to their account and shows you what you need to put after @.

PS Don’t worry about the trolls. Our mighty mods have them under control 🙂

[IAmNotAFishIAmAFreeMan @pedant]

@timeloop @scaryb

Even adjusting for my eccentricity, it can be a tad hit and miss.

[Craig @craig Emperor]

@pedant @timeloop

Can you send me some links to posts where it didn’t work and I’ll check the code. I’ve never had a problem, and the only time I see it not working is when someone’s name is spelt wrong or they put a space in the name e.g. @Scary B

[Timeloop @timeloop]

@scaryb Yeah, but that is not the case for new joiners, right? I read somethere in here that Craig turned that option off and @pedant is the only one who still can do that.

@craig

http://www.thedoctorwhoforum.com/forums/topic/the-next-doctor/page/5/#post-11906

http://www.thedoctorwhoforum.com/forums/topic/the-next-doctor/page/5/#post-11861

http://www.thedoctorwhoforum.com/forums/topic/the-next-doctor/page/5/#post-11846

http://www.thedoctorwhoforum.com/forums/topic/the-next-doctor/page/4/#post-11832

 

[Craig @craig Emperor]

@timeloop

Oh, so it’s not that the name is not the link, just that the @ symbol is not part of the link.

That’s not really a big issue for you is it? Really…?

I thought you were @ mentioning people and it wasn’t turning into a link at all.

The reason that happens is because you copy and paste the name (in visual mode), which is already a link, so when you submit your post it checks and sees there is already a link, so doesn’t create another link using the @ symbol.

Without copying and pasting: @timeloop

With copying and pasting: @Timeloop

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