Subscribed Forums not sending email

[d-type]

Hi All,

Is it just me, or are others having this same problem?

I have subscribed to all forums on the group, but everytime I come back to the forum website, there's loads of email threads and messages that are completely new to me - I don't think I'm being informed of them by email.

Any comments?

Cheers,
Phil

 

[guddler]

This problem has plagued WebWiz forums on and off for some time and seems to effect some users more the others. We tackled it a while back but it may have resurfaced?

 

[trm]

It's this version of WebWiz being a stupid PoC

It basically tries to not send you more than one email on any topic until you've come back and revisited the thread - basically the opposite of what I imagine most people want; a mailbox full of thread updates rather than just one per thread showing there has been (some - how much?) activity.

The way to confuse WW and make it send constant updates is to remain logged in and it seems, to have a forum contents page open (the main contents page seems to be a good choice). This combined with the AJAX seems to trick WW into thinking you're hitting F5 in terms of when you last visited, so it'll send you updates doh.

There is a 'proper' fix for this which is to mod the mailout code so it doesn't bother checking for last read times. I have a set-up using this on one of the dev UKVAC hosts but I never got to the bottom of testing it to see if I'd removed all the dumb date/freshness checks.

If this is bugging people I'll see about doing some more testing and then moving the code from test to prod.

 

[d-type]

Hmm, other forums work like you say, and for a live thread your interested in, it's not too bad. But old habits die hard...I don't have the time to surf lots of forums every day, especially at work where it's blocked.

There's a lot of UK Pinball people that are dead against having a forum and will only use a mailing list like Yahoo! Groups. (I'm not one of them, as long as the forum can email out all new posts.

My ideal situation is to have all new posts emailed out, that way I can see be connected during work breaks on my Android. Why not have a poll to find out what people think?

And whilst were on the topic, is it possible to put the default WW links in the emails at the bottom, underneath the message text, like you get with a Yahoo! Group message? It's a hassle to have to scroll down each message on a small phone screen.

And whilst we're at it, maybe some of the forum software will react to the "Facebook effect" (and BBC Football scores) where you're viewing a thread and it updates in real time, without you having to hit F5.

Want, want, want...

Cheers,

D-T

 

[guddler]

Two observations:

What phone are you using? I'm not going to be presumptuous or even as rude as to suggest it might need updating but all the same is scrolling to the bottom of a page really that much of an issue? Obviously I guess it is, but I'm surprised! A lot of modern phones these days just take a flick of a finger to do that

Anyway, point taken on board I'm sure. Not sure if email replies are template'd and can therefore be modified or not.

I've got a similar issue at the moment with the forums on an iPad / iPhone. When you're in a thread the 'New Posts' button is immediately above the 'Log Out' button. Even with my skinny fingers I keep logging out. Not too big a deal but being a moderator my password is managed by a password application and as such is about 18 random characters that I have no knowledge of what it is at all - right pain!! Again, it's been noted and is on the radar.

As far as the forums / mailing list is concerned, I agree about the forum mailing out and I do just that but only on selected parts of the forum, not in it's entirety. But people need to realise though that mailing lists are a thing of the past these days and a leftover from the bulletin board era. Time marches on and waits for no man

While I think we could be a way off your last point (auto updates) - though maybe not, I whole heartedly agree that would be awesome. Would put an end to cross posting!!

Ok, that's three points

guddler2011-06-02 12:28:42

 

[d-type]

I'm using an Orange San Francisco Orange which is unhacked Android 2.1. It's not the fastest phone in the world, but it works fine for email. (And it was ~60 quid new when I bought it and my Internet is 120MB for ~3 quid a month - I'm no Rolls Royce user and I bought it just to try it out, and now I love it even if I were only to use it for Podcasts.)

Yes, it's a flick of the finger to get to the message text, but if you're not intending on clicking the link to the forum (I would suggest that's most times if you were sent all new posts), why have it at the top? What would it be like if websites had a logo that fills 75% of the screen? I just want to push the "Older" button to got to the next message on the Android gmail app, none of that scrolly stuff. One other thing, using Gmail in a browser will auto-hide quoted (repeated) text, it might also be able to hide the link text as well, if it were at the bottom and it didn't change between messages in a thread.

I can concur with the accidental log-out issue, that sort of thing happens a lot on my Android, it's damn annoying!

I disagree that mailing lists are a thing of the past to a significant number of people, they won't move to a forum instead, they will only take an email stream. (Maybe email is a thing of the past?) Yahoo host 1000s of mailing lists and Google also, forums take time and money to administer.

Long live the mailing list! (Or a forum that acts like a mailing list, but better, as it's easier to search!)
d-type2011-06-02 12:48:40

 

[Robotgreg]

I was just about to ask the same thing but looks like I think i'ts been answered. You're saying that I can;t get a digest of all posts like we used to for ukvac and still get on the pinball group.

I don't want to have an email for each new post as it just gets too much but a digest is a great way to pick up what's going on without having to click into each thread.

Greg

 

[guddler]

I might be wrong but no, I don't believe you can. This is a forum and not a mailing list after all