Forum Feature Requests

Only just tried the new forum for first time today, and (I am known as the local Luddite in my family), I’m afraid I can’t share the enthusiasm that most people seem to have for it so far. Sorry to be a grumbler…maybe I’m just tired, but what I’m seeing initially is a confusing lack of structure. When I saw the words “social network” (or maybe not quite those words,) in the context of the new site / forum/whatever, my first thoughts were “oh diw it’s going to be like Facebook…”. Maybe it’s not exactly, but that thing on the left does have one unfortunate feature of facebook which is that you have absolutely no idea how far down it goes, and no sidebar to quickly navigate to the bottom. Just those down and up arrows.

So navigation is an issue, I’ll just say at this point. Also, editing seems a bit lumpy - doesn’t seem to like my backspace, at least on 1st hit.

Going back to “the thing on the left” … Are there gtoing to be categories, like with the (nice, warm, cosy, familiar) old forum, so we can quickly get to the part of the forum we want, or are we going to have to page endlessly down, looking for individual threads? Seems a little odd, the way it is, if I’m honest.

Maybe I will grow to love it, but it’s hard to see how, just at the moment.
Sorry and all that.

P.s. And am I supposed to be able to edit my own posts (once posted I mean)? If so, it’s not obvious. There is a tiny icon in top right whcih might do it, but no hint appears if I hover, and I’m not going to click on it in case it’s the delete button.

And the videos on the Bootcamp page have gone missing again! I know they aren’t really missing, it’s that silly browser security thing again. I know how to circumvent it as a user, but I shouldn’t have to especially as this problem was well known about and I think fixed on the old version of the “new site”.

The one key addition that I would have on the forum, which has already been mentioned at the top of the thread, is to have a little system in place that indicates threads that I have commented on and whether there have been any responses/additions to that thread.

That would be helpful as I have a diabolical memory and cannot recall which threads I have previously commented on and therefore risk missing the responses. It also, in my opinion, reduces the need for structure - though you may find that over time you end up with several threads on the same subject (e.g. questions on Course 1 Lesson 6).

Still, this stuff has almost certainly been discussed at length already and, from my perspective, it is just good to be back and to see that developments are continuing to take place.

Mike: Are there gtoing to be categories

Nope - for the time being, you’ll find that search works well, and in the future we’ll be adding a tagging approach to help with findability - the category system looked organised, but all it really meant was that you needed a lot of clicks just to see if a thread was where you remembered. It was particularly confusing for new users, many of whom never got the hang of ‘view new posts’.

As regards the videos - yes, it’s a known issue, but if you could see the length of Ifan’s ‘to do’ list, it might help you grit your teeth and be patient about it…:slight_smile: And the icon in the top right is not a delete button…:slight_smile:

Die Bok: to have a little system in place that indicates threads that I have commented on

Yup, we’ll have a ‘my stuff’ area within the next couple of months or so…:slight_smile:

Hi Aran/Ifan, I’ve put a request on the original Barry SSIW thread saying please delete.or at least change the heading so it doesn’t come up when people ‘search’ for the group and get very confused. Thanks. At Iestyn’s and Gruntius’s suggestion I started a duplicate, to avoid a negative FLOT, now it’s causing a bit of a potential problem. Sorry for the extra work, but you’ve taken away our ability to address this sort of problem ourselves.

I’ve made it disappear for now - not exactly deleted, but not visible to other people :slight_smile:

You’re a star, Dee. Many thanks, your help is much appreciated, as always.

Just had a thought about a feature that’s extremely useful and a great time saver. A signature where you can say what course and lesson you are up to. It saves that discourse that happens when a question is asked and cuts down on unnecessary posts (all the more important with this new system I think).

A signature where you can say what course and lesson you are up to.

Thanks for the suggestion…:slight_smile: We’re hoping to find a way to do that without using signatures, to try and keep the flow of discussions a bit clearer, but agree entirely that it’s a useful piece of information…:slight_smile:

I put that info in my profile in the “About” section. Maybe you can add a category for that info Aran, to prompt people to add it.

I put that info in my profile too, but viewing profiles is a problem. The time that you will want to view someone’s profile is when you are reading their post and wonder what course they are doing. But after viewing the profile there seems to be no way to resume reading the thread because pressing the back page button takes you back to the main list of threads and you will have lost the one you were reading. A small but annoying thing if it was a recent thread but a bigger prob if an old thread. Is it possible to put a “resume reading thread” or similar button in each profile page?

Edit: and when you are taken back to the main thread list, all threads show green again.

I use right-click (or long-press) on the tablet and then “Open in new Tab” to view profiles without losing the thread. (pun intended!)

A request for the future future - could we have a Welsh language interface option for the ssiw forum? :slight_smile:

I worry that if that was to happen, people might start posting in Welsh!

One of the things we’ll be working on will be a way to filter content in Welsh so that we can have a separate stream for people who want to practice writing in Welsh - which will become increasingly interesting as we make the course available through the medium of different languages, and start to get people on the forum who don’t share any languages other than Welsh…:slight_smile:

Round about the same time as we crack that, we’ll probably be live with the option to change the interface language…:slight_smile:

Now this would be an outstanding idea that I’m very excited about. Many of us live in places where there is zero opportunity to speak Welsh, only hear it on radio or TV, so it’s becoming a one-way stream, or talking to the pot plants. As much as my peace lily is enjoying this, it would be great to produce what I have learnt and have others respond in Welsh too. Looking forward to this feature.

Carole: Is it possible to put a “resume reading thread” or similar button in each profile page?

This works now. I just saw someone’s profile, pressed the “return” arrow, and came back to the post.

Carole: Is it possible to put a “resume reading thread” or similar button in each profile page?

This works now. I just saw someone’s profile, pressed the “return” arrow, and came back to the post.

It’s not perfect. For some reason I’ve not quite gathered, it’s not letting you jump about between threads properly, but if you jump away from the threads and back, it should work.

I think more of the HTML5 History API is needed.

Carole: Is it possible to put a “resume reading thread” or similar button in each profile page?

Brigitte: This works now. I just saw someone’s profile, pressed the “return” arrow, and came back to the post.

Sorry, couldn’t reply before now, I’ve been without internet connection since Thursday pm. Pressing the back page button does now take you back to the thread you were viewing - this didn’t work just before I posted originally, so it’s great that now viewing profiles is so much easier…diolch yn fawr! :slight_smile:

@Aran,

I’m rather sorry, that you seem to find the idea of categories unimportant.

Search and tag are all very well…if you have some idea what’s already in the forum, or what’s likely to be.

Also quite useful I suppose if you really haven’t a clue as to what’s in the forum , e.g. a brand new SSiW / Forum user.

For an experienced forum user / SSiW forum user, they can also be useful, but then so can categories. There’s more than one way of looking, and having categories does not of course preclude have a good search engine and /or using tags.

I’m sorry to say this, but I wonder you are so committed to the new system that you are blind to its weaknesses which are pretty obvious to some of us, maybe a lot of us.

You have, in my humble opinion, made a similar mistake to that which Fastmail (who happen to be my email provider) did, in their webmail interface: they changed the user interface virtually overnight and without warning. It was almost totally different to the old one, and was lacking a lot of the features that experienced users had grown to know and love, and depend upon. Caused a heck of a rumpus, I can tell you. But at least they had the grace to provide the ability for users to go back to using (almost) the old interface (albeit on the new platform). It’s not quite identical, but it’s good enough for me.

Well, having got that off my chest (and I don’t promise not to revisit the subject from time to time and not infrequently), given that we are where we are, I would like to see:

  1. The ability to edit my own posts
  2. The ability to reply directly to another person’s posts (e.g. I could not reply directly to yours @Aran, hence having to use these silly Twitter @ signs
    2a. the option to quote that user’s post. (or not)
  3. The ability to make the list of threads on the left of the screen disappear at will with a single mouse click,. so that the contents of the current thread, i.e. the thread I am currently in, appears across the width of the whole screen - this could be a toggle switch, so you can easily toggle the thread
  4. A slider bar on the RHS of the list of threads
  5. The ability to page down - page up the list of threads
  6. Make a count visible of the number of threads and the number of posts to each thread
  7. The "toggle " I mentioned above - have a third option to just display the list of threads across the width of the whole screen (ok, if it’s 3 options, then it’s not really a toggle switch, but I hope you know what I mean.
  8. As, I assume, part of the motivation for the Forum to have the “look and feel” that is now does is to cater for Smart Phone and Tablet users that you (perhaps rightly) see as your new target audience. Well, chwarae teg, if that’s the way the bisceden breaks, but to allow for those of us dinosaurs still on laptops/PCs, I think you should have two user interfaces: One. for “mobile devices”, and another for PCs / laptops/ (And perhaps more in future as technology carries on carrying on.

I suppose that’s enough for now.
Yours,
A very unhappy bunny.
p.s. To say something nice: I’m really enjoying the new course 1.