patrick.net

Did anyone requested to see only the new messages when clicked on a previously visited threads. This should eliminate lot of redundant traffic.

Well, when you click on a previously visited thread, it should already position the page so that you start at the new comments. Let me know if that is not working.

Patrick says

should already position the page so that you start at the new comments

It starts at the last page of comments, but it doesn't scroll to the location of the last comment I saw previously. If memory serves, if I never visited the thread previously, then it still shows the last page of comments. That sounds like a much easier system to implement, but I think Blue's idea would be great.

Are you clicking on the "unread comments" icon?




If I click that, it pops to the location of the last comment you saw.

Patrick says

Are you clicking on the "unread comments" icon?

Nope! Not discoverable. Just looks like an annoying animated gif designed to further distract me. (Ooops... sorry. "Annoying" is redundant, as all animations are annoying.). I see you have a text description, but I never bothered to roll over that graphic. I thought it just indicated maybe that there were some new messages.

I'll be clicking that now, though!

Well, that's good feedback. I twas obvious to me, but then I created it, lol. Hard for you all to know what I'm thinking.

Maybe I should have every post link simply open at the next unread comment and not at the top.

Oh, and try the "unread" tab which I created a few months ago.

It will open your most recent active, popular, or new post (depending on what tab you're on). You can just click on it over and over to quickly catch up on everything.

I guess that's not obvious either, but I don't know how to explain it succinctly.

I was just scrolling through those tabs today. I think we are in such a hurry, we just don't pay attention to details anymore. Proof: I'm a SW tester, my career exists for that exact reason.

Good to know about the icon, will retrain myself to start using that.

I think it does make sense to jump to the latest unread comment for people who are logged in and click on a post link.

So I'll make that the default action.

How hard would it be to add a DM feature so we can message other users directly?

It would be significant work to add it as an on-site feature, and then I'd have the problem of people threatening each other over DM. I don't want to be the moderator for that kind of thing.

I used to have a "befriend" feature where if you befriended another user and they accepted, you could both see each other's email address. It would not be very hard to bring that back, and would get me out of the moderation game. Should I add that back?

Patrick says

It would be significant work to add it as an on-site feature, and then I'd have the problem of people threatening each other over DM.

I'll tell you how to fix that, any direct message can be made public by either user - maybe have email addresses removed - those are easy to detect \S+@\S\.

So if somebody makes some crazy statement in a direct message, just expose it.

Patrick says

I think it does make sense to jump to the latest unread comment for people who are logged in and click on a post link.

So I'll make that the default action.

OK, I did that thing.

So if you click on a link on the home page or any other list of posts, you'll automatically jump to the oldest unread comment on it.

I use the heck out of the handy "bottom" and "home" links. I notice today the "bottom" link puts you lower in the thread but not to the bottom, I keep having to click the "last" link to get there. Had me confused looking for my "deleted" post at first.

Also, since bringing it up last, I've figured out which tags work for bold, italic, and underline. When you have time, adding a tool to drop open and close links at the cursor, or before and after highlighted text, would be very much appreciated and save on using CAPS for routine stress or emphasis.

Just read the comment above mine, that the "bottom" functionality was changed to "last post read." That's actually a good idea, but you might change the text to "last read" and bring back the "bottom" link with its original function.

Automan Empire says

I notice today the "bottom" link puts you lower in the thread but not to the bottom

@"Automan Empire" This is news to me. I cannot reproduce the bug. "bottom" in the lower left of each page works the same as ever for me. Can you give me a post where this happens?

Yes, I should add a tool to make it easier to format.

You can surround a word or phrase with the * character to make it bold or the _ character to make it italic.

After experiencing it several times in a row earlier, then not being able to duplicate it in several ways now, I believe I figured out what's going on. When a positioner like this gets appended to the URL

?280#footer

then "bottom" won't take you farther than the bottom of the same "page" the referenced post appears on in a long thread, no matter how many times you click it. Maybe it's always worked like that..? I assumed the "bottom" was supposed to act as a page-down on long threads, so repeatedly clicking would scroll you to the bottom.

It might be an artifact of my habit of getting a stupid amount of open tabs going, doing Patrick activities on some of these, then much later coming back to the computer and clicking on one of the now much older open tabs.

Also, I found that the markdown tags work but are tedious, glad to see * and _ supported too.

Patrick says

So if you click on a link on the home page or any other list of posts, you'll automatically jump to the oldest unread comment on it.

Seems to be working! Funny thing is I think it's a little bit weird. It's pretty clearly the best behavior, so probably just need to get used to it.

You probably don't need the View Unread Messages button on the home page links. That button does at least serve as an indication that I have or haven't viewed a thread at all.

@patrick is patnet source code still hosted publicly?

@Hircus No, I removed my github account when they imposed a politically motivated terms of use.

But if you want the source code, send me an email at p@patrick.net

Well, anyone can always just log out and see all the comments, so there's no way to completely block a particular user from seeing your comments.

I know some people used to keep a separate porn window open to view the site anonymously just so they could see comments which were blocked by mutual ignore when they were logged in. So in the end it seemed silly to try to prevent people from seeing whatever comments they want to.

I suppose I could require login to see the site at all, and then block, but:

1. people will get throwaway accounts, again to see the blocked comments
2. I want the general public to be able to read all your comments without logging in

Patrick says

I suppose I could require login to see the site at all, and then block

I think you are being fooled into accommodating the minority.

This is a public forum, it should be accepted that what is posted here is public. If people want private communication and don't want to share their thoughts outside of a group, there's mailing lists.

richwicks says

Patrick says

I suppose I could require login to see the site at all, and then block

I think you are being fooled into accommodating the minority.

This is a public forum, it should be accepted that what is posted here is public. If people want private communication and don't want to share their thoughts outside of a group, there's mailing lists.

yes please don't change that, it's nice to read it if i can't login on the device. i have multiple devices, i don't have login on all of them.

HunterTits says

richwicks says

This is a public forum, it should be accepted that what is posted here is public. If people want private communication and don't want to share their thoughts outside of a group, there's mailing lists.

Every other 'public forum' lets users block others. Standard practice.

Every other public forum allows you to not see what somebody posts, not to prevent them from seeing what you post.

To do that, users would have to be uniquely identified through a phone number or something similarly fascist and invasive, to prevent people from signing up with multiple accounts, and even then, they can view it when they aren't logged in at all.

Does anybody want to recreate Twitter here?

What you say here, is public. You are free to use a pseudonym, you can use tor to connect, or a VPN. What you say here is public, although its trivial to make yourself anonymous. Brave has Tor, VPNs are priced around $1.00 a month - why would anybody want to prevent people from reading what you post? They can bitch and moan about it, but can they demonstrate you're incorrect?

HunterTits says

How come I can't downvote posts by people who set me on ignore? I can comment on them.

@Patrick - I think that IS a bug.

I once suggested you shouldn't be able to downvote a person without making a reply. Just telling a person they are wrong, doesn't allow them to evaluate how they may be wrong. I hate getting downvotes without somebody explaining how they think I'm full of shit.

You disagree with me? Fine, but explain why. Maybe I'm full of shit. I can't change my mind without somebody explaining how I'm wrong.

I'll look into it.

I have a suggestion, I never see the "unread" part of a new post, because it's not noticeable. I want to suggest replacing:



with the following image to replace it:



That's the same image, cleaned up, in red although I got a little fancy with the "a" - I added a tail.

Patrick says

@SunnyvaleCA

The only way is to use the "forgot password" link. That will issue you a new random password.

I know people want to choose their passwords themselves, but from years in tech, I have learned that a fair number of people will use, say, their banking password. So then if patrick.net got hacked, it's possible that the hacker would get your banking password and your email address. Not good.

So not allowing password choice is a defense mechanism against that. I know it's not great, but I can't think of a better solution.

I used this mechanic of temp password in past, But Now I can set password.
Go to your profile and "type password" and it takes that password.

richwicks says

I have a suggestion, I never see the "unread" part of a new post, because it's not noticeable. I want to suggest replacing:



with the following image to replace it:



That's the same image, cleaned up, in red although I got a little fancy with the "a" - I added a tail.

Thanks for the volunteer work @richwicks !

I uploaded it and am trying it out.

this is bold and this is italic

personal

I think they work, except perhaps at the beginning of a line:

*bold*
_italic_

Made note to fix that.

Patrick says

I think they work, except perhaps at the beginning of a line:

bold
italic

Made note to fix that.

OK, fixed.

Hi Pat, looks like uploading pics is busted for me.

Might have something to do with the underscores?

AmericanKulak says

Hi Pat, looks like uploading pics is busted for me.

Might have something to do with the underscores?

@AmericanKulak Yes, it was an underscore problem. Thanks for telling me.

Please try again, should work now.

Patrick for Twitter CEO/CIO

I noticed some changes today.

1) When I click on my profile and then view my comments (https://patrick.net/comments?a=Hircus), they now start at my oldest comment, when it used to be my newest comment. I prefer the old behavior if this wasn't an intentional change.

2) When viewing my comment list, if I click the date/permalink link of a comment, in the past it would take me right to my comment, but not anymore. Some links give me an "invalid start number" error, like this one
https://patrick.net/post/1345054?start=2118#comment-1840720

Some other links worked and went to the right thread, but I ended up the wrong post.

Thanks @Hircus

1) and 2) are bugs. I will fix them tomorrow.

Can you tell me more about ending up on the wrong comment? (In my own terminology, a thread is a post.)

You know I thought the link scrolled me down to the wrong comment in the thread, but I was mistaken - it just simply doesnt scroll to a comment at all. If the link doesnt give me the "invalid start number" error (most links give this error now), then it just doesnt scroll me down to any comments.

This link exhibits such behavior. It should take my to the last page where my comment is, and then also scroll me down to the comment, but doesnt. I see the first post in the thread, and then the first comment underneath it is 2116 out of 4485. No auto scrolling occurs.
https://patrick.net/post/1338647?start=2116#comment-1840406

I suppose this is because the url param start=2116 is wrong. The url should probably be start=4485 or something like that, to take me to the page where my comment is. I bet fixing the other bug fixes this too.

@Patrick - where is your current code again?

You need a regression test system. I've made a few. I need to look at (and setup) your code to see how I approach it. As I recall, you're using nginx, mysql, and your code. I can short circuit the email system so I can simulate that.

Curl should be able to simulate user interaction. Verifying what it produces should yield the same results.