[RESOLVED]Incomplete feature on the new forum

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Expand view Topic review: [RESOLVED]Incomplete feature on the new forum

Re: [RESOLVED]Incomplete feature on the new forum

by Peregrine Falcon » Sat Apr 21, 2018 1:58 am

I'm going to hopefully wrap up this discussion, since I think it's become circular.
Reading back through the thread, I think everyone's now on the same page that there's no bug; the new forum's urls simply need a specific and complete form in order to function as intended.
One thing that still seems unaddressed is the dialogue box. It pops up because the primary function of the button is to be able to link others to the post. A link to that is not necessary if you are looking at the post, but a url to copy might be helpful, hence the pop-up link to copy.

I think the reason this confusion got out of hand is because jmo and ghug, among others, have put a lot of time into making this forum work. As it's being implemented, it has been important to find and address emergent issues and bugs as quickly as possible, to ensure it runs smoothly. In a lot of ways, this issue seems frivious when compared the rest of the work they do to keep the site functioning.

Since our dev team has very limited time, they often need to make hard choices about what to work on. That's why they might be short when asked about feature requests that don't add something new or fix an important problem. The go-to line from devs is often to ask people to implement their idea themselves, not as a mean-spirited response, but because the issue legitimately does not make the list of things to fix.

So, that being said, if this is something you truly believe needs to change, I would suggest researching the issue yourself, and either making a feature request on the GitHub, or learning to code the change yourself. Otherwise, the simple fact of the matter is that this is not going to change.

I hope that clears up the confusion, and resolves the issue here.

Re: [RESOLVED]Incomplete feature on the new forum

by JECE » Fri Apr 20, 2018 7:25 pm

jmo1121109: where the confusion lay

Re: [RESOLVED]Incomplete feature on the new forum

by JECE » Fri Apr 20, 2018 7:23 pm

ghug: I understand what a # anchor does. You say that in the old Forum the # anchor did something but in all practicality was useless since it merely reproduced the threadID. That's exactly what I'm saying. When I saw repetition here, I instinctively ignored it.

I also understand, for the record, that this is improved functionality since I said as much in my original post at the top of the thread.

"If you want phpBB3 to do it, why do you keep asking here?"
How many times did I ask here, exactly? I'm not going to the phpBB forums because I don't have an account there and, as I already explained to jmo1121109, "I hardly think that they'd care about that." Maybe they would care, but it would make more sense for a dev to ask them for the feature than some random newbie.

Re: [RESOLVED]Incomplete feature on the new forum

by JECE » Fri Apr 20, 2018 7:01 pm

jmo1121109: There is no need to be rude. I "explained how you can get the link that works" myself in my original post at the top of the thread. And frankly, if you're not following, I don't know why you bothered to post in the thread at all.

I revived the thread because I was able to reproduce the problem. I thought that you all might be interested to know that there wasn't a bug in the coding and to understand where the conclusion lay. If you're not interested, fine. However, for whatever reason, you decided to respond by writing posts that asked me direct questions that had already been answered in the thread. You can't blame me for humoring you.

Re: [RESOLVED]Incomplete feature on the new forum

by CommanderByron » Fri Apr 20, 2018 3:00 am

It appears this is resolved. My best recommendation for anyone still confused is to go through and re-read. Come back with a question and I’ll do my best to answer them in a way that is understood. If it’s less about understanding and more about wanting a different answer my best advice is to sign up to volunteer to develop our site in your vision. Who knows your effort may result in a lasting change. :)

Re: [RESOLVED]Incomplete feature on the new forum

by jmo1121109 » Fri Apr 20, 2018 2:55 am

No JECE, I'm honestly not following on why any part of this conversation was needed after it was explained how you can get the link that works here.

Re: [RESOLVED]Incomplete feature on the new forum

by ghug » Fri Apr 20, 2018 2:09 am

As I said, the # anchors do do something in the old forum. It's just that there was no easy way to hyperlink specific posts.

If you want phpBB3 to do it, why do you keep asking here?

Re: [RESOLVED]Incomplete feature on the new forum

by JECE » Fri Apr 20, 2018 1:47 am

jmo1121109: Are you sure that you're following? That the "#" anchors in the old Forum do absolutely nothing is more of a useless quirk to my mind rather than a stylistic choice.

ghug: How hard would it be to follow TheGoffy's implied advice and do away with the dialog box entirely, replacing it with a direct link? The code for that already exists since it is implemented in the "Search user’s posts" feature on profile pages. And if it is phpBB3 that has to do the work . . .

Re: [RESOLVED]Incomplete feature on the new forum

by ghug » Fri Apr 20, 2018 1:37 am

Do you realize that you're asking for a ton of dev work, something that's in very short supply and could be used on far more important things, to "fix" something that's not even broken? I personally would much rather have our devs working on something that improves the quality of gameplay than slightly change how URLs that the forum generates for you to link are composed.

Everything after the # specifies where on the page to look. This is standard across the internet. It was on the old forum too, it just wasn't straightforward to get a link for a specific post, so it usually defaulted to the OP, and there was some funkiness with which page you happened to be on. This is improved functionality.

I'm sorry the feature confuses you, but I'm not sure exactly what you want to happen here.

Re: Incomplete feature on the new forum

by jmo1121109 » Thu Apr 19, 2018 9:44 pm

There was really no intent to keep any of the style of the old forum aside from making sure this one can do all of the same things. This isn't an incomplete feature so I'm marking this thread as resolved. We can't change this without phpbb changing their format.

Re: Incomplete feature on the new forum

by JECE » Thu Apr 19, 2018 3:47 pm

A_Tin_Can was following the conversation. Maybe A_Tin_Can has something to say?

jmo1121109: Well it's particularly unclear given how the old webDip Forum worked. I hardly think that they'd care about that.

Re: Incomplete feature on the new forum

by jmo1121109 » Mon Apr 16, 2018 9:39 pm

Unless I'm completely misunderstanding, the only concern is how clear the feature is? If that is the case then it's really something I'd recommend posting on the phpbb support forums. But from everything I can see, it's working exactly as it's supposed too.

Re: Incomplete feature on the new forum

by JECE » Mon Apr 16, 2018 4:44 am

Now all these dialog boxes have even more elaborate URL's, with a giant "sid=" string in them. What is that about? I'm not sure if that makes the URL's more or less confusing.

jmo1121109: If you select all, yes, but that wasn't obvious to me, to the extent that I didn't even notice where I had gone wrong.

Re: Incomplete feature on the new forum

by jmo1121109 » Mon Apr 16, 2018 4:13 am

I don't see a problem here. Am I wrong in that if you click the post #, select all, and copy you end up with the correct link?

Re: Incomplete feature on the new forum

by JECE » Mon Apr 16, 2018 2:09 am

bump

Re: Incomplete feature on the new forum

by JECE » Mon Mar 26, 2018 4:27 am

I reproduced the problem.

Notice how these URL's end in "p=11309#p11309". When I was presented with the dialog box, I ignored the final part of the URL to copy and paste everything before "#p11309".

In the old forum you are often presented with a similar pattern. For instance, the "Last person to post wins." thread generates a URL that ends in "viewthread=1538359#1538359" when you hit the "Open" button, but this URL behaves identically to other URL's for the same thread that end in "threadID=1538359" or "viewthread=1538359".

With the new forum, that 'anchor' actually does something. To me this was unexpected, especially given the similar repetition of the same string of numbers on either side of a "#". The longer URL I found through goldfinger0303's profile actually has the same repetitive ending. I didn't notice anything amiss with that URL because the hyperlink directed me directly to where I wanted to go. The "#251" instead presents you with a dialog box.

If simplifying the new forum URL's is too difficult, I suggest that you all follow TheGoffy's implied advice and do away with the dialog box to avoid confusing other users.

Re: Incomplete feature on the new forum

by A_Tin_Can » Sat Mar 24, 2018 3:16 pm

Goffy - that illustrates that JECE's problem is *not* reproducible, right?

Re: Incomplete feature on the new forum

by TheGoffy » Sat Mar 24, 2018 4:12 am

I can replicate the problem.

The link provided in the OP will take you to the post in question. If you then click on the hyperlinked #251 in the subheading line:

Re: World Cup 2018 Signups!
#251 Unread post by goldfinger0303 » Sun Mar 18, 2018 10:27 pm

This will pop up a dialogue box saying:
webdiplomacy.net says:
Message #251
[text box with link in it:] http://webdiplomacy.net/contrib/phpBB3/ ... 309#p11309
[OK] [Cancel]

Both OK and cancel simply close the dialogue box.

This is reproducible on other messages too. If anyone wants me to dogfood it please message me on the social networks.

Re: Incomplete feature on the new forum

by A_Tin_Can » Sat Mar 24, 2018 2:13 am

I think the only part that's needed is the anchor (#p120704), right?

Re: Incomplete feature on the new forum

by JECE » Thu Mar 22, 2018 5:03 pm

Not sure what I was seeing either. I guess it does work if I hit enter twice.

It's interesting that the URL generated from the # hyperlinks doesn't include the "f=10&t=298&" part of the URL. Maybe that has something to do with it?

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