Subject: What about...
Author:
Posted on: 2013-04-12 16:35:00 UTC
... mild background imaging? Something like the effect on my website, with the paper thing? Would that still track as 'mostly empty'?
hS
Subject: What about...
Author:
Posted on: 2013-04-12 16:35:00 UTC
... mild background imaging? Something like the effect on my website, with the paper thing? Would that still track as 'mostly empty'?
hS
What exactly happened to the idea of moving to a new, more forum-y Board? Is this still a thing people are thinking about? Why or why not?
Without reading the foot-long thread by people who know more about this than me, I would tentatively say that no, I don't think they are. This Board has sentimental value, and so on...
Email notifications are a thing on T-Board. In fact, they fire for replies to replies (to replies to replies ...) as well. The reason you didn't get an email when you replied to yourself is because there's code to prevent that, because getting emailed about a post you just made just clutters up your inbox.
Also, thanks for your typo report! It's fixed now. While you're here, do you have any ideas about how T-Board should handle long threads? Also, is the site easy to use on your phone? I tried to design it that way, but I'm not sure how well I succeeded.
The 'Jump to this post's position' thing works very well.
I think that colour-coding the tags would be helpful, although I get your point about not really needing it yet. As far as the final set of tags go, I'd tempted to add in 'badfic report' and maybe 'looking for Beta' to the current set.
At: http://ppc-posting-board-2-proto.herokuapp.com/
(Thanks to Tomash, who set it up)
From just a quick glance I noticed that clicking on a specific post seems to open the entire thread... was that intentional, is it just not been noticed yet, or have I not looked far enough in to discover it might be just on that thread?
The specific posts open at the very tippy top of the page, I don't know if there is a way to make this more obvious, but it took several thread investigations for me to notice it was up there and I didn't have to scroll down to where I was trying to get to.
Then again, maybe I just didn't get enough sleep last night and it's not actually a problem for anyone else XD
It seems to be pretty much similar to this place, but a bit more confusing. But this is coming from an idiot who only looked at it a little, so I'm not sure how much my opinion matters.
In any case, I still prefer this Board, really.
I would be willing to pay some money for it. Dunno how we would organize it exactly. Perhaps a donation drive? Of course, that requires trusting someone to pay the bills, but that doesn't seem like a huge issue.
I'm preeety sure I can get us hosted for ~$8 a month. So, y'know, not a big deal.
GoDaddy has some really good introductory rates for even less. My troop has had their website hosted with them for a while, and it has worked out pretty well. Still, I've heard some less than savory things about them.
I'm going to assume that the functionality would be equivalent, since, in both cases, things are limited by what's allowed by the board. It's a matter of <> vs [].
(I'm not directing this at you specifically, EF, but this seemed like a good place to put it)
T-Board allows both filtered HTML and Markdown. Markdown is a simplified syntax for writing the sort of things that often come across the Board, like bold, italics, links, etc. For example, in Markdown, you can bold text **like this**. A link looks like Text for link. I put that in there so people wouldn't have to fiddle with HTML if they didn't want to.
What are the Board's thoughts on this setup, which should probably be explained more clearly on the "New Post" page?
<b></b> just sounds more like bold than the stuff wikis (for example) use. But as long as HTML remains usable, too, I'm okay with it.
Tagging & forums: it seems, then, that the best way to move a thread into the Badfic Discussion subforum is to forego editing the top post on someone's behalf, but simply to tag your reply correctly. I assume that doesn't remove the thread from the 'Everything Else' forum? No, apparently not. Bet there's still complaints.
Nobody will ever be completely happy with everything. Someone is going to complain at some point, because everything is imperfect. The topic at hand is whether the T-Board is better than this one, not whether it's so good no one will have complaints.
By "complaints", I meant "I bet there are still people who go around telling everyone who posts in the general forum something which could be in a subforum that they are doing things wrong and that they ought to have tagged their post". I thought I made that clear, but apparently I missed putting the context into this post.
hS
By "complaints", I meant "I bet there are still people who go around telling everyone who posts in the general forum something which could be in a subforum that they are doing things wrong and that they ought to have tagged their post". I thought I made that clear, but apparently I missed putting the context into this post.
Could you clarify? It's still not clear to me what you meant.
...is a problem with people, not the Board they're on. As you've shown, it doesn't matter whether we move or not; someone's going to get snippy with a hapless newbie for making a mistake Boarder 2's seeing for the umpteenth time. That's Boarder 2's issue, and not the fault of the T-Board.
For unwritten rules like 'don't make a new Badfic thread until the last one's off the front page' or 'please tag appropriately', it would be best to fix that 'unwritten' bit and have a link in the header to a page with specifically things like that. That way, they're clearly laid out for newbies so they know that's how we roll.
perhaps you can experiment on the T-board, and bring up issues that you find through posting, as that's what the most pressing issue with the t-Board is at the moment (read: getting it working).
Also, you seem to have ignored her first and last points?
That was also what I was trying to suggest other people should do.
But I'm done. Discuss or fail to discuss whatever you all like. Just be aware that if you try to move to a broken board, you'll lose people.
hS
Actual post will follow soon.
Never did get to test it out when it was up, though, since I was gone last summer.
Last time this topic came up, the majority of people agreed moving was a good idea. And then Dann and Tomash started working on a new board. As far as I can tell, at this point we're basically waiting for that board to be done. Which could possibly take a year or more.
(Also, just about every time this comes up, the majority favors moving. hS even ran a PPC survey thing where one of the questions was about if people would prefer a new board, and the majority said yes.)
If - hypothetically and hyperbolically - I were to come in here and say "Switching to a new forum would remove ALL KITTENS from the world!", and then I were to offer actual proof thereof - would you expect everyone to say, "Yes, you have a point, but your argument is moot because we already decided. Shame about the kittens, but..."?
hS
Your analogy implies that there are new facts that came up. What are these facts (aside from the fact that this board is perfectly hackable, that is)?
Who am I to say which, if any of them, are going to make any given person think "Hey, that's a good point"?
hS
Switching to a new forum would not remove all kittens from the world, and even if you said it would there would be no proof of that statement, so your analogy is invalid. You also completely skipped over Data saying that the majority is in fact in favor of moving.
Ask him to clarify. Don't jump straight into "You're wrong because that's an invalid analogy!" Guys. Please take a deep breath and think before you post. You all know better.
Taking a deep breath sounds like a good idea. If anyone needs me, I'll be over there destressing by trading ludicrously valuable prepared meals to the caravans.
(PS: -gives VM a white party hat with '#1 Mod' stenciled on it-)
The whole "returning oldbie" bit, that is...
... that's the first time I've seen anyone do that. ;) I've seen people mess up images and links, sometimes to the point of blocking the Post Reply button from view, and of course throwing an accidental bold or italic down the rest of the Board - but I've never seen anyone work a popup in.
hS
I haven't looked into this too much, but you can put a lot of things into a post. And even if the reader needs to touch the post with the mouse cursor, if the post's long enough, they will do so. I'm just glad that vengeful authors aren't usually that tech savvy.
And it's potentially a big problem. Basically, a malicious poster could make the 'board do whatever it wanted - say, suggest that you download virus-containing files, try to forge requests from you to other websites, redirect you to phishing sites and try to steal your password, etc, etc.
Exhibit 4: Link in the header.
Exhibit 5: It's... still a forum. It would work pretty much the same. Also? I'm not sure what you're using, but the Board is actually pretty unwieldy on my phone. Simple, yes, but the moment we get nested replies it all gets tossed out the window.
This may not be the case any more, but at one time, yourwebapps boards actually auto-disappeared entirely after they'd been activityless for long enough.
hS
Then have somebody post something once a month.
Like Tray said, it's a few minutes of my time every month. Hell, I might do it every couple of weeks just to make sure I have some give in case of RL emergency. And with two people willing to do it, that's slack in case one of us gets sick or "inconsiderately" hospitalized.
"no-one will ever thank you for doing it"
I've always thought of that as the coward's way out.
It's not a big deal, and it will only take a few minutes of my time every month.
Seriously, it's... it's not like it's the end of the world or anything.
Even if there's nobody here, I'm just making a post once a month. I don't really care if nobody thanks me, I'm used to that.
I seem to recall the IRC being the scene of one big blowup after another not all that long ago...? Some of which were caused by 'How could you kick that person?'...?
And I have commented elsewhere on this thread on why ultracollapsed threads are not, in my mind, the best of ideas. Several items on my list here refer to it.
hS
I mean, it's not like stuff like this has ever happened or anything.
Yes, there is Drama on the chat. But you can't pretend that there's never any on the Board, either.
(also, if you were actually in the chat you'd notice that it's actually been completely drama free since... hm. I've not seen any "blowups" since I came back in... Mid-september?)
to link to that thread.
hS
(And no, I mean that I didn't post on the Board until well after a month after I returned because I was no longer -and to an extant, still am- comfortable with posting here, due to the events of that thread)
I'm not sure what I was thinking, but it wasn't that >.
And yes! I would gladly take you up on your offer of that. (don't worry about timing the emails, my job basically entails sitting about the house checking my email occasionally)
...to take a moment, please, and think about whether this might be getting personal, and if it might be better continued later, when feelings are more calm. Although I'm responding to Tray's post, this message is directed at both of you.
(This, by the way, is exactly what I would do in the IRC. The only difference here is nobody gets a title for doing so, which I'm fine with.)
I was referring to Dann's post. You'd have the option to view it in a format like it is now. It just wouldn't be the default.
The code we have now has the view that we have now as the default, with clear ways to change it to something else (like subforums) on a mostly permanent (barring a cookie clear or browser change) basis.
...Talking with people, the reason why some don't visit more regularly/join/use the Board is specifically because it's not a forum. This is the whole reason I brought it up.
What I was under the impression of is that the categories would be more "badfic" "new mission" "new people" "EVERYTHING ELSE", since the badfic and new people threads seem to be what people are concerned about when they talk about stuff getting nudged off. There's no reason to go "I will only hang out here" if the only place where actual hanging-outing is done is in the one subforum.
You're right that it's possible to post in-character without changing your name, but I'm talking about posting under the name of a character, whether it be for a roleplay, or as a humourous way to respond to someone mentioning your agent. That immersion, I feel, would be lost if people didn't look at a post and think 'Oh hey, it's Agent Rosalind' rather than 'Oh hey, it's hS saying he's posting as Agent Rosalind'.
hS
Is it /really/ that complicated to have login name and shown name be different?
I've never actually seen a forum where you login and then still have an option to enter your screenname-of-choice every time you post, but I suppose it's possible. You'd have to ask the techies. ;)
(I would accept that as an excellent solution to this point)
hS
...And I've never felt a sense of immersion was lost. If you're posting in-character, people seperate the you from the character, if that makes sense.
I said physically for a reason. I'm not a complete doof.
And no, I didn't. There was a blackout?
I cannot look at spaces of mostly-empty. Dark is better, but it's not really saying much.
... mild background imaging? Something like the effect on my website, with the paper thing? Would that still track as 'mostly empty'?
hS
...so no.
(deeeeerp) Also, I would like to nudge you gently towards Dann's post. You'd have the option of viewing the Board as-is. Presumably there'd also be an option to not have thread-bump.
Tomash built a prototype a while back that had multiple options - threads were divided into categories, and then it was up to the users if they wanted to see the different categories as different forums, different tags on topics on a single big page, or what have you. It would provide an interface that's a lot like the current Board for people who like it as it sits now, and a forum-like Board for people who prefer that view, along with inbetween options for people who want something between the two.
It would also get us off yourwebapps, which is basically running the Model T of discussion technology.
The Board is, as EF has demonstrated, capable of breaking down in potentially dangerous ways. It also has other failure modes - for example, trolling as someone else, which we've seen happen.
And yes, I can be reasonably sure that a forum I work on would not be the Reliant Robin of websites - I work for, and have learned a ton from, a company with a bit of experience in the matter.
Wasn't the Fiesta notable for being an incredibly terrible car, though? I mean, my uncle's a mechanic and some of his worst horror stories come from Fords.
The actual names involved weren't the core of my point. ;P
hS
Subdivisions make everything nice and tidy! If it's one of those boards that require a login, then that's even better because that's a really good spammer deterrent.
Who is going to make one?
...I know Dann and Thomas were working on one. not sure exactly how ready it would be, though.
If that doesn't pan out, there are some forum hosting servers that don't charge for their services. (I know of Zetaboards off the top of my head)
((also your anon is showing >.
...I know Dann and Thomas were working on one. not sure exactly how ready it would be, though.
If that doesn't pan out, there are some forum hosting servers that don't charge for their services. (I know of Zetaboards off the top of my head)
((also your anon is showing >.
I think I prefer the more forum-y board set up, it makes it easier, for me at least, to keep track of new replies. Though I must say, having hung around here for a couple months, it's not as daunting as it first looks like, so I won't be overly disappointed if the board stays here either. :)