Upcoming changes to the forum

[John Robinson]

I'm working on the following changes to the forum software:

Thread URLs will change.

Old links will be redirected to maintain bookmark compatibility. The new links will be more descriptive, offering the date of the article and perhaps a meaningful filename.

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-chat/1510575/posts doesn't say much.
http://www.freerepublic.com/2005/10/27/freeptoon/p1 says so much more.

Time zone handled by browser.

The timestamps on threads will change to your computer's local time zone, but only if you have JavaScript enabled. Otherwise they will be in US/Eastern. Your FR preference will be ignored (and will be phased out in favor of browser-side time zone handling.) The beauty of this arrangement is that as long as your computer displays the time in your time zone, FR will "Do The Right Thing"(tm).

Fixed number of comments.

No more than 50 comments per page will be shown. Your preference of 20, 100 or 250 is going to be ignored. I know this is a bit of a heartbreak for some, I understand it is a sacrifice. There are very good and very strong reasons this is changing.

Article text.

Only the first page of the thread will show the article text, and will always show the article text. Subsequent pages will only ever show a summary. In the future, a little browser-side magic could make the article text appear when you click a link.

All for one and one for all.

Everybody logged in or not will see the same content and links. For example, in the existing software, if you're not logged in you won't see the "Report Abuse" links. This check is going away, everybody will now see the same row of buttons.

In exchange, we'll have cache-friendly forum pages. This means:

• Faster downloads. If nothing changed on the thread you won't have to download it again. Also, local caches can store the page and deliver it much quicker.

• Better response time. Our servers will have to do less processing. Better yet, the front-end server will probably already have a generated copy of a thread in cache memory. Your request will be served instantly.

Update 10/30/05

I've expanded the scope of changes. I'm cleaning up the information we present to search engines like Google and Yahoo. Our site will be more useful to third-party search engines and thus more useful to you. For the most part this will not directly impact our human visitors. There will be changes that could break bookmarks of certain types of pages, but the chances such bookmarks have ever been made are slim.

[Ernest_at_the_Beach]

Oh thanks...I had decided I was just talking to myself on this thread.....good suggestion!

[Bob J]

Keep up the excellent work John.

[shetlan]

I'm riding the wave--TX Mini-Boss!

[King Prout]

no complaints from my end - none of the changes will affect me any ;)

[BufordP]

I have one request. How 'bout adding this.focus() to the slave window script?

[Rightly Biased]

Thanks John Rob

Bump to the Top for great info

[conservaDave]

Thanks for continuing to make FR the BEST site on the internet. I really mean that!

[Praxeus]

lol.. just noticed the "r" is a .45.

guess my eyes aint what they used to be.

[CellPhoneSurfer]

Old links will be redirected to maintain bookmark compatibility. The new links will be more descriptive, offering the date of the article and perhaps a meaningful filename.

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-chat/1510575/posts doesn't say much. http://www.freerepublic.com/2005/10/27/freeptoon/p1 says so much more.

I like the idea of the article link having the date, but not the descriptor. The numerical link system, for me at least, has its uses, especially as article shorthand. I often write down just the number of an article thread when I am using a computer not at my home, and then I just plug that number in when I get home and voila. A numeric based system blended with the date would be the best. Something like :

     http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-chat/051028XXXX/posts

This gives you the date 051028 and then the XXXX could be the sequence of posts for that day. 0510280001 would be the first post after midnight on that day and each post after would sequentially follow: 0510280002, 0003, etc., etc.

Speaking of article dates, I have occasionally thought that the article browser could benefit from a visual cue and a link set separating articles posted by each day (i.e. at midnight a large text divider indicates a new date, and a set of links to navigate to the previous and next midnight markers). Something along the lines of:

^ 12:00 AM FRIDAY - OCTOBER 28, 2005 ^
<< 12:00 AM SATURDAY - OCTOBER 29, 2005         12:00 AM THURSDAY - OCTOBER 27, 2005 >>

There have been many times that I have tried to go back through a few days of articles to find something, or to catch up on some breaking news event as they happened, or to simply read the articles from days I might have missed. A simple set of links like above would help more than the "Show more results ... " link at the bottom of every page.

[Calpernia]

Forum changes tidbits.

[Junior]

Damn. I'm going to have to write some SQL to re-orient my database. Currently, I have the thread number and forum stored separately, and the SQL adds all the other URL code automatically.

[ELS]

bttt

[getmeouttaPalmBeachCounty_FL]

Bumping to the smilie-lovers of FR!

[MEG33]

Oh my..I just hurt myself laughing..

[RebelBanker]

I abhor puke-inducing cutesy smilies, avatars, and other images that add nothing to the discussion. That's just my personal opinion, however.

I agree! Also, I am still in dial-up Purgatory at home so minimizing extraneous graphics speeds up downloads quite a bit.

Thank you and God bless you for all your hard work here!

[Monkey Face]

Thanks! I even understood that!

[SmithL]

Faster Downloads
Better Response Time

Mmmmmmmmmmmm!
Speed Good!

[Alex Murphy]

Bump for later reference, when I ask myself "what happened to the forums?"

[Eepsy]

Is there any chance at all at having 100 comments rather than 50? I find the majority of interesting threads hover at aroud 50-100 posts and it would make things easier for us dedicated skimmers.

I must admit to being a dedicated 250-at-a-time girl, but I will gladly give up what I must :)

[devane617]

>>The new links will be more descriptive, offering the date of the article and perhaps a meaningful filename<<

So, will someone be able to supply a wildcard and see all posts for a certain day? Could get nasty if not careful with this naming scheme.