The official "Features we would like to see implemented on the new platform'' List - Page 6  

going to a members "see all posts" needs a page list as numbers not just a "go to next page" arrow.

I miss the "thread tools" function that allowed me to organize the most recent post at the top of the thread, so that when I clicked on the thread, the initial post was at the bottom of the page)s) and the newest post at the top of the page(s).

How soon can this be brought back?

Richard

I've asked a couple of times now if there are any plans to bring back a "Good Trader's" feedback function on this site.

Are there?

I know that there are trades and sales being made in the Software/Hardware for sale/trade sub-forums...but, currently there is no way to award positive feedback to members. 

Is a feedback system returning to the forum?  Has the old feedback from the recent system been lost?  Should we start a new "Good Trader's List IV" in the interim?  I would, again, volunteer to oversee such a list.

* "Search this forum" feature. (I want to find "backups" in the Mac section, but I get stuff from everywhere.)

* Drop-down menu navigation tool in the Search Page. No easy way to change forum from Search results.

* Link to "Home" Page at bottom of page, with Nav drop-down menu. I'm always scrolling to top of page to go Home to look at thread updates.

Well...there IS a link to the Home page at the bottom of every HTF page, Dave.  It's the very first link in the bottom-most deep blue bar.  I am now using this every time I want to return to my home page after visiting a subscribed thread.

I have been advocating for the Home page to be listed first in the drop-down navigation (like the old UserCP).  I also want the drop-down navigation menus added to the home page.  It strikes me as crazy-weird that the page that is being pushed as one's center-of-the universe for navigation doesn't include the drop-down menus to jump to the various forums.  You have to, currently, click on the forum link at the top of the home page and then get taken to the main forum index page. 

That kinda conflicts with the "lost post count" explanation:

www.hometheaterforum.com/forum/thread/289655/post-counts

The explanation for the lost post count was that in a previous changeover a lot of posts were lost, but the post counts still reflected the number of lost posts. Then with the change to the new forum these post counts were adjusted because the old "lost posts" were no longer counted. Now you are saying that these previously lost posts were actually found and are included in current searches. If that is so, why did the post counts change?

I hadn't seen that. And it's too far down and too tiny. I want something at the end of thread for easy navigation. Including it in the Forum Nav is logically reasonable but feels too inefficient for my taste. "Home" is my constant way-point; it's the hub of my airline flights through HTF. Making it part of the drop-down means to get there I have to click the name menu, scroll two or three times to find it and then click the "Home" listing.  I'd prefer a single prominent link below the thread, as there is one at the top of the thread.

* Quote tool includes blank lines where the quotations would have been in the newly quoted post. These must then be manually deleted. I suggest the Quote tool shouldn't include these extraneous blank lines.

That's why I specifically suggest including it at the VERY TOP of the drop-down menu.  I had found it very useful to navigate to the old UserCP that way:  go to the drop-down menu, slide the scroller all the way to the top, let 'er go, and it would automatically take you there (without clicking "go").   How did you navigate to the UserCP under the old software?

Quote:

That's just what I find inefficient. From this Forum I'd have to:

* Click the Nav menu
* Move mouse down into menu
* Scroll wheel full stroke
* Scroll wheel full stroke
* Move mouse up to top item
* Click

Give me a link and I
* Click Link

The Forum Nav will work, but it's more effort to get to a page I go to *after every single thread*. I'm no longer browsing forums, I'm browsing my Home page. I Home Page to a thread, go back to Home, go to next thread, back home, and so on.

I'm all for it.  It's what one gets used to, don'tchaknow!

Why, I don't see why there couldn't be a "Home" button sitting right next to that "View fist unread" button just after the last post in a thread! 

I think the layout should just duplicate the nav links from the top just like it does w/ the dropdown:

Home Theater Forum  ›  Forums  ›  Feedback/Misc  ›  Forum Help and Feedback  ›  The official "Features we would like to see implemented on the new platform" List

That would solve the problem *and* provide a more logical, elegant look-and-feel and navigation.  In such cases, a little symmetry goes a long way...

And this would even make all this jump-scrolling-back-to-reply-box that I'm experiencing much less painful too -- I'd go to the top and click on a nav link (after submitting a reply) and get knocked all the way back down to the reply box (unless I remember to click on the background first).

_Man_

Man:

The only problem with your idea:

...is that the Forum and Home links don't fall within the same path.  They are "competing" jump-off points on the navigational hierarchy.  For example, in your quote above, you could navigate back to 'Forums" from here...but NOT to the "Home" page that way.

And..."elegant?!?" 

Mike,

Clicking the first link in that sequence of nav links, ie. Home Theater Forum, brings me to my "personalized homepage".  Is that not what you guys are asking for?

RE: "elegant", I'm using design/programming speak there.  Normally, I might say "logical, elegant solution for ...", but I was trying to be more succinct there and maybe mangled it a bit.  Sorry if that's confusing lingo for you.

_Man_

Quote: It didn't go "Home" originally. It does now. This would work for me.

Here's another thought.  In addition to doing that at the bottom, maybe that "follow me" side panel should also provide quick access to some of those links, eg. Home page, top/main Forums page and current forum page, and maybe also the popular nav dropdown, especially considering that's a big part of the design that's forcing us to scroll more now (and keeping us farther away from those nav links and dropdowns at any given point).

But I'd probably put that addition (to the side panel thing) toward the bottom of the enhancement list since I haven't heard too many people liking to use it the way it is so far.

_Man_

What Dave says.  Although I kinda like the idea of having a "home" button just to the left of the page numbers at the bottom of last post on each thread page. 

Elegant, schmelegant! 

I noticed that "locked" threads aren't notated on the Forum page, only at the top of the first post.
For example, this thread (http://www.hometheaterforum.com/forum/thread/290677/the-o-reily-factor) is "closed", but from the forum list page (http://www.hometheaterforum.com/forum/list/25) it looks like any other open thread. 

You know, I just had an epiphany of sorts. 

That freakish box that goes sliding around the screen if you haven't checked the "don't follow me" box?

I was on another site recently, and there was a box like it that "followed" you around.

Except it didn't creep and crawl.  It scrolled like the page until it got to the top of the browser window, and then stopped: staying there, not creeping, crawling, sliding, or otherwise stalking the user.  Much less obtrusive, but the functionality remains.

Leo

Yeah, someone else suggested that approach also -- think it might've been DaveF -- as seen on slashdot.

That would certainly be much better.

_Man_

I've exchanged messages with Huddler about this. They noted that the slashdot solution excludes IE6, and that's not currently an acceptable solution. They're looking for another solution to achieve the "stationary" sidebar. I hope they find it.

Ya know, I don't expect to be baby-sat or anything...but it's been a long time since we've heard anything from the Huddler people about what's going on with all the recommendations that are being made by membership.   Outside of some occasional feedback from Adam Gregorich, it has been more than 100 posts since anyone from Huddler has stopped by to react to anything heard here in this thread. 

One of the things I am curious about is any chance of a buy/trade feedback system being implemented.  I have just completed a transaction with another member and have already asked a couple of times what we might expect down the road.  I'm sure other deals have been transacted since the switchover.

That's just one example. 

But since the initial flurry of activity it seems there has been very little reaction to issues/ideas discussed here or in the Observations thread (except for some feedback from moderators RAF, Cees & others).  Even if behind-the-scenes issues are being dealt with, it would be nice to get the occasional update of what's going on. 

Or maybe I misunderstood that the Huddler staff would be taking an active part in discussing the transition with the membership.

I have reason to believe they've heard our comments and are working behind the scenes to address some number of them. My sense is that they've stopped tweaking "live" and we're not seeing user interface changes dribbling out in real-time. My hunch is that they're working on back-end stuff (performance) and that we'll see a refresh at some point with some variety of requested features implemented.

From experience working as an engineer with customers who desire excessive communication, honestly the best thing at times is to be left alone to work the problems. Back and forth with customers is suprisingly time-consuming and really drags down actual work product. Huddler may have decided it was time to get back to work, as it were.

What DaveF just said above.

I'd add that I've had private correspondences about one particularly annoying issue I've been having (w/ jump-scrolling-back-to-reply-box).  Although an actual fix might not be forthcoming anytime soon (due to the nature of this bug), I feel better about it already even though I still keep running into it.   If I'm only one of a very few having the problem (because of the way I surf/navigate), I guess I might eventually learn to workaround it thru habit and not need an actual fix -- I do know upgrading to IE7 wouldn't solve it, but not sure about IE8.  Also, if they implement my above suggestion for those nav links, that would probably substantially reduce the annoyance for me -- and I already mentioned that to them privately.

In any case, I thought they were intending to keep us updated thru this other thread:

http://www.hometheaterforum.com/forum/thread/290396/forum-wide-features-and-task-implementations

Granted, there hasn't been any updates there since the original post.  But it's only been a week.  As long as there aren't any serious showstopping issues that require immediate attention, a week is really not that long to wait.  Maybe there will be another update there soon...

_Man_

I was completely unaware of that thread.  Thanks, Man. 

Apologies we've been a little quiet in the forums, Mike!  As DaveF and Man-Fai Wong noted, we have indeed been work on a lot of things behind the scenes (performance, bug fixes, adding a "Preview" button on replies, and some new shiny toys for the moderators).  A lot of these things are improvements you won't "see" but they're very important to make HTF a well oiled, smoothly running machine.

Even if we're not posting as much, rest assured that we're keeping a running list of all the feature requests and we're checking in with these threads multiple times a day.


In regards to this specific request, the buy/sell/trade functionality is definitely not lost forever.  It's on the long term feature roadmap to be designed with a whole suite of functionality encompassing trader feedback, buying and trading, and maybe even a way for sellers to message folks en masse who say they "want" the item via their Lists.  Needless to say, it's been on our wish list and we'll certainly put a lot of good effort behind it.  Additionally, none of the existing trader feedback has been lost.  We maintain backup copies of everything on the HTF databases even if we don't have an analagous feature to date.  Of course, now there's the question of when will it happen.  It's a little further out in the game plan.  Based on the stats from the vB implementation of HTF, it's not the HTF-Huddler team top priority given that it wasn't the most widely used functionality but I promise, it is on the list.

We're also working on a bunch of stuff you WILL see.  As DaveF mentioned, we're actively working on that right column, making some tweaks to the home page, and reorganizing the Advanced Search to make the functionality a little more clear.  So don't worry.  There's still a flurry of activity. 

Cristina:  Thanks for taking the time to answer those issues.  It is much appreciated. 

I completely understand the low priority to the Sale/Trade Feedback system, but it's good to know that it will, someday, return. 

I still believe that, until it does, the HTF should possibly consider some sort of interim placemarker-type system or people will tend to forget those transactions which happen during the wait.  Just a thought for the mods. 

Two more things. Is it possible to set it up so that when a link appears in a post it opens up a new browser window when you click on it?  Due to the fact I am broadband challeneged, this just take so much time waiting for ads and pictures to load. I can be reading the rest of the thread while waiting for the link to open. The old software did this.

Along the same lines, don't display images inline. Put links or give us the option to turn inline images off. Again, load issues. My firewall at work prevents access to this site so I have to use dialup to get here during the day. I am sure there are others who also still use dialup that woud appreciate it.

Mark:  This issue has been discussed here already.  I'm glad to see it repeated, but know that you have the option everytime you want to click on a link to right-click and open that link in a new tab/window (depending on your browser).  Hopefully it will be changed eventually..but, in the meantime, you've got options.

Maybe sometime down the road we could change the information that's printed when someone edits a post to no longer reflect GMT but reflect the time zone of the person who is looking at the thread?  Seems to me that's how it used to be. 

Higher math is sometimes hard for me.