change order posts are viewed

I would like to add to this thread -

This site was set up by a person (Hayley- Admin) who is a sleever-just like all of us here, who decided to start up a forum to help people out of the goodness of her heart and her time.

A site free of charge for thousands of people that has helped thousands of people for 4 years.So it is extremely hurtful to (hayley and myself and mods)to have a post telling people to leave over minor issues like posting layout, that have nothing to do with weightloss or support-the reason why we are all here.

Please remember the reason why this site is here and that was set up at hayleys own expense and time and is ran by volunteers-for free, who put in there time and effort to help others!

shelly

vanderaj wrote:

I stopped coming here primarily because of this issue. I will continue to stay away until it is fixed.
I've never come across a forum that actively removed user's choices as to post sorting preferences, especially as this software is a modified phpBB2 forum. Out of the box, phpBB 1, 2 and 3 implement the standard sorting direction. More importantly, it allows users AND admins to choose their thread and post sorting order. The parameter that you can add to a URL to revert it to normal behavior has been removed or disabled.

I hope that one day, this hosted platform will return control to users and this becomes a non-issue. If they do, I will return.

Hi there,
If you want to stop coming here because you can't be bothered clicking a button that will take you to the last page then good luck to you. Sad to see you go after you have contributed quite a bit to the forum.
No one ACTIVELY took away ANYTHING from anyone! You sound like someone has robbed you! The tool just was not implemented into this forum foundation, along with ALL forumotion forums- which is thousands of forums. Other forums on the internet have this also, not just us! Had I known this from the beginning, I would never have gone with forumotion, but in my inexperience I did so.
Here is the link to my first question about this on the forum of forums back in 2008. http://help.forumotion.com/t24367-order-of-posts-descending-ascending, and I am not posting links to my other discussions on this because the language got foul.
This issue is really the only technical issue that has been an ongoing one, and trust me, I have nearly got myself banned from the admin forum for being so outspoken about this issue. But overall, I think the vast majority of people are happy with the forum.
I am not going to argue about this topic any further with anyone. I have tried to explain why it is the way it is, and time after time we still get the odd person jumping up and down screaming 'I'm taking my barbie and going home!'
There is nothing I can do about that until I find a better platform for our forum.
And trust me when I do find a new platform for our forum, I will be in even deeper shit with all of you because we will most likely lose all our information if and when we switch over. I am sick and tired of being the whipping boy for this topic, so I am locking it.
If you don't like it, well I suggest you go and create your own forum and find out how easy it is. I mean really, there seems to be a lot of experts...
Or you could patiently stick around while I try my best to work at a new solution. This forum is free information, free for you to enjoy. I have worked my ass off for this forum and so have other Admin, Moderators and MEMBERS, and it's really sad when I come in here and feel like I need to explain things time and time again. It's getting old.

Hayley

Also:

vanderaj wrote:

I stopped coming here primarily because of this issue. I will continue to stay away until it is fixed.

That is the definition of irony lol. (I do not mean that in a nasty way at all, just rather silly)

I have never been on forums actively before, this would be my first one. When I first got on here I noticed that (in my opinion) the threads were backwards - Most recent post on the first page. I just assumed it would be the other way around so people can read through. Now that I have been on here for a while and have done a lot of reading, I as well as the majority of the users of this forum, prefer it to be this way. You can view the most recent comments without having to sift through.

Most importantly... it really is not hard to click the last page and work your way back if you wish to read from the start.

I stopped coming here primarily because of this issue. I will continue to stay away until it is fixed. Those who don't like it, leave, which skews the results until a majority who remain like the non-standard way because they're the only ones who can tolerate it.

That's a crying shame as this place is full of awesome people on the most amazing journey in their life.

In my 23 years on the Internet, I've never come across a forum that actively removed user's choices as to post sorting preferences, especially as this software is a modified phpBB2 forum. Out of the box, phpBB 1, 2 and 3 implement the standard sorting direction. More importantly, it allows users AND admins to choose their thread and post sorting order. The parameter that you can add to a URL to revert it to normal behavior has been removed or disabled.

I hope that one day, this hosted platform will return control to users and this becomes a non-issue. If they do, I will return.

So glad I found this post, thought I was going mad that I couldn't find the preference to change to reading the 'normal' way. Have never been on a forum where th posts are laid out like this, but will give it a go.

Admin wrote:

Just to reply to a bunch of posts all in one go,
The main people who have any problems with the posts being the way they are, are new people with hardly any posts. I don't mean to insult anyone, but why not give it a try before complaining?
The forum as a whole has voted on this thing, and the vast majority want it the way it is- so I sometimes wonder why on earth I am still discussing this.
Hayley

To be fair, I have been trying to give it a go. I come here pretty rarely since I joined precisely because it gives me a headache going to the last page and then the bottom post, and then scrolling back up to read back down and then scroll up again to the read the next post.
I honestly just don't like the format, and it is impossible to get used to when it is in the minority of forums (ie only one I know of) that has posts in this order.

ANYWAY, it would still be a big help either way for the opening posts to be a sticky at the top of the thread page :)

gottarhyme wrote:

I like the way the forum operates Hayley. Last post first seems sensible.

Although I have had some people complain to me that they find it difficult to navigate. Perhaps a new TAB above the forum where the HOME button is explaining the way the forum works, the purpose of a diary, how to friend people, how to upload photos, the purpose of the search function, etc may help?

Those buttons are very prominent, and I think stickies sometimes get lost! Especially if you don't know what you are looking for!

Hi Gottarhyme,
When new members register, they all get an automatic message to their PM box. This is a welcome message that Shelly, myself and Moderators cooked up in order to give a warm welcome, and a quick intro to the site. In the message we put links such as Introductions, about Gastric Sleeve surgery, help if you are lost, who the moderators are, how to contact mods or Admin and lots of other good info.

I might pop in a section about the way the threads run- I don't know. But your idea above is a good one, I think I could add that info to the intro message though. The vast majority don't seen to have a problem with how things work. Some do, then they get used to it. I have had messages from people saying they weren't sure, but now they have been here for a while, they prefer it how it is.
Of course, I am in favor of every individual having their own choice on how the threads are viewed, and I am pushing for it let me tell you!
Not all forums are created equally and there are alot of forums out there just like this one, where there is no choice. There are things on this forum that other forums might not have etc...
Any how, I will continue to nag the bosses at forumotion to implement such a tool until they do!
Hayley

I like the way the forum currently runs Hayley as I like seeing the most recent post (thanks for all your hard work) but I agree that the original post at the top of the thread could be a really good idea.

I know sometimes I accidentally click the wrong arrow button and go back to home page rather than back to the previous page in the thread (does anyone else do this or is it just me? LOL).

Thanks!!!

I like the way the forum operates Hayley. Last post first seems sensible.

Although I have had some people complain to me that they find it difficult to navigate. Perhaps a new TAB above the forum where the HOME button is explaining the way the forum works, the purpose of a diary, how to friend people, how to upload photos, the purpose of the search function, etc may help?

Those buttons are very prominent, and I think stickies sometimes get lost! Especially if you don't know what you are looking for!

I am going to make contact with admin at forumotion before I do anything with the posts guys.
Sorry to give anyone the run-around!
I am sure that we can find a solution somewhere.

Hayley

vanderaj wrote:

You're at the mercy of these folks and their business model.

I really don't mean to offend, but I have deleted your recent post and ask that you stay on the thread topic which is a discussion about how we view the threads here. Thank you for your advice, but please stay on topic.
Hayley

Just to reply to a bunch of posts all in one go,
This is a phbb2 forum, and there is no way in all the world I am going to switch to Phbb where we would lose a tonne of benefits such as customization and many other things. And why on earth would I want to go back in time...
The forum does make money on the ads- that is how it survives.
I own the domain outright. It belongs to me.
I am at the mercy of no one, I don't know why anyone would say that...
Forumotion has never been difficult- they have always been quick when I have needed tech support.

The main people who have any problems with the posts being the way they are, are new people with hardly any posts. I don't mean to insult anyone, but why not give it a try before complaining?
The forum as a whole has voted on this thing, and the vast majority want it the way it is- so I sometimes wonder why on earth I am still discussing this.

Anyhow, I will pop the very first post onto the top of each thread and see if that helps. Some of you mention that it would be a solution... If I get any complaining about that though, it's out it goes.
Cheers all
Hayley

I agree with Andrew on this. I had a similar problem a few years ago with a forum I used to run, and the host owned not only the forum data but also the domain name. It ended up in a bitter dispute that took 3 years or so before I could grab the domain back (when the host finally couldn't be bothered anymore and we had already migrated to a slightly different domain name).

The bigger the forum gets the harder it will be to change anything.

I would like the original post at the top of each page. I am also used to threads in the opposite order to here, I find it a bit frustrating but can live with it given it's already been voted on and decided by the majority in the past. It's a shame it can't be changed in preferences by individual members though.

Oh great - these guys will never give you your forum data, which is just so immoral. To do a basic post and thread only migration would have to be spidered using a custom written script to get public content out such as posts, threads and attachments, and non-public data, such as PMs, membership metadata including the password would be impossible to migrate.

You're at the mercy of these folks and their business model. Aussieveedubbers had this problem in 2001 when EzyBoard went essentially out of business, and when it came back, it came back very slow with porn ads and JavaScript malware that infected member's machines. We lost of a lot of members and data in that move, but I'm so glad EzyBoard forced us to move when we had just 500 members, and not the 12,000 members and close to 800,000 posts and 80,000 threads and 4 GB of attachments that we have today. We would be hosed if we had to do that transition today. The longer you leave this issue, the worse it will get.

The maxim - "if you're not paying for something, you're not the customer; you're the product being sold" is true here.

I'm only new here, so I'll let you folks work on it for a bit and discuss amongst yourselves, but honestly, Forumotion is not a good solution for a thriving forum. You can make actual money using Google AdSense (I make nearly $200 per month). You don't need "free" once you have a fantastic community.

thanks,
Andrew

Dear Haley,

I run my own forum (Aussieveedubbers with ~ 12,000 car nuts on my virtual host. That runs a custom forum I helped develop before I really ran out of time to do it anymore, and I'm about to migrate it to XenForo.

Gastric Sleeve Support is running what looks to be a highly modified phpBB 2.0.x forum, which is easy to migrate to real phpBB. The real phpBB has the ability to sort posts and threads in any direction you like:



The real thing can set the sort order is settable by users in their profile, or on individual threads, or by the admin on a per forum setting.

If Forumotion becomes too difficult I can offer to host this place for you for free. I have more than adequate storage (about 30 GB free), spare CPU (it's a 16 CPU 64 bit host), memory (1.2 GB free out of 1.7 GB total), and bandwidth (I have 5 TB a month and use about 100 GB of that). More to the point, I've run my forum since 2002, and so I know what I'm doing. If you know what you're doing, you can have sudo shell access. ;-)

thanks,
Andrew

Admin wrote:

Oki Doki Joy wrote:

My vote: Same as chrisbychic - Keep it the way it is. Too annoying to flip through pages to get to latest post.

I would not go against the majority of the forum and reverse it. (Something like 97% like it this way)
Yikes! I would be in very hot water.

Hayley

Not to upset you just a quiry when i click on the tread on other forums it takes you to the last post on the last page, so its just opposite here, but the idea of a reference post at the top sounds good idea

Jacko84 wrote:

yes i must admit interesting normally the last post last page idea is the easiest. on the car forums im on.

on here you get some some way some the other and it doesnt take you to the last read post all the time.............

i've just learnt to deal with it

Bolded by me!
Argh! I wasn't aware that some were one way and others the other way!
Oh someone fire me for goodness sakes!! lol. I will fix this asap!
How dang confusing!!

Oki Doki Joy wrote:

My vote: Same as chrisbychic - Keep it the way it is. Too annoying to flip through pages to get to latest post.

Hi okidoki Joy!
It would not reverse how you see the posts, it would simply pop the very first post on top of the thread.
So you would see the thread exactly how it is now, but with the very first post, the post which began the thread, at the top of each page. Kind of like a reference. Does that make sense?

I would not go against the majority of the forum and reverse it. (Something like 97% like it this way)
Yikes! I would be in very hot water.

Hayley

Admin wrote:

Hi guys,
I have no way of allowing the individual member to change the way he/she views the forum, (trust me I have NAGGED forumotion) They don't like me. There are just some things I cannot change, but overall, this has been a great website host so far. And I have never understood that something that seems so standard in forums is not standard with this forum! I do get your frustration!
I can however, place the first post onto the top of each page of the thread. Would this make it easier?
Any input would be great!
Maybe I should make a poll... I like polls. Should I have a poll to see if I should have a poll? JK!

Hayley

I would find it easier - if I could find the opening post straight up :)

My vote: Same as chrisbychic - Keep it the way it is. Too annoying to flip through pages to get to latest post.

Hi guys,
I have no way of allowing the individual member to change the way he/she views the forum, (trust me I have NAGGED forumotion) They don't like me. There are just some things I cannot change, but overall, this has been a great website host so far. And I have never understood that something that seems so standard in forums is not standard with this forum! I do get your frustration!
I can however, place the first post onto the top of each page of the thread. Would this make it easier?
Any input would be great!
Maybe I should make a poll... I like polls. Should I have a poll to see if I should have a poll? JK!

Hayley

Bast I would vote with you .

If the originating post is at the top you can see what posting was about. Then if you want to go to the last page then select teh last page.

Not being critical to the lovely people who do a wonderful job in maintaining the site . its a lot of work and i appreciate your efforts.

I just hate having to troll through pages to get to the original post....just a preference on my part.

Isis wrote:

haha it's an interesting debate! I find the NZ threads on this forum are back to front (i.e. first posts first, last on the last page) and it's impossible to find anything. It's great having the most recent posts first, cos often you have read all the others and just want to keep up to date with the conversation. I'm not a member of any other forums though so maybe it's just about what you get used to.

All other forums that I am on have a button or some sort of icon on the port title that takes you to the last post that you read in that thread.

The closest that I can see to that on here is if you click on the "new" on the far right hand side of the topic title.

I guess I just get frustrated at back to front reading, especially if it is a long post.

haha it's an interesting debate! I find the NZ threads on this forum are back to front (i.e. first posts first, last on the last page) and it's impossible to find anything. It's great having the most recent posts first, cos often you have read all the others and just want to keep up to date with the conversation. I'm not a member of any other forums though so maybe it's just about what you get used to.