Feature Requests and Suggestions Thread

Free For All didn't work, Boot Camp didn't work, and the finer forum-by-forum access control hasn't been widely utilized, so I have another proposal that should allow problem posters to remain here while minimizing their impact.I don't have a name for the restriction yet, but it would work like this. Members in this restriction category would be permitted to participate in only a single thread at a time in the Main Topic forums. They could participate as much as they want in that thread, but if they wanted to change threads they'd have to wait for 24 hours to pass. The time period would be settable for the discussion board.Comments? Suggestions?

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--	Percy
	EvC Forum Director

Actually, this is a rather nifty feature. If you click on the non-link part of this message title it will take you to the message. If you click on the link part of the message title, it will take you to the link. You can even have multiple links in message titles.The only downside to this is that if a message title consists only of a link, then there are no characters on which to place the link to the message itself. The link to the message is there, but since it has no characters and zero width you can never find it. The "Message 145" part should always be a link to the message, though, but it isn't, and this is a bug. It looks really simple, though, and as long as it doesn't turn out to be the tip of an iceberg I'll fix it now while have a spare moment.This message has been edited by Admin, 05-14-2005 09:17 AM

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--	Percy
	EvC Forum Director

Okay, you convinced me. Links in message subtitles are now only active when the messages are displayed. Yes, when I make the changeover to HTML email there are a number of improvements I can make.

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--	Percy
	EvC Forum Director

A common request is spell checking. I've just discovered the Google toolbar has a spellchecker that works with both Internet Explorer and FireFox. I just tested it in both browsers. It works fine in FireFox, but not Internet Explorer where everything works except correction. When you click on a highlighted misspelled word in Internet Explorer, nothing happens.I have a feeling it actually works in Internet Explorer, but not with the beta 7.0 that I'm using. Unfortunately, when I installed Internet Explorer 7.0 I couldn't figure out how keep Internet Explorer 6.0 from being overwritten, so I can't test the Google spell checker with Internet Explorer 6.0. Could someone please give it a try and let me know if it works?

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--	Percy
	EvC Forum Director

There are two ways to turn off the blue light:

1. Visit the thread.
2. Click on the blue light (Clicking on it again turns it back on. In IE 6 it doesn't appear to have turned back on until you refresh, a bug fixed in the new IE 7 that's in beta right now.)

On the page listing all the forums, you can turn off the blue light for all the threads of a forum by clicking on the blue light next to that forum. And you can turn them all on the same way.The blue light only applies to threads whose most recent post is less than 48 hours old.Changes are coming (albeit slowly) that will make possible all kinds of various display and filtering options.

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--	Percy
	EvC Forum Director

Don't understand the request. When a thread is moved, a message is added with a links to the thread and forum to which it was moved.There *is* a bug with moved threads which will be remedied when we move the messages to MySQL, and maybe this is what you're thinking of. Right now, old links to a thread don't follow that thread if it is moved. For example, if you link to a message of a thread in Biological Evolution and then the thread is moved to Human Origins, the link will point to a non-existent thread. This will be fixed by having a single table for all messages, with message number, thread number and forum numbers being mere data associated with the message.

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--	Percy
	EvC Forum Director

Isn't your browser caching the photos so they're only downloaded once?

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--	Percy
	EvC Forum Director

This could easily be done, so even though I don't think it would be used much maybe I'll do it anyway. I don't think many people will look up a user's ID (user ID's exist already but they're hidden, so I'd have to make them available) and type [userid=2741] instead of just typing the name. It would be kind of neat if there were a button you could click after typing your message that would change all occurrences of member names into this dbcode, but there are too many members with names that are real words, like Faith.--Percy

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--	Percy
	EvC Forum Director

dBoard 3.0 will move the message database into MySQL, and at that time each message will receive a unique ID. URL's will refer to this ID, and this will make it possible for the correct message to always be displayed in the window, no matter how many messages/page you've chosen.

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--	Percy
	EvC Forum Director

Great idea, but you guys are either going to have to find me some kind of energy drink that lets me code faster or get me some help!

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--	Percy
	EvC Forum Director

Now that we have our own server we can do proper code development. The right way to do this is to install cvs on the server for code control, then give anyone doing code development an account and subdomain where they can work. Once they debug a feature in their own subdomain they can check in the code. Other moderators can help with the testing.I've never set up cvs before. Anyone have experience with this?

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--	Percy
	EvC Forum Director

I'll add this to the list.I noticed my Message 187 that asks if anyone is familiar with cvs. I'm now using cvs on my development machine, and if and when the time comes that I have co-developers then I'll install cvs on our server so that development can take place there. Right now I'm just using cvs for change control and to maintain multiple development streams.

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--	Percy
	EvC Forum Director

Great! So I should give you a subdomain. If we call it "nosy" then the subdomain name will be nosy., but you can have whatever name you like, just let me know.Once the subdomain is set up I'll copy the sources into it. I use cvs on my home development machine and do all development there, and I think I'll continue doing it this way until it is no longer workable, i.e., until there's enough software changes coming from people other than me that it becomes unmanageable. If/when that happens I'll add cvs to the server and shift all development there.

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--	Percy
	EvC Forum Director

Your account name is adminnosy. I'll email you the password, you'll want to change it. You can access your account at: Your domain name is nosy.. It won't be accessible via a browser for 6-24 hours.You can upload/download from the site using ftp, but ssh is much better. Let me know if you need a Windows version of ssh. vi is available on the server, I can make emacs available for you, also.

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--	Percy
	EvC Forum Director

The http://nosy. subdomain is now accessible through your browser.

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--	Percy
	EvC Forum Director