To Summarize

I'd like to give a summary of how I see things so far.

Most of the changes are welcome. "Today's Posts" and "Find New," and other improved search functions, are the most welcome of all. Signature files, user preferences, and improved navigation are all welcome. "Email this thread" and "email this discussion" features are very welcome.

Mixed feelings on emoticons (smilies) but even those who don't like them can live with them. Some even want more.

Those who have expressed a preference would rather be able to store their username and password somehow, but again, they can live with it the way it is in the interests of the increased functionality.

Some design issues, as well as a few features like user filters and spell check, are desired, but will almost certainly be in a future revision rather than this one.

Some want to be able to load photos directly from their hard drive, which right now isn't being considered because it would conflict with our photo galleries. This is a subject we're still listening on, but most likely won't change in this revision either.

The new "HTML" functions are nice in that they are spelled out, and solve some technical problems for us. Some users want more flexibility, especially in the area of nesting of tags. I am not sure where this stands.

The issue of sub-threading as an organizational system is complicated by its confusion with some unrelated navigational issues. Some users who are adamantly against sub-threads are actually more against the "new to old" listing (which will now be set by user preference), and the "back and forth navigation" which will now be fixed because the whole discussion will be listed at the end of each message, than sub-threads per se.

If we could find a way to keep messages from scrolling off to the right, a lot of anti-sub-threaders would support them.

If we could have sub-threading as a user preference, everyone would be happy. If that is possible, O would ask for sub-threads to be the default, at least on kingsnake but probably everywhere.

If we cannot do that, there are two ways to fix that problem that I've thought of.

1. We could have only a single layer of sub-threading, ie, only the first "response to a response" would indent. I have looked at many kingsnake forums and *most* of the discussions do not have sub-sub-threads, although some do.

2. We could reduce how far we indent each sub-thread, setting them off with different... icons? colors? italics?... so it is easier to spot them, but indent only a space or two per sub-thread, so as to reduce how far to the right the responses will be listed.

It's fine to say people "should" do this or that, or we should educate people to re-set their monitor resolution or font size or other browser settings to accomodate right scrolling, BUT... best would be to set things up so it's less of an issue in the first place.

As I said, the techs are working on making this a user preference, which I think is the best solution so everyone can be happy. If that fails, we'll have to look at other options. Let me know what you think of the two I've presented and suggest others.

Thanks!
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Christie Keith
Director of Community Services
pethobbyist.com

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