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UER Forum > Archived Forum Announcements > Forum Read States Change (those little circles) (Viewed 3006 times)
PhotoSeeker 


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Re: Forum Read States Change (those little circles)
<Reply # 80 on 12/7/2010 12:18 PM >
Posted on Forum: UER Forum
 
Posted by Avatar-X
I'm not a DBA, and there is probably a better way to do it, but I don't know it. If someone wants to volunteer their time coding and implementing a new system that they guarantee is faster, I wouldn't be against it. Send me a message.


First, I think you've done and continue to do an amazing job with this site.

Second, you owe no one anything. We owe you for the worldwide community you've created here, even as dysfunctional as we sometimes are.

Third, I'm a DBA. I work for Cambrian College in Sudbury. I'd be curious to know which DBMS you're using, and if you're willing, to have a look at your database structure, etc. I don't know that I'll necessarily have anything constructive to add, but I'd be willing and interested in having a look.

Lots of Urban Exploration goodness at https://urbexobsession.com
trent 

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Re: Forum Read States Change (those little circles)
<Reply # 81 on 12/7/2010 2:33 PM >
Posted on Forum: UER Forum
 
I'm so confused by the changes I don't even...



Av, have you considered instead of trying to maintain readstates via the back-end database and tracking it all server-side instead passing on that task on all the read-state tracking to the clients?

It could be possible for the client to remember their detailed read states via something like a cookie or locally stored file. Then when when viewing the forums, set UER to update the users person read-state file each time they thread is opened and remembering the last post # seen by the user and the thread ID it came from. Then at the next login or page refresh run a query to match all threads logged on the clients local file against those same thread ID's on UER; if any UER threads have a higher post count in a thread than the users file, mark the thread as having new posts (blue). You could also run a compare between viewed threads in the user file vs new ones on UER not in the users file meaning they are new threads (green).

I see this as a possibility to restore the exact same functionality we're all used to while freeing up the DB size and processing issues which you say were the culprit behind forcing this move.

Edit: Reading back through the thread I see others have mentioned the possibility of running the read states more the client side.
[last edit 12/7/2010 2:41 PM by trent - edited 1 times]

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Avatar-X 

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Re: Forum Read States Change (those little circles)
<Reply # 82 on 12/7/2010 2:40 PM >
Posted on Forum: UER Forum
 
Hi everyone,


I fear this'll get lost in the noise, but like many other 1-in-12 males, I'm pretty red/green colour-blind... these new 'leaves' (sprouts?) with a tiny coloured red/green dot is almost invisible to me.


This is actually the first time this has been mentioned... UER usually doesn't use red, it's either gray, green, or blue. In any case, the 'new threads' icon is now a christmas tree, and the 'unread posts' is a blue bauble. The 'favourites' is now a stocking. This theme is temporary, for the holiday season.


also i just noticed that it reset all my readstates in the DB. that's...really annoying. now i've no idea what i've checked out and what i haven't!


They have been switched to the new system, but they're not gone. If you switch to Advanced Readstates they will come back.



edit: also, not sure if the corporate edition ever showed icons for readstates but it's not doing so now.


No, the Corporate Edition never showed them, because it is supposed to be devoid and colourless.


Third, I'm a DBA. I work for Cambrian College in Sudbury. I'd be curious to know which DBMS you're using, and if you're willing, to have a look at your database structure, etc. I don't know that I'll necessarily have anything constructive to add, but I'd be willing and interested in having a look.


Awesome. Read this section, where I've posted details about how the back-end system works and the challenges it faces.
http://www.uer.ca/...id=1&catid=1000589


Av, have you considered instead of trying to maintain readstates via the back-end database and tracking it all server-side instead passing on that task on all the read-state tracking to the clients?


Yes. It was already discussed earlier, but basically, it is way too much data to store locally and fetch in any kind of timely manner. Also, it would only be on one computer, which would be annoying as well.

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rob.i.am 


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Re: Forum Read States Change (those little circles)
<Reply # 83 on 12/7/2010 2:46 PM >
Posted on Forum: UER Forum
 
Posted by Avatar-X

No, the Corporate Edition never showed them, because it is supposed to be devoid and colourless.



Thanks Av.

What about the mobile version? Santa seems to have made the readstates indistinguishable.

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seicer 


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Re: Forum Read States Change (those little circles)
<Reply # 84 on 12/7/2010 2:47 PM >
Posted on Forum: UER Forum
 
Posted by Avatar-X
OK, I've created a new pricing structure to reward people who make a larger donation:


  • Donation of $5 - 30 days of Premium Membership
  • Donation of $10 - 90 days (three months) of Premium Membership
  • Donation of $15 - 180 days (six months) of Premium Membership
  • Donation of $25 - 365 days (1 year) of Premium Membership


I'll be updating the donation page and putting new subscription options for the new intervals. I think these prices are fair and offer a better incentive to make a larger donation.

-av


Do we still get a plushy image of a wolf if we donate?

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trent 

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Re: Forum Read States Change (those little circles)
<Reply # 85 on 12/7/2010 3:21 PM >
Posted on Forum: UER Forum
 
Oh, and I don't know if I missed it, but is there any way to use any kind of read states on user boards?

I can see the new states on individual threads, but none of them seem to carry over to the main forum page -- all my users boards display as there's been no new posts in them until I actually go into that board.

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Re: Forum Read States Change (those little circles)
<Reply # 86 on 12/7/2010 4:32 PM >
Posted on Forum: UER Forum
 

I can see the new states on individual threads, but none of them seem to carry over to the main forum page


I've fixed this.


Do we still get a plushy image of a wolf if we donate?


You'll have to donate to find out


What about the mobile version? Santa seems to have made the readstates indistinguishable.


Fixed!

huskies - such fluff.
makman 


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Re: Forum Read States Change (those little circles)
<Reply # 87 on 12/7/2010 4:46 PM >
Posted on Forum: UER Forum
 
Posted by trent
Av, have you considered instead of trying to maintain readstates via the back-end database and tracking it all server-side instead passing on that task on all the read-state tracking to the clients?


That's actually what I've been working on. The problems are:

- Read states won't carry over between machines
- Computing read states for the forums on the fly would be expensive; to see the read state for "Rookie Forum", you'd have ajax load the rookie forum page to compare the last post date of each non-archived thread in that forum against your stored version. You'd have to do this for each forum category. This means 20-something page requests each time you load the main forum page, not counting how many more requests you'd have to do to check lists of threads past the first page in each category.
- You only get ~5 mb local storage per domain on Firefox and 10mb on Chrome. Depending on how you did it, you could be pushing those limits by storing readstates for 10,000 + threads.

I'm currently working on a client-side version of this just for the 'New Posts' page, since that's all I really use. That's a bit of a simpler problem.

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Freak 


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Re: Forum Read States Change (those little circles)
<Reply # 88 on 12/7/2010 4:52 PM >
Posted on Forum: UER Forum
 
Bug-wise: I've noticed that the top level read states don't always reflect the contents of a subsection. For example, I'm on a private board that has new posts since my last visit, but on the main page the icon for that forum is gray.

Opinion-wise: I loved the old readstate system. It is/was one of the best I've ever seen on a forum in terms of user friendliness and features. Especially on a forum of this size where it's nearly impossible to follow every thread of interest in a single sitting. However, my interest and time for UER has decreased over the years, so I was down to occasionally checking the Main, World, and some regional forums a couple times a week. Without readstates, I'll probably ignore those sections completely now, and just stick with the one private section that I actually contribute to. The changed readstates are an annoyance there, but it's a small enough forum that they're not a disaster. I'm on a pretty tight budget (saving for a house). I have donated in the past when I had surplus cash, and $5 a month or even $25 a year sounds cheap, but for the amount I use UER it's not worth it.

Alternatives-wise: I would agree that the LDB readstates should be split from the forum. I don't use the LDB at all, and haven't for years. I'd also agree that there could be some culling of old users, I have a friend who still has an account here, although he hasn't logged in for almost 4 years and AFIK he doesn't explore anymore. I'm on some other forums that aggressively cull inactive users, if you don't log in for a set time (a month, three months, etc), you get an email warning that your account will expire if you don't log in within a week or something.




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olive 


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Re: Forum Read States Change (those little circles)
<Reply # 89 on 12/7/2010 5:10 PM >
Posted on Forum: UER Forum
 
How are you working around the amount that paypal takes for each donation? Cause I just donated using the $25 button but I forgot that paypal will take some of that. so does that mean I only the 6 month membership? That sucks if its the case... I would rather just pay the difference of what paypal is going to take (less than two dollars i'd guess) and get the full year.

Sorry, what was that you were saying about forever alone?
rob.i.am 


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Re: Forum Read States Change (those little circles)
<Reply # 90 on 12/7/2010 5:17 PM >
Posted on Forum: UER Forum
 
Posted by Avatar-X

Fixed!


Indeed it is. Thank you!

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trent 

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Re: Forum Read States Change (those little circles)
<Reply # 91 on 12/7/2010 5:27 PM >
Posted on Forum: UER Forum
 
@makman Yah, you're right about the overhead of processing all read states on the client side. That's be a lot of threads it would have to hit in a short amount of time. In the priv board Av set up for this discussion though, I did have a different idea for running it all on server-side, but at a much less lower performance hit which at this time still seems feasible.



@Freak. I totally know what you mean. I really like the old read states system, very well done. Also, as you mentioned it seems the majority are agreeing that the read states for the UE DB really aren't that important and it seems the UEDB states are a main culprit of the slowness. I'm sure people would gladly sacrifice them to keep the old forum read states.

This read state change actually now makes it increasingly difficult to even figure out what the heck is going on and there seems to be bugs on top it. As you were mentioning, I could also see myself spending less and less time attempting to decipher read states in the main urbex forums. After being used to a nice read state system, it's really a kick in the balls to lose that ability. I'm not trying to be a gloom and doomer here, but the recent changes in my opinion may be disenfranchising to some users. The changes offer no new benefit and remove awesome functionality. I understand the old system couldn't continue on forever, but I also feel there are other technical methods to offer the same feature while not drowning the server.

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trent 

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Re: Forum Read States Change (those little circles)
<Reply # 92 on 12/7/2010 5:28 PM >
Posted on Forum: UER Forum
 
Posted by olive
How are you working around the amount that paypal takes for each donation? Cause I just donated using the $25 button but I forgot that paypal will take some of that. so does that mean I only the 6 month membership? That sucks if its the case... I would rather just pay the difference of what paypal is going to take (less than two dollars i'd guess) and get the full year.


Pay pal calculator: http://www.rolbe.com/paypal.htm

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Re: Forum Read States Change (those little circles)
<Reply # 93 on 12/7/2010 6:12 PM >
Posted on Forum: UER Forum
 
I can't speak for Av, but I think donations have always been calculated before PayPal takes their cut.
[last edit 12/7/2010 6:12 PM by -MisfitStyle- - edited 1 times]

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trent 

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Re: Forum Read States Change (those little circles)
<Reply # 94 on 12/7/2010 6:21 PM >
Posted on Forum: UER Forum
 
Posted by -MisfitStyle-
I can't speak for Av, but I think donations have always been calculated before PayPal takes their cut.



http://www.uer.ca/...d=1&threadid=27619
Q: I donated $5, but the system told me I only donated $4.55. What's up with that?
Gotta love PayPal... they need their cut, of course. The difference is due to PayPal's fees. I used to not bother counting it... $5 was $5... but when you have 20 $5 donations, that suddenly adds up to a missing 10 dollars. So, now, your donation counts for what UER gets.

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olive 


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good plan, poorly executed.

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Re: Forum Read States Change (those little circles)
<Reply # 95 on 12/7/2010 6:32 PM >
Posted on Forum: UER Forum
 
Posted by trent



http://www.uer.ca/...d=1&threadid=27619
Q: I donated $5, but the system told me I only donated $4.55. What's up with that?
Gotta love PayPal... they need their cut, of course. The difference is due to PayPal's fees. I used to not bother counting it... $5 was $5... but when you have 20 $5 donations, that suddenly adds up to a missing 10 dollars. So, now, your donation counts for what UER gets.


well the new "$25" button should say "26.06" then.

anyways, I'll speak to av about it and see if i can just donate another 1.06 (or whatever) to get the full year.

Sorry, what was that you were saying about forever alone?
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Re: Forum Read States Change (those little circles)
<Reply # 96 on 12/7/2010 6:32 PM >
Posted on Forum: UER Forum
 

I've noticed that the top level read states don't always reflect the contents of a subsection. For example, I'm on a private board that has new posts since my last visit, but on the main page the icon for that forum is gray.


This has now been fixed.

How are you working around the amount that paypal takes for each donation?


Despite what it says in the FAQ, for the purposes of premium membership, I calculate using the original value of the donation. $25 counts as $25.

the UE DB really aren't that important and it seems the UEDB states are a main culprit of the slowness. I'm sure people would gladly sacrifice them to keep the old forum read states.


While it is true that the UEDB suffered much worse than the forum, the forum was also quite slow and also quite unmanageable. We are examining ways to keep the forum readstates for everyone in the other thread, but at this point I can make no promises.

This read state change actually now makes it increasingly difficult to even figure out what the heck is going on and there seems to be bugs on top it.


I will fix the bugs as I find them and as they are reported. But it is no different from how readstates work on most other forums, so for many people it is probably a welcome change.

-av

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Re: Forum Read States Change (those little circles)
<Reply # 97 on 12/7/2010 6:45 PM >
Posted on Forum: UER Forum
 
Posted by trent



http://www.uer.ca/...d=1&threadid=27619
Q: I donated $5, but the system told me I only donated $4.55. What's up with that?
Gotta love PayPal... they need their cut, of course. The difference is due to PayPal's fees. I used to not bother counting it... $5 was $5... but when you have 20 $5 donations, that suddenly adds up to a missing 10 dollars. So, now, your donation counts for what UER gets.


I stand corrected.

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Re: Forum Read States Change (those little circles)
<Reply # 98 on 12/7/2010 7:07 PM >
Posted on Forum: UER Forum
 
Posted by -MisfitStyle-


I stand corrected.


I was wrong, too

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Re: Forum Read States Change (those little circles)
<Reply # 99 on 12/7/2010 8:41 PM >
Posted on Forum: UER Forum
 
My read-states are currently set at Mode 5 however it is not tracking the LDB correctly. It is giving me the basic view.

I plan on telling (begging) my wife to (let me) donate this weekend. I have been browsing this site for years now and should have donated a *long* time ago.

Thanks Av for all of your hard work.

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UER Forum > Archived Forum Announcements > Forum Read States Change (those little circles) (Viewed 3006 times)
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