Some suggestions for the website

[Ashish Ramteke]

Hello!!

I have some suggestions for this website, the codeRanch. They are given below.

1. When some forum is opened, the page comes (the first page) where the all different new posts in the forum are given page-by-page.
There some posts marked as ' ! Sticky,' or, 'Hot topic,' or, 'Moderator says it's resolved,' etc., may be there..
So, when one hovers/points the mouse pointer over the icon given just before the post-topic there, like, when mouse is pointed to the icon before the post-topic that means the post is a 'Hot topic,' I think the text- 'Hot topic'- should be displayed there, near the mouse pointer. I found that while this is already there for the icons of 'Moderator says it's resolved' and 'Poster would like moderator to mark as resolved,' it is not there for the icons of 'Hot topic' and ' ! Sticky.'

2. When writing a post in this editor, for making the text bold, italic, or, to underline it, or to do some other operation given in the editor on it, keyboard shortcut keys should be made available. Currently, one has to select the text and then click on the b, i, u or the desired option from the options, or can use HTML tags by their own... so shortcuts like 'Ctrl + b' for making the selected text bold, 'Ctrl + i' for italicizing the selected text, and so on, can be made available...

3. Suppose I am writing (a reply to) a post where that (original) post has two pages of posts by users. So, if I post my message, it will be the last one there. So, while writing, the page shows, below the text-editor, the posts from the last one, in the descending order of the time of posting... I found that those posts include the posts only of the last page there and not all the posts... So, I think all the posts, i.e., the posts from the end to the start under that particular topic, or the posts from all the pages in that post-topic) should be or can be displayed there.

I hope you got what I am saying in the points above here...

So, these were the suggestions I wanted to give for the website...

Thanks!

[Jaikiran Pai]

Ashish Ramteke wrote:I found that while this is already there for the icons of 'Moderator says it's resolved' and 'Poster would like moderator to mark as resolved,' it is not there for the icons of 'Hot topic' and ' ! Sticky.'

Good catch. We'll fix that.

Ashish Ramteke wrote:
2. When writing a post in this editor, for making the text bold, italic, or, to underline it, or to do some other operation given in the editor on it, keyboard shortcut keys should be made available. Currently, one has to select the text and then click on the b, i, u or the desired option from the options, or can use HTML tags by their own... so shortcuts like 'Ctrl + b' for making the selected text bold, 'Ctrl + i' for italicizing the selected text, and so on, can be made available...

Our editor isn't a rich text editor and is pretty simple. Having been on other forums which have rich text support, I am glad that CodeRanch keeps it simple. There have been instances where I have had to fight with such editors to just get the content show up fine. Having said that, if it's just for Ctrl + i and Ctrl +b then maybe it could be included.

[Ulf Dittmer]

The alt-b, alt-i, alt-u, alt-w shortcuts (and probably some others, these are the ones I can recall) work fine, just not in the "Quick Reply" box.

[Ashish Ramteke]

Hello!! Thanks for the reply!!

Jaikiran Pai wrote:
Good catch. We'll fix that.

Thank you!!
More for my first point in the post:
I noticed one more thing.
If a thread (post(-topic)) is locked, then an icon representing a 'lock' is shown near the post-topic, as with other posts(-topics) and their respective suitable icon(s)... I noticed that the 'lock' icon is not given in the list of different icons given with their respective meanings given at the bottom side of the page that contains post-topics (the page that opens after clicking on a forum's name here).

Jaikiran Pai wrote:
Our editor isn't a rich text editor and is pretty simple.

Sir, I am talking about the current text-editor that codeRanch has... it already has options of bold, italics, underline, strike-through and some other options. So, I thought that, keyboard-shortcuts for those already-available options can be added.. (So while I type some message from the keyboard, then, I can format the text using the keyboard only...)

And the third point, it also good I think... what do you say..?

[Ashish Ramteke]

Hello!! Thanks for the reply!!

Ulf Dittmer wrote:The alt-b, alt-i, alt-u, alt-w shortcuts (and probably some others, these are the ones I can recall) work fine, just not in the "Quick Reply" box.

I did not know about these shortcuts. Thanks for telling!! I can use some now.
I tried the usual (maybe)- the 'Ctrl + b', 'Ctrl+i'.. the 'Ctrl' ones... the ones you told are the 'Alt' ones...

I tried the ones you told about, alt-b, alt-i, alt-u, and, alt-w. Yes, they work in the 'Post-Reply'.. did not try in the 'Quick Reply' box... But, they work in a quite different way I think... it is not, like,- select the text first and then press the keyboard-shortcut-, one has to first press the shortcut and then enter the text in the pop-up box that appears depending upon the keyboard-shortcut-buttons pressed...

While using the keyboard-shortcuts in the editor, the 'Alt' ones, I found that all of that we are talking about, the- alt-b, alt-i, alt-u, alt-w-, are not working correctly... For instance, consider the working of 'Alt+b'. When I pressed the shortcut-buttons- 'Alt + b', then, a pop-up box appeared where I had to put the text that I want in 'bold' format. Then, I put the text in it. And, after that a single press of the 'Ok' button on that box was not doing the thing.., I had to press the button twice, either way, using keyboard or mouse for pressing that button. And, after the box is gone, the text in the text editor comes with a double '[b]...[/b]'s one after the other. It is same for the others also... But, the 'Cancel' button on that pop-up box does its respective operation with a single press of it.

Thanks!!

[Ulf Dittmer]

There are two ways to use the shortcuts : 1) select some text, press alt-b, and the tags are inserted before and after the selection, 2) press alt-b, enter the text to be bolded in the dialog and hit enter - the text with tags will be inserted in the post.

[Ashish Ramteke]

Oh, yes! Sorry, I just tried them in my other browser, they are working fine!
But they were not working correctly in my current browser.. I just checked, it is having a new update..

[Jaikiran Pai]

You did have some good suggestions. Your post has now earned a cow.

[Ashish Ramteke]

Thank you so much, sir!!
Thank you very much! Its very nice, quite awesome, that I am having a 'cow' here now.

[J. Kevin Robbins]

If I may add one more to the wish list; automatically lock threads after, I don't know, six months or maybe longer, to stop people from waking the zombies.

There have been several times that I start reading a thread only to realize that it's several years old but someone woke it and added one more reply.

Just a thought...

[Campbell Ritchie]

We used to complain bitterly about waking zombie threads, but in the last two or three years have changed our opinion about that. Some people actually add something really useful to old threads.