New Answers thing

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This isn't a question. I just wanna declare my love for the way the New Answers thing works on this board. Most places you go tell you that there have been new messages since your last visit, but not where exactly you got to on the thread, which is a bore. Actually I think the Guardian boards do something similar nowadays, but they lack the beautiful red writing of ILE/ILM. It turns me on.

― Eyeball Kicks (Eyeball Kicks), Wednesday, 23 October 2002 14:03 (twenty-three years ago)

red writing? am i missing something?

― blueski, Wednesday, 23 October 2002 14:14 (twenty-three years ago)

You don't get told in red when there's new messages in a thread you've already looked at? Well, I do - ha ha!

― Eyeball Kicks (Eyeball Kicks), Wednesday, 23 October 2002 14:16 (twenty-three years ago)

blueski, its because you havent registered (ie you dont login), so it cant know what you have and havent read

― gareth (gareth), Wednesday, 23 October 2002 14:18 (twenty-three years ago)

woo to graham yet again. Graham, if I was you I'd "version" the software, right some docs for distribution, and bundle it up. i think the software might prove popular if it got a bit of "publicity".

― Alan (Alan), Wednesday, 23 October 2002 14:20 (twenty-three years ago)

I log in, but I don't get red writing :-(

― PJ Miller (PJ Miller), Wednesday, 23 October 2002 14:20 (twenty-three years ago)

me neither... :/

― RJG (RJG), Wednesday, 23 October 2002 14:21 (twenty-three years ago)

if ever there was an incentive to register then i think this is it :)

― blueski, Wednesday, 23 October 2002 14:23 (twenty-three years ago)

ok, go back to the new answers page, describe how this thread appears next time theres an answer you havent read (that isnt your own)

― gareth (gareth), Wednesday, 23 October 2002 14:23 (twenty-three years ago)

tick "Show unread messages on the New Answers page" on your settings page

― Alan (Alan), Wednesday, 23 October 2002 14:23 (twenty-three years ago)

I will also declare my love. It is teh rock~~. I wasn't going to log in from here but I couldn't bear to be without the new answers feature.

― Rebecca (reb), Wednesday, 23 October 2002 14:28 (twenty-three years ago)

A-mazing! But still not red :-(

― PJ Miller (PJ Miller), Wednesday, 23 October 2002 14:30 (twenty-three years ago)

It's red now :-))))

― PJ Miller (PJ Miller), Wednesday, 23 October 2002 14:32 (twenty-three years ago)

*shit* mine still isn't red.

― michael wells (michael w.), Wednesday, 23 October 2002 14:33 (twenty-three years ago)

...and now it says that i haven't read threads that i have, a number of times in some cases.

― michael wells (michael w.), Wednesday, 23 October 2002 14:40 (twenty-three years ago)

Probably has to do with what color you have different types of links set to.

― Mr Noodles (Mr Noodles), Wednesday, 23 October 2002 14:51 (twenty-three years ago)

yeah, i'm going to leave it as it is. i'm happy with it. why change?

― michael wells (michael w.), Wednesday, 23 October 2002 14:54 (twenty-three years ago)

but were those threads threads you had read before logging in? ie, how would it know you were you?

― gareth (gareth), Wednesday, 23 October 2002 14:58 (twenty-three years ago)

Ooh. I've just discovered the magic red writing too. Truly, Graham is the Albus Dumbledore of ILX!

― Archel (Archel), Wednesday, 23 October 2002 15:04 (twenty-three years ago)

Thankyou. This has heartened me after an afternoon trying to do the simple task of buying a new mobile phone, and failing miserably.

I will also declare my love. It is teh rock.

Bah! Always ther bridesmaid, never etc.

― Graham (graham), Wednesday, 23 October 2002 15:13 (twenty-three years ago)

thanks for the tip, guys, this is so much better!
props to graham!

― joan vich (joan vich), Wednesday, 23 October 2002 15:36 (twenty-three years ago)

You forgot my tilde tilde, bridesmaid. </best "oh, swayze! you've grrown!" voice>

― Rebecca (reb), Wednesday, 23 October 2002 18:22 (twenty-three years ago)

no gareth, i've been logged in all the time, i just changed my settings.

― michael wells (michael w.), Thursday, 24 October 2002 08:11 (twenty-three years ago)

yes, sorry, i got mixed up. its blueski that wasnt registered

― gareth (gareth), Thursday, 24 October 2002 08:37 (twenty-three years ago)

it's cool. i think i can live without the red writing.

*lives rest of ilx life in denial*

― michael wells (michael w.), Thursday, 24 October 2002 09:12 (twenty-three years ago)

Michael, it doesn't log what pages you've looked at before you enable the option. It's a privacy thing, as much as how much data it would produce.

Rrebecca, you make less and less sense every day. But I like you that way.

― Graham (graham), Thursday, 24 October 2002 09:25 (twenty-three years ago)

Right, it caches the unread count for the newanswers page now, it has to. If you don't refresh the New Answers page more than two minutes apart, which you shouldn't anyway, this shouldn't be a problem. If you're looking at a cached copy and you have unread counts turned on, it will have a time generated stamp at the top.

Sorry, but the server just wasn't coping with regenererating the page each time. I would come up with a cleverer more elegant solution to this, but my modem is broken so I'm stuck with what I can program in half an hour at an internet cafe.

― Graham (graham), Tuesday, 29 October 2002 18:43 (twenty-three years ago)

so what does it mean that the page i'm looking at has been 'generated at 5:53'
btw here my clock says 7:53. must i change my settings, or just wait?
god, i feel stupid.

― joan vich (joan vich), Tuesday, 29 October 2002 18:49 (twenty-three years ago)

I've fiddled with the timezone settings too today, so you might have to change them again cos daylight savings has screwed things up and I had to fix it properly, arg. Sorry.

― Graham (graham), Tuesday, 29 October 2002 18:52 (twenty-three years ago)

(I'll get something sensible sorted out for spring DS)

― Graham (graham), Tuesday, 29 October 2002 18:52 (twenty-three years ago)

no problem. ta.

― joan vich (joan vich), Tuesday, 29 October 2002 18:56 (twenty-three years ago)

It's been said many times, many ways: Graham rocks.

― Andrew Farrell (afarrell), Tuesday, 29 October 2002 19:49 (twenty-three years ago)

Ok, Andrew is complaining about how much processing resources the board is using, and I agree. The main problem is generating the unread messages counts (and also the search engine). They both need rewriting, and I have some ideas, but my computer at home is fucked so I'm not really in a position to do that, so:

Probably this'll mean restricting the unread messages feature to 15-20 of you. Is this OK?

(which is how it was at the start when I was testing it out because I knew it would be too resource intensive. But then Martin started a thread about it and I panicced (sp???) and let everyone at it, which was dumb of me)

― Graham (graham), Tuesday, 5 November 2002 11:24 (twenty-three years ago)

graham do what you have to

wd it help to simplify it to read just: "1 unread message" or "several unread messages"?

(i know two isn't really several)

as a matter of interest do you know how many visitors the boards actually have?

― mark s (mark s), Tuesday, 5 November 2002 11:34 (twenty-three years ago)

Probably this'll mean restricting the unread messages feature to 15-20 of you. Is this OK?

Pick me! Pick me!

Actually, the people who most depend on it are the people who shouldn't be picked for obvious reasons, so, yeah, DON'T pick me.

― Andrew Farrell (afarrell), Tuesday, 5 November 2002 11:36 (twenty-three years ago)

I don't know how you go about generating the unread messages text, so don't know how it could be improved, though I have an idea -- in fact I'm sure there are loads of people who could suggest all sorts of things -- but unless we can read the code, we'll not know if it's relevant or not. is there somewhere we can have a butcher's?

― Alan (Alan), Tuesday, 5 November 2002 11:37 (twenty-three years ago)

What Alan said.

― RickyT (RickyT), Tuesday, 5 November 2002 12:18 (twenty-three years ago)

I don't have it on me and I can't log in from here to get it, but masically it does a left join to the msgid of the last read message and then groups by thread, something like:
sum(if(newanswers.msgid>lastread.msgid,1,0))

It's not very efficient I know.

― Graham (graham), Tuesday, 5 November 2002 12:46 (twenty-three years ago)

Woah. That's horrible shit, Graham. Not that I don't love you.

Yes, do the server a favour and disable the red text! I did this a day or two ago, and it has expedaited my ILX experience.

― Andrew (enneff), Tuesday, 5 November 2002 13:09 (twenty-three years ago)

oh, but the red colour is so useful...

― joan vich (joan vich), Tuesday, 5 November 2002 13:13 (twenty-three years ago)

sum(if(newanswers.msgid>lastread.msgid,1,0))

HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA!!

― N. (nickdastoor), Tuesday, 5 November 2002 13:55 (twenty-three years ago)

nick, i look forward to your improved version... 8)

andy

― koogs, Tuesday, 5 November 2002 13:59 (twenty-three years ago)

Codefight!

― Tim (Tim), Tuesday, 5 November 2002 14:02 (twenty-three years ago)

Sorry - I was just trying to bluff my way at geek humour.

err.. RUN/DOS/RUN.

― N. (nickdastoor), Tuesday, 5 November 2002 14:06 (twenty-three years ago)

We can smell a fake a mile away.

― Andrew (enneff), Tuesday, 5 November 2002 14:12 (twenty-three years ago)

red schmed... i like the way a lag in discussion earns an authoritative horizontal line to mark it out... thread-killa palimpsests! bella!!

― Tracer Hand (tracerhand), Tuesday, 5 November 2002 14:23 (twenty-three years ago)

Preliminary list (everyone from top ten most frequent posters for each board, and most frequent readers too):

Ned
jdesouza
mark s
electricsound
gareth
graham
reb
Groke
dubplatestyle
Eyeball Kicks
rosemary
N.
Martin
Dan
jel
Ronan
Nabisco
Tracer Hand
felicity
Jody BR
Alex in NYC
Charlie
Fritz
Tim F

― Graham (graham), Wednesday, 6 November 2002 11:49 (twenty-three years ago)

but how do you generate the page? i imagine there is a basic page cached every 2 mins that is fed straight back to the unregistered, but with registered you do some sort of reg match magic replacing an invisible tag with the red lettering looked up from the dbase.

― Alan (Alan), Wednesday, 6 November 2002 11:54 (twenty-three years ago)

Sniff.

― Madchen (Madchen), Wednesday, 6 November 2002 12:11 (twenty-three years ago)

Graham, maybe this is a niggly point, but privacy and all that - did the top ten readers consent to having their names broadcast like this?

― N. (nickdastoor), Wednesday, 6 November 2002 14:12 (twenty-three years ago)

ok i disabled all the features on mine. if just getting rid of the features alltogether would speed up the requests going to the server, then i vote for that!

― ron (ron), Wednesday, 6 November 2002 16:07 (twenty-three years ago)

so should we all disable all the features?
it would be sad for me (i'm getting used to following the red threads/arab straps), but i hate it when it takes ages to load the page.

― joan vich (joan vich), Wednesday, 6 November 2002 16:14 (twenty-three years ago)

No nick it generates the page for normal people and caches that. And it also regenerates the page completely with the unread counts when someone with them enabled loads the page (because just generating the unread counts gets you 90% of the way to generating the whole New Answers page. There may be some merit in twhat you suggested though - I'll look into it).

I think I've spotted a reason why it takes so long to generate sometimes as well.

― Graham (graham), Wednesday, 6 November 2002 17:43 (twenty-three years ago)

No Alan I mean. (properly it was foolish trying to generate the whole page with a single SQL query)

Nick, sorry yeah, but most of them are regular posters as well, so I didn't think.

― Graham (graham), Wednesday, 6 November 2002 17:52 (twenty-three years ago)

oh right.

anyway WAH! i have to post loads more again to get back into the magic new answers enabled list.

― Alan (Alan), Thursday, 7 November 2002 13:07 (twenty-three years ago)

Right, It's been done now. I haven't cleared out the database of records (15,000 of them) yet, so if you want it re-enabled you still can. I don't like being the person choosing, so object now.

― Graham (graham), Thursday, 7 November 2002 13:16 (twenty-three years ago)

I refresh all the time when I'm online, Graham. Should I try to curtail this habit for the good of Andrew's server?

― N. (nickdastoor), Thursday, 7 November 2002 13:17 (twenty-three years ago)

bah! now i have to use my brain more. curses!

― g-kit (g-kit), Thursday, 7 November 2002 13:17 (twenty-three years ago)

Yes.

― Graham (graham), Thursday, 7 November 2002 13:25 (twenty-three years ago)

(NB I am going to come up with a more effiecient way to do this that doesn't use up so much resources, but not today)

― Graham (graham), Thursday, 7 November 2002 13:26 (twenty-three years ago)

New Answers thing is dead.
All hail New Answers thing.

now i have to use my brain more.
Yeah,I'm with Kitten.

― Sarah McLusky (coco), Thursday, 7 November 2002 13:38 (twenty-three years ago)

Yeah,I'm with Kitten.

that means you're agreeing with me, right? you don't mean it like "with child", i hope.

― g-kit (g-kit), Thursday, 7 November 2002 13:42 (twenty-three years ago)

Greg, are you really called Kitten? I seem to remember you saying that you were but maybe you were joking.

― N. (nickdastoor), Thursday, 7 November 2002 13:43 (twenty-three years ago)

I miss the red numbers as I only use Ile at this net place it helps me find the threads I've been reading before :o(

― chris (chris), Thursday, 7 November 2002 13:45 (twenty-three years ago)

Put Post-It notes on the screen.

(I presume you stole a lifetime supply when you left mmm)

― N. (nickdastoor), Thursday, 7 November 2002 13:46 (twenty-three years ago)

Greg, are you really called Kitten? I seem to remember you saying that you were but maybe you were joking.

not legally, but yes, i have become known as greg kitten. long story that's hard to explain without telling my real name. everyone i know calls me greg, and has done since i was 12. and not even that part is my legally given monicker. and my name's not monica either.

― g-kit (g-kit), Thursday, 7 November 2002 13:49 (twenty-three years ago)

I can't bear to take the feature away from anyone. I'm so so sorry.

― Graham (graham), Thursday, 7 November 2002 13:55 (twenty-three years ago)

So you should be, this is murder! Hang your head in shame. Be thankful you have Melissa to lean on.

― Plinky (Plinky), Thursday, 7 November 2002 13:56 (twenty-three years ago)

actually, i've got over it pretty quickly. i miss the red, but it's alright now. after all, i coped before, right? so i can cope again. oh yesh. survival instinct. nooch.

― g-kit (g-kit), Thursday, 7 November 2002 14:01 (twenty-three years ago)

mmm, hello red numbers

N. we didn't use post-it notes at mmm, they cost us too much so we used nice day ones, how's taht for business irony. or something

― chris (chris), Thursday, 7 November 2002 14:02 (twenty-three years ago)

I ain't got 'em no more, and I NEEDS my red numbers.

― Colin Meeder (Mert), Thursday, 7 November 2002 16:02 (twenty-three years ago)

"now i have to use my brain more.
Yeah,I'm with Kitten"

No, I was just mentioning that I'm here hanging out with a kitten. a;lksdjf kl;sa asdfasssssssssssssaaaaaf sfafda
(Oh, look! It typed something!)

― Sarah McLusky (coco), Thursday, 7 November 2002 16:34 (twenty-three years ago)

And now they're gone, and with them any realistic chance of me keeping in the top 50. Sigh.

― Andrew Farrell (afarrell), Thursday, 7 November 2002 22:04 (twenty-three years ago)

two months pass...

Graham: so is everyone (registered) now getting the magic red lettering again? it seems faster, and it looks like there's been other tinkering over the xmas/new year period (thanks for the RANDOM feature, heh heh)

I bet you posted the changes in some thread in that time, but i wasn't "on board" and can't find it. hmm?

― Alan (Alan), Wednesday, 8 January 2003 10:43 (twenty-three years ago)

I can't see any red lettering, although I'm registered.

Graham: why do I sometimes see ppl's entire email addresses and sometimes only a few letters of them, without apparently changing anything?

― MarkH (MarkH), Wednesday, 8 January 2003 11:38 (twenty-three years ago)

It's supposed to only show the full address if you are logged in. Is that not the way it is working for you?

― N. (nickdastoor), Wednesday, 8 January 2003 12:06 (twenty-three years ago)

Alan, everyone who switched on before has it back, and anyone can switch it back. Due to a new cacheing system, it's now up to date whenever it's reloaded (kinda - revived threads won't appear for a couple of minutes), and puts a much tinier load on the server.

I never posted a list, so other changes:
- Searching is faster, especially on name/email/date etc
- New random feature
- New archive feature at bottom of search page
- Various fixes and other changes

Mark is experiencing the ilXor.com vds ilx.wh3rd.net proglem of being suddenly logged out when you click between the two. I've got to work out a solution to this. You need to turn on "Show Unread messages" in the settings to see red writing.

― Graham (graham), Wednesday, 8 January 2003 17:43 (twenty-three years ago)

two years pass...

random bump

― Britain's Jauntiest Shepherd (Alan), Saturday, 3 September 2005 08:15 (twenty years ago)

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