New Forum Fun, Questions and Glitch Reports

[skydy]

Thank you for all your hard work @Moderator 1 and @Simkie.

I am disappointed in some of our members who are being impatient to the point of rudeness.
I don’t understand how everything works yet either, but the entitlement exhibited by a few members is very off-putting.

The tech people need time to work out the kinks and the Moderator needs to receive input from forum members in a civil manner, as we all take time to learn the new format so we can help to get the forums working as we would like them to.
As @bluey mentioned, we had advanced warning of the change and that tweaking would be necessary.

[CrazyGuineaPigLady]

I don’t mind learning new tricks or being patient while things are better organized. But, sloooowwww is an old trick that shouldn’t be here unless the server needs an upgrade or there is a “glitch” that somehow got transferred from the previous software.

Perhaps it’s rude of me to say that but I’m a function over form type.

[Renn_aissance]

I would bet you a bucket of horse treats that part of the problem was underestimating the amount of time it would take to index the MASSIVE post history (dating back into the early oughts) so that it could be searchable; or underestimating how continued indexing would interact with live user load.

Personally, in those shoes I might have been tempted either to take the site back down until it finished (if that really were the problem) and the performance had been fully tested, but see above about load testing not being perfect at modeling live user variables, this is a free forum, we are consumers but not clients, and COTH would then have to deal with unhappy people saying “you said it would be back up on Monday.”

I am confident that the developers are fully aware of whether or not the performance is meeting whatever SLA they have, if it doesn’t, are working to address it. You always hate your rollout to go with a bellyflop instead of an Olympic dive.

I’m also noticing a substantial improvement in load speed on desktop (Chrome) compared to this morning and around but loading on iOS mobile hasn’t improved substantially since morning. Any time I was on during the day today was a 5-minute escape from quarterly planning so I wasn’t exactly benchmarking with precision, but I’m finding that Chrome page load of this thread is within 10 seconds and iOS is over that mark. (I’m attuned to 10 seconds as the upper limit of our edge case loads for a service that’s given trouble, but I’m not suggesting 10 seconds, especially with no loading indicator, is desirable UX…)

[mommy_peanut]

Every time I open a new page/thread/post, I am getting kicked to the very bottom of the page, below all the stupid & annoyingly large ads.
Is this a glitch or is there a setting on my end I can change?
Everything is so damn SLOW…

[Joanne]

Each thread is one page, no matter how many posts are in it. Pain in the butt to get to the last post, unless there is a way to do it.

Where is the ignore button?

Now there is no way to know who started the threads without opening it up.

These forums have been VERY active. You can see from the amount of new posts that people are either fed up with the waiting or just don’t like this new format.

[Simkie]

@Joanne

Each thread is one page, no matter how many posts are in it. Pain in the butt to get to the last post, unless there is a way to do it.

There is. Here you go.

@Simkie

How do I go directly to the first or last post in a thread from the forum page?

Click on the “replies” number:

A menu will pop up with the date of the first and last post. Click on the top date to go directly to the first post in the thread, or click on the bottom date to go directly to the last post in the thread.

Also check out “How do I navigate within a thread” here: FAQ -- Tips for Using the Site

@Joanne

Where is the ignore button?

Let me show you. You won’t be able to ignore until TL 2 (see “what are trust levels” on the FAQ for more info.)

@Simkie

"How can I mute or block a poster?

Muting a poster blocks all notifications and private messages from that user. You will not be notified if that user mentions you, quotes you, or invites you to a thread. They will not be able to send you a private message.

Ignoring a poster blocks all notifications from that user, and also hides all of their posts and replies. The ability to ignore a poster is granted at trust level 2 (for more info on trust levels, see “what are trust levels?” above.)

To mute or ignore a poster, navigate to your user settings:

To mute, enter the user name under “muted”:

To ignore, click “Add” under “Ignore”

Enter the username and select a timeframe (few hours to forever), click “Ignore”

If you’d like to remove an ignore or mute, navigate back here to remove the user from your ignore list.

@Joanne

Now there is no way to know who started the threads without opening it up.

There is.

The left most avatar image is the OP. If you don’t know who that is, hover over the picture and it will tell you.

@Joanne

These forums have been VERY active. You can see from the amount of new posts that people are either fed up with the waiting or just don’t like this new format.

Yep, the devs are clearly working hard on solving the loading issues. It’s improved quite a bit already, yay!

[Jenerationx]

Taking on average 60 seconds to load a page now, so faster than it was, but still slow. I did find for those looking to move to the last post of a long thread, you can click the bottom time in the timeline on the right hand side of the thread once it’s opened.

Like this, click the 5hr, and you’re at the bottom. This helps if it’s a thread you’ve read on the old version, but haven’t opened here. The next time you open it, it SHOULD take you to the last unread.

[MHM]

Are all these navigation options supposed to work on an iPhone? I’m not seeing the navigation bar on the side, or much of anything else along those lines. And the whole thing is still slower than molasses for me.

Also, I’ve been posting on this board for almost exactly 20 years, but I have to jump through a bunch of random hoops to work my way up the “trust levels”? Seriously??

[Bluey]

Things are zippier this morning.

Right now, it takes 2-3 seconds to change pages.

[trubandloki]

So far this morning things are MUCH faster! Thank you to everyone who is working so hard behind the scenes!

@Joanne

Each thread is one page, no matter how many posts are in it. Pain in the butt to get to the last post, unless there is a way to do it.

This was answered up above. I will find it for you and give you a link to the answer. It is easy once you know the trick.

@Moderator_1

Yes! That worked! Ok, you just go to the chain link icon at the bottom of the post you want to share – click, and then you can copy the URL and share it in your post, like I did above.

Thank you once again, Mod1! You are amazing!

@PamnReba

I also went into my user settings and checked the box to “open external links in a new tab” - it’s not selected by default.

Thank you for posting this. I was wondering why some links I hit were not opening a new tab.

[trubandloki]

@Joanne

Now there is no way to know who started the threads without opening it up.

Joanne, here is the answer that mod1 gave me above.
The click the number option works amazingly! I did it quite a bit yesterday when things were running slower and it took me right to the end with out an issue.

@Moderator_1

Yes. From the OP, you can click on “last reply” from the bar at the end of the post that shows info about who has posted. Also, when you’re looking at the list of threads, you can also click on the number that shows the number of replies in that thread. It will give you options to click to the start of the thread or the end of the thread from there.

[trubandloki]

Something I like with this new forum is that the suggested topics at the bottom appear to all be current threads that I have posted in and have new comments. It is an easy way to catch up on those posts. Good job on whoever made the suggested topics so functional. (On the old forum suggested topics were frequently outdated threads that had nothing to do with anything going on at the moment.)

[Simkie]

@MHM

Are all these navigation options supposed to work on an iPhone? I’m not seeing the navigation bar on the side, or much of anything else along those lines. And the whole thing is still slower than molasses for me.

Yep. See the green rectangle in the bottom right hand corner? Click it to access the thread navigation slider.

[Bluey]

A curious observation, the Rolex clock is showing for me at times a few minutes late, or ahead, without a reason I can figure?

Not a site working glitch, just noticing that, wondering if that clock right now is interfering with other, or is it’s own program, separate from the web site programming?

[JB]

[quote=“walktrot, post:20, topic:751072, full:true”]
This isn’t making it. I know a lot of work has gone into this and we need it. But it still has too many basic problems. It appears to offer a lot nifty features to play around with which is nice once you figure them out I’ll leave out errors and server errors I don’t like:.[/quote]

I know you posted this yesterday but give it some time. ALL upgrades have had issues for at least a few days, never mind a whole platform change

part of this post disappeared so i have to retype it?

Not sure what you mean? Can you take a screen shot and paste it (yep that’s a thing!)? Do you have the preview window on? If not, bottom right of the box you type in has “show preview”

no pages

No but there are post counts and a nifty slide bar that moves things along fast

sub-replies under a post should be thrown out. does not qualify as a feature., or

sub-replies under a post should open with everything else in chronicle order.

The bottom of a comment says if there are replies which do open under that comment if you click. Comments as replies DO appear in chronological order

why did i get a thread from 2019 with 123 replies that was not revived…

what does “get a thread” mean?

cannot get a list of topics in a particular forum.

Did you click the forum header, aka Technical Help Forum?

Can’t tell if i already responded to a thread.

check the FAQ thread, not sure about that one

No previews of a topic so you can decide whether to read it.

They’re hopefully going to get that back - not a high priority feature

Mishmash of topics, including Off topic which I don’t want.

what does this mean?

Replies should be dated and timed, not 4h or 3 days.

If you’re dying to know, hover over the 4h or 3d

Too much clutter in list of topics.

why are there 5 somethings in the middle of the page of topics.

no idea what these mean

Put the software development team in a room with snacks and soda and a nearby restroom. Lock them in and don’t let them out until they do something useful, like fixing basic stuff like pages, order of replies, list of topics, it goes on forever. Some of the complaints have been out there for weeks.

Well that’s kinda rude? You don’t think they’ve already been busting their humps under deadlines to get this site up for WEEKS, so advertisers can get their ads back up? There aren’t pages. Not up for discussion, not part of the Discourse platform. Order of replies aren’t a problem, still all chronological

Complaints can’t be there for weeks - you’re just now seeing all this and thinking it’s all broken

There is a circle on the lower left that has been turning for a long time. Why?

screen shots help

Software developers can’t design a good product until they understand the market and the users. They have to get down and dirty and use it.

Discourse isn’t a new platform. You DO know COTH developers didn’t design this, right?

[JB]

@Renn_aissance

Personally, in those shoes I might have been tempted either to take the site back down until it finished (if that really were the problem) and the performance had been fully tested, but see above about load testing not being perfect at modeling live user variables, this is a free forum, we are consumers but not clients, and COTH would then have to deal with unhappy people saying “you said it would be back up on Monday.”

Like, paying advertisers who want their ads up and running?

[trubandloki]

@JB

what does this mean?

I am guessing they mean in the ‘latest’ list. Where unless you exclude the CE and OT topics they are part of the list.

@JB

If you’re dying to know, hover over the 4h or 3d

I admit I am confused by this advice. When I over over the 4d in a post I get nothing. When I hover over 5m ago at the edge of a post I get 5m ago in a little window.

[trubandloki]

What is the bell for?
When I hover over it, it does not give any information about what it is.
I assume it is some type of notification.

[JB]

So the timestamp hovering is odd. If I hover over trub’s 2d I get a timestamp, but not if I hover over SmareAlex’s 2d. In the end does it REALLY matter if it was days ago?

@trubandloki

What is the bell for?
When I hover over it, it does not give any information about what it is.
I assume it is some type of notification.

is that on a mobile? The bell for me is beside the dropdown for Watching, Tracking, Normal, Muted. Did you click it?

[trubandloki]

@JB

is that on a mobile? The bell for me is beside the dropdown for Watching, Tracking, Normal, Muted. Did you click it?

It is not on mobile in this case (it could be on mobile, I have no idea). It is on a PC. It is the same bell that is in your screen shot, just under the green bar.

I did not click it. I am not one of those ‘click random things I do not know what they do’ people. I am a ‘it will break if I use it wrong’ person so random clicking does not happen.
I just ask.

On the time stamp thing - I think it does matter in some cases. Two days ago is kind of vague. It is a reasonable question. If it is not an option (to have access to a date and time stamp that offers more information) then it is not an option, but still a reasonable question.

Edit to add a screen shot that better shows where the bell is.