Web Wiz Forums - SUGGESTION - from forum member

Print Page | Close Window

SUGGESTION - from forum member

Printed From: Web Wiz Forums
Category: Web Wiz Web App Support Forums
Forum Name: Web Wiz Forums
Forum Description: Support forum for Web Wiz Forums application.
URL: https://forums.webwiz.net/forum_posts.asp?TID=24124
Printed Date: 06 April 2026 at 9:13pm
Software Version: Web Wiz Forums 12.08 - https://www.webwizforums.com

Topic: SUGGESTION - from forum member

Posted By: ohiopbx
Subject: SUGGESTION - from forum member
Date Posted: 09 August 2007 at 7:44pm

Borg, one of my members brought up a good feature that he sees on other forums and i was wondering if you would incorporate anything like it. Here it is.

Lets say there is a hot topic with 300 posts, and when the user comes back the "Active Topics" indicates there are 320 posts. Well the user can only go to the 1st post or the last post. Not to just the beginning of the 20 he did not read. It makes sense to me to have a button to go right to the beginning of the 20 you have not read within the 320...make sense?

Replies:

Posted By: MadDog
Date Posted: 10 August 2007 at 1:14am

It makes sense, but its not possible. The reason why its not possible is because the forum does not record and save what threads/topics have been viewed. So once the member comes back, there is nothing to tell the forum how threads/topics he read last time.

-------------
http://www.iportalx.net" rel="nofollow">

Posted By: billd3
Date Posted: 10 August 2007 at 2:06pm

SMF forums does it,
the amceaglenest ( http://forums.amceaglenest.com ) does it.
I love that feature in their forums.
I can go and see or start reading where I left off, not just the last or latest post.
It places a small graphic word "New" next to the topic and if you click that, it takes you to the first post you have not read or viewed, or all that is new since your last visit.

-------------
BillD
http://theamcpages.com
http://theamcforum.com

Posted By: ohiopbx
Date Posted: 10 August 2007 at 2:28pm

billd3 wrote:

SMF forums does it,
the amceaglenest ( http://forums.amceaglenest.com ) does it.
I love that feature in their forums.
I can go and see or start reading where I left off, not just the last or latest post.
It places a small graphic word "New" next to the topic and if you click that, it takes you to the first post you have not read or viewed, or all that is new since your last visit.

yeah, thats exaclty why he suggested it. I think it would be a great enhancement.

Posted By: Scotty32
Date Posted: 10 August 2007 at 4:15pm

MadDog wrote:

It makes sense, but its not possible. The reason why its not possible is because the forum does not record and save what threads/topics have been viewed. So once the member comes back, there is nothing to tell the forum how threads/topics he read last time.

you *could* store the last post ID in the cookie, but thats not a 100% complete solution

-------------
S2H.co.uk - http://www.s2h.co.uk/wwf/" rel="nofollow - WebWiz Mods and Skins

For support on my mods + skins, please use http://www.s2h.co.uk/forum/" rel="nofollow - my forum .

Posted By: WebWiz-Bruce
Date Posted: 10 August 2007 at 4:57pm

Placing the data in cookies is not good, could you imagine how big the cookies would get!! and remember a cookie needs to do a round robin trip to the server and back for each HTTP connection which can be 100's on just one page.

The way to do it is to base it on the last visit date of the user the same as is used to display the number of unread posts in a forum or topic, and also used for active topics etc.

You just need to find the last post in a topic based on the last visit date, if the post date is newer, then the post is new since the users last visit, combine this with the array already used to display the number of unread posts in topics and forums and it should be quite accurate and update in real-time.

-------------
https://www.webwiz.net/web-wiz-forums/forum-hosting.htm" rel="nofollow - Web Wiz Forums Hosting
https://www.webwiz.net/web-hosting/windows-web-hosting.htm" rel="nofollow - ASP.NET Web Hosting

Posted By: WebWiz-Bruce
Date Posted: 14 August 2007 at 1:11pm

Thought this was such a good idea and because the forum already displays in real-time the number of unread posts in each forum and topic (by hovering the mouse over the forum/topic icon) , the foundation for this was already done.

Presently testing this on this forum;

Under the new unread post system, unread posts will display a star icon on them inplace of the blue bullet icon at the top of each post, so you can easly see which posts are yet to be read.

The 'View Last Post' grey '>' icon next to forum and topics will be displayed as a 'View Unread Post' icon '>' in a yellow colour for topics and forums that contain new posts, clicking on this icon will take you to the first unread post in the topic it relates to.

-------------
https://www.webwiz.net/web-wiz-forums/forum-hosting.htm" rel="nofollow - Web Wiz Forums Hosting
https://www.webwiz.net/web-hosting/windows-web-hosting.htm" rel="nofollow - ASP.NET Web Hosting

Posted By: billd3
Date Posted: 14 August 2007 at 1:28pm

WOW! What a great guy!

-------------
BillD
http://theamcpages.com
http://theamcforum.com

Posted By: WebWiz-Bruce
Date Posted: 14 August 2007 at 5:10pm

Seems to be working quite well, something I seem to be using all the time already as it's very useful.

Don't know why this wasn't suggested before, it's an extremely useful way to find the newest unread post.

The added icons in different colours also help to see quickly which topics contain unread posts, and which posts have not been read.

It's also been updated so that when you hover the mouse over the arrow which links to the first unread in a topic it will display the number of unread posts that topic contains.

-------------
https://www.webwiz.net/web-wiz-forums/forum-hosting.htm" rel="nofollow - Web Wiz Forums Hosting
https://www.webwiz.net/web-hosting/windows-web-hosting.htm" rel="nofollow - ASP.NET Web Hosting

Posted By: ohiopbx
Date Posted: 14 August 2007 at 11:33pm

-boRg- wrote:

Seems to be working quite well, something I seem to be using all the time already as it's very useful.

Don't know why this wasn't suggested before, it's an extremely useful way to find the newest unread post.

The added icons in different colours also help to see quickly which topics contain unread posts, and which posts have not been read.

It's also been updated so that when you hover the mouse over the arrow which links to the first unread in a topic it will display the number of unread posts that topic contains.

very nice borg!

Posted By: billd3
Date Posted: 15 August 2007 at 12:45pm

Yes, I love it. This alone is a good reason to update, but I still need to hold off a bit.... still want to get the location part changed so they can type in a city and state or province/country, etc That's about the only other thing we need.
Oh, and make it a REQUIRED field!

-------------
BillD
http://theamcpages.com
http://theamcforum.com

Posted By: WebWiz-Bruce
Date Posted: 15 August 2007 at 1:43pm

This is qute simple to do yourself. In register.asp at around line 1679 you will find:-

<select name="location" id="location" tabindex="11">
        <option value="" disabled<% If strLocation = "" Or strLocation = null Then Response.Write(" selected") %>> -- <% Response.Write(strTxtSelectCountry) %> -- </option>
        <% If strLocation <> "" Then Response.Write("<option value=""" & strLocation & """ selected>" & strLocation & "</option>") %>
        <!-- Include countires include file -->
        <!-- #include file="includes/select_countries_list.asp" -->
     </select>

Replace it with:-

<input type="text" name="location" id="location" size="30" maxlength="27" value="<% = strLocation %>" tabindex="11" />

-------------
https://www.webwiz.net/web-wiz-forums/forum-hosting.htm" rel="nofollow - Web Wiz Forums Hosting
https://www.webwiz.net/web-hosting/windows-web-hosting.htm" rel="nofollow - ASP.NET Web Hosting

Posted By: billd3
Date Posted: 15 August 2007 at 2:45pm

And that will then also populate it with the current location if they have one. For example, I go to "modify" my profile, say, change some other little thing, avatar, whatever - it will "stick", won't lose the location already in the database?
That's the only reason I didn't change it from a list to a text area because I wasn't sure how to automatically populate it with the "last known location". I was afraid it would be blank and if they saved other changes, they'd lose the location they already put in upon registration.
Gee, well, there goes any excuses! LOL

-------------
BillD
http://theamcpages.com
http://theamcforum.com

Posted By: WebWiz-Bruce
Date Posted: 15 August 2007 at 3:01pm

It will auto-populate any existing data.

-------------
https://www.webwiz.net/web-wiz-forums/forum-hosting.htm" rel="nofollow - Web Wiz Forums Hosting
https://www.webwiz.net/web-hosting/windows-web-hosting.htm" rel="nofollow - ASP.NET Web Hosting