Captain Jordan

Mahz's Dev Journal

I think the new post/unread tracking should only be done for subbed topics. People don't care about if there is a new post in every thread on the site, only the ones they are participating, or otherwise interested, in.

@TheMaster99

Ehh, sorta. I don't sub to every thread I post in, for good reason. Yes, posts move fast in RPs, but there are topics in Off Topic and RP discussion that don't drop off the first page so quickly. The NEW indicator is going to be useful there if you're just popping in to read and haven't found a reason to reply or sub yet.

Plus, this is also expected behavior for a forum. Obviously, the best behavior is going to be for subscriptions, but not everyone is going to have the same workflow.

Mahz's Dev Journal

30% of Guild users (and growing) access the site on a smartphone and 15% of users use a tablet, so my go-to UI paradigms have been forced to change.

I've always been a fan of tooltips, but there is no mobile equivalent of a desktop-user dragging their mouse cursor down a bunch of list-items thus sending the hover event to each one. While I can overload tooltips so that they display/dismiss on hover and click/tap, it's not something I can depend on anymore since you can't have a tooltip on a link or button that changes state.

I need to set aside some time to study UI paradigms for small/touch devices.

@Mahz

Desktop:

[IC (5 New)]

Mobile:
[ IC
(5 new)]

Make the 5 New a different color. Bold it. Make it gold like the normal Last Post button is now. Make it blink, flash neon lights around it, hire girls in low-cut shirts to gesture seductively towards it.

Honestly, I don't know the best way to make new features immediately obvious to people who won't try things.

Mahz's Dev Journal

<Snipped quote by Captain Jordan>

The trouble with that would be communicating that to all users. You know the trouble we had with the 'go to last post' buttons which nobody could figure out. A system like that would probably confuse people.

@BBeast

People would figure it out. For the rest of them, tooltips. Do we really need bad design (no offense, @Mahz!) in order to hold people's hands?

Mahz's Dev Journal

Fair points, @Shienvien. I'll give you the theme.

About the buttons, I put some more thought into it. What changing the tab read counts to display UNREAD posts, similar to how the PM counts were changed from total to unread. Then the numbers could take one to the newest post, while the IC/OOC/CHAR title can take one to the OP.

Goes to OP --> [IC (#unread count)] <-- Goes to first unread post

Mahz's Dev Journal

@Shienvien Good idea, I'll have to play with darker backgrounds. Made an issue so I don't forget.

@Mahz

Honestly, they look fine to me. At some point I'd like to see a high contrast theme made to separate this out a bit. No offense to @Shienvien, but the higher contrast buttons and colors often get too glaring.

And, @Mahz, is it absolutely necessary to have one-click access to both the OP and Latest Unread Post? I'd be curious how many clicks to the OP you're going to get once the Unread feature goes live. As much as I sometimes detest it elsewhere, I'm wondering how awful it would be to just default those tabs to the Latest Unread Post.

Mahz's Dev Journal

Decided to implement a hard feature this weekend: the unread-posts tracking system.

Here's what I've got working so far:



Those "Unread" buttons will appear on each tab that has new posts, and clicking one will take you to the first unread post of that tab.

The tracker is backed by the database, so it'll remember your unread posts across computers/devices.

<Snipped quote by LegendBegins>

Thanks, I'll try to fix it right now. (Edit: Think I fixed it, I'll deploy the fix later tonight)

@Mahz

WHOA! Interface needs work, but WHOA!

Hope to get a Mark Read/Unread feature, too, at some point.

Mahz's Dev Journal

A "ghost" or BCC would only be nice if you had to option to send it to a Mod.

@Blue Demon

I'd rather have "Report PM."

Mahz's Dev Journal

Idea: Can view/Can comment/Can edit/Ghost PMs:
Jack, Jill, John, and James. have a PM.
Jack starts the PM. He doesn't want Jill to know John can view the PM, so he sets John to 'Ghost'.
Jack wants James to only be able to comment on some ideas, so he sets him to 'can comment'. Comments would work like replies that appear in margins within hider-like things.

@UltikanaRe

Please, no "Ghost" setting. That just invites further drama. I'd rather make people go through the extra step of copy/pasting PM text to someone else, to have to think about the action, rather than let them choose a one-click setting to do it. If it's totally legitimate copy/paste, then fine, the person will have no problem with it. If it's to create drama, well, then perhaps the effort will make them reconsider.

Otherwise, I like it. As long as all participants can see who can do what, I'm golden.

Is there a 'can reply' permission? Or is that your 'can edit'?

Mahz's Dev Journal

@Genkai
If a PM buttons is added, I highly suggest it not being placed in the bottom right. Any more options there, especially that offer nothing in regard to post creation, would simply end up as clutter.

@Mahz
Speaking of regulars, this thread has transitioned from less of the "Regulars have some good ideas and want to help" thread to the "Feature Requests and Bugs" thread.

@LegendBegins

PM buttons should go on the left under the avatar. They relate to the person, not the post, so that's where they belong.

Mahz's Dev Journal

Is it at all possible to have that be triggered when someone's firs post has been edited recently too? Because hey, new information is fresh even if the thread isn't.

@Genkai

Can't thread creators change the thread title? Seems like that's a means to highlight new information as well.