Post subject: Suggestion : View the first new post
Joined: 8/27/2006
Posts: 883
I know that it's currently possible to see the first new post on a thread, but it's only possible the first time you select the thread even if you are not on the page with that new post. Also I've read a couple of time something like "Oh I didn't see your post because it was on the page before this one" So would it be possible to add something after the page number to be able to jump directly to the first new post ?
SXL
Joined: 2/7/2005
Posts: 571
a larger request I'd have would be to be able to search by date, either by topic (last post by criteria) or by post (show a link to the next post of each topic that has been updated afterwards). that's what the new posts function does, except it only shows what has been updated since your last connection. why not any arbitrary date ?
I never sleep, 'cause sleep is the cousin of death - NAS
Former player
Joined: 8/1/2004
Posts: 2687
Location: Seattle, WA
SomethingAwful recently implemented something like this, and the lead coder for the forums said it was a pretty big hassle for such a small benefit. There are a few Firefox Extension, called "_____ Last Read," that can be used whilst on forums to mark which responses you have loaded and which ones you haven't? That being said, how hard is it to read the most recent portion of a thread before posting? I don't think I've ever seen someone say "sorry, I didn't see your post on the last page." That seems pretty lazy and almost inexcusable to me.
hi nitrodon streamline: cyn-chine
Joined: 8/27/2006
Posts: 883
And about the view post since last visit, that return the list of thread with new post, isn't it something lazy ? But if you implement search by date, you could implement search post since last visit in a thread. It wouldn't be that hard.
Emulator Coder, Site Developer, Former player
Joined: 11/6/2004
Posts: 833
I think what my problem is, and it's related to this or maybe what ZeXrO meant. Suppose there's a thread with 14 posts (and the page cutoff is 15) and I read them all. While I'm away, 2 posts are made -- one on page 1 and one on page 2. When I do the "new posts" search, I see 2 pages. If I click page 2, then the new post on page 1 is marked as read. If I go to page 1, I won't notice it as new. Possible solutions: * Hard: preserve unread-ness on a per-post basis and only clear it on viewing the post rather than anything in the thread. * Easy: the search page marks the page with the first new post. I can assume that all posts starting from there will be new, and I won't run the risk of missing anything. The easy solution won't permanently mark posts as new for each page you look at, but hopefully you can figure out what's new if you know where it starts. Am I on the right track? It's late and I'm not entirely coherent right now.
Player (206)
Joined: 5/29/2004
Posts: 5712
DeHackEd wrote:
Suppose there's a thread with 14 posts (and the page cutoff is 15) and I read them all. While I'm away, 2 posts are made -- one on page 1 and one on page 2. When I do the "new posts" search, I see 2 pages. If I click page 2, then the new post on page 1 is marked as read. If I go to page 1, I won't notice it as new.
Yeah, and I like how if you try to anticipate that by visiting page 1 first, but it turns out you were in error and the first new post was actually on page 2, then you still won't get to see where the new posts start when you go and visit page 2 or wherever.
put yourself in my rocketpack if that poochie is one outrageous dude
Emulator Coder, Site Developer, Former player
Joined: 11/6/2004
Posts: 833
Exactly. Any view of the thread removes all those "new post" indicators on all pages. That's why you need to be told where the first one is BEFORE you go into the thread and kill them all off. And with some of these huge and fast growing threads (Mario64 being one) you can easily get lost.
Former player
Joined: 8/1/2004
Posts: 2687
Location: Seattle, WA
DeHackEd wrote:
Exactly. Any view of the thread removes all those "new post" indicators on all pages. That's why you need to be told where the first one is BEFORE you go into the thread and kill them all off. And with some of these huge and fast growing threads (Mario64 being one) you can easily get lost.
I'd like to make the distinction that isn't a totally necessary tool, per se. It's a nice way to ensure that you're all caught up on the progress of things, but I'm still confident that anyone who has any sort of real investment in to the progression of a thread will go to the trouble of reading a few posts back in case they think they may have missed something.
hi nitrodon streamline: cyn-chine
Editor, Expert player (2080)
Joined: 6/15/2005
Posts: 3284
It's really only necessary for boards with an extremely high post rate (i.e. "chat" boards), and only for people who care enough to be up to date on everything, which is usually not the case for lurkers of those boards.
Joined: 8/27/2006
Posts: 883
Well I think that it could be very useful, but not necessary, (we don't use it now and it's not that of a problem) but it could be nice if it could be implemented easily, if it's hard, them forget that until someone have time to improve it.