Quoth @Aran: “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”
hmmm…wonder how that could be done? Categories…? Nah, hopelessly outmoded and old fashioned…:-p 
When I was a new user to the SSiW forum, I did not find the categories in the least confusing. I found them immensely helpful.
They allowed me to have a quick overview of the kind of things the forum discussed, for example:
I’m not saying that some of the categories hadn’t outlived their use by date, but that’s just a question of good housekeeping.
On the other hand, I find the new forum immensely confusing and much less helpful (so far anyway).
(I will admit, the backspace problem I had was probably caused by my wireless keyboard - problem now fixed).
p.s. And when I asked for “the ability to page-down the thread list”, I meant on the keyboard, i.e. using the “page-down - page-up” keys, not using the mouse on the up and down arrows on the top and bottom of the list of threads)
(whose action is quite slow I notice, and perhaps prone to make one feel a bit seasick if you watch it scrolling…)
And there should be a way to get instantly to the very top thread and the very bottom thread.
S’mae Mike,
Fixed categories are problematic when people post stuff in the wrong places. They would not help if Welsh were posted into a category where the rest of the posts were in English, say.
The proposed tagging system should provide dynamic categorisation of posts. The tags available and the relative number of posts using a given tag can then be visualised and presented via methods such as the so-called “tag cloud” where the tags are listed and the relative populatity of the tags is indicated by the font size. Not saying that this is what will happen, just that dynamic tagging of posts can be used and presented in a user friendly manner.
This software is still under development, and there is much planned for the social layer that will be of great benefit. Ifan has done a great job to get the forum launched, and has a lot more on his plate than just the forum. I believe we need to be patient - your list of requests is extensive.
Hwyl,
Stu
Of course one (albeit minor) other problem with categories is where to post when a topic covers 2 or more categories. At least with tags there’s some cross-referencing available. My first post on the old site, for instance, covered all of ‘Introduce Yourself’, ‘Why are you learning Welsh’, and ‘Welsh Encounters of the Nervous Kind’ - and my post wasn’t even very long! In fact I jut checked back and my very first line was “This is a bit of Introduce yourself/Why are you learning/Welsh encounters/How far have you got all-in-one, sorry about that 
”
With tags, there would have been no need for such confusion about where best to post 
Hi Claire!
I think you’re right about the fixed category problem - I’d got into the habit of putting nearly everything I posted in “General Chat” because i didn;t have to think too hard about which category was best suited…
When tagging comes along, we will have a far better ability to look for relevant posts - Mike, I think this is one of your biggest beefs, isn’t it?
The problem with “fixed” subjects is, as Mike says, they need “good housekeeping”. With only Aran working full time for the company - and Ifan fulltime and more on development, of course - “good housekeeping” means less courses, less support on the forum and less SSi.
Actually, Mike, there are a couple of things on your list which are already available. You can already edit yourposts, but only for an hour or so after you’ve posted them. Clck on the cog wheel in the top right corner of the post in question. (We ratehr not allow editing “for ever” as we have had a number of instances where people have editted posts after other people have replied to them, and made a nonsense of the replies and at times, the replyers.)
You can quote, but it is a bit clumsy at the moment. Use a “>” sign before copying the text you need. I usually include the person I’m quoting as well. like this:
Mike Ellwood: the option to quote that user’s post
There are other options available like italic and bold (using * marks around words, single: like this or double like this) - I shall write a quick guide for our “How To” section when i get the chance.
Toggles and keyboard options fro scrolling etc may or may not come in time, but I’m afraid will not be a priority until we’ve got a whole load of time on our hands!
As someone who only ever used the “view new posts” or “view active topics” on the old forum, apart from specifically looking for stuff liek bootcamp threads (which I often couldn’t find, byu the way…!) I don;t really have a feeling for the use fo categories that you obviously miss so much. Whta would be really helpful would be to know how you, and others used them. I suspect that once tags become available, they will be as useful as categories for most things, and more useful in other ways.
Oh, yes, and I have to take some personal responsibility for the fact that tags aren’t availabls already. Ifan was not willing to release the forum in it’s present working-but-not-perfect state (and finds it’s weaknesses like a fire in his skin now), but with the old forum dying we made him do it, and more impertantly, aren’t allowing him the time that he wants to imporve it, because there are other things on the priority list.
So, keep ideas coming, but please be patient. We want a forum that everyone can use, on mobile or proper computer (!), and we will introduce the features that people want over time, but we need a bit of patience in the meantime, while we spend our time producing new SSiW courses, and new SSi-other-language courses.
We want a forum that everyone can use, on mobile or proper computer (!)
I regularly use the forum on my desktop computer aswell as on a tablet, and it works perfectly well on both, so to me it’s unclear how the forum is being perceived by some as geared predominantly for mobile users anyway.
I suspect that once tags become available, they will be as useful as categories for most things, and more useful in other ways.
Yes, I agree. They’re pretty much the same thing, aren’t they.
And paid â becso Iestyn. I’m sure that everyone agrees that course content is a much higher priority than forum tweaks!
Jon Thomas: And paid â becso Iestyn. I’m sure that everyone agrees that course content is a much higher priority than forum tweaks!
Hi Jon - Yes, I know that everyone agrees on that.
The problem is, when anyone is hit with a new thing that doesn;t do what the old thing did, and there’s lots of little annoyances, it’s very easy to think “if they could just change this and this” without thinking through the time implications and the knock on effects of that on other work.
And the reason i know that is that I have said to Aran / Ifan - can we just have this this and this, becasue it will achieve that that I am missing… - and had to have the time issue pointed out to me. If I can forget it, experiencing every day how much time SSi consumes, then it’s probably a good idea to remind myself and others publicly from time to time that there is a time cost to everything.
I think that Ifan is achieveing miracles at the moment (not realising that mere miracles now will just encourage Aran and me to ask for a bit more in the future…!) and the forum now is already a stepchange better than when we opened it a few years (sorry - was it only weeks?) ago.
But everything (almost) comes to he who waits, so pwyll pia hi, and ymlaen mae Canaan! (steady does it, and onwards to Canaan!)