Improving Comments on Propeller 2.0 - Newsquake »
Posted By tdrapeau 1 year, 4 months ago in Science & Technology
I wanted you all to be aware that we have made several significant improvements with comments on Propeller. We have been hard at work reading and heeding your feedback. Here's what we have fixed with this new upgrade...
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tdrapeau
Tom Drapeau is the Director of Propeller social news. He enjoys all manner of geekery and internet foolishness. He has seen every episode of Battlestar ...
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Eagle_Eye1 year, 4 months ago
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Thank You!! I noticed this last time I came on that I could edit my comments, excellent...but I also noticed that the positive and negative comment votes icons have been reversed and I almost negged the positives!!!
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Otherwise I have to say it has taken some getting use to, you are listening to the community and addressing our concerns so I am still hanging in here.
Also, thank you for darkening the type, my Eagle Eyes were getting tired of squinting!! -
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AlphaGnosisComment removed: Hard Banned8 Replies
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gamahuche1 year, 4 months ago
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Well, I negged you on that - if it helps to know. I think the points that Nixie makes down below are very telling and I have enjoyed the new prop mostly because there hasn't been the same grudge-matching going on based on that identification.
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I WOULD like to see the ability to neg stories restored - whether identifiable or anonymous.
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capecoralMComment removed: Retracted by user2 Replies
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ind061 year, 4 months ago
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It's one of several changes, mozzer
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RESTORED
More stories on the home page
Darker, easier to read type
3,000 character PM's
Ability to paste clikable URL's into comments
Edit
Friend's Submissions
Single clik posting (thanx Neo)
REMOVED / ALTERED
Not being able to see all of a PM without cliking
This looks like forward momentum to me! :D-
AlphaGnosisComment removed: Hard Banned2 Replies
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AndyComment removed: Retracted by user
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ranchhandComment removed: Retracted by user16 Replies
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mackiemesserComment removed: Retracted by user
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hyperbola1 year, 4 months ago
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I'm sorry to say that this looks like another patch that only half works and was not tested before springing it on us.
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(a) I have reply buttons attached only to some of the comments and they are NOT in the correct place on the page (many are obscured by the "vote buttons").
(b) I still have washed out grey when adding a comment.
(c) The nesting depth seems to have changed to 3 rather than 2, but the whole thread is still not visible. PLEASE make the default that all drop-downs are open. This is the only way that one can scan over the entire thread with the scroll bar to see if there are interesting comments.
In short threads (this one at present) this makes minimal difference, but in long threads I go crazy clicking drop-downs to see what is being said. I can close any drop downs that have only long, tedious shouting matches. This approach would greatly reduce the amount of clicking and scrolling I have to do to see the same information.
Some of the most interestng back and forth discussion is often nested deeply (as those who really care cut loose with ideas, information and links). At present these kinds of highly informative exchanges are being discouraged by the drop-down structure.
Were drop-downs introduced to avoid the tedious columns 1 letter wide in deeply nested comments? Actually drop-downs do NOT address this problem. If discussion gets back to previous levels here, we will again have such columns. In fact, because only 60% of the page width is now being used (I HATE the empty columns of white space to my right), this is likely to occur at far smaller nesting depth.
Perhaps the solution is to have all drop-downs open until the column width becomes less than about 20 characters? And then, for those readers who want to see the deeply nested comments, to expand (from a user-chosen point) the subsequent entries to full column width (as was previously possible).-
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hyperbola1 year, 4 months ago
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From here on I am conducting a test to see what happens with deep nesting in the present version. Some of the above text is simply repeated in each reply. The only interesting point is when the nesting starts to create problems.
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""""I'm sorry to say that this looks like another patch that only half works and was not tested before springing it on us.""" -
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brettodactyl1 year, 4 months ago
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Great improvements; I'm very grateful you've brought back the ability to edit comments, since I could've used that a couple times recently. One thing I'd also like to see relative to comments would be a link from my profile page directly to my comment threads, like on the previous version of Propeller. It's really hard to find discussions I've had about the more popular stories, so I can't always reply to a message directed at me.
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hyperbola1 year, 4 months ago
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OK, it broke and I can no longer reply to my initial post (no usable reply button available at the top of the nest). My observations are therefore placed here.
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Now a few conclusions. First, the messed up reply buttons for more deeply nested comments may be because of width problems.
Second, Mike, thanks for your comment. I reply here because I did not get a reply button at the location of your comment. I would guess that you were not involved in the propeller community prior to the revision and did not see the number of times that comments were nested so deeply that columns were only 1 letter wide and dozens if not hundreds of rows long.
If the degree of back and forth conversation again reaches the levels prior to revision, I would expect to again see VERY deeply nested commentary. As I noted, these are often the most interesting exchanges - sometimes the only ones where users take the trouble to back up their arguments with lots of information and links (perhaps this is not common in other communities Mike?).
Third, with the present structure, the commentaries are pleasantly readable down to a nesting level of about 12, but this will only continue to be true if avatars stay small (please!).
Down to this level, I would prefer that all drop-downs be open by default so that I can scan the whole thread quickly with the scroll bar rather than having to repeatedly click and scroll throughout the thread.
I stand by my previous suggestion that if nesting gets very deep (say >12 at present), the best solution is to close the drop-down at that level. If the reader opens the thread at the deep nest, expand it to full column width.
Finally, snap-back (re-insertion) at the top of the thread rather than at my last activity is PAINFUL. It is particularly painful if the thread is full of drop downs. It is excruciatingly painful if I am in comment 212 (or more) in the thread and must then page and page to try to find the correct insertion point again. Which reminds me that page navigation in the threads (so I can see the last or penultimate page of the commentary) also needs to be restored (in progress?).-
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hyperbola1 year, 4 months ago
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OK. The test seems to have been eliminated so you can't see it, but I did reach a few conclusions.
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First, Mike, thanks for your comment. I reply here because I did not get a usable reply button at the location of your comment (and your comment is now gone). I would guess that you were not involved in the propeller community prior to the revision and did not see the number of times that comments were nested so deeply that columns were only 1 letter wide and dozens if not hundreds of rows long. If the degree of back and forth conversation again reaches the levels prior to revision, I would expect to again see VERY deeply nested commentary.
At present nest depths of up to about 12 still give readable text. I would prefer that down to this level all drop-downs are by default open so that I can quickly scan over the completely open thread with the scroll bar to see if anything interests me. Beyond that, close the drop-down. If a reader opens the drop-down expand the subsequent nesting to full column width so it becomes readable.
Mike, you may not believe it, but this re-expansion at deep nesting is where I found some of the most intersting exchanges in propeller prior to revision. Perhaps our community is different to others in that LONG back and forth conversations (sometimes over many days) were not unusual. Personally I regard the shortening of the conversations (occasioned by the revision structure up to present) as a loss to the community. I suggest some of the disappointment from previously highly active users is because this flavor of propeller has been suppressed at present.
By the way, snap-back (reinsertion) at the top of the page is another SERIOUS constraint on the long back and forth commentary characteristic of the propeller community and is presently excruciatingly painful and slow. Reinsertion at my last activity AND page navigation in long threads are IMPORTANT (and coming?).
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airwick1944Comment removed: Retracted by user
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AlphaGnosisComment removed: Hard Banned1 Reply
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cushi1 year, 4 months ago
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Alpha has referenced my one remaining complaint and that is seeing who I pos and neg, because I often don't remember when I or propeller refresh the screen. I often waste time trying to rate a comment only to see that the number/percentage doesn't change, thus letting me know that I already pos or negged the comment. Big waste of time.
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ADAGUY1 year, 4 months ago
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In the upper right hand corner of my monitor, I see my avatar, with the words "hello ADAGUY" indicating that I am logged in. But when I click on the "friends" icon, I get the message that I am not logged in, and must be logged in to use this feature. I then go through the trouble of logging in again, yet it makes no difference.
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What is the problem?-
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MikeWesner1 year, 4 months ago
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Good question. We haven't seen other reports of this issue. Feel free to either send us feedback or PM me and we can figure out what is going on and get it working for you.
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Send us/me info on exactly what link you are trying to click on and what browser you are using.
-Mike
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Candida1 year, 4 months ago
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Thanks for the hard work; this is a definite improvement, but I'm with hyperbola that the default for nesting should be open as far as possible with the option of opening up further comments, and that they should then snap back at that point to full width.
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I'm glad to see the + and - buttons farther apart, and the Average rating removed. I guess it's now the percentage rating, which is meaningless. One positive rating is 100%, while 75 positives and 25 negatives would be 75% I assume. The two cannot be compared. Even the positive and negative counts are more meaningful, but ideally we should be able to see who gave those votes because that's what gives their real meaning.
I notice that you've changed the time stamp to a time elapsed measure. It makes no difference to me which you use, but replacing a passive field with an active one seems wasteful to me. I assume that this one has to update itself for each comment each minute, which probably uses some processing capacity that could be better used elsewhere.-
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hyperbola1 year, 4 months ago
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Hi Candida.
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Returning this morning I see a few more changes. But I also ran into old problems that frustrated me immensely. I wrote an extensive further comment on thread structure and posted it, but it again went off into thin air and disappeared. I repeat it again here in the hopes it may appear. Although I hope with this to get a visible post that may be seen and/or elicit a response from Mike and other participants, I would be interested in your response to the idea of upward-closing nesting.
MIKE.
Thanks for your comments and feedback. As you can see I feel strongly about visibility of threads and reducing unnecessary clicking, scrolling and paging. Especially if it suppresses the kinds of discussions which I valued in propeller. I also see that this morning the response thread has been allowed to spill over to the right upon deep nesting (so my previous "test" has been altered in appearance), which goes some way to addressing my concerns. I also seem to have reply buttons for all comments - GREAT!
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ScroatieComment removed: Hard Banned
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ScroatieComment removed: Hard Banned
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