Naked Science Forum

General Discussion & Feedback => Just Chat! => Topic started by: chris on 05/01/2018 09:00:17

Title: APOLOGIES FOR THE RECENT DISRUPTION
Post by: chris on 05/01/2018 09:00:17
Dear all

I apologise for the recent downtime on the forum; I've been doing a lot of upgrading because much of the software that was running this forum was out of date and relying on now-obsolete functions; it was becoming tricky to keep it alive and keep our technology and security up to date. Unfortunately, the latest upgrades meant some considerable downtime while I fixed a few things, brought others up to speed and also fixed the things I broke while doing the work!

You'll see that this is not the normal forum layout you are used to. This is an interim measure to ensure that the site is live again and you have access to your content; I'll continue to work in the meantime to return the other - currently unavailable - options and formatting.

Thank you for your understanding.

Chris

Title: Re: APOLOGIES FOR THE RECENT DISRUPTION
Post by: smart on 05/01/2018 10:00:39
No problem @chris

I do like this theme.

Have you upgraded the SMF software to a newer version?

 
Title: Re: APOLOGIES FOR THE RECENT DISRUPTION
Post by: SeanB on 05/01/2018 13:22:55
Chris, please add the Thank you function to SMF while you are at it, it is a useful thing I find.

Updated, this is the latest version of SMF as well.
Title: Re: APOLOGIES FOR THE RECENT DISRUPTION
Post by: Bogie_smiles on 05/01/2018 13:29:12
Thanks for making such a big overhaul, and good luck with the rest of the process. They say, "Absence makes the heart grow fonder", so getting back on line with the Naked Scientists, with full features, what could be better.
Title: Re: APOLOGIES FOR THE RECENT DISRUPTION
Post by: Petrochemicals on 05/01/2018 17:19:42
Appreciations Chris fpr you hard work.

I like this layout for functionality, even if it is not as pretty or relaxing as the other. I hope the new has the benefits of bothe

Thanks again
Title: Re: APOLOGIES FOR THE RECENT DISRUPTION
Post by: LB7 on 05/01/2018 17:22:03
Chris: no problem, I prefer this theme, happy new year ! Thanks
Title: Re: APOLOGIES FOR THE RECENT DISRUPTION
Post by: evan_au on 05/01/2018 19:25:14
Thanks for getting it going again!
I hope you can catch up on your sleep soon...
Title: Re: APOLOGIES FOR THE RECENT DISRUPTION
Post by: syhprum on 05/01/2018 22:23:06
My thanks too  for your heroic efforts
Title: Re: APOLOGIES FOR THE RECENT DISRUPTION
Post by: Zer0 on 06/01/2018 16:03:01
Change is Inevitable.   👊

On second thought, this Format is even nicer.   👌

Appreciate your hard work n thank you for not giving up.   👍


P.S. - I need not say anything more, my signature line says it all.   ✌
Title: Re: APOLOGIES FOR THE RECENT DISRUPTION
Post by: chris on 06/01/2018 22:58:14
UPDATE - I have now developed and tested (successfully) a way to revert all of the previous functionality we had previously, and on the responsive theme that will work nicely on mobile devices and tablets (which this version cannot).

I don't want to push through the change late at night for obvious reasons, so I'm going to make the attempt tomorrow morning when things are quiet and I am fresh.

However, it looks like you all quite like this layout, so I'd be eager to hear what about it you like and appreciate and I will take that into account when building the next stage of the forum development.

Thanks

Chris
Title: Re: APOLOGIES FOR THE RECENT DISRUPTION
Post by: Bogie_smiles on 07/01/2018 01:15:56
I like the feature of being able to edit my posts forever. I like and use the image gallery a lot, and it helps to use images in my threads, where I am often describing alternative ideas. I do like to see who is on line and what they are looking at, and would like to be able to tell which members have viewed my posts, if that is a feature that SMF provides. Thanks for all you efforts.
Title: Re: APOLOGIES FOR THE RECENT DISRUPTION
Post by: chris on 07/01/2018 12:18:45
Dear all

okay, pretty much everything is now restored and / or upgraded to a much more stable architecture. This should all perform more reliably and more quickly than it has before, and be more secure too.

Obviously, there may be bugs or unexpected behaviours. If you spot anything, please tell me and I'll deal with them. Also, please do make suggestions for improvements or upgrades we can make to ensure that we keep developing this place to keep it relevant to your needs.

Once again, thank you for being patient.

Chris
Title: Re: APOLOGIES FOR THE RECENT DISRUPTION
Post by: Petrochemicals on 07/01/2018 12:48:12
I liked the way you could see one thread from the main page without having to load the sub forum. Surely you could load all 1st pages of sub forums onto the main page, its only a bit of text, not too much data. Only problem then would be the size of the main page, so if you could click on the headyng to expand which section you wanted, and that wouod automatically collqpse tye heading you opened prior to the current one ? Without having to move off the main page

Also the other when you clicked on a thread, you automatically loaded all of the posts, it wasnt a loqd by how far you moved thing. 

And when people quote people, we do not need to see the whole quote every time, plus that persons quote, plus the quote before, perhaps a click to expand on that too ?
Title: Re: APOLOGIES FOR THE RECENT DISRUPTION
Post by: chris on 07/01/2018 14:00:09
And when people quote people, we do not need to see the whole quote every time, plus that persons quote, plus the quote before, perhaps a click to expand on that too ?

You can use "quote selected" (from action drop down, or the previous posts listed below the reply box if you clicked reply) to quote just the bit you want. No need to include all the back-quotes if people don't want to.
Title: Re: APOLOGIES FOR THE RECENT DISRUPTION
Post by: chris on 07/01/2018 14:02:03
I liked the way you could see one thread from the main page without having to load the sub forum.

Can you just explain this a bit more - at the moment you can see a reference to the latest post in each board on the board index; is that not what you mean?
Title: Re: APOLOGIES FOR THE RECENT DISRUPTION
Post by: Petrochemicals on 07/01/2018 17:19:43
Yep but having to go into the different forums and out again gets a bit tiresome, i was thinking about the main page. If you clicked on the general science tab on the main page it would drop down giving page 1 on general science, you could hqve q quick scan through the posts, and if nothing took your fancy (whilst still on the main page) you could click on chemistry banner, which would then drop down page one whilst still on the main forum page, whilst general science would collapse back to just the banner.

If you wanted to go in depth to any forum you could, but my experienc3 is that the top ~15~ posts are the only ones that are active at any one time.

Edit

Ive just checked, my android mobile software does not even show the 1st post

And when people quote people, we do not need to see the whole quote every time, plus that persons quote, plus the quote before, perhaps a click to expand on that too ?

You can use "quote selected" (from action drop down, or the previous posts listed below the reply box if you clicked reply) to quote just the bit you want. No need to include all the back-quotes if people don't want to.

As you can see above i have included my earlier post in your post, and there is no way of screening that. Alot of forums are using a click to expand gismo.

http://www.trek-lite.com/index.php?threads/peeling-pu-layer.3463/

and the replies on here are not quite as long as the naked scientists !
Title: Re: APOLOGIES FOR THE RECENT DISRUPTION
Post by: Bogie_smiles on 07/01/2018 19:42:58
I am having trouble accessing the image gallery. I hope you are planning to keep it.
Title: Re: APOLOGIES FOR THE RECENT DISRUPTION
Post by: chris on 07/01/2018 20:05:10
I am having trouble accessing the image gallery. I hope you are planning to keep it.

It might be one of the casualties not behaving itself yet; leave it with me and I'll sort it out.

Chris
Title: Re: APOLOGIES FOR THE RECENT DISRUPTION
Post by: smart on 07/01/2018 20:32:37
Dear @chris

Can you please put back the ability to see which user is reading a thread and forum?

I enjoyed that feature  8)
Title: Re: APOLOGIES FOR THE RECENT DISRUPTION
Post by: chris on 08/01/2018 12:29:40
Dear @chris

Can you please put back the ability to see which user is reading a thread and forum?

I enjoyed that feature  8)

It's: https://www.thenakedscientists.com/forum/index.php?action=who

you click on the "Guests" in the footer and it tells you what people are looking at what.
Title: Re: APOLOGIES FOR THE RECENT DISRUPTION
Post by: chris on 08/01/2018 12:30:05
I am having trouble accessing the image gallery. I hope you are planning to keep it.

Now all fixed and working again...
Title: Re: APOLOGIES FOR THE RECENT DISRUPTION
Post by: chris on 08/01/2018 12:31:57
Hello everyone.

After another few hours of painstakingly editing the mod code and the database for the remaining misbehaving mods, I have restored everything that we had before to full working order, as far as I can tell.

Now "recent topics", buddies, bookmarks and gallery are all back.

If you spot missing or misbehaving functions though, do please shout and I'll fix it. I'm getting quite good at this...
Title: Re: APOLOGIES FOR THE RECENT DISRUPTION
Post by: SeanB on 08/01/2018 12:45:16
Going to get a job as a SMF installer and maintainer then Chris, I can see there is a market for it.
Title: Re: APOLOGIES FOR THE RECENT DISRUPTION
Post by: chris on 08/01/2018 13:45:14
Going to get a job as a SMF installer and maintainer then Chris, I can see there is a market for it.

HaHa - feels like it.

And, btw, "Say Thanks!" was prioritised yesterday just for you, Sean, since you asked so nicely!
Title: Re: APOLOGIES FOR THE RECENT DISRUPTION
Post by: chris on 08/01/2018 13:46:51
Observant users will notice that I have also managed to fix another irritation of the other forum, which was that clicking "login" when within a page took you back to the homepage upon successful log-in. Now it returns you to the thread you were looking at (which is what it should have been doing originally...). I discovered why while battling the other issues and fixed that too!
Title: Re: APOLOGIES FOR THE RECENT DISRUPTION
Post by: SeanB on 08/01/2018 14:54:39
Going to get a job as a SMF installer and maintainer then Chris, I can see there is a market for it.

HaHa - feels like it.

And, btw, "Say Thanks!" was prioritised yesterday just for you, Sean, since you asked so nicely!

 ;) :-*
Title: Re: APOLOGIES FOR THE RECENT DISRUPTION
Post by: chris on 08/01/2018 17:02:05
Yep but having to go into the different forums and out again gets a bit tiresome,

That's a nice suggestion about drop-downs, but quite a hefty job to implement; I might put that on my list for a longer-term project...

But, just to flag - and you may know this already - you can see what's new in several ways:

1) Click on "RECENT TOPICS" at the top - or https://www.thenakedscientists.com/forum/index.php?action=recenttopics

2) Use the "POSTS" dropdown option at the top and select either "Unread Replies" for an amalgamated list of all the new replies in threads in which you have participated (indicating which board), or "Unread Posts", which is a list of ALL the new posts made in any board, forum-wide, that you've not reviewed yet.

Hopefully that's helpful.
Title: Re: APOLOGIES FOR THE RECENT DISRUPTION
Post by: smart on 08/01/2018 19:35:11
It's: https://www.thenakedscientists.com/forum/index.php?action=who

you click on the "Guests" in the footer and it tells you what people are looking at what.

This page takes forever to load... Previously, we could see by visiting a forum or thread which users was active in the room.
Title: Re: APOLOGIES FOR THE RECENT DISRUPTION
Post by: chris on 08/01/2018 21:08:20
It's: https://www.thenakedscientists.com/forum/index.php?action=who

you click on the "Guests" in the footer and it tells you what people are looking at what.

This page takes forever to load... Previously, we could see by visiting a forum or thread which users was active in the room.


Ahh, now I know what you mean; I'd not realised that feature was not working. I'll track down the offending mod...
Title: Re: APOLOGIES FOR THE RECENT DISRUPTION
Post by: chris on 08/01/2018 21:20:41
It's: https://www.thenakedscientists.com/forum/index.php?action=who

you click on the "Guests" in the footer and it tells you what people are looking at what.

This page takes forever to load... Previously, we could see by visiting a forum or thread which users was active in the room.

There you go... how's that for a fast service!?
Title: Re: APOLOGIES FOR THE RECENT DISRUPTION
Post by: smart on 08/01/2018 23:45:25
Thanks @chris

I appreciate your hard work in maintaining this fine forum!  :)

tk
Title: Re: APOLOGIES FOR THE RECENT DISRUPTION
Post by: chris on 09/01/2018 08:19:32
Wow, two happy customers in one day; I must be doing something right (for a change!).
Title: Re: APOLOGIES FOR THE RECENT DISRUPTION
Post by: chris on 09/01/2018 08:20:24
Meanwhile, anyone else spotted any gremlins in the system?
Title: Re: APOLOGIES FOR THE RECENT DISRUPTION
Post by: syhprum on 09/01/2018 12:54:33
Make at least three I appreciate all your hard work I know what a battle with computers is like!
Title: Re: APOLOGIES FOR THE RECENT DISRUPTION
Post by: chris on 15/01/2018 09:00:05
A quick "bug-fix" update - I discovered that that attachments directory was now allowing the forum to upload new attachments, such as images etc.

This has now been fixed, so you can safely upload attachments to your posts again.

Sorry about that; it was an oversight following the recent rebuild.
Title: Re: APOLOGIES FOR THE RECENT DISRUPTION
Post by: Petrochemicals on 01/03/2018 02:04:55
Yep but having to go into the different forums and out again gets a bit tiresome,

That's a nice suggestion about drop-downs, but quite a hefty job to implement; I might put that on my list for a longer-term project...

But, just to flag - and you may know this already - you can see what's new in several ways:

1) Click on "RECENT TOPICS" at the top - or https://www.thenakedscientists.com/forum/index.php?action=recenttopics

2) Use the "POSTS" dropdown option at the top and select either "Unread Replies" for an amalgamated list of all the new replies in threads in which you have participated (indicating which board), or "Unread Posts", which is a list of ALL the new posts made in any board, forum-wide, that you've not reviewed yet.

Hopefully that's helpful.
That is massivley helpfu, maybe im computer useless thats all.

Another suggestion, or hopeful ask maybe

If in a thread lots of people post arguments and quote each other repeatedly  a thread can get a bit diluted and cumbesome see this one i started

https://www.thenakedscientists.com/forum/index.php?topic=71332.100

Half the posts and 3/4 of the content is just junk, is there any way to mark posts as inconsequential or irrelevant, perhaps a sub thread that collapses ?

Good work and much apreciation again chris