What happened to the classic user titles? (Such as “Chair-throwing legislator” – I loved those.)
Never been a big fan of discourse… seems so messy and chaotic. But hey, it’s the new thing isn’t it?
We haven’t figured out a way to implement them. The badges in the user profile looked like they could be one way, but the way they’re set up it would consume a considerable amount of system resources to use them for that purpose.
Badges certainly look like a way. At the very least one can grant a badge depending on number of posts / topics / replies etc. Should not be too hard to include the name of the “highest” badge next to the name? What are the problems you are running into?
We’d have to set up a series of badges that would check a range of post totals to see if a poster qualified, as in 0-99, newbie, 100-199, blah blah, etc. Badges are checked once every day to see who qualifies, so there would be a time of every day where each of these badges would have to be evaluated for every user on the site, thus creating a potential resource problem. I don’t see a way that would do a simpler “this user has this post total and therefore qualifies for this badge” single calculation, with badges at least.
Yes, but setting the badge-checking to something like 5AM should avoid any resource problems, right? Also, while the forums are not small, the queries shouldn’t be big enough to cause serious disturbances for longer time frames… Afaik you can also set the badges to be checked once a week (which seems fair given the slow change), or on each new post (which might reduce load due to many inactive users).
Have you tried it yet and run into trouble, or is that just a fear you have? I’d just try it in a sensible way and see what happens. If there are performance issues, smooth it out after the fact. After all some one-time lag would not harm the forum.
Alternatively, is it hard to just add an additional field with #posts to the users properties, or even a new table with only user id reference and no_posts, and have a cronjob do the update? (No experience with discourse, but this sounds reasonably doable if you can setup a cronjob on your server.)
But even if you had 50 different titles (maybe you do, not sure how many there were), I find it hard to imagine that the update should take longer than a few minutes. Maybe one can even set the badges to be evaluated at different times. But in fact I do not know if you can control the time to trigger a badge (seems a nobrainer feature though).
Thanks for the suggestions, we’d like to get this going again and we do plan to look at different possibilities for it in the future.
Can you set it up to check the totals only for those who have posted within the last 24h?
Not with the stock features of the site. There could be plug-ins with additional features, I’ll take a look.
I’m going to have to be more circumspect before clicking “Reply.”
I’m used to editing early and often at will, and even coming back quite a while later and editing as long as my post hadn’t been answered (although I’ve messed that part up a few times), but in my last post, I noticed that my dirty editing underwear is on display for all to see:
That’s located here:
Here’s what Jeff Atwood, the apparent creator or co-creator of Discourse, says about showing edits:
After you post, there is a 5 minute grace period for editing, where new edits are not counted as revisions.
https://meta.discourse.org/t/is-there-a-way-to-remove-your-edit-history/9716/8
I’m glad I saw this in a relatively innocuous post. Now if I commit a gross faux pas, I know I’ve got five minutes to take it back. 
Wow. Feel free to move this topic. I’m sure there are several like it, but I can’t find a feedback forum.
-
I couldn’t log in with my old password.
-
This new layout is jarring, to say the least, for someone who’s not here all that often any more. I feel like my second second home has gone. I’ve actually got digital culture shock. Or something.
-
I can’t find anything.
-
How could you DO this? Whaaa! I wan’t my old Forumosa back.
-
Hey, ya’ll. How’s everyone doing?
2 Likes
It is quite overwhelming when you first start to get used to it. After a few more logins, you’ll realize how the new Discourse forums is 1000x better than the old.
If you’ve logged on with your old account, you can check your post history via top right corner (your avatar pic) → clicking on your username → clicking activity. If you’re not here too often, you shouldn’t have too many old posts to scroll though.
If you’re trying to find a thread, the top right magnifying glass is the search function.
2 Likes
feedback forum
http://tw.forumosa.com/c/about/feedback
this post is actually in the feedback forum. To find the site map click the Categories button on the top right, which would take you to the categories page.
http://tw.forumosa.com/categories
It does take some getting used to, kind of like switching from a mouse to a touchpad, or a trackball.
By the way, is there a way to remove the “Latest” Pane from the “Categories” page?
If the “Categories” can get a full page, it will greatly improve readability, and make it easier for users to find what they are looking for.
We already have a “Latest” page, and the home page is essentially a latest page, having it as a pane in the “Categories” page is pretty redundant.
1 Like
Welcome back!
Yeah, it feels weird at first, but with time you appreciate it is way easier to work with, especially from the cellphone.
This New Forumosa has essentially killed a long-standing community and now rides on historical posts.
It’s too bad you feel that way. It seems to be the exact opposite of what I see based on the traffic of the site, which has grown steadily week-in, week-out in terms of visitors since the move to Discourse on 1 August (I am only referring to both the Google Analytics and Discourse’s own stats module).
Discourse takes getting used to. For new Forumosans, however, it is probably a better experience from the start. I hope to get more feedback in threads like this one so we can come up with ways to make the site even easier, especially for accessing that rich historical content you mention (ex. @housecat’s last quote above)
So far I haven’t been able to figure out the search function’s rules for Chinese characters. I admit I didn’t check any online forums/documentation on Discourse for help with that problem, but I had a sneaking suspicion that searching for Chinese characters is not gonna be a priority for many folks out there (in fact it may not be anybody’s priority in here, but I’m already registered here ).
To give some examples of my problem figuring out what the search function allows and doesn’t allow:
The sequence of Chinese characters for Toufen Township (頭份鎮) is on this board, as this Google search shows:
But if I search for that sequence of characters (頭份鎮) using the board’s search function, I get this result:
I get a different result, though, if I search for the TV series 風水世家 (Fengshui World Family?):
If I infer from the difference between the two results that the search function requires more than three characters, and then try the sequence of characters for Miaoli County, Toufen Township, (苗栗縣頭份鎮), which is shown in the first example to exist on the board; then I get this result:
So it appears that the reason that the search function will bring up 風水世家 but not 頭份鎮 is not necessarily related to the difference in the number of characters in the two expressions.
Out of an abundance of caution, I admit that there is a distinct possibility that I’ve made some error or another of a glaringly obvious sort. But if I’ve made such an error, I’m hoping someone will point out what it is, because I sometimes like to plug Chinese characters into the search function.
–Charlie
1 Like
Hmmm. Interestingly, this thread now turns up when you enter “頭份鎮”.
If you click on the Magnifying glass icon, and then “options”, and scroll down, a “search with Google” window is shown. That looks like a more reliable option for Chinese at the moment. I’ll try and figure out what’s going on.
EDIT: If you noticed, that thread isn’t accessible through its Google link. Layers within layers…
Not without some editing. Leaving that aside for now, the post does exist, and I’m not sure why it’s not being read. Still looking.
There seem to be some known issues with this process. Looking at a potential fix.
We have a ten-minute grace period now! And things should be set so that users can’t see later edits now, though moderators will be able to.
Hi tempogain,
Thanks for the feedback-feedback!
I didn’t notice the “search with Google.” Thanks for that info.
I wonder if the problem with the characters has to do with either time
limits or some sort of “setting” left over from shutting down the old
board. I know, I’m just spouting the vague blither of someone who doesn’t
really know anything about computers, lol.
But the reason I’m talking about the old board is that I got on the old
board yesterday to test characters in its search function, and characters
didn’t seem to work on the old board’s search function, either, although
Roman alphabet searches still do. So I figured that search must be disabled
for characters on the old board, and then I wondered whether that could
somehow have an effect on the new board.
But I’m just babbling.
Anyway, I noticed a change in the edit format. I wasn’t sure of the
details, but I could tell it had changed. Thanks for that! I feel less
vulnerable now, lol.
Take care,
Charlie
I like the new Forumosa better than the old one. It seems to remember where I have read to in a thread and draft replies are saved automatically. Took a bit of getting used to. I also like the new selection of silly emoji.
1 Like
I only rue that the “full moon” emoji doesn’t show up well against this background. We may have to change it 
