Slashdot Mirror
Slashdot Discussion System Updates
So D2 now remembers what you have read. This will mostly be useful to readers who use the key bindings to navigate -- we didn't really want to guess if you've read something, but if you use the WASD keys to navigate, moving on from a comment flags it as read. Read comments are slightly faded, and if you re-enter a discussion a few hours later, it should remember what you've read.
We've simplified comment retrieval as well. If you get to the 'End' of a discussion and try to get more comments (either by clicking one of the various 'More' links, or by pressing a keybinding like S or D that tells us to move on to the next comment) a dialog box will show up asking you if you would like to lower your threshold. So if you normally read at Score:4, and read to the end of the Score:4 comments, it will offer to lower your threshold to Score:3 either for all time, or just for this page. This means you don't need to constantly raise and lower your threshold to handle discussions of different sizes. This works really nicely.
Lastly is a user preference in the pref pane labeled 'Collapse Comments After Reading.' I'm actually considering making this one on by default but I'm open to feedback. It does what it says -- after you've navigated off a comment (using the keybindings again), it collapses the comment you just left. This makes it very easy to keep your place in a discussion as it grows. This is especially useful in discussions where you want to leave a tab open for several hours, or else come back later and figure out what's new.
There are undoubtedly bugs: feel free to email me or post them to the bug tracker. Thanks to pudge for hacking all this stuff too. Especially the bugs -- he wrote those first.
Hmm, I think it's also about time to fix some display bugs. The most important one would be that replies to a given comment visually look like they're replies to the parent. And the lines that should tell you what nesting level you're at seem to disappear sometimes, especially when you collapse something. And collapsing a grand-grand-grand-parent, for example, also hides all children, but it triggers that triggers another kind of display bug: the boxes and hooks don't disappear.
I usually use Opera, but I was able to see that Firefox doesn't do away with those problems either.
Maybe add support for unicode?
w-a-s-d might be fine for some, but for us old school vi types, h-j-k-l is hardwired into our brains. Could that be added along-side the w-a-s-d stuff?
I've never consistently gotten the correct threads when I have more than one page and say show me the next page. I see a certain thread in the first 50, then hit page down and there it is again. The only way I've been able to compensate is filter to a high enough level that all threads fit on one page and then drill down.
And the biggest problem I have is lack of editing.
Just 15 minutes-- or better yet- hold all versions so people can see what you posted first so you can't lie but CAN fix stupid errors.
Also, there is no way to see level 0 posts only. That's very helpful when you want to up-mod folks who were silenced by a bad mod.
She was like chocolate when she drank... semi-sweet at first and then increasingly bitter.
Logging in without having to navigate away from the page when replying would be nice.
So, in the old system, you hit reply, realise you aren't logged in, type in user name and password (or have FireFox auto complete), type your comment and post.
The new system, realise you aren't logged in, hit the login link, get taken to a different page, login, navigate back to the old page, have to find where you wanted to reply, and notice that in the three minutes you spent logging in (some people are on dial up, some people do other things while waiting for pages to load, some people do both), you notice someone else has made the comment you were going to make!
So, how hard can it be to just include a username and password box when you hit reply and aren't logged in?
I wank in the shower.
these changes seems to explain why i can't assign mod points with IE7 ?
who knows..
No, that's more likely to be a deliberate editorial decision. :-)
XML is a known as a key material required to create SMD: Software of Mass Destruction
Soon you'll have recreated the functionality of a late 80's usenet client.
Before all these changes this site was much easier to scan. Now it bunches comments up on the right side if they are nested to deep, the lines while clever are not ready for production and I just liked it better before all these CSS changes. If you guys need something to do, start reading more science and engineering sites and less game and sysadmin sites. I mean if you are having a slow newsday you aren't looking hard enough.
An Education is the Font of All Liberty
I didn't even know about this feature until now, but it isn't all that useful if you've got 'find as you type' enabled. Anyway, I would really like to use this, so does anybody know of a way to use these keys in firefox without disabling the search functionality completely?
We still can't mod the editors.
I use dvorak you insensitive clod.
No really, I do. Any way we can change these or am I going to have to browse the web with 2 hands?
Thats nice that the discussion system has been updated, but it would be even better if the moderation was improved. We have too many hacks running around with mod points that are ripping down comments that they disagree with, regardless of their relevance (look at the gun control threads to see good examples of irrational moderation.
We need moderation methods that actually reflect the scoring more intelligently, or a scoring that more intelligently reflects the value of the comment. The "overrated" and "underrated" moderations are garbage. Hacks use it to promote their friends and demote their foes. Why should a comment that started at +2 ever be marked "overrated"?
Damn_registrars has no butt-hole. Damn_registrars has no use for a butt-hole.
What I'd like to see is the option to gray-out / collapse any comments older than a certain timestamp. Then have that timestamp automatically set to the last time a particular discussion was brought up (allowing the user to adjust it if needed, i.e., if you didn't finish reading the whole page the last time it was brought up). That way, new comments would stand out.
. . . for every moron who claims:
etc, etc, etc.
I'm a huge vi user myself, but the biggest difference is wasd is left handed and hjkl is right hand. Most people are used to using the mouse with the right hand. So you'd be jumping on and off the keyboard to click links/etc.
It always just felt klunky and slow to me. Earning my special ire was the fact that, by default, it has that damnable sidebar floating on the left, one of my most hated web UI devices. If I remember correctly, it displays fairly wonky in IE as well. I realize that "klunky and slow" is pretty subjective, but it's good enough for my purposes. Not to mention, by all the accounts here, it's buggy as hell, so while I may check it out again in the future, I'll wait to do so until it isn't the widespread beta it seems to be right now.
"16MB (fuck off, MiB fascists)" - The Mighty Buzzard
Turn the sidebar off.
A bullet may have your name on it but splash damage is addressed "To whom it may concern."
The biggest problem with Slashdot is that anonymous downmodding is used to suppress comments instead of posting something disagreeing with them.
If someone modding down a comment was required to post their reason, exactly like a reply comment, that could be viewed by both regular readers and metamoderators alike (and made hideable by default in preferences), that would probably cut back a lot of the frivolous downmods, and convert them to explicit disagreements instead. Since that feature is so similar to the regular comment system, it should be quick to develop, debug and deliver.
--
make install -not war
There was a big change in the moderator system some years ago. I think it was motivated by exactly the kind of abuse you're talking about. As I understand it, Rob decided to limit mod points to people in the middle of the range of posting rates. People who post a lot never get mod points, neither do people who post very little.
IMHO, this change actually made things worse, because they excluded the regular participants who were most committed to making the community work. People who post haphazardly are exactly the people who should not be moderating; they're the snipers and "oh yeah" types who like to tell others they're FoS, but don't have the attention span to have a serious conversation.
Rob and his editors obviously don't agree. My guess is they've had less occasion to "correct" moderations they consider unfair (because there are much fewer mods to correct) and they see that as evidence that the new system is working.
As for "overrated" and "underrated": these are not supposed to reflect the quality of the comment, they're supposed to be a way of correcting scores that have gotten multiple mod points when only 1 was deserved because two moderators flagged it at the same time. Personally, I don't think this happens often enough to justify two mods with so much potential for abuse. But if we must have it, you should be allowed to apply "overrated" to a post with less than 2 upmods or "underrated" to a post with less than 2 downmods. Ideally, those two mods should come within a few minutes of each other, but I suppose that would be hard to detect.
And whatever the quality of the moderator pool, it would make a lot of difference if people actually understood what the moderations are supposed to mean. The definitions are hard to find and hard to understand. What's the difference between "troll" and "flamebait"? "Interesting" and "insightful"?
(Hey guys, I explain stuff for a living. Give me a call.)
At this point, it would be helpful if one or more of the editors (Rob especially) butted into the conversation, defending their policies and correcting any facts I've gotten wrong. Never seems to happen. I guess they find the resulting flame wars taxing. Understandable, but frustrating.
If I remember correctly, it displays fairly wonky in IE as well.
I am certain this bit of advice may sound repugnant to you considering you signature, but it works out very well for me. Stop using IE.
The cancel button is your friend. Do not hesitate to use it.
I've seen a few sigs that echo this sentiment humorously; "Slow down cowboy, it's been 11 minutes since you last made a comment. Chances are, you type faster the 11 words per minute".
I understand the reasoning for the "slow down, cowboy", and mostly approve, but there are a few times when the slowdown seems inappropriate.
One is in one's own journal. I don't see any reason at all to have a "slow down cowboy" in your own journal.
The second is responding to a response to your comment, especially when you are getting to the comment through the "slashdot message system". How can it truly be a discussion when you can't reply to a response?
The third would be on stories older than 24 hours old. By then pretty much everyone has had a chance to comment.
I almost never comment anonymously, so I was surprised the other day when I tried to. A user posted an anonymous comment with the statement "sorry for the AC posting but I just moderated in this thread." I was going to point out that what he was doing was a bit unethical; the system is set up so you can't comment in topics you're modding for a reason. I was also going to say "there are legitimate reasons for posting AC" and wanted to illustrate this by posting AC. An hour later I still couldn't submit the comment, so I gave up. I was logged in; I checked the "no karma bonus" and "post anonymously" for the offtopic comment. If I had been posting anonymously all day I would understand this, but it was my first anonymous comment in months. I don't understand why it was so much longer than my usual four minutes.
I was surprised to find that you can metamoderate a comment that is in response to your own comment. I wouldn't have thought the system would have been set up like that, but I've seen it twice now.
Another suggestion would be on a user's "journal" link. Often I'll see a funny or interesting comment and want to see a user's journal, click the link and find that he's only made two journals and the latest is from some time in 2003. Rather than the link saying simply "journal, I'd like to see "latest journal entry [&date]".
And now for something completely different, I'd like to see TWO BRICKS BEING SMASHED TOGETHER</Python>
mcgrew's razor: Never attribute to stupidity that which can be explained by greedy self-interest
That's your decision, though, isn't it? You are basically choosing between two key bindings and you can't have one key do two things.
The global economy is a great thing until you feel it locally.
This has been driving me nuts ever since the new comment system was introduced. Overall, I mostly like D2, but since the old system has allowed me to login while posting for *years*, and now suddenly I can't, it feels like a step *backwards*. I especially I hate when I've typed 2 paragraphs of text, then suddenly realize I'm not logged in. Yeah, copy-and-paste are you friend in that situation, but it's still a pain. As the parent pointed out, after logging in, you have to find the main article, then find whichever discussion thread you wanted to reply to, which can be a major waste of time.
Please, why in the world can't I login right in the comment box? I know you guys want to ajax-ify everything, but really, just having the username/password fields as part of the form with the comment summary and body was so simple and elegant, how could you possibly improve it? Since the code on the backend is already there to handle it, since the old system is still there, I can't imagine it would be terribly difficult to add this back into the new system?
Should this be modded +3 funny, or +3 tragic? Oh wait, 2x= comedy, 3x=tragedy. Never mind.
At the risk of losing karma:
...it's a site developer's responsibility to make their web site work in all browsers in common usage, not just the ones they feel like.
My sig is more hate toward the moderators...
Love them or hate them, moderators and meta-moderators are part of the system. If all you are concerned about is karma, then you will have to weigh you desire to post against your fear of loosing karma points. My suggestion is to say what you want intelligently and damn whether it is popular. Popular speech is boring.
As to your post above:
I must disagree. If it exists, it is a developer's responsibility to code to a set of standards. It is a site and browser developer's responsibility to code to a set of standards.
The cancel button is your friend. Do not hesitate to use it.
I've found the quality of posts has greatly increased since D2 started forcing people to preview before posting.
Modding Trolls +1 inciteful since 1999
Dvorak keyboard lay-outs are one thing, but how about all those people, like me, who use AZERTY? On those, WASD just plain sucks.