New AFF Website

[Pushka]

@samh004 Am I doing something wrong when I upload photos? I usually write some text then upload the photo and so the cursor is after the text. But the photo loads up so that it appears first and working on the phone I cannot get space ‘before’ the photo to swap the text ‘up’ ahead of it. Is it me or the way this works now.

As an example the photo in this thread was loaded here ....

 

[anat0l]

And I note the vast different between their first version and the version that is chosen by default, which you can see using their style chooser in the same bottom left location. Wonder how long it took them to get it perfect... I'll bet not in the first week!

Maybe not the first week. I guess that said, when the next major migration comes along, there will be some lessons to be carried forward from this experience.

That would require either setting every thread to 50 posts per page, which might upset users on a lower data plan. Or alternatively we would need yet another add-on, which funnily enough would increase page load times. Oh and if we chose to set 50 posts per page as default, all links would break. It's not as simple as it looks.

Kind of odd how Xenforo doesn't allow a user-by-user change of this setting, let alone they can't even make it dynamic to platform. Changing from 50 posts per page to say 10 posts per page when the viewport changes may not be realistic (at least, when it changes on the fly), but there could have still been ways to improve this system that would not require a terrible amount of software rework. This isn't the fault of AFF as the admins eventually just had to make a decision; if this was one of the key compromises then it's unfortunate but understandable.

I wonder how much page load times would change with such an add-on, or any for that matter.

I don't understand how all the links would break if the number of posts per page were to change. A link to a post, to my understanding, is a pointer to a unique post ID. It is dynamically generated depending on the context (e.g. posts per page setting, or when a thread has posts added or removed from it, or when threads are merged). You could use the permalink to link a post but unless you can guarantee the page location of that post (e.g. will always be the first post or first page), that's not a wise idea and a similar problem was present on the previous AFF (in fact, almost any forum software I'm aware of) unless you used the correct linking codes.

 

[samh004]

@samh004 Am I doing something wrong when I upload photos? I usually write some text then upload the photo and so the cursor is after the text. But the photo loads up so that it appears first and working on the phone I cannot get space ‘before’ the photo to swap the text ‘up’ ahead of it. Is it me or the way this works now.

As an example the photo in this thread was loaded here ....

On mobile, you perhaps need to put the cursor where you want the image before scrolling down the page and inserting the image.



When I uploaded this image just then and inserted it, the behaviour was the same as you mentioned. So I backspaced it away. Moved the cursor to where I wanted it and scrolled down to insert it again, and the result was it is now where I want it.

I don't understand how all the links would break if the number of posts per page were to change. A link to a post, to my understanding, is a pointer to a unique post ID. It is dynamically generated depending on the context (e.g. posts per page setting, or when a thread has posts added or removed from it, or when threads are merged). You could use the permalink to link a post but unless you can guarantee the page location of that post (e.g. will always be the first post or first page), that's not a wise idea and a similar problem was present on the previous AFF (in fact, almost any forum software I'm aware of) unless you used the correct linking codes.

I was also questioning about this but the way Xenforo was coded means that URL’s are handled differently. They’re not just links to a post, but also a page. Perhaps this will change in version 2.0 due out in a year or so, as that has undergone significant under the hood changes.

 

[Pushka]

I’ll try again



Yes. Thanks Sam. It needs a ‘double’ selection so to speak. Where it inserts itself initially it doesn’t recognise the cursor. So then backspace delete and then going back to the desired insertion place then selecting thumbnail/full size again it works. Cheers.

 

[marki]

I have only been on for a few minutes what a re-freshening change

 

[coriander]

<snip>..... and the result was it is not where I want it......

Should the not not be there?

 

[Pushka]

Should the not not be there?

Yeah. I kinda ignored the not not.

 

[Captain Halliday]

@Admin I received the AFF email newsletter twice today. Not a big deal. Just letting you know in case it's not yet a known fault.

 

[admin]

@Admin I received the AFF email newsletter twice today. Not a big deal. Just letting you know in case it's not yet a known fault.

Apologies for that. This is actually an unrelated issue. Xenforo doesn't (easily) support the vBulletin system we were using to send out the Community News. So we are now using the same system as we use for the weekly Gazette newsletter. And unfortunately that system has its own idiosyncrasies. Normally it works just fines, but at times it has been know to send multiple emails to the same email address. The problem is that it is not consistent, and we can't replicate the problem. This makes it very difficult to fix.

 

[rainbowgirl]

I don't fully understand why we can't have 40 posts per page however, based on my observations of the way vbulletin handled this issue, I appreciate what the moderators are saying on this subject. I used to have my settings on 40 posts per page. If a member had a link to a particular post, I'd follow that link and end up on the wrong page. One example of that was the threads which announced 1000 or 5000 posts or other milestones. If I followed those links, I'd end up on the wrong page as the system linked me to a page number and not a post number. The system was partly broken before so the standard 20 posts per page for this format is one way around that glitch. I came across other problems related to the issue but I can't remember the exact case. The good news was that by clicking around on the thread I could usually find the post I was looking for.

 

[Millie]

Just followed the instructions and now have AFF on my phone. It's great - so much better than the app was! Thank you AFF!

 

[oz_mark]

I don't understand how all the links would break if the number of posts per page were to change. A link to a post, to my understanding, is a pointer to a unique post ID. It is dynamically generated depending on the context (e.g. posts per page setting, or when a thread has posts added or removed from it, or when threads are merged). You could use the permalink to link a post but unless you can guarantee the page location of that post (e.g. will always be the first post or first page), that's not a wise idea and a similar problem was present on the previous AFF (in fact, almost any forum software I'm aware of) unless you used the correct linking codes.

The authors/designers of Xenforo made different design decisions that made by other forum, and one of those decisions means that if Google says a Post is on page 2, then it is on page 2 for everyone. In some respects they put SEO in front of User Experience.

For SEO, think about how you would create a canonical link for a page if it varied per person. Anyway if you click on the permalink for posts in here, you see the page number is included....

 

[RooFlyer]

Apologies if this has already been raised, but permalinks don't appear to be working. Previously, I could direct a reader to a particular post by clicking on the #post number, copy the URL and then paste that into the thread. Here is a permalink link to post#135 in the thread Historic Turkey ... (thread URL)

 

[Steady]

I have just started seeing adds again

 

[samh004]

Should the not not be there?

Sometimes my fingers make things fun for me by typing letters that I do not want. Occasionally, this changes the meaning of words and sentences.

I spend an awful long time proofreading, but fail to catch some mistakes as the word is spelled correctly, it's just the meaning that is broken.

I used to have my settings on 40 posts per page.

Me too

The authors/designers of Xenforo made different design decisions that made by other forum, and one of those decisions means that if Google says a Post is on page 2, then it is on page 2 for everyone. In some respects they put SEO in front of User Experience.

For SEO, think about how you would create a canonical link for a page if it varied per person. Anyway if you click on the permalink for posts in here, you see the page number is included....

A great explanation of the issue, better than I would have come up with. There are add-ons out there that would enable this, but everyone would be posting broken links for everyone else. This could be something we consider for the future... but we haven't got a test system running yet and the last thing we want to do is implement a BIG change that breaks site functionality for everyone.

Apologies if this has already been raised, but permalinks don't appear to be working. Previously, I could direct a reader to a particular post by clicking on the #post number, copy the URL and then paste that into the thread. Here is a permalink link to post#135 in the thread Historic Turkey ... (thread URL)

Okay, so I can see where your problem is.

There are two ways to take a permalink and insert them into a post. When clicking that post number a dialog box appears providing a link to the post, and below it a BB Code or HTML Code.

In your example, you wrote the word "HERE" and presumably selected it before clicking the chain-link icon in the editor to add the link. At this stage you should have pasted the top link from that dialog box, which would result in "HERE". From looking at the link contained within, it appears you chose the BB Code snippet, which is something you can paste straight into a post and expect it to work, such as: Historic Turkey (and 5 airports!), finishing in Muscat,Oman. QF, QR and WY J, TK whY



Long story short, the permalink worked, but you pasted the wrong bit of text into the link box.

 

[RooFlyer]

Got it, thanks.

 

[Pushka]

When the update was released I put the shortcut to the home screen on the iPhone.
It looked like a Xenforo icon.
Now it looks much better. Don’t know how/why it changed.

 

[Captain Halliday]

When the update was released I put the shortcut to the home screen on the iPhone.
It looked like a Xenforo icon.
Now it looks much better. Don’t know how/why it changed.
View attachment 106257

How do you do that?

 

[Pushka]

How do you do that?

Open up the website in safari. I’ve searched through the AFF website to the New Posts url. Scroll until you see this square with arrow up.

Click then that select Add to Homescreen

 

[moa999]

I'd say the developers have uploaded a favicon (favourite image).
Favicon - Wikipedia

On Android I deleted the old one with the XenForo icon, and a newly created one has the AFF logo.
(Whereas Apple seemingly auto updates)