A new way to view recent topic posts

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Sharkey
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A new way to view recent topic posts

Post by Sharkey »

The forum has been busy lately, ~very~ busy. I'm not complaining!

I usually keep track fo recent posts by using the list in the left hand menu of every page, but lately that has been getting swamped with new posts. I increased the number of new posts it displays from 10 to 12, but even that hasn't covered all the new activity. I don't want to make the list too long, as it eventually would impinge on the formatting fo the entire site (remember, that list of forumn posts appears on every page on the site!)

So.... time to put my feeble programming skillz to work and create another method of viewing recent posts.

Go to: http://www.mrsharkey.com/forum/recent.php and you will see a forum-display-like listing of the 50 most recent topic posts, with clickable links to the topic, most recent post, user profiles, ect. It's really a lot more like viewing the forums themselves rather than the recent post list, but that's good, because it give you more information.

For now, the page is very plain. My brain is cooked from writing all the necessary code, so it may be a day or two before it has all the embellishments and pretties that the finished page would have. I also need to get a link to the new page in the menu and elsewhere. All in good time.

This new page is somewhat configurable, so if anyone has a suggestion, let me know and I'll try to work it in while I groom the page.
graydawg
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Post by graydawg »

I like it better, that way you know whats going on if you go MIA for a few days, it will be a lot easier to catch up. anyway you built the bus drive it like you stole it, james in da GRAYDAWG
I ONCE WAS A MIGHTY GREYHOUND
I THEN GOT OLD AND RETIRED
I LOST MY SEATS AND GOT A NEW GIG
I AM NOW A HAULIN SOME OLD DAWGS &
I BECAME THE GRAYDAWG
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Dennis The Bus Dweller
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Post by Dennis The Bus Dweller »

That works out great
Peace along the way
Dennis the bus dweller N.Y.
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ezrablu
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Post by ezrablu »

Real nice, Sharkey...thanks...MUCH easier to keep up with action 8)
ezrablu
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Post by rlaggren »

Hmm..

I've always used the "since last visit" button. And yeah, the list has been getting impressively long!

Rufus
Sharkey
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Post by Sharkey »

The "since last visit" link works well for users who are logged in, but it does not appear for guests or logged out users. It's also limited to reporting replies to topics since your last visit, which is fine if you were thorough and read all the topics the last time you were here. Many times, I'll be in a hurry and just skim over a couple of hot topics and then come back later when I have more time to read up on what's been going on. The new page allows you to see a larger slice of forum activity. The orange flags are a nice touch which emulates the "last visit" behavior, but they aren't required to visually scan the list for material you haven't seen yet.

I did some clean-up on the page template, added a title and header, a link at the bottom back to the forum index, and put a link to the "recent" page in the menu and at the bottom of the "recent posts" in the menu sidebar on every page. Thank goodness for a flexible CMS so that I didn't have to edit every page on the site to do this!

Still open to suggestions. Is 50 topics enough for now?
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Post by dburt »

Are you sure you couldn't do 51 Sharkey? :D
Sharkey
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Post by Sharkey »

Actually, I was thinking of doing 51 so that it would kick into "pagination" and I could try getting that working. I don't think that the script is set up to do this without some serious tweaking. More trouble than it's worth until someone requests 100 or more topics.
Sharkey
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Post by Sharkey »

Because I taught myself how to put "pagination" into the PHP scripts while working on another forum page, I've inserted that feature on the "50 Recent Posts" page. It's now possible to view topics in reverse chronological order all the way back to the very first when the forum was started. Just use the "Go to page" links at the top and bottom right of the list of posts. This makes it easier if you want to read or reply to a post that you know was recently discussed without having to comb through the forum categories looking for it.

Enjoy.
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