The Un-Official Proxomitron Forum

See what's new here: http://www.mybboard.net/features/feature-tour

Note that some aspects of the forum theme have changed; I will be fixing minor cosmetic issues later on today! I hope the forums load faster for everyone! (there is a performance improvement in this update)

Is it possible to make the RSS feed inform not only new topics but also new posts? Just like what Castlecops RSS used to be.

This is a low traffic forum and I'd like to be informed by every new posts. ;-)

Is the update why my bookmark to here didn't work and took me to a site claiming to be this one but is for sale and half the google links to here don't come here but to the site for sale? I was last here on Aug 4 just before this update.

i'm using the same exact shortcut i've been using since we moved to "Prox Box"...

I too am using the same shortcut that's been successful for me, since Kye-u took the domain name "PRXBX". It reads like this:

http://prxbx.com/forums/index.php


HTH



Oddysey

my shortcut is:
http://prxbx.com/forums/

it gets you to the same place...

(Aug. 11, 2008 11:52 PM)ProxRocks Wrote: [ -> ]my shortcut is:
http://prxbx.com/forums/

it gets you to the same place...

This from an Engineer who is supposed to be anal about the difference between precision and accuracy.






Oddysey

OK, Boys and Girls........

The schiesse is hitting the fan, rather squarely. Anyone else note these little "discrepancies":


1) Pages are often slow to finish loading. You see most or all of the content right away, but the browser doesn't think that it should return control back to you until it's made you wait for many extra seconds. Between 4 or 5 and as much as 12 seconds, depending on the phase of the moon, the impending tide in Antarctica, and Hell's current proclivity towards freezing or not......

2) Pages don't cache properly. Using the Backspace key (or the menu button) doesn't just pop the previous page right back, it has to re-load all over again. I see nothing in the Header META or MOOTA stagements that should be causing this.

3) When viewing quoted passages, either on a Thread/Topic page, or as a preview when preparing a reply, the background color (white) doesn't line up with the actual passage. Plus, an extra Horizontal Rule shows up, striking through the second or third line of the passage. Looks sort of like a border that got misplaced.

4) And finally, my real bug-a-boo: When typing in the textarea box of a Reply, the visual feedback gets slower and slower, until after about three lines, it starts failing to keep up with my fingers. At this point, I can type as usual, and then I have to wait from 3 to 23 seconds(!!!) for a visual response from the browser. This isn't my machine, this oddity happens only here at the Proxo Forums. Of course, this is also the only Forum I attend that uses MyBB, so there may be something going on in that direction.

And yes, I do use IE6 and IE7, on three different 'puters, with W98SE and XPSP2 - all show the same behavior. And it doesn't matter whether Proxo is active or bypassed, same thing.

Am I the only one riding the short bus here?



Oddysey

Kye-u;

I just noticed........

If a responder doesn't take take manual action to the contrary, the Forum automatically subscribes him/her to a given topic when he/she replies, and sends them an email (external, not PM).

I think that the default behavio(|u)r should be "Do not subscribe to this thread", and let the viewer decide for themselves, whether or not to receive notices. IMHO, of course.

At the moment, I see no way to make this setting for me personally in my Profile, nor can I find a way to make it happen for everyone in the Admin settings.

Over to you, Fearless Leader!




Oddysey

(Aug. 12, 2008 02:10 AM)Oddysey Wrote: [ -> ]I think that the default behavio(|u)r should be "Do not subscribe to this thread", and let the viewer decide for themselves, whether or not to receive notices. IMHO, of course.

At the moment, I see no way to make this setting for me personally in my Profile, nor can I find a way to make it happen for everyone in the Admin settings.

Over to you, Fearless Leader!

I've fixed it! Seems like the upgrade set a certain column named "subscriptionmethod" to 3 for all members. A simple query fixed it:

UPDATE **Users Table** SET subscriptionmethod = 0

I'll have a look at the other bugs I have a ton of meetings this week. Hang on tight!

Fearless Leader;

The subscription method is fixed, to be sure...... thanks!

The speed of visual feedback while typing into the textbox (of a reply, such as I'm doing now) is back up to normal - there seems to be no delay, no matter how many lines/characters I enter..... that's a good thing! If you caused the repair, thanks! If not, then we'll sacrifice a prized posession to the proper Gawds, etc.

However, the page-load-and-return-control-to-the-user speed is still abysmal. Does no one else here have any problems with the page-load speed?

And the quoted text within a reply is still showing a Horizontal Rule where none should be evident, and the white background is mis-aligned. These are very small glitches, I wouldn't pay much attention to them, except that I see nothing in the page's source code that could account for this anamoly........ (insert head-scratching smilie here)



Oddysey

Kye-U;

I just put two and two together..........

In another thread, you mentioned that you had melded the forums and a Wiki page into one symbiotic website. Well, I don't know about anyone else here, but I can say with all due respect, that Wiki .....stuff is the culprit here, speed-wise. I have yet to visit a Wiki page anywhere on the web, and have it load at a decent speed. Moreover, the real problem is that they somehow hi-jack total control over the browser window, meaning that the user can't do anything within that window...... I can't even click on any of the Minimize, Restore, or Exit buttons - the mouse goes there, but clicking is unrecognized until Wiki decides that break time is over.

In spite of that, if I click anywhere else on the screen, outside the browser window, the mouse works, so the Wiki page didn't hi-jack the whole system, just that one window. (Other open browser sessions or tabs are also unaffected, only the one displaying (or attempting to display) a Wiki page is affected.)

The question becomes, even though you disabled some of the Wiki features, is it possible to completely divorce the whole ball-of-wax from the forums? ??? That's the only way I can see to test my theory.......



Oddysey

i haven't seen any slow-down "at all" here...

but WHOLEHEARTEDLY AGREE about the wiki-bit, at least, in the sense that i BOYCOTT wikipedia.org because page-loads are SSLLOOOOWW and "scrolling" with a scroll-wheel takes FFOOORRREEEVVVEERR...

(Sep. 11, 2008 03:51 PM)Oddysey Wrote: [ -> ]However, the page-load-and-return-control-to-the-user speed is still abysmal. Does no one else here have any problems with the page-load speed?

And the quoted text within a reply is still showing a Horizontal Rule where none should be evident, and the white background is mis-aligned. These are very small glitches, I wouldn't pay much attention to them, except that I see nothing in the page's source code that could account for this anamoly........ (insert head-scratching smilie here)
Oddysey

Pages load very fast here.

I'm not sure what you mean by a "horizontal" rule where none should be evident in the quoted text but everything looks fine to me.

What browser are you using?

---

(Sep. 11, 2008 04:39 PM)ProxRocks Wrote: [ -> ]i haven't seen any slow-down "at all" here...

but WHOLEHEARTEDLY AGREE about the wiki-bit, at least, in the sense that i BOYCOTT wikipedia.org because page-loads are SSLLOOOOWW and "scrolling" with a scroll-wheel takes FFOOORRREEEVVVEERR...

And what browser are you using? Fx 1.5 that I use mostly and Fx3 that I have on virtual machines loads wikipedia.org very fast and always has. I use "autoscroll" for Fx (rather than smoothscroll) and then click the center mouse button to set autoscroll. Works beautifully at the wikipedia site.

What wiki is here? The Go to Site button? What is wrong with that? It works fine. No mouse problems. Loads very fast. No auto scrolling problems.

Mele;


The Wiki "slow-down" phenomenon is not universal, true enough, but it's also not a "small fraction of the total population" either. I don't know the underlying cause why it does that, but I do know that it's neither browser nor OS related - the list of what sufferers are running covers the entire gamut of software. You can even run an instance of Lynx on a Linux system, and you'll find that pages from Wiki.org/en are noticibly slower to load than most other pages. (Lynx doesn't render any kind of graphics, so it's very quick to display simple text layouts. (Not to mention, just think what that means in terms of 1x1 gif files coming from privacy-ignoring servers! ))

What I was asking Fearless Leader for was an affirmation that the Forums are in no way reliant on anything with the Wiki imprimatur on it. I'm grasping at straws, sure, but this Forum loaded quick as snot before the "upgrade", and afterwards...........

On the subject of browsers......

I'm sure you've noted by now that ProxRocks and I don't always see eye-to-eye on many things, but on this one we agree, and that is, if I'm happy using Browser X, then by Gawd and Golly, the page should load fine in it, and that's all there is to it. I shouldn't have to change browsers just to avoid growing a beard while waiting for the crap to finish loading. (Oh wait....... I already have one of those....... never mind. ) Specifically, if your browser loads a Wiki page like lightning, and mine doesn't (nor do any of PR's browsers), then it becomes highly likely that the Wiki code is purposefully and intentionally writing code for the express purpose of slowing down one's browsing experience, based solely on one's choice of browser. ProxRocks has already stated his reaction to that scenario, and I endorse his position - I too will abandon a site if it tells me outright, or hints broadly that I have what is to them an unacceptable browser. Of course, if they wanna pay my bills, then I'd have no kick about using their browser of choice, but since the money is coming out of my pocket, I get to call the tune, right?

But wait....... as I've already said, the list knows no bounds - everyone and his uncle's brother is having problems with speed, no matter which browser they're using (nor which OS). I'd be more inclined to think that if a person is seeing low page-load times, then they are probably blocking something from the Wiki server software, whether intentionally or otherwise. That's certainly possible, and not for just a minority, either.

I do thank you for letting me (us) know that I'm on the outside looking in, that's about par for the course. It simply means that I've got my work cut out for me, trying to see if I can kill the clutter from both these Forums, and from most Wiki-enabled sites.

(BTW, after about 40 or so lines within the textarea in a Reply, I do start getting a tiny bit of slowdown. Not nearly as bad as it was, by at least two orders of magnitude, but it is observable.)


Oddysey