Pros and Cons of New Forum Software

[Sheryl]

(adopts high-pitched, mocking tone)

And Sheryl--wow, you get your dog picture and now you think everything is fine. I think he does, too (or is that his rear leg I'm seeing?).

If Milo's happy, Everybody should be happy.

 

[yelnad]

Is there a "mark all posts as read" button? I can't find one.

 

[REWahoo]

Is there a "mark all posts as read" button? I can't find one.

Go up to Quick Links and it's on the drop-down menu.

 

[yelnad]

Ah ha! Thanks.

 

[yelnad]

Oh smack! That marks the ENTIRE forum as read!!

Is there a way to just mark particular sections of the forum as read? Like "Young Dreamers" for instance?

 

[Goonie]

Oh smack! That marks the ENTIRE forum as read!!

Is there a way to just mark particular sections of the forum as read? Like "Young Dreamers" for instance?

Yes, there is. Go to the forums main page http://www.early-retirement.org/forums/ and just double-click the icon on the left side (that looks like a bulletin board) beside the particular section you're wanting to mark as read....like "Young Dreamers".

Hope that's what you meant!

goonie

 

[Andy R]

Is there a way to just mark particular sections of the forum as read? Like "Young Dreamers" for instance?

Yes, please see the attachment for how to do this...

 

[Andy R]

double-click the icon on the left side (that looks like a bulletin board) beside the particular section you're wanting to mark as read....like "Young Dreamers".

Wow, that's slick, I did not know about that trick. I knew they were adding lots of AJAX stuff. Very cool. Thanks for sharing!

 

[CCdaCE]

Search feature sucks.

Can't even use AND ... it always defaults to OR

For instance, try searching for "Vanguard Money Market" and see how relevant the results are.

-CC

 

[MikeD]

I like the new SW. I am used to it because it is used on many other forums that I hang out on.

Mike D.

 

[Goonie]

Wow, that's slick, I did not know about that trick. I knew they were adding lots of AJAX stuff. Very cool. Thanks for sharing!

I just came upon it by sheer accident! I just started clicking around on stuff to see what would happen. :

 

[ladelfina]

Pros:
-I like the divisor that indicates "new new" unread threads and just "new" unread threads
- The "similar threads" is intriguing even though unreliable.

Neutral/getting used to:
-I see that someone has created a subcription folder for me that contains threads I have posted to so far under the new format. I'll bookmark that page to replace my old "read unread replies" bookmark. Thanks!
-Ads - don't bother me.
-It seems the search function, for me, works as it should (eg., "treasury bills" -w/o quotes- yields fewer results than just "treasury", not more)

Cons:
-Quick link for "today's posts" good.. but would like to see something broader, maybe an extra menu item for "this week's posts", to substitute for the 'recent' posts on the old board? I don't always visit every day (it just seems like it).
-Extra space still annoying, but I have learned to minimize it by turning off signatures and avatars in the User CP. There's still more space than necessary for the posts, but at least I can fit a bit more on the screen. For a while I toyed with reading the threads in their print version! I also switched posts per page to the max (40, I think) to minimize jumping around.

 

[wildcat]

I have had some serious problems with the new software. I log on and then as I browse through a thread I get dropped from the forum. I log in again, it accepts and then I get dropped again, again & again. What is up with this?

 

[Brat]

My whine of the day: I am in the middle of composing one of my more thoughtful comments, move my cursor up the the spell check tool and a da*n ad pops up. I back arrow, my thoughts are GONE.

ARRAH !!!!!

This is more than annoying. Whatever the perceived weakness of our other software this is enough for me to say GO BACK!

 

[Andy R]

I am in the middle of composing one of my more thoughtful comments, move my cursor up the the spell check tool and a da*n ad pops up. I back arrow, my thoughts are GONE.

I can assure you that no pop-up ads are being delivered from our site. If you had a pop-up ad you may want to check your system for adware. Here are some free tools for this:

Ad-Aware SE Personal - Lavasoft
The home of Spybot-S&D!

Andy

 

[Rich_by_the_Bay]

I can assure you that no pop-up ads are being delivered from our site. If you had a pop-up ad you may want to check your system for adware. Here are some free tools for this:

Ad-Aware SE Personal - Lavasoft
The home of Spybot-S&D!

Andy

I've noticed that some ads (not sure if I've seen one here) enlarge when you hover over them. Yahoo seems to be getting alot of those recently. Not sure it its a Java or CSS-based trick but it's annoying and seems to be a popular workaround to popup blocking.

 

[Andy R]

I've noticed that some ads (not sure if I've seen one here) enlarge when you hover over them. Yahoo seems to be getting alot of those recently. Not sure it its a Java or CSS-based trick but it's annoying and seems to be a popular workaround to popup blocking.

They call those expandable ads. The trick is to not hover over them (ie make them expand). I don't think Google will serve those here on our site but they can serve Flash ads (which is the technology behind those).

 

[ladelfina]

More pros and cons:

Pros:
-I like the little msg. preview; helps with checking out threads that have ambiguous titles.
-I like the automatic titles for links in posts and not having to go to TinyURL..

Cons:
-Seems slower than the old board.
-I don't like the lag when trying to get to a new thread; it always loads the first page.. chews for a while.. and then goes to the last updated page.
-While the Subscription folder helps with seeing threads you've posted to... these threads then stay there forever with the list ever growing. The old board would "disappear" the threads that were read until a new post was added, at which point it would reappear. If I delete threads I've posted to that seem to be inactive from my Subscription folder, will they automatically get "re-subscribed" to the folder if new threads are posted in the future? Also, is there a maximum for threads in the folder? That would be the only reason to have to delete subscribed threads..

I never see any popups.