Community Updates - February 2019

Hello all,

Sorry for not updating anything recently on the Community - a lot of the team have been very busy with Big Garden Birdwatch.

However, our team of web developers have been busy making some improvements based on what you've been asking us. In this update we've been focusing on the layout of the forum posts. In the next 24 hours, you'll see the following changes:

  • Pagination - We have now added pagination, which lets you skip forward or back either a page at a time, or to the beginning or end of a thread immediately.
  • Discussion order - Adding pagination has allowed us to reverse the thread order, which is the other big change many of you have been asking for, so the oldest posts appear first and the newest appear last. Without pagination we had switched this around this to make it easier to see the latest posts but have now switched it back which should make it easier to follow the flow of a thread. 

There are also some smaller changes to the layout of the posts themselves and the reply function.

  • Quoting - The biggest of these changes is probably how quoting works; the drag-to-quote feature has been replaced with a simpler system, similar to how it used to be.

If you want to quote on a previous post, then:

  • Click on the ‘Reply’ button beneath that post which opens the reply box
  • Then click on the ‘Use rich formatting’ link which will take you to a new page with all the advanced layout options
  • Beneath the original post is a link to ‘Quote’. Click this and the quoted post appears in the text box for you

Many thanks for your ongoing feedback - we are working through all the great ideas for improving your Community experience as quickly as we can.

Elliott.

p.s. I also know there are a few concerns with the current rate of Moderation within the Community - this is being looked at and I hope to be able to update you further in the coming days.

  • I just popped back here, feeling I must re-emphasise how tickled pink and grateful I am for what has been achieved by the Techie Team so far :-*

    .

    Unknown said:
    it would be helpful if there was some demarcation of the sig as well, either a shaded background, or a line to separate it from the rest of the response maybe

    And while I'm here I'd like to add my voice to Whistling Joe's on that subject Slight smile

  • scylla said:
    And while I'm here I'd like to add my voice to Whistling Joe's on that subject

    You can just put an underscore as the first line of your signature as I have done. There's a 256 character limit to your signature so you can't have it across the whole width.

    ____________________________________________________________________

    Tony

    My Flickr Photostream 

  • Tony, I promise you I thought of that, but decided to wait rather than get lost trying to find how to edit my sig. Honest! If it turns out to be difficult for the techs to make a separation, I'll have to bite the bullet.
  • Unknown said:

    Elliott.

    p.s. I also know there are a few concerns with the current rate of Moderation within the Community - this is being looked at and I hope to be able to update you further in the coming days.

     

  • Kate, it looks like the spam posts have been deleted. I've noticed that some threads now have zero views but some replies, we must have people who can reply to posts without reading them, ESP or what!!! I think that situation arose before. Ian
  • I appreciate the effort that you have put in on trying to rectify faults with the 'better system, and the difficulty in choosing between opposing requests for certain details. However, you have still got potential user(s) who cannot sign in at all, and some who cannot achieve selected standard actions whether signed in or not! We did not expect to receive such a beta version at changeover, nor so many unhelpful or ineffective updates since the upheaval. In particular just now the amended pagination is still a pain. The pages functions at the bottom of the page are fine, but why cannot we see the latest page when clicking on last post. We have to trawl through pages of history to join in at the current point.
  • Unknown said:
    The pages functions at the bottom of the page are fine, but why cannot we see the latest page when clicking on last post. We have to trawl through pages of history to join in at the current point.

    If you click on the date/time to the right of "Latest post" it should take you to the last comment in the thread

    ___

    Find me on Flickr / All about your camera - The Getting off Auto Index

  • Re OG's problem about signing in Has she simply tried to reset her password. 

    Do you see this when trying to sign in

    Enter what you believe is her registered email address making sure to click the button for Email address.

    Leave the password box blank or enter any characters and click sign in

    This dialog should appear.

    Click recover password.  You should receive an email telling you what to do. Of course if for some reason the email doesn't match the one held by the RSPB it won't work.

    Apologies if you've already tried this. I've had to do this myself when I lost my password. 

    ____________________________________________________________________

    Tony

    My Flickr Photostream 

  • Thanks, TeeJay - OG here. Yes, been through all that. Web techies say they think my account is fine - I just can't use it! Their latest 3 weeks ago was that they can't do much on a Friday, but would try on Monday - three weeks ago. I have emailed to ask them which Monday!

  • Unknown said:
    OG here. Yes, been through all that. Web techies say they think my account is fine - I just can't use it!

    All very strange. You'd think it would be a simple matter to resolve. Sorry I wasn't more help. Good luck.

    ____________________________________________________________________

    Tony

    My Flickr Photostream