A week ago I asked what readers though about the new format updates, and overwhelmingly, readers have approved of the changes as seen in the results at right.
About 25% of the respondents were unsure, and I get that, you have to try new things out to decide.
Some people hate it. I suspect a lot of that has to do with the threaded comments that I enabled that day, though some people are simply resistant to change. I get that too.
Today I want to do three things:
1. Pass on some tips for using the new format (which I have decided to keep)
2. Put some misconceptions to rest.
3. Query readers about threaded comments, which some people love and some people hate.
First let’s cover some things I’ve learned in the past week.
1. Tips for using the new format
Issue: The front page may look different to different users based on your browser window size and/or screen resolution.
This is normal, because the theme is designed to detect and format the output of WUWT based on your display.
For example, if your screen resolution is set for 1024×768 pixels (such as many older computers and monitors) you’ll get a front page that looks something like this:
For those running larger monitors, such as an HD monitor at 1920×1080 or larger, you’ll get a screen that looks something like this:
Note that when running a larger screen size, you get a drop shadow edge with grey background on each side. Some people reported this as some sort of problem, but this is normal. The design has an upper width limit. If it didn’t, things like the sidebar would never work right.
Note also when running higher resolutions, you get the vertical capsules of the 4 most recent stories where when running the lower resolution, you do not. If you aren’t seeing these, you may want to increase your browser window size and/or your screen resolution if your monitor allows it.
Having used every computer monitor style since the era of ASR-33 teletypes and 80 character 10″ CRT green screens, I can tell you that if you not upgraded to a wide screen HD computer monitor yet, you are missing out on a lot.
TIP: To get the most out of WUWT, run a screen/monitor resolution of at least 1280×1024.
Issue: Some people complained about font sizes, either too large or too small. That is easily remedied.
If you have not figured this out yet, use the browser zoom function. All browsers support this. I’ve played around with fonts for over a week now, and I think I have a good mix that “most” people can read. However, there are some older or oddball computer and or browser setups that don’t render fonts correctly, and they look bad on a handful of those.
TIP: Use the CTRL key and the mouse wheel (if you have one to change the zoom up or down) Pressing the CTRL and + keys or the CTRL and – keys simultaneously will change the browser zoom. Pressing CTRL and 0 (zero) will reset to default.
Issue: Some people reported that they can’t see elements on the screen we have been discussing, or that the page rendering looks odd.
This is likely related to your computer hardware and/or browser.
There’s not much I can do about that except to say that the current theme expects a modern computer and a modern browser. If you are still running IE 6 and FireFox 4, then you’ll never get the benefits of the improvements we made. Here is a breakdown of browser versions in use on the net today:
Source: http://www.netmarketshare.com/browser-market-share.aspx?qprid=2&qpcustomd=0
And by browser name:
Source: http://gs.statcounter.com/#browser-ww-monthly-201308-201408-bar
TIP: Use a modern browser, and one that is updated. Chrome works best I’ve found, followed by Firefox 31, and IE9 or better. Opera, not so much, and it is not recommended. Android web browsers are still hit and miss, but Apple users on modern versions of Safari seem to be doing OK with WUWT.
Issue: With the new threaded comments, some people say they won’t be able to determine if somebody replied to them without reading through the entire comment thread, and thus that’s a reason not to participate anymore.
I can understand where you are coming from, but there is an easy solution to this that is actually more precise than simply looking at the bottom few comments in a linear comment thread, and hope to see replies to your comments there.
TIP: Use the “find within the page” search feature supported by all browsers. Pressing CTRL and F keys simultaneously brings up the search dialog. It looks like this on FireFox:
Commenter Kadaka sums it up nicely:
I have adapted.
I can find new comments by searching the page for a day like “august 31″, I can find by hour like “august 30, 2014 at 11″ and note am or pm. I can find replies to me by my handle.
In a small way nested comments are better, as before there were a-holes who would give derogatory replies using my words without using my handle, or use some version of my name. I’d have to scan the list to catch them.
Now, when they use the reply option, there it is near my handle, easy to find.
So with that in mind, the comment threading has advantages if you learn how to make use of them.
2. Put some misconceptions to rest.
A number of people have made suggestions about moving WUWT off of wordpress.com and onto some self hosting. Likewise a number of people have made comments about using wordpress plugins to solve issues or add features.
I can’t do either right now. Moving WUWT to private hosting is a HUGE undertaking and has large risks. We have over 10,000 articles, over a million comments, and over 3 gigs of image and video content that must all remain perfectly linked and synchronized.
I’ve studied the issue for months. I studied it more last week. It won’t be easy, and then I’m at the mercy of a company that may decide later to terminate the arrangement, get sold, go broke, or start censoring content because they get pressure from outsiders. I have less risk on my current setup with wordpress.com
Right now, WordPress.com and its parent company, Automatic are in my corner. Why? Well it has something to do with something I can’t talk about by an agreement I have. Suffice it to say that Al Gore got involved in an issue a couple of years ago, and WUWT was the focus. WordPress/Automatic took the high ground on my behalf and WUWT remains in the top 10 blogs on wordpress.com worldwide.
While wordpress.com almost lost me to the recent “beep boop editor” change, they have shown by their actions that they are still a company that listens to its users, and they rescinded the change last week.
So while I’m limited to what I can do on wordpress.com hosting (like being unable to install plugins, edit code to provide special tweaks beyond CSS, or provide some specialized themes) I can say I have better safety with them from attack, not only from things like IP based DDoS attacks, but also from business/dogma attacks. They hold the First Amendment dear and reject the calls of those would see WUWT shut down. I can’t really find a better deal anywhere, especially since wordpress.com hosting is free for unlimited traffic.
So, I’ve decided to stay awhile longer. I really don’t need more work to manage WUWT nor do I want to live under the threat of censorship for daring to speak an unpopular truth.
3. Query readers about threaded comments, which some people love and some people hate.
OK we’ve had a week trying threaded comments. Let’s find out how the readership feels about it.
Again, thanks for your patience, and thanks for reading WUWT.
– Anthony Watts
P.S. Many people have expressed their thanks to me for keeping WUWT going, and I appreciate all those notes. To help keep WUWT strong, please always remember to SHARE on Facebook, TWEET stories, and use other forms of social media to tell others about what we do here. There’s a bar at the bottom of each story with easy links. Please use it:
One thing the Pro AGW crowd does better than climate skeptics is to make use of social media to “get the word out” I’m asking that we all do better there, even though you may find much of social media unpalatable. – Anthony
Can you post comments in reverse time order, with newest one on top?
I’ll check
I disagree. I prefer the first comments first.
Or there an control to make a personal choice. Have seen it on other sites.
Is this the first comment?
perhaps you could arrange for the first line of a reply to be at the end and the last line at the top, too. That would make it less confusing when trying to read backwards trough a thread of replies 😉
No, seriously we all read from top to bottom, that’s the way it scans quickest. It would be a nightmare to be jumping up, reading down a comment then jumping further up, trying work out where we are and whether we’ve already read it .
Please leave things in the traditional, logical order.
Why not default to oldest comment first. Then give people choice to reverse it.
oldest comment first please.
Leif apparently “grew up” using Microsoft and didn’t learn the evils of top posting as those of us who started out using mailing lists and usenet learned.
On another note, can you insure that article authors are shown in the short headline whatever you call ’em on the main page? I always liked that in the old format and it would be a shame to lose it.
check
I’ll
– We’re all going to sound like Yoda now 🙂
I also prefer 1st comments first; perfect solution is to implement as an individual option (if supported by website).
In any event, I continue to strongly support threaded comments (I frequently don’t have time to pick thru 100 comments to follow an interesting thread).
Oh, no! Leif predates me on a few things. And I had to help invent Email before people created mailing lists! Sorry about how that spam thing turned out.
I tried – and failed – a while back to find one of the exchanges Leif and I had about DEC and SDS systems, back when you moved computers with forklifts.
Ric
—
> A: Because it messes up the order in which people normally read text.
>> Q: Why is top-posting such a bad thing?
>>> A: Top-posting.
>>>> Q: What is the most annoying thing on Usenet and in e-mail?
mit-eddie!alliant!werme http://WermeNH.com/
Ric Werme September 2, 2014 at 4:57 pm
“Leif apparently “grew up” using Microsoft and didn’t learn the evils of top posting as those of us who started out using mailing lists and usenet learned.”
Oh, no! Leif predates me on a few things.
The computer I grew up with:
http://www.leif.org/research/GIER.jpg circa 1964
7 K memory or 1 miilion times smaller than the one I use today
0.7 kips or some 5 million times slower than the one I type this one
so I am about 10 times more productive today than back then…
Disagree, please leave it as it is.
Nobody reads books from back to forth.
I seem to be with the majority here – I prefer oldest first. It makes reading the comments easier as they make more sense in the order posted.
If you decide to go with it, please make it an option. (assuming it’s an option available to you at all)
“back when you moved computers with forklifts”
Hrmph. I’ve heard it took as many as 3 engineers, a small crane, and a couple hours time to add half a meg of memory to Cybers back in the 1980s.
Well, the new form seems to work after a fashion (which is more than I can say for many news and magazine sites on my early version of Safari), but many of the “reply” links that should be here are AWOL.
I have to agree that “top posting”, and quote headings with different levels of chevrons or bars or indenting from the quoted material itself, are annoying (as is the Balkanizing of discussions since usenet news was assaulted by the barbarian spammer hordes).
Using Microsoft systems has jack to do with comment ordering. Newest comment on top encourages comment spam and makes following a discussion incredibly difficult.
Hint: If you are notified of new comments by email you will get the comments in the order they are posted.
Please no. Not unless there is an option for users to switch back to oldest at the top. We read from top to bottom and to follow a thread from bottom to top would drive some mad. If you think format changes cause people to rant just try starting a “top to bottom or bottom to top” discussion sometime when you are bored.
Vice
Versa
Not
Bottom
To
Top
From
Read
People
Type thing explodes.
Duster September 2, 2014 at 2:02 pm
Leif apparently “grew up” using Microsoft and didn’t learn the evils of top posting as those of us who started out using mailing lists and usenet learned.
The rule should be that the position of the top-level comment is governed by the latest time of any of the comments linked to it. If so, there is no ‘evil’ to ‘top posting’. The ideal would, of course, to have it both ways [selectable] so the masochists can be satisfied too.
An example of the evils of threaded comments without top posting [or bottom posting with the same rule] is Curry’s blog.
Leif you apparently missed that episode of “Computer Holy Wars” where there is one and only one way and that’s that! 😉
I’ve read with both for so long it doesn’t bother me but whoa can you get a good argument going by saying one is superior to the other. I prefer oldest at top but like I said I’ve worked with both for so long I’ll make do with whatever is here.
Cheers
No, I didn’t miss anything, but if I had just gone to the bottom of all the comments to see what was new, I would have missed your latest comment. Luckily, my top-level comment was the first of all, so I did get your latest comment. The ‘best’ rule would seem to be that if there is a new comment in a thread, then the thread is promoted to be either to first one or the last one. I prefer the first one, but can accept and live with the last one. The important point is not to miss the new comment because it is in the middle of 100 other comments.
P.S. be somewhat careful not to assume that people have ‘missed something’ just because they have a different opinion.
@Leif,
Rereading your original comment, I believe I misunderstood your remark. I was thinking about threading which is a different issue. Of course the newest comment on a – what’d’yah call it? – topic? can be at the top. If I did misunderstand it, my apologies; if I didin’t, well heck.
There may be some confusion here. Some terminology may be needed:
Post: the article describing a topic
Comment: a comment attached to the post
Thread: a sequence of comments connected by each being a reply to a specific comment
This introduces a hierarchy: a post has many comments on level 1, each being a thread. Each thread may have a sequence of comments at level 2. Each of there may have further comments on level 3, and so on.
Within a post, threads may occur with the oldest one first or the newest one first. Within a thread, comments are read in order, i.e. oldest one first. If a new comment at any level arrives the thread ‘inherits’ the arrival time and is placed either last or first, depending on the policy chosen. In this way, new comments do not get ‘hidden’ in the middle of hundreds of other comments. This was my idea. I don’t know if WP can support this, but, if not, would raise it to a suggestion for them.
Thus, the most recent reply is ALWAYS at the bottom of the page, regardless of which date-time-group the first comment that began that specific conversation/thread the reply is a child/grandchild/stepchild of, right?
Thank you. .mod
or at the top, depending on one’s preference. But, as this reply shows, I can’t even figure out how to reply. There is no link to click on…
Ditto on Leif’s request, reverse time order listings are very handy.
….. Contingent on it being an option button as opposed to the default. Chronological order is best as the default with a newest-first button as an option.
I’d go from “Love” to “Hate” with a reverse time order. Thread flow would be counter to paragraph flow.
Agree.
You could have an entire separate forum for discussions about blog stories (and so much more). If you allowed everyone to contribute, it might be the busiest forum on climate ever. I will bet money volunteers would be happy to Moderate it, run it and even pay for the cost.
Just a suggestion. I like the new look, and the threaded responses. The problem with commentary is the amount, not the format.
Or at least the option to put threads in time order. Personally, I favor oldest to newest. But otherwise like the threading. Other blogs with newest comments on top can be confusing to the occasional reader.
Also, some collapse threads to the first comment which would be a nice feature particularly on an cell phone browser. Then it would be easier to scroll around.
A,
Thanks for doing what you do so well!
Mac
The new font type is much more difficult to read. The one used in quotes is perfect.
Otherwise, the new format is good/great in general.
Agree, serif fonts don’t suit the medium, sans serif far easier to read
The font type, size and color you see in your browser is under your control. Each browser lest you customize your fonts (as well as a lot more).
I run IE 8, and find that the screen does not look like your examples, a straightforward text taking up about 3/4 of the screen, with a thin sidebar on the right.
And threaded comments are an absolute pest. If I click on ‘reply’ what I write seems to disappear into the wide blue yonder. Fill in the comments form, and there is a far better chance it will appear. At the bottom , where it should be.,
Dudley, that’s the best argument I’ve seen for upgrading to a modern browser yet, thanks!
What would be really cool is if WordPress eventually had a button option for a raw chronological unthreaded sort with each post in the raw chronological sequence topped with a link to the post it is replying to. It is then possible to speed read posts and responses to quickly find those subtopics of that are of interest. (Including reverse unthreaded raw chronological order as well.)
This is probably a complicated piece of software coding to do, but it would be well worth it for those users like myself who speed scan the comments. Maybe this task could be outsourced to the Elbonian Ministry of Complex SQL Queries as a funded software research effort.
I hope that you are sending some the suggestions that WordPress won’t let you do on to them. I’m sure they’d rather people go with the paid service but they must get something from the free version. Perhaps incorporating some of the suggestions in the free version would entice more bloggers to sign up with them.
PS Thanks again for what you do. The information you make available here is important. And that you’ve taken so much time and put forth so much effort to try and satisfy your readers says a lot about you.
PPS I voted “on the fence” because I’ll adapt to either. This is your “living room”, not mine.
Dudley,
Upgrade your browser soonest.
Thanks, fms amd Anthony, but IE8 works very well. Why go to something else that might not. In any case the only problem is the idiotic messages that I occasionally telling me to update my browser – if I click on them for update, they then tell me I have the latest version. Why go to another version so that Microsoft can put bugs in it, and then take credit for taking them out?
@Dudley Horscroft
IE8 can’t handle most of the modern CSS3 features as well as widespreaded jQuery.
Time to update or abandon IE in general with all its security flaws and use a non-Mickysoft browser, like FireFox.
Not to mention the ability to run a 64-bit version of the program.
Dudley, do you still run 16-bit Windows programs as well? :))
Why are you using IE8? Using a 5 year old browser is an eternity by Web Standards.
If you are using…
Windows XP, you need to upgrade your OS.
Windows Vista, upgrade to IE9
Windows 7, upgrade to IE11
Windows 9, upgrade to IE11
Otherwise use the latest version of Chrome or Firefox.
No website owner should waste their time supporting an obsolete web browser.
Anthony, I think you’ve worked hard to get the site looking more up to date. It’s extremely good. I’m getting used to threaded – which is strange considering I’ve been a long-time user of DISQUS and it’s threaded comments (can’t put my finger on that….).
I do have a couple or three niggles though:
1. Can you reduce the indent on the threads so that a third thread reply isn’t too narrow to view?
2. Any chance that the comments counter will return on the summary of the post?
3. I still love the font that comments are written in – but not the font they subsequently display in.
Answers:
1. Maybe, I’ll look
2. I have a ticket in with wordpress.com about this, the feature is actually missing from the theme.
3. I have people that want serif fonts, people that want sans serif fonts, and other requests. No win for me.
Please darken the low-level text a bit more.
rogerknights
1. define “low level text”
2. how do you know the problem isn’t with your monitor settings?
[2.] I have code running now to fish the comment counter out of the individual posts, and my display in “Ric Werme’s Guide to WUWT” is displaying comment counts again. It is a poor substitute for what WP used to provide, as I update the data once a day (0500 ET, a couple hours after the change of day in WP time).
Checking http://home.comcast.net/~ewerme/wuwt/index.html in the PT morning is a semi-useful to see which posts are popular and which still have a discussion.
I do get the sense that posts have a longer “active lifetime” now thanks to the infinite scroll on the home page, that was one of Anthony’s goals.
[3.] Stick with serifs. I used to be a fan of Helvetica sans-serifs, but have come around to the Times Roman set. Sans serif is okay for headlines and vital for crossword solutions. 🙂
“3. I have people that want serif fonts, people that want sans serif fonts, and other requests. No win for me.”
User style sheets: http://webdesign.about.com/od/userstylesheets/a/aa010906.htm
The indent is less, about 1/2 of what it was. I like it.
Yeah you beat me to announcing the change.
Again, I ask if it is possible to enable double-tap zoom for Android tablets? If not, no worries, but it’s a nice feature on Android that strangely doesn’t work anymore on WUWT…
No, I don’t have any control over that, it is theme based.
That can be controlled in your settings. You can override site limitations on zoom in most instances.
David: I was amazed to find my Android Nexus changed the double-tap to triple-tap at the last upgrade – and didn’t even mention it!!! Plus a few other weird things.
Is it possible to implement a numbering system on comments similar to what Jo Nova does?
I would also second Leif’s request for newest comment first options. That would eliminate much of the tread milll effect many mobile users deal with getting to the bottom.
Looks good Anthony. Thanks for doing what you do.
I second ossqss’s comment of newest comments “on top”. Much of my net reading is now on my cell and the scrolling becomes tedious due to the great number of comments in most threads.
Anthony thanks for all you do. You have and are making invaluable contributions.
Steve, it’s much better to read on your cell than in your cell
In essence you are proposing that all users get the short topic most recent comment version.
Persistent readers must page down to the bottom to where the discussion actually begins.
Those of us who prefer to follow threads in their entirety parsing through orderly sequential time postings would have to start at the bottom and page upwards. When encountering new comments we then reverse order while we read downwards through the comment and then again search upwards for the next sequential comment. Rather bizarre that.
ClimateAudit has utilized the indented sub comment style for awhile now and frankly, the more complicated or detailed the topic the better the indented comment structure aids detailed review and analysis.
Add to that that using the ‘search on this page’ function would also hit the last reply first. Though we could search in reverse jumping from off hit till we hit a reply (searching in reverse for my name as a quick check would first find my name outside of the post thread).
If there is an option for user preferences, of course that is agreeable; other than that, I vote for keeping the current sequential form.
Numbered comments with sub number replies as suggested above sounds useful though. Especially if Anthony could apply color codes to dates of postings. (Just watch for new colors for the latest replies) But that does sound like asking too much from Anthony.
After all the requests here for things that WP can’t do, why are people asking for newest first instead of talking to their “smart” phone manufacturers about adding some effective way to scroll long distances and jump to the top or bottom of a web page? Or maybe you are and we don’t see those requests. I’d think the Android folks would be quick to implement that before Apple does.
You still use a browser on mobile, and are subject to its functionality.. Now, if wordpress made an app for optimized mobile viewing only, that would be different.
I’m not clear what you’re describing. And, I’m not a phone-user, but I want a website to serve them well.
Mobile support/plugins are exploding on WP, and I study them.
I am very happy to read your blog. It is good work and hard work sometimes by yourself. Having access to legal protection is good thing and is well appreciated. For those who feel this is not necessary, try Andrew Bolt in Australia and his issues with people trying to shut him down.
Is there a way to see newer comments? To change comment order?
Threading is very useful, but sometimes I want to sort by date.
Please read the lead post again and pay particular attention to the use of “CTRL and F” keys at the same time, then type in your search criteria.
“Commenter Kadaka sums it up nicely:” The search function allows you to sort/search by name, date, time, phrase, word, etc. This function remains operational through other posts/articles and remains until you close it of leave WUWT.
Works like a charm. Give it a try. You’ll like it!
Please read my message again.
Please explain how “CTRL and F” has ANYTHING to do with my request.
PMS?
The search function is browser dependent and has nothing to do with this webpage, this feature has been around forever in browsers yet no one knows how to use it,
http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2011/08/crazy-90-percent-of-people-dont-know-how-to-use-ctrl-f/243840/
Having trouble remembering Ctrl-F?
Think of it as “Control + Find” (any letters or text you choose to type) on the current web page.
By the way, there are a couple other keystroke/shortcut commands you may also use
Ctrl-C is “Copy the highlighted text to the buffer” (but leave it in place).
Ctrl-X is “Cut from the page (and put it in the buffer) the highlighted text.
Ctrl-Z is “Undo whatever I just did”
Ctrl-Y is “Undo the “undid” that I just did”
Ctrl-V is “Insert from the buffer” the text that is stored in the buffer.
There are others for formatting …
Are you for real?
Yes. Defining everything though your right hand and a one-mouse finger is going to lead to trouble for many billion fingers and hands and wrists in the future. Besides, ctrl+ keystroke commands are faster, less confusing, with less net movement of your hands from your fundamental typing position.
Now, if I could only figure out how to use Mozilla Firefox’s automatic text spell-checker without having to position the mouse over the red-lined (highlighted) misspelled words and then left-mouse selecting the correct spelling option …….
Thanks for the tips on additional use of the control function key. I played around with those you noted. Could be handy.
With regards to the buffer, well I don’t know what that is but the text is stored/remembered somewhere. Can the buffer be seen/read before pasting?
I like to read all comments before making my own. In the previous format, It was trivial to read top to bottom, and to pick up at that point the next session. Now it is a chore to keep up with comments, because they’re all over the place. I voted ‘hate it’.
I like the typeface for the body text because it is clear and legible – I’m guessing it’s Garamond – but the block quote typeface is horsey, cheesy, and extraordinarily inelegant.
It is a rare and evil typeface that not only discourages reading, but also penalizes the determined reader with eyestrain should he persist.
Ditch it please and revert to standard practice for displaying quoted text, i.e. the italic font in the same size as the body text typeface.
Thank you!
I think the blockquotes should only be italicized too. It was changed to that for a day, but then reverted back.
Anthony
Chrome, under setting/advanced, gives you an option to change the font style/size, which works for some websites like wiki, is there something that is preventing it from working on wordpress?
Call me weird but I like reading comic sans font ;0)
WUWT change – we’re doomed!!!
(just kidding 🙂
And it’s even worse than we thought!
I like it though. Thanks Anthony, for all your time and effort. WUWT is what keeps my hopes up high.
Another effect of global [climate] change.
I don’t care what you do, so long you keep blogging. Keep leading the way!
You keep blogging too. I read your blog everyday.
Anthony,
Thanks for your continuing effort.
I currently cut and past your postings daily to the American Society of Engineers which they display weekly on one of their Environmental Newsletters. I always reference the WUWT website. They are well received and are viewed by possibly hundreds of Mechanical Engineers or more. As long as that works I am extremely happy with your site.
Thanks for your effort it makes it easy to spread the truth.
Regards,
Don Shaw
You might want to think about an edit button next time so the user can clean up typos and save minor changes. See the abominable Bloomberg news site for examples.
For the millionth, gazillionth, time. I can’t install plugins to enable this feature.
I can get it by using the WordPress “Enterprise” upgrade (which I tried briefly last year) but that is $500 a month and the comment editor was pretty lame, and wasn’t worth it.
Okay, thanks for the info. It does sound like a bad option.
I like the new format and the Nested Comments make more sense regarding imbedded conversations on subjects. What I miss is the Right Side Banner information regarding Temp and weather satellite loops that isn’t there any longer. Is it still accessible someplace on the page?
Please move the Recent Posts list higher in the sidebar, preferably much higher. It’s a chore tracking it down–it makes site navigation much harder.
Concur. That would be great.
Ditto. Directly under the Site stats – but WUWT ads and donate button might not get clicked as much.
If WordPress allows it, maybe an option to “show more” Recent Comments would be good.
Anthony, the changes are all for the good. The entire presentation is great. Please don’t lose any sleep over the relatively few negative comments. Some people will never be satisfied. By the way I am a Microsoft 8.1, high resolution, wide screen, IE user and very satisfied with all of it, but because of your suggestion I will give Chrome a look see.
I’m easy to please — so I’m happy with the new look. I guess the overall issue is what should occupy most of Anthony’s time — content or appearance? I think content will always win.
Yes!!
Oh I’m so glad someone has made this point.
But if requests are being made, I would like First comments first, breakfast in bed and a nice sunny holiday please.
Keep the content as excellent as it always has been. I’ll work out the rest.
As always, thanks.
Eamon.
I haven’t posted a comment in years because it was too difficult to log on. That seems to have been fixed now. Oh, and I like the new threaded comments, too!
Can we get a return to top button for those long,100 or more comments posts?
Do you mean like how the Home button works when you’re not clicked into an “enter text” box? You click on the general page outside of a data entry field if needed, then hit Home and the page scrolls back to the top. That sort of button?
Or, in reverse, the End button takes you to the bottom of the page.
with firefox back to top extension puts button on toolbars for this.
https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/back-to-top/
think they have chrome extension too.
very easy to use.
if on internet exploder…sorry.
This site has just gotten better with time…
and a lot of work from Anthony…
and a lot of help from the mods…
and a lot of input from the posters…
keep up the good work, everybody.
I like the new look.
I use Opera 12(so it is old but it has bookmarks) and have no issues.I suspect the new Opera based on Chrome code will have no issues either.
I hate the reply to comment feature, because nobody ever replies to my comments.
I hate the reply to comment feature because I hate threaded comments.
But I’m mainly replying because I thought you’d appreciate it.
Not true!
Reply #3: I love your music videos!
Oh, that Elmer! Yes, M4GW videos are great (as is the consternation of the authors of the production software). Your mosquitoes have trained you guys well!
Is this a thread-jacking attempt? 😎
“I hate the reply to comment feature, because nobody ever replies to my comments.”
If you really, really want a reply say “unprecedented“.
YOU LIE !!
🙂 🙂
I respectfully disagree that newest comments should be at the top. In reality it would be the comment group (comment and its replies) that would be affected, and the most recent “comment” would be a reply under another comment. I’m not sure how that would work out but it seems like it would be a mess to read through in addition to the unnatural ordering. Please don’t do that.
You might want to poll people in a future update on a) What device they use to read WUWT, and b) How familiar they are with browser customizations. The more knowledgeable can help out the less experienced in tweaking their browsers, but I realize a lot of people just want it to work.
Larry, I think you have hit upon a key point about reverse order:
In reality it would be the comment group (comment and its replies) that would be affected,
If the 1st level comments are in reverse order (most recent at top), then you will encourage people to post in nested replies.
Hi Larry,
If I’ve understood you correctly – it usually doesn’t work quite that way. When threaded comment sections are in reverse order, it’s only the first order comments that are revered – all the replies under them are still in normal chronological order. For example if you had a few comments as it is now, they could be represented like:
1. First comment
……1a first reply
…………1a1 follow up
……1b 2nd reply
…………1b1 2nd rep. follow up
…………1b2 2nd rep. another follow up
2. Second comment
……2a first reply
…………2a1 follow up
3. Third Comment
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Then reverse chronological order that’s still a threaded version of those same comments would be on the page in the following order:
3. Third Comment
2. Second comment
……2a first reply
…………2a1 follow up
1. First comment
……1a first reply
…………1a1 follow up
……1b 2nd reply
…………1b1 2nd rep. follow up
…………1b2 2nd rep. another follow up
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
In other words, the only comments reversed are the first order ones, the primary comments. Their nested replies all still are in descending chronological order within each nested level.
Do you know any blogs with 3 level threaded comments that are organized in a Level 1 reverse order?
I just noticed that Linked-In Pulse blog has a “Newest” “Oldest” “Most Popular” order to its listing.
When on Newest, the 1st level replies are in newest order, and the replies to the replies are in newest order. Only 2 levels allowed.
Main Post
Comment 5
Comment 4
— Reply 4.3
— Reply 4.2
— Reply 4.1
Comment 3
It is a disconcerting order for any discussion.
Example:https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/article/20140826190850-3388458-everything-we-know-is-wrong-part-1
On the other hand, there are very few replies to any comment. Finding 2 replies to a comment is very hard.
@Stephen Rasey
Do you know any blogs with 3 level threaded comments that are organized in a Level 1 reverse order?
Offhand, no. Pretty sure I’ve seen them before, however. It seems that reverse order comments used to be more common than they are now.
I love it all……except for the threaded
I stopped reading Jo’s and Judith’s blog because of that…..it’s impossible for me to keep up
….and no, I’m not being resistant to change…I’ve never liked it
Might as well be playing a jigsaw puzzle trying to put all the pieces together……..
..or just stop reading the current threads and pick them up stale
I have the same problem over at Jo Nova’s. I’ll still work through them if I’m really interested, but it’s a bit off putting and I’m not over there nearly as often as a result. It just depends on how long the comment sections get – and how many nested replies get made. The fewer the comments the easier it is to know where you are. A lot of comments however, and I find myself having to put my finger on the page at the nested level I’m at, then scrolling up and up to find out just what comment that person was even replying to so I can understand the context and not misinterpret, then scrolling back down to find the place I left off at. It can get VERY tedious.
it’s a love/hate kinda thing. I like the threaded feature when I’m in the conversation and I keep checking back on that particular thread, otherwise, I pick up from the bottom to see new statements. But really long comments section means you can never go back and read all the new additions to individual threads….what to do?
It’s still scroll fatigue hell on most iPhone browsers. The paragraphs narrow down to a single word when threads branch down. It simply refuses to load as a desktop site despite my usual ability to set browsers to pretend to be desktop ones.
Hey, Nik –
Part of that may be the text size you are using. Even so, try holding the iPhone in “Landscape” position and you get more text across the screen.
Further, two tricks may help you:
To go to the top of a page (Safari), tap once at the very top of the screen.
While there is no iOS “go to the bottom” touch method, I’ve been using this:
save an page as a “bookmark”. Doesn’t matter what page.
Copy the following line in the “URL” area:
javascript:window.scrollTo%280%2C100000%29
Now “Edit” that bookmark, and rename it “Go to bottom of page” (or whatever makes sense to you). Make sure the info in the “url” section remains that “javascript” info.
Now when you are looking at a loooong WUWT page, to go to the bottom, select that bookmark and it will take you to the bottom of the page.
Viola!
Cello!
What’s missing is the good old link at the bottom to display a desktop site. Of dozens of sites a day I view comments at there is no bizarre two word wide paragraphs. The era of mobile sites is over now anyway now that I have such a high resolution screen in my pocket with just as many pixels as most laptops. The site was fine before the update. Landscape mode is even more confusing since though it allows longer lines, I must scroll even more to scan down in posts. My font size has little effect on the line breaks, a screen shot being here that is representative of quite a few browsers I’ve tried:
http://i58.tinypic.com/2aj6fx5.jpg
Since this only occurs on this site but not on the hundreds I’ve visited this month, it’s a bug that should be fixed now that so many people are on iPhones, especially Democrats who haven’t been convinced yet.
The changes have come along just fine with one small quibble … I miss the color change which denotes previously visited stories/links.
I’m on IE11, so I don’t have those issues associated with dated browsers.
As for nested comments, as a routine matter, they’re just fine. The only problem I expect would be on a hot-button story, when everyone’s jumping in with their own 2¢, and then commenting on other comments. As for reverse order, I don’t see any advantage to that … if I want to go to the latest comment, I have this magic button on my keyboard marked “end” that takes me to the latest comment.
I like the new format and love the nested comments.However, that black toolbar across the top bugs me. Is there any way to get rid of it? Please
Are you logged in to WordPress? If so, that is a WordPress feature and you will see it on any WordPress blog you visit. I am not logged in and I don’t see it.
Does the black toolbar have a WordPress logo on the far left, right next to “Watts Up With That?” That one automatically comes from being logged into WordPress (and your blog(s)).
If so, you can get rid of it by being completely logged out of WordPress. Or run two browsers, for example have Firefox logged into WordPress for those duties, use Chrome (or Epiphany or Midori) for WUWT.
Would it be possible to have the amount of comments posted on each article on the front page. At the moment you can not tell whats hot and whats not.
A tip about whether or not to nest a reply.
If you use the “Reply” button, you can compose your reply in an edit box immediately under the comment to which you are referencing.
If you then click the “Cancel Reply” link, what really happens is that it de-nests the pending comment. You still have the comment text in the edit box but it will be a Level 1 comment now. You can then click the Post Comment and your composed reply will appear as a Level 1 comment at the bottom.
So, you can start with a short reply that you want nested, but if you go long and decide to make it a Level 1, click Cancel Reply, then Post Comment.
Anthony: “Issue: Some people complained about font sizes, either too large or too small. That is easily remedied.
If you have not figured this out yet, use the browser zoom function. All browsers support this. I’ve played around with fonts for over a week now, and I think I have a good mix that “most” people can read.”
Thanks for spending time and listening to comments. It is more readable now than when I raised the issue following the initial change.
The comment font is still rather heavy but is at least readable. The article text is fine.
I still prefer the ligher weight, smaller fonts we get in the reply box, but I can live with it. It is no longer detremental to using WUWT.
I did not vote because I don’t “love it” but I would agree with “let’s keep it about the other poll options.
Thanks again for the time you’ve put into this ( and the excellent resource that WUWT is generally ).
BTW replies seems to work better here than over at Judith’s. Not sure why.
This web-site is the best if I am honest which I always try to be . Sometimes to zealous for my part which Anthony has brought to my attention and I have benefited from it.
Anthony you are doing a great job and I sincerely believe you are seeking the truth when it comes to all of this climate controversy and will always to new thoughts and ideas on the subject within reason.
Meant to say will always be opened to new thoughts and ideas
The “thread” is in the eye of the beholder, or in this case the moderator, which can be confusing to us who post and, I am sure, the moderator as well. I say this as there is sometimes no “reply” button so I assume the moderator must make the call as to if the comment belongs in the thread. I voted “on the fence” at this point.
The reply button does not appear on the third nest deep.
Look upthread for the appropriate reply button.
The suggested reduction of the indent size would allow a couple more depths, unless this would create one word lines on mobile devices. Less indent would be an improvement anyway.
I have done enough computer programming to reject nesting greater than three layers as a visual hazard, even with continuous 132-column line printer output and a straight edge to mark off the indent edges.
I miss tractor feed and green bars. Easy to follow, fit right into the ring binders.
People are already complaining about one word lines on phones with this setup
I enjoy reading the nested comments. It is more like a conversation than otherwise; and on the other hand, some conversations I don’t care for, so I just scroll on past and the threading makes that easier. 🙂
Leon says:
I miss the color change which denotes previously visited stories/links.
Yes! Sometimes a link is the same in another post. It would be nice to see that it has already been viewed, like we could before this update.
And:
…the block quote typeface is horsey, cheesy, and extraordinarily inelegant… It is a rare and evil typeface… Ditch it please, and revert to standard practice for displaying quoted text, i.e. the italic font in the same size as the body text typeface.
Have to agree with that comment, too.
I don’t like the nested comments either, but it looks like I’m outvoted. So I’ll just suck it up.
Otherwise, excellent!
I don’t get how a typeface can be “rare and evil”.
I think that’s just over the top as far as complaints go.
I think that’s just over the top
But it’s humorous while still conveying the intent, which I suspect may be how it was meant. 🙂
I hadn’t noticed that yet – but haven’t been able to visit in the last few days. I would very much miss the color indicator for a previously visited link also. And now I’m trying the blockquote with this post to see what it looks like, but since others have already fussed about it I won’t complain if I feel the same.
I rather like the blockquote as it is now – I’d get rid of the big quote mark if possible and let the text go closer to the left hand side of the shadow box, but the shadow box certainly does make the quote stand out nicely.
“I don’t get how a typeface can be “rare and evil”.”
97 % of experts say that use of Comic Sans is evil (except for comics, of course).
Anthony – the inline browser search function does not work well with Firefox and possibly others. The JetPack infinite scroll mod actually brings new pages in and tosses out earlier pages as you scroll, so for posts with a lot of comments over several pages the inline search will find a pattern only if that content is in the visible page. I haven’t explored a solution as time is limited at the moment.
Example – from the top of the current home page a search for All Rain is Acid Rain will not find anything. Scroll down far enough and it will pop up. So far this is my only complaint with the Expound theme (which I like so much I’ve adopted it for one of my blogs, too).
I have a 256K copper DSL connection, coupled with several personality anomalies. Although I am a computer, programming, Internet enthusiast … I balk at some of the predictable developments that digital trends bring. I am WordPress-experienced, run my own localhost with WP and other wares … and just received the Bluehost invoice for my new hosting package. I hope to start putting my site up and have a web-presence again, in coming days.
I run Firefox with NoScript, which controls/blocks JavaScript. The usual reason to run this, is that many sites do things with JS, which they know folks don’t want going on, but heh – you can’t live without JavaScript!. Well, actually you can … and if you do require a JS-mediatated functionality, you can turn it on temporarily or selectively, easily. (Some people running sites, don’t know how much JS their pages require, nor what kinds of things JS is doing on the visitor’s screen … mostly fairly innocuous, but some of it ‘edgy’.)
Although it used to be excessive graphics that were the leading ‘offender’ at many websites, JavaScript has for some time been the big download-hog. This is pretty weird when you think how much code this represents. 100s, even 1,000s of times more JS code, than all the HTML code for the ‘native’ functionality & content, combined. whoa.
Ok, here’s how it works. With a slow connection and with images and JavaScript turned off, one first enables images and lets the page reload, noting how long it takes to load the pictures. Then JavaScript is turned on, and the download-time for all the script is observed. Normally these days, it takes much longer to download the JS, than it does the graphics. With a fast connection it might take some software measuring tools to get good numbers.
Most folks using NoScript (it’s a popular Add-on/Plugin) are not concerned about download times, since most have a fast connection. Rather, they are blocking JS, due to the ‘antics’ it is being used for. They don’t notice what a colossal mass of code is involved, since everything happens quickly for them anyway.
I normally ‘force’ webpage colors in the browser, mainly because so many places do not show link-colors, which becomes a problem for me because I can’t tell at a glance which links I have already visited.
So when I visit WUWT, it doesn’t look like the Expound WP Theme. The JavaScript is broken; images are blocked; and the element-colors are all overridden. But … this is how I see most of the web. And mind, many other folks in my area, even business folks with online responsibilities are still on original 28K dial-up. I was able to upgrade to low-ball DSL ‘fairly’ recently, but we still have a lot of locales where people will never have fast terrestrial service. Gulp – I will probable move, and rejoin them.
Ted, unfortunately, Javascript is pretty much a necessity these days. Pure HTML coding can only take you so far. I suspect that you have a very limited set of sites that you visit, and that even on those you are missing a large percentage of the content/functionality.
I just finished a website that has maybe 10 lines of HTML, and several hundred lines of Javascript. its the only way to do a lot of things that users need/want these days.
Hi Philip,
About 2% or 20-some million in the US have JS off. NoScript (to not just block but ‘manage’ the JS activity (and Flash)) is well-up on the short-short list of most-popular browser plugins.
That’s roughly the same as the Linux usership, and several other markers for ‘post-consumer’ Internet usage.
NoScript is actually about “security”, rather than download bandwidths or JavaScript-driven ‘foolishness’. Folks using it for the latter, though, push its popularity almost into ‘mainstream’ ratings.
No doubt about it: A typical Internet user slaps NoScript on their browser (unawares), they will be put-off by the changes in the browser-experience. But it’s more just ‘change’ than breakage.
JavaScript is a “necessity” only in certain functionality-contexts. You can tell what they are easily-enough, and you just click an icon in the toolbar, the page reloads, and JS works.
I will also say, there is a certain activism, advocacy or ‘message’ aspect to running NoScript … for a meaningful number of users. The lead “security” role it plays is to fight tracking, spying & surveillance (all these are done with JS). Eg, each time another NSA story comes out, NoScript downloads jump.
I have 20,000+ links in Bookmarks, and ‘roam’ heavily online.
Javascript is not a security threat on modern browsers that run these in a sandbox. All such vulnerabilities are browser exploits that are fixed by keeping the browser patched (Chrome does this automatically). NoScript is a waste of time and simply breaks functionality on pages. Oh please, if you want to fight NSA surveillance NoScript is not going to do jack. You have to use more advanced methods of masking your IP.
What sort of masochist is still on dial-up? If you can get cell phone service you can get Broadband from your cell phone provider otherwise Satellite broadband is widely available in remote areas.
Anthony,
I didn’t participate in the poll. The new format takes some getting used to visually but is plenty functional and more importantly has a high end look which should help WUWT continue on its path to take over the entire internet.
Thanks for the huge continuing effort you put toward taking WUWT to the next level. Your efforts are much appreciated.
Thanks for all the effort! Reminding me of the zoom function of my browser was what I needed. Now WUWT looks fine with 125%. (Chrome on Mac, fn + cmd + “+” or “-“)
I do like the better readability, but I miss the reference to “puzzling things in life”. Will Willis’ and Anthony’s personal stories be banned? Hope not.
I am unsure about the new comments format. I tend to read less comments than before. My favorite format for comments is like this:
1. Headlines
2. Reply – but not moved inward, just different background color.
3. Likes – but only for registered users
4. Sorting function to rearrange comments by time, likes, most recent first, etc.
5. Background color for replies of the author, Anthony or mods.
6. Featured comments
What I don’t like so much is the new header jpg. The image is not as sharp as before. And for me the green color of the aurora is evocative of venom. I liked the warm orange glow of the older header images better. They were more inviting.
Now:
http://wattsupwiththat.files.wordpress.com/2014/08/wuwt_test_header91.jpg
Before:
http://wattsupwiththat.files.wordpress.com/2014/05/wuwt_header10.jpg
My favorite header was the old one without the red thermometer line:
http://wattsupwiththat.files.wordpress.com/2011/09/wuwt_header_final.jpg
But whatever Anthony choses to do: WUWT is a fantastic resource. Thanks again!
I had actually put in a random rotator for 9 different header images (that included your favorite) over the weekend, but then ran into a bug, which wordpress.com support says they can’t see, so I’ll enable it again now.
Well, so much for that. The randomizer is still broken.
Yeah! I don’t mind the broken randomizer. It got stuck with my favorite header… 🙂
http://wattsupwiththat.files.wordpress.com/2014/08/wuwt_newheader32.jpg
Fonts readability seems to have improved. I view WUWT at 75% zoom now as that’s about right size for me and it feels like it’s easier to read now than it was right after the change. It’s good the browser only applies the zoom to this site and not to other sites I’m visiting. Only this comment entry box font feels a bit tiny.
I like the new comment nesting. In the old format i had problems finding replies to my comments as most people failed to copy my nick right to their reply. This way it will be at least immediately obvious who replied.
If possible, it would be nice to have all replies to comments initially collapsed so only root level comments are visible at first, and only expand discussion to individual comments when I press a button at that comment. Not all sites have that option, but it is very comfortable to have since discussion to comments often more or less diverges from topic of the article.
It’s all wonderful but even so, we all would like something extra….my extra would be…when you click on the date/time of a comment, it slightly changes (maybe colour? Or maybe the whole comment appears ‘over’ a shaded box?) so that when you come back to the comment later you can see instantly if it has had any extra new comments added. These in turn will change after you’ve read them. This would also be useful when trying to find where you’d got to in a long thread.
Nifty idea, if there’s a way Anthony could easily do it. It certainly would help us tell at a glance what we’ve already read vs. what’s new.
I’ve seen a slightly different version of that with comments at the Washington Post and a few other sites – you don’t have to click on anything, but new comments come up automatically with a horizontal bar along the lefthand side… and if you hover your cursor briefly anywhere in the text of that reply the horizontal bar disappears. I’d like the entire comment very lightly background shaded as you suggest better… I’ve always had a sneaking suspicion that those things wind up hogging memory – oh, plus, if you close and reopen the page later it’s all refreshed and no longer shows what you’ve read or not read. But it’s still helpful.
I voted “Hate it” on threaded comments, but that’s the only thing I disliked about the format changes. Everything else seems to be an improvement to me and to borrow a phrase, “I’m lovin’ it!”
I’m always mindful that this isn’t my blog, and if the host is doing only one thing I don’t care for – in just the format, fer cryin’ out loud, this isn’t a content issue – then it’s my problem to deal with and not our gracious host’s problem.
Anthony has enough on his plate wrasslin’ aligators, running a business, keeping up with family, and running this blog of the finest kind. I’m not a child who has to pout because I don’t get an extra scoop of ice cream when Anthony and WUWT is serving up the whole bloomin’ ice cream factory to me. I have sense enough to know when I’m getting a good deal.
Thanks for all you do Anthony. Threaded comments or not, I’m with WUWT all the way.
Steve P September 2, 2014 at 11:58 am
I like to read all comments before making my own. In the previous format, It was trivial to read top to bottom, and to pick up at that point the next session. Now it is a chore to keep up with comments, because they’re all over the place. I voted ‘hate it’.
I cannot express in words my distaste for threaded comments. It is so easy to copy and paste what you are replying to as I have done above. Those who simply hit “reply” often do so in reply to a multi-paragraph comment, but don’t bother to single out the sentence or specific issue they are replying to. New comments wind up jumping all over the thread, and frequently result in reading old comments for a second time before realizing, hey! I’ve seen this before.
This is a vote that I sense Steve P and I will lose, but the fact is that the blog was far more easily followed with the old format, and those who can’t take the few extra seconds to copy and paste for clarity are, in my opinion, lazy. Not having button forces you to be clear.
Sorry, but I gave the reply thing my best shot, and it just ruins the readability of a thread with a lot of comments on it. I hated it at first, made an honest attempt to adopt it, but I hate it more now. You may see a larger number of people vote to keep it, but the true measure is what happens to the quality of the debate. I think it will decline.
Comment to both H.R. and davidmhoffer:
You know, I don’t see why one can’t continue to do the “cut & paste” old method if they prefer.
I see the new change as giving us an “either/or” choice.
Can it not be?
I know Anthony can’t do the following but WordPress could so why don’t they?
1) first of all, comments sitting in the Level 1 chronology (old style) could have an unobtrusive icon at top left along with the wording “reply to [name]”. Stand-alone comments would not have the icon (but see ‘mini menu’ below).
2) When you click on the name it immediately culls that comment from way above in the list and sets it into the Level 1 chronological list temporarily for you to read first. If you want the full thread you click the icon- this drops down a bubble that says “set in thread?” . Click on that and the comment immediately appears nested in its place along with all the other comments for that thread as if they’ve all been temporarily culled from the Level 1 thread. When you’ve read all you want in the thread, you click on the icon again (in any comment in that threaded list) and click “return to Level 1?”. If you were then to scroll up and down the Level 1 thread you would see those same comments separated into chronological order as it always used to be. You would know which were threaded because they would have the icon. A stand-alone comment would get a thread icon added only if someone replied (ie the first respondent).
3) Mini menu: the icon could drop down a small menu with a veritable cornucopia of options. You wouldn’t ever have to use it (or the ‘set in thread’ function) if you didn’t want to- it’s just an icon sitting at the edge if your familiar old thread. But I would use it for sure.
4) often when you start to scroll up and down the comments they turn into a blur and you have to keep stopping to see where you are even with numbered comments (4a- number the comments!). So there should be small window at top right that appears after a certain speed of scrolling (or time of scrolling) that shows the comment numbers going up and down. That way you can scroll to your hearts content and stop dead on the comment number you want. You could even have the date scrolling with the number or select that option from your drop-down mini menu in every comment.
5) include a function (driven by cookie information) that highlights all the new comments since you last visited that page. That could apply in level 1 or threaded. Looking through Jo Nova’s threaded comments for recently added replies is difficult to say the least. The highlight of course could be toggled on and off from the mini menu in any comment.
6) allowing the option to click on ‘reply’ but carry the other comment with you to the comment box, temporarily, to refer to if it’s a long one (I know some blogs do this already)
7) an option in the mini menu to ‘save comment to file’ so all your comments are sitting in your own WUWT account. The file could be arranged by date or blog post at will. The Economist does something like this.
8) an option in the mini menu to save other people’s comments to file in the same manner as above. In both 7) and 8) you could click on the comment and see it in context in the post. Also a ‘reply later’ or ‘add to clipboard’ option- I often read a hundred comments and wonder if I might reply to comment 50, 80 or 99, depending on what transpires in the thread and how much time I have. Trying to find the one I really do want to reply to is time-consuming.
In conclusion, old timers who like things as they were would never have to bother with any of this. They could even hide the mini menu icons and read on in bliss. Others could use it as much or as little as they liked- they wouldn’t be a slave to any WordPress system sending them down avenues they don’t want to go. The mini menu sitting as an icon in every single comment means that it’s your baby and you’re in full control. Many would suddenly find these indispensible tools while others would happily continue with the old way.
These are just a small number of things that I thought would be commonplace on all blogs by now when I dreamt them up years ago due to shear frustration. I can hardly believe how unimaginative programmers are. And we’re talking about just text and files/fields here. No video or massive data crunching. It would all happen in an instant and requires minimal programming when compared to say gaming and animation.
Scute
For everyone using internet explorer 7 or 8 with vista or windows 7 you can change the fonts and colors with a few simple clicks http://windows.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/change-webpage-colors-fonts#1TC=windows-vista
This also restores the color change after clicking a link so you know you have been there ;0)
No one should be using IE7 or IE8 both are obsolete browsers.
Anthony, this is a truly excellent site both in terms of content and its new format. The threaded comments format is a great improvement for both reading and the occasional contribution. I hope that the majority of users want to keep it.
I find that the most user friendly improvement is the one that seems to be unheralded: Now, when you click to read a link you return to the same position in the thread when you hit the ‘back’ symbol. Previously, on an Ipad1 at least, you would always return to the main post and have to scroll down to find the point at which you left the thread to read the link. On a long thread this became a real disincentive to click on a link. No such problem now.
https://wordpress.org/plugins/tapatalk/
is this type of plugin allowed?
if so it MAY help with mobile users as well as being another ad revenue tor you.
I have never installed on WP but have installed on many invisionpoer/smf/phpbb setups and its very useful.
” is this type of plugin allowed?”
I still don’t understand why people can’t seem to pickup the fact (mentioned several times now on WUWT and also in this post) that I can’t install plugins when hosted on wordpress.com.
Zero, zip, none, nada. No plugins allowed.
♪ Yes!… we haaave no plugins, we haaaave no plugins today! ♫
I thought items listed on WP site itself were ok but all others were not.
The key word is “install”.
and….
wordpress.org [self hosted, self installed software]
wordpress.com [ready to run but with limits]
There is ‘self-hosted’ WP, and ‘WP-hosted’. Having WP host WP for ya means they take care of the workings (and fend off evil) … but the cost is you only get the ‘stock’ version.
If you tend to the hosting of a WP installation yourself, you can add plugins and themes and tinker with the code, ‘but hey dude – yer on yer own’.
WP recommends that when you self-host & go crazy with add-on & custom stuff, you stick to stuff they host in their free repositories, because it’s relatively safe … but even then, it’s just a suggestion.
Now I’ve got to deal with that little jingle on my mind for weeks to come. LOL
Self hosted WordPress installations work great for small blogs, and even some big ones that have a lot of financial resources and full time tech staff.
For us claimed “big oil check” recipients, not so much.
‘Hate it’ is a little bit of a strong way to put it in the poll question, I think. And thinking makes me tired.
Anyway, good work.
And thanks.
Oh, while one can probably tell by some of my remarks above, I don’t think the new changes are perfect, but overall I am adjusting and like the new look/feel.
I appreciate Anthony and his teams’ efforts and give it an “atta boy” so far.
JohnWho September 2, 2014 at 3:25 pm
Comment to both H.R. and davidmhoffer:
You know, I don’t see why one can’t continue to do the “cut & paste” old method if they prefer.
You can! I just did!
But that doesn’t solve the problem with the thread’s readability since it is still disrupted by those who don’t. Plus, people who use the reply button are going to look underneath their comment for any responses rather than at the end of the thread, so may miss a response to them as a result. In other words, I expect one winds up with the worst of both worlds.
I respect that.
If I’m looking for replies to me, I would use the “find on page” browser option and check the entire page anyway. As long as a reply is either under my original post or does the “cut & paste” trick, I’ll find it.
This is one reason that I would prefer the type of forum you’ll see if you follow my name’s link. All replies stay within a topic and the forum shows all threads that have been active since you last visited it.
However, WordPress isn’t like that, so we just gotta make the best of it. I believe WordPress is much more secure which I would think we would all agree is of utmost importance.
I like the new format and I’m pretty much neutral on the threaded comments.
What I really wanted to say was… a very big Thank You to Anthony for all of the effort he’s put into making WUWT better. The care, attention to detail, and willingness to listen are simply exemplary!
Congratulations on the wonderful work and thanks again!
First, it’s been awhile since I’ve thanked Anthony and all the moderators for their excellent efforts on all of our behalves!! So… THANK ALL OF YOU VERY MUCH!!
Overall I like it. Suspect I know the answer to this but my biggie would be to have a button or link at the top of each comment section (or better yet, that stays on the page as you scroll so you can hit it any time) that would allow us to immediately at will toggle the comments from the threaded version as it is now to strict chronological order as it used to be, and then right back to threaded at will as we preferred. Many bulletin boards like yahoo groups etc., have had that option for years and it’s incredibly handy. Prolly not available, but perhaps worth checking again to be sure if it’s been awhile since you last looked for that option? I’ve recommended it to wordpress before a few times and never get a reply, but will do so again. That way its very easy to be sure one hasn’t missed new posts, far easier than the find button (especially if you can’t recall keywords in a large thread to get to a certain comment!)… and yet more logical and easy to follow in the threaded option.
If you’ve still got the four link limit per post that you mentioned before… I’d suggest perhaps going to perhaps eight or even a few more. Sometimes people are awesome about posting great references in their comments and can include a large number – those posts are often some of the most informative, interesting, and useful ones.
Very minor note, I’d go for slightly smaller body text – it would be a little easier to read and a little less scrolling/more compact. But this size may be easier for anyone with vision problems I suppose. And yes, I know, I could change my screen that way, but then all the other sites that are currently already small enough would be too small and I don’t want to have to constantly reset the computer defaults.
The old version was great as it was, but this new version does look even more polished and visually appealing. I find myself wishing that there was a little more horizontal text space and a little less picture space on the main page – but those graphics do polish it up very nicely. So I suppose I’m on the fence there – I’d like a little more of the initial text with each article on the front page, however. A slightly smaller font might help with that too since more words would fit in the space available.
So, that’s my 2 cents for whatever it’s worth.
Thanks so much again, Anthony – I’ve loved the site for years, and of course, it’s the awesome content, along with the logical yet compassionate and helpful moderation, that’s key. 🙂
And thanks also to all the other interesting folks here! Altogether it makes for a great and informative community.
My bad, and I feel silly – you reminded us of the zoom (which I actually use fairly often for images), and there I went off on adjusting individual computer defaults. Sorry about that – I had a brain short circuit as I was reading all the other comments.
1) Can you do something about the extreme wastage of screen real estate for white margins?
2) This may be a peculiarity of Firefox, but I see *WIDER MARGINS ON SMALLER WINDOWS*. I’m not talking percent. I’m talking wider margins in terms of pixel count. This is totally backwards.
I have a 1920×1080 screen but I prefer browser windows of 960×1080 so I can have 2 windows open side-by-each. Here are a couple of screen captures showing more wastage on the smaller windows.
Narrow (960×1080)
http://i.imgur.com/nB6titG.png
Wide (1920×1080)
http://i.imgur.com/PjDMcub.png
FWIW, I’m using firefox 27 on a PC laptop – if I do a single cmd – to zoom out, the font size looks great – but a lot of horizontal screen space is left unused that way. So I’d still vote for a slightly smaller font size for the main text in articles and comment paragraphs.
Shrink your browser window borders, no screen waste. that’s what I do.
“Shrink your browser window borders, no screen waste. that’s what I do.”
How do you do that Anthony?
Why are you using an outdated browser? Firefox is up to version 32.
https://www.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/32.0/releasenotes/
FYI, since version 27, they have fixed over 50 security vulnerabilities.
https://www.mozilla.org/security/known-vulnerabilities/firefox.html
Bad news! This means that there are many more. It would be good news if they had only found a couple and fixed those.
Ah, old algore. The stories his emails would tell. Once you get by the petty childishness, probably totally lacking in content.
Ok, I’m going to take one last final shot at nested comments – IMO, they suck, big time I can read a linear thread FAR faster than I can a nested one. I can find stuff in a linear thread FAR faster than I can in a nested one WITHOUT using ctrl F (and ctrl F is still available in a linear thread – hint). With my Mk I eyeballs, clouded and out of focus as they are, I can usually spot keywords every bit as fast as I can activate and enter words in a search function. Take the click function off your mouse so you’ve got smooth scroll , set its motion speed consistent with your eyeball speed, learn to find “home, end”, pg up, pg dn” and you should be able to out perform your fingers in the search function – the search function doesn’t get the aside comment that catch your interest.
So far nested comments are an exercise in the following kind of exchange”
“did so!”
“did not!”
“did so!”
“did not!”
” mother wears army boots!”
“does not!”
“to bed and to church!”
…
Two or three of those and I leave the thread, usually also WUWT and go read something else.
Now, If you’ve consigned your life to trying to work the net on a tablet, or an Iphone, well,, you pretty much get what you deserve. Content rich site are pigs on most small devices ( I too use a 7″ Android tablet). Android appears to be stillborn – not much new has come out recently for existing tablets, and ALL of the tablet browsers suck too.
I can live with the format and the fonts (they’re actually good for me), and nobody lets a friend use Chrome if they value any sense of privacy (but what do I know I use an Android tablet…).
But lose the nested comments, please.
Anthony, you are demonstrating yet again why your blog is so popular.
Who woulda thunk of soliciting ‘customer’ feedback. Certainly not Obama and Holdren or the EPA.
Kudos.
Just my $0.02, I like the nested comments much better than the old linear format. I did not think I would, but a week has made me a believer. The whole rest of the changes are great. You have done a fantastic job with all of it. A note on browsers, I am using Opera under Win 7, and it works perfectly for me.
Nested comments. . If you use “Recent Comments” and click on a comment from someone whom you would like to read it puts you in the nested conversation without any idea of where you are in the thread. One of the most important features of WUWT, as I have mentioned before, is the instant evaluation of posted comments by other readers who will bring immediate attention to incorrect information so that the those comments are not left to stand as fact. I believe that nested comments do not allow for this free flow of self correction simply because they have greater chance of being unseen. It is much easier to spew misinformation in nested comments.
I don’t find Kadaka’s vulgar language amusing or deserving a quote.
Rad tebya videt! Kak dela?
Pakah.
Just to make things clear to those who don’t know Russian, this particular kadaka’s reply is not vulgar. It means somply “Glad to see you! How are you? So long.” Not an example of any deep knowledge of Russian, I am afraid.
Disclaimer: as far as I can remember, I never answered to any message, or quoted anybody’s message without somehow referring to the author of the message.
Having said that, let me explain to you, dear Kadaka, why real people do not use unprintable words and expressions (even in their abbreviated forms), at least in written messages, especially when they communicate outside the circle of their close friends and relatives.
I spent several months (not by my choice) doing hard labor in the company of inveterate criminals in Siberia. Criminals use unprintable words and expressions all the time; it is their distinct language, because, by using it, they underscore their disdain toward the established norms of the civilized society and formal dignity.
Pampered people, who have not encountered any real hardship or danger in their lives, dally with obscenities, because they think that it makes them sound tougher than they really are. But in the eyes of the real world, this “freedom of expression” looks pathetic and out of place.
It doesn’t mean that using an unprintable word automatically strips a person of other, more respectable qualities. Penn and Teller deserve some respect for their skeptical skits (though they still have no guts to confront the AGW myth directly). However, their propensity toward foul language doesn’t do them any honor. I suspect that (at least in the case of street-wise Penn — Teller, a former teacher of Latin, as we all know, prefers to be silent) can be explained by the necessity to keep their high HBO ratings, and thus to earn more money.
In short, watch your mouth, bro.
I am a nearly 60 yr old linear thinker. Tangents, loops, and threaded comments scare the crap outa me. So my posts will simply be at the bottom of the entire thread. Why? It is way beyond my pay scale and age to change. I cut my teeth on a Wang (black screen, yellow font, burned screen, and in house server taking up the entire basement floor) and a BBS (betting the younger gen does not know what that means). The first calculator I was introduced to was desk size. So this new fangled stuff I will leave to the younger gen. Hell I can’t even beep boop dial, preferring rotary thank you very much. So I will stubbornly refuse to thread and simply attach my comment to the tail end of the whole thing. Long live the rocking chair gang.
And I love this website.
Amuse small children, lift the handset off the phone and tap in a phone number on the hook. Tap-tap, tap, tap-tap-tap-tap-tap etc.
They will be amazed and in awe of how hard it was to call someone in the 1990’s before cellphones.
I’m nearly 70, retired IT professional who can’t stay away from servers, so I have a home data center and some servers hosted in a COLO. I bought one of the first TRS-80 computers sold anywhere in 1979, and the first from the particular Radio Shack store in Bellevue, WA, former home town for Microsoft. Started with twisted wires and Hollerith cards in the 1960’s thanks to the proximity of Cal Berkely. Nothing scares me. But plenty annoys me :). After a short time pretty much any new interface becomes comfortable if not desirable. Give it a chance and it will grow on you. I don’t care for threaded replies because of the secondary problem seen in blinding clarity at Dr. Curry’s site – bickering and an urgent need to get in the last word.
Since we are letting it all hang out here, I will fess up to being 67, cranky as ol’ he!! at times, and have a lonnnggg history with computers and other assorted technologies. Cut my computer teeth on an IBM1620 programmed with an IBM 026 keypunch, sold the first TRS80 Model I business computer system in South Ontario and then spent the next 2 years trying to keep the guy running with Radio Shack’s interpreter Basic (he ran his business successfully with it for 10 years!) I run a LAN of 6 computers at home doing everything from digital radio communications and weather radar data processing to HD video editing. So, I’m not a stranger to the platform. I have 7 WP blogs serving various purposes, so I’m not a stranger to blogging either:) I have a Remington Rand hand calculator with fluorescent numbers that to read right of the decimal. you have to push a button to see the second group of numbers. It has no decimal point, and unlike a plethora of calculators and computers gone bye, this old Rem Ran still works, and the display is big enough I can still read the numbers, which is not the case with some of the new store debit card readers!.
But I’ve also learned that people rarely listen to advice proffered, so I’ll throw my 2 cents out there once in awhile and resist the urge to have an “I told you so” moment. Yes, I can learn to “tolerate” nested comments, but I’ve also learned that I don’t have to be bothered doing so. One of the down sides of attaining the mantle of seniority is realizing that much of what gets people’s knickers in a knot, simply won’t affect you down the increasingly short road…
All of the conversations regarding future “climate catastrophies” have no meaning for me whatsoever other than prurient academic interest, and by my reckoning, climate will be the least of this planet’s worries over the next decade. So whether comments are nested, truncated, delineated, bifurcated, obfusticated or become delapidated is of little consequence in the bigger dialog. The key thing about WUWT is that there is a dialog, and we don’t have to listen only to the megaphone of political correctness incessantly.
Anthony. It”s all good as it is. Some people are never happy unless they are complaining.
Time for a visit to the tip jar folks!
I went to the new nested-comments Poll just now, which Anthony links to near the bottom of this post.
I voted “Love it”, although that’s overstating. I think it does make a better participation-environment, for most tho not all commenters.
If you’d like to applaud for the nested-threaded approach, or if you fold your arms and stare at ’em Duck Dynasty-style … here’s the new nested-comments poll.
Paul, add macular degeneration to clouded lenses and a desire to hear everyone equally and you will peg me exactly.
I used modems and bulletin boards when they were “cutting edge” — along with fax machines reeking of sour chemicals. My eyesight is lamentable, after 33 years of incessant sitting at the keyboard.
But I find threaded comments to be much more logical and easier to use. Try them, and you will find out that answering to several people in one thread is much simpler than posting several answers separately.
And remember: changing habits makes you younger!
Mobile browsing is garbage in general, especially with most “mobile webpages”, this is one of the reasons for the ridiculous explosion of apps. WordPress sites like WUWT however render fine if you are using an updated browser like Chrome or Firefox. Mobile browsing has limitations, get used to it. Nothing should be changed at WUWT because people are trying to use their phone for things it was never intended. If you do not own a desktop or a laptop then I assume you are a masochist trying to have in-depth blog comment discussions on your phone. Touchscreens are torturous, screen-sizes are minuscule and mobile browsers are limited. Sure you seem “trendy” except you are absolutely inefficient and wasting your time, it is generally the same thing with tablets. I actually believe people do not want to look stupid and continue to use their phone for things they should use a PC for.
Kadaka, that is too funny. In the 1990’s I had two college degrees and was getting my research published. Tapping on the hook was a pain in the neck BACK THEN! I much preferred the somewhat linear 1, 2, 3, 4, 5…dialing than the 9 key operator system. The only people using 9 key systems were accountants. Remember the old calculators with the pull bar for “equal”? Looked like the old casino $.05 slot machines but in miniature and without the colorful paint and row of lemons. Or was it cherries. Don’t know because I’ve never played on one.
Are you young enough to remember why it was first called a “carriage return”? 8<)
Or why you sent CRLF (Carriage return, line feed) instead of LFCR to a Teletype? Answer – the carriage took more than one character time to return to the left, so the line feed was sent second to give the carriage the extra tenth of a second it needed.
Nested comments aree good when I read the tread the first time. BUT most of the time I am rereading a tread to find new comments. THEN I nested comments do not work at all. Actually I would like to see that a tread has new comments at to top page.
This can be done with a cookie and little programming.
Not on Anthony’s part, it can’t – it’s something that WordPress will have to change.
Or, you could write a program that downloads the page and reorders the comments yourself. I sometimes think about that. Just a little programming.
Typing over this instruction ia bit annoying ! I’d be thinking the most recent comments on top is the best option. However The Guardian, at the start of every Comments Listing has a viewing option; top or bottom..Readers choice. Brilliant ! Go the Guardian.
I can’t get used to the new font. I’m reading WUWT on my smartphone right now, and it’s a relief that you’re still using a simple sans serif font in the Mobil version. The fonts (both headings and body) of the standard site are far too “plump” for my eyes. But YMMV of course, and I notice that the font looks a little less plump on my windows machines than on my macs
You might see good – or bad – font effects, simply by changing your preferred font-render size in the browser. This is the easiest & best adjustment to try first, since it affects different fonts proportionally.
After that, one can ‘force’ webpages to be displayed in a preferred font, but if a page uses more than one font to emphasize or distinguish different elements, this will be lost.
“Mobil version”
Shh – that’s from Big Oil, people aren’t suppose to know about that connection to WUWT!
On some shift handovers at work when not much has gone on people say “All’s the same that’s not different”.
Changes can be difficult to cope with, some can be for the better and some can be for the worse.
Anthony I thank you for all the hard work you and your helpers put in to make WUWT what it is, I have learned so much about so much thank you.
James Bull
When using Chrome on Ubuntu 14.04, the browser will occasionally hang (50% of the time). The message “Waiting for cas.criteo.com…” is displayed at the bottom of the browser. Pressing the stop (X) button will render the page correctly. This started with the new layout but is probably coincidental.
Criteo is a mass ad-server. The ‘cas’ subdomain comes up in Alexa, etc, fielding 100s of thousands of ‘visits’ a day.
Many people & softwares now try to filter (block) these kinds of ‘services’. More over, Criteo is a “targeting” operation, trying to go after individuals it thinks might yield a better click-return.
Without some ‘forensic’ research, it’s hard to say where in the software-chain the Criteo-request is being made … or where its getting hung.
Threaded comments. I was nervous about threaded comments, because I felt that the standard of comments on WUWT was much higher than on Judith Curry (JC)’s blog, and that the reason was that JC’s blog had threaded comments. Threading encourages trivial comments and silly smart-alec exchanges. I decided to wait and see before commenting here, but it seems to me now that threaded comments have already contributed to a serious decline in the standard of comments.
Funny, Mike, but I posted mine without reading yours first. I agree. (Didn’t this add a lot?)
I’m not so sure Mike. Before, food fights were spread out over the whole length of the thread, whereas now they are condensed in a sub-thread and easier to notice. It may simply be an appearance thing.
I agree, Mike. They have. The old way was better. But if most people want it this way, I suppose we’re stuck with it.
My main concern with threaded comments is that the quality of the comments will go down. It becomes too easy to start a back and forth that becomes mostly sniping, or taunting.
Although I’m not certain, I think that might already be happening. With unthreaded comments, I suspect most people who would toss in a taunt don’t bother because it would be separated from the original comment far enough to lose effect.
I’d suggest that moderators be especially hard on posters who show a tendency to snipe at people for a bit, and use the “snip” liberally for a while again if I’m right and the comment quality starts to decline significantly.
I’d also suggest waiting a week or so and then taking two comparable articles before and after threading and objectively analyzing the quality of the comments attached to each. My guess is that the unthreaded commentary will be much more focused, and informative.
Another way to tell is comment volume. If it doubles or triples, you have to ask, are you really getting better comments, or just more verbiage to plow through to get to the ones that were always there under the unthreaded system?
Try visiting CDR Salamander’s blog. He’s been using threaded comments for forever, and you’ll find some very intelligent conversations over there.
I personally find the Disqus system to be excellent, but I suspect (if usable by WP) it comes under the “no plugins ban.”
“You can please some of the people all of the time, you can please all of the people some of the time, but you can’t please all of the people all of the time, and if you please yourself you’ll probably go blind.”
Think I got that quote right.
Hope this helps some here:
The “Home” key will send you to the beginning of the lead post/article.
The “End” key will send you to the last comment.
“Ctrl plus F” keys (pressed simultaneously) will allow you to search the thread.
In case you missed it see earlier comment above for use of the “Ctrl” key : RACookPE1978 September 2, 2014 at 9:13 pm
I used the “Home” key to move from a comment in the middle of the thread to the top and then used the “Ctrl-Z” function to try to return to the comment but if did not work as I hoped. Are there any shortcuts for this?
Perhaps a drop-down with useful tips for using the site would be in order?
Steve P wrote
September 2, 2014 at 11:58 am
You had said previously:
I am not seeing the blockquotes in all-bold italic. Currently it looks like you missed closing the one blockquote and started another instead, until the mods maybe fix it. I can clearly see “Rare” as bolded italic, distinct from the rest.
To me, it’s serif italic, not bolded, that almost looks like a handwriting-style font. That’s with Iceweasel (Debian Firefox).
Ah, a discovery! Preferences, Content tab, Fonts & Colors, Advanced. For “Proportional” I had Serif selected. But when changed to Sans Serif, blockquotes changed to Sans Serif. And that is with it checked that pages can choose their own fonts.
I was using Liberation Serif, changed to something called FreeSerif. Okay, now that’s annoying and hard to read.
I am not receiving a font selection from WordPress for blockquotes, it is using mine. Midori, my alternate browser, is showing strong-looking sans serif italics. Until I change it in Preferences to Liberation Sans, now it is normal looking, and readable.
By my research, WordPress is not giving a font choice for blockquotes.
If you are seeing objectionable bold blockquoting, go into your browser Preferences and select something else for Proportional, see what that does. Also select a minimum font size to make the italic quoting the same size as main body text.
Yes, I flubbed the close blockquote tag after ‘persist’
And you’re right about the typeface styles. In Firefox 32, those controls are buried in the Tools menu, under Options:
● Click the ‘advanced’ button, and deselect ‘allow pages to choose their own fonts, instead of my selections above’
And then choose your own default text settings, remembering the basic rule that it’s always a good idea to make note of current settings before making changes.
Bear in mind too, that in making these changes allweb pages will now conform to your type choices, rather than using their own internal design defaults. ‘Quick check shows most pages look worse with my initial settings, which is why it is generally less work & better appearance to keep that ‘Allow pages to choose their own fonts’ box selected.
Based on my current configuration, WUWT looks better in Chrome, out of the box. & IE displaying properly as well, so the problem is my settings in Firefox, apparently, with which I need to fiddle, and which was in fact the source of the horsey interpretation of the WP defaults, or something like that.
Thanks for your valuable input.
Cropped (so smaller) view of my Firefox32 display letting WUWT choose font:
http://i61.tinypic.com/b99l6a.jpg
If I deselect that ‘advanced’ box & choose my own fonts, I get pretty good results with Arial or Times Roman, and blockquotes appear as I think they should -☺- but I do rather like the standard body text typeface here, so it’s a shame that some of us are seeing this WP theme with blockquotes in a smaller italic font, apparently, of the display typeface being used for the commenter’s name.
You girls ever heard of keep it simple? Of course not, you don’t have any Ren.
http://img.gawkerassets.com/img/17rx905tq9ztsjpg/original.jpg
Neither do we have any Stimpy.
Stimpy is a real pill, that… Stimpson can make about anything emotionally brittle. 😉 But Ren has a large fan club.
http://tallbloke.wordpress.com/2014/02/22/ren-how-did-the-polar-vortex-lock/
Anthony ==> you might add an anchor at the end of the comment column with a link to it at the start of comments, for those who want to go directly to the latest comments. I type on by tablet, and swipe-scrolloing tothe bottomabout wore my hand out.
The “comment column” is a continuous object to below the comment box, there’s no place to put an anchor in right above the comment box.
So the best you’ll get is still the same as hitting the End button on a standard PC keyboard.
Perhaps you need a usable keyboard for your tablet. I’m using a Logitech K400r with my computer.
http://www.amazon.com/dp/B005DKZTMG
Fuctional as a laptop keyboard with trackpad, uses tiny USB insert for the wireless. Also has power switch, turn off and ignore when not using. I’ve had cats sleep on it, until I saw them.
I see the indent is about 1/2 of what it was yesterday. I think that is good. Still very readable.
Left margin is also smaller? Probably good for mobile devices.
Has the text in the comment edit box gotten a little smaller than yesterday.
I’ve got used to all the changes now except for not having a date and poster at the higher level. I never know exactly how far back I am as I do not refresh until I’ve read all the posts from the last refresh, so I can get further and further behind.
SteveT
Sweet!
It’s all good here! one thought, concentrate more on quality over quantity of posts, a good quality post is more enjoyable and gets the best of of us mere mortals thinking and swinging digs in good form.. 😉
I will join with those who say oldest on top. I tend to not read comments on blogs with newest on top, I’m too lazy to scroll to the bottom and read up, especially if the bottom is on a different page.
I like threaded comments but have no problems with unthreaded comments.
I have belonged to forums that have given users a choice between threaded or unthreaded comments. The option was a simple toggle. That option isn’t available here?
I am more of a lurker than an active participant, but I thoroughly enjoy the site, including the discussions in the comments.
A new CSS update was just posted that solves many (but not all) of the requests made in this thread.
Comments indenting is better, visited links change color now, and a few other tweaks based on user input. “Evil” font (I still don’t get that) changed for block quotes to Arial, and if you don’t like Arial, tough noogies.
Changed the header (for now, we have a rotator of 9 images waiting for a fix)
What we can’t do unless we move off wordpress.com hosting and self-host WUWT:
1. Re-order comments to make newest comment at top.
2. Add comment editing
3. Anything involving (why can’t you simply install this WordPress plugin to add/fix/change feature X?)
These are waiting on wordpress.com support:
Add comment counter back to main page article capsules
Adding a rotating header for various images (works now, but has 1 blank image at random)
Sincerest thanks to WUWT reader Jim Reekes who helped change the early version of this theme into a much more polished one!
Thank you, kind sir. I just got back from a 30 mile bike ride and the changed color for visited links grabbed my attention … and took my breath away (it was the only thing I looked for) … (now, who’s gonna be the first to complain about the color choice?)
If you can’t do newest comment on top, then I withdraw my vote for threaded comments, as new comments to an old thread gets hard to find among several hundred comments.
You don’t know how to use Ctrl+F (PC) or Command+F (Mac) to search the page? If you are using a mobile device get a PC.
Newest comment on top encourages comment spam and is a horrible way to read a discussion.
BTW, now that we’ve got all the caterwauling under control (well, most of it) I’ll now have time to finish up the “really big” announcement that was supposed to happen this week.
Look for it Monday.
Anthony, I don’t know how you did it, but now with CA Assistant Preview the links I’ve visited (inserted with “a href”) are whited out, the text same color as the background. They show up when I highlight the Preview text so I know they’re there.
Likewise the text of the Preview button is a light blue, until you mouseover and the text disappears while the background goes light orage-ish.
Maybe try a different color for visited links than the current orange-brown?
…or maybe just not worry about it, because CA assistant is a custom program written specifically for Climate Audit and the theme in use there, not WUWT.
I can’t support a program I don’t manage, use, or even have advertised compatibility with.
Bottom line – I’m done. You are on you own if you want to use CA assistant with WUWT.
True, you haven’t recommended it with this theme, but previously…
It’s okay, I can highlight the Previewed text to check for link mistakes. It’s still better than making unneeded work for the mod squad.
CA Assistant Preview – LOL
First, get a real browser – seriously. A quick check tells me this is a script, which hasn’t been updated for three years. Maybe I’m wrong about the specific details, but it’s not a real app and just a script written specifically for a few sites. It’s not a real browser, and wasn’t intended to be used in a general sense.
Getting the color white for hover and visited links sounds like a caching problem. It’s not what the current WUWT site is telling the browser. If you’re seeing white, then the script (and/or your system) has a bug.
Try is with ANY other current browser and see if it doesn’t work as designed.
Climate Audit Assistant is a user script for GreaseMonkey that runs on Firefox as originally designed, and Iceweasel (Debian-rebranded Firefox), and also runs with differing Mozilla-base browsers. As seen in the comments on the linked page, it has been made to run elsewhere with programs that allow running GreaseMonkey scripts on other browsers. In 2013 someone used NinjaKit to run CA Assistant with Safari and OSX.
CA Assistant is made for WordPress blogs. Besides the valuable Preview feature, it also provides a toolbar for the comment box allowing easier use of formatting options and insertion of LaTex and images, when supported on those blogs.
Adding other WordPress blogs to the list of those using CA Assistant is easy, Add-ons: User Scripts: CA Assistant: Preferences: User settings, add URL. Thus there is theoretically no limit to how many sites will work with it.
I am running Iceweasel 31.0, a very real browser.
CA Assistant continues to work fine at Climate Audit, just checked, no “white out” problems. The problem is theme-related. Twenty Ten still works, with a few quirks not related to Preview and the comment box. Here at WUWT with the last CSS tweak, white text as I noted, visited links in the comment box and Preview button text on mouseover.
Trying with another modern browser. I installed Chromium, the open-source base of Chrome, as available with the Debian distribution. For GreaseMonkey scripts on Chrome, the Tampermonkey add-on is recommended. Installed. CA Assistant, installed.
CA Assistant working fine on Climate Audit. On WUWT, still have the white-out.
I gave you the benefit of the doubt, invested considerable time in troubleshooting. I verified the problem is not the browser. Both do it, the problem did not exist before the last changes, it’s not a caching issue.
And you really had me worried there the way your comment sort of sounds like you think I was using CA Assistant in place of a browser, which would be stupid to say as it’s not possible.
Thanks for helping out, the site does look great.
No, it was designed for a specific web site – thus the name of this script “CA Assistant.” It is not a generic script for WordPress sites.
No, it is not. It’s caused by the script your using, which is not compatible with WUWT (or many other sites for that matter). Let me explain…
CA Assistant is a script that alters the web page’s HTML/CSS. It is not a browser, but code that assumes very specific HTML/CSS patterns found at climateaudit.org. This is totally dependent on intimate knowledge of that site’s theme. Depending on the skill of the programmer, and the quality of the code, it may work on sites other than CA but you can not be assured of this.
climateaudit.org is using the theme Sandbox 1.6.1, which was released in 2009. If you read the release notes for this theme, you see it states it is “mainly intended” for custom CSS. That makes any site using that theme unique, and makes a GreaseMonkey script be familiar with that custom CSS.
You can look at the very first line of the script, and see how it inserts custom CSS from the CA site. Doing this REQUIRES one to be intimately familiar with the targeted site’s coding. Also note the comment the code, written by the programmer describing this action.
append http://www.climateaudit.info/ca-assist/ca-assist.css/ / grab CSS for the mess we're about to create
The “theme-related” problem you’re having is the CSS code above. The CA script is literally attempting to mix two different themes. This is what’s causing the problems your seeing.
The CA script was written January 8, 2010 and updated only twice to support two other sites. There’s another indication that this script is very specific to a site’s theme. Each of the three sites it was designed to support required three new versions.
When I suggested trying a “real” browser, I meant a current browser with a high percentage of market share AND without the CA Assistant script. The bugs/problems you’re finding are not part of WUWT. They are caused by the script you’re using. Look at WUWT without using this script. I’m sure you won’t find the problem(s).
The dream of a WWW where every site has interchangeable parts is just a fantasy. Even WordPress sites are customized by the theme’s author. GreaseMonkey scripts must be very specifically written to the targeted site, or so general to the point they wouldn’t add much value.
In other words, GM scripts should only be used on the site it was designed to affect. And if that site ever changes, the script will likely break. If it ever worked on WUWT, it was luck and not by design. If it was only the last change of CSS at WUWT that triggered a problem, that was incredibly lucky (though I understand unfortunate).
You’ve got just three choices:
Use CA script as is
Stop using CA script at WUWT
Find someone to modify the script to support WUWT
From Jim Reekes on September 5, 2014 at 2:05 pm:
What we have here is a failure to communicate.
CA Assistant generates the Preview button. CA Assistant generates the Preview text inside the comment box.
If I don’t use CA Assistant, the Preview button will not exist, the Preview text in the comment box will not exist.
That is not the same as not finding the problems on the WUWT site when not using CA Assistant.
Despite your protestations, CA Assistant remains usable on many WordPress sites. If you had it installed you could see it’s named “CA Assistant, Open Science webring edition 0.0.9”. It’s set by default to work with six different sites, which includes WUWT.
I just ran a test. Went into Preferences, turned off letting the page select the colors. The white-out problem went away, “visited links” show up again in Preview in the comment box. The WUWT setting for the visited links color is causing the white-out.
Kadaka: “I am running Iceweasel 31.0, a very real browser.”
Never heard of it until now.
However, the Guardian recommends it:
http://www.theguardian.com/technology/blog/2006/oct/13/dumpfirefoxsw
Which is reason enough for me to say it’s likely to be flawed. Reviews I’ve seen are mostly “meh” and complain of some junkware toolbars and other detritus it installs. Your problems are likely related to some incompatibility between the weasel browser and CA and Grease Monkey. No other user are reporting issues. The four major browsers I’ve tested work just fine.
Jim said it best: “First, get a real browser – seriously”.
Are you still running dialup as previously mentioned, or have you finally moved into the 21st century for connection speed?
IceWeasel is an open source rebranding of Firefox with no Flash or anything non-open-source, so it is effectively a useless Firefox clone. It continues in the long tradition of open source advocates not knowing how to properly name anything. Do you get the play on the Firefox name? Lame.
Chromium is the junk version of Chrome, same open source idiocy that does not work properly with pages no one uses like YouTube. /sarc
Anthony do not waste your time on either browser. Ask them why they use them first, that will be a fun discussion, as I already know the answer.
Linux users can install Firefox or Chrome, as both are supported on all the major distributions.
Poptech, I don’t plan to waste any time at all. WUWT is well tuned at this point, I can’t help it if some people want to view it with outdated or crippled browsers, so they’ll just have to fend for themselves.
I’m done.
Re Anthony Watts on September 5, 2014 at 8:57 pm:
Iceweasel is Firefox: https://wiki.debian.org/Iceweasel
I use the backports repository for the latest version for Debian Stable. These days you can install Flash through Aptitude, got that and other plug-ins and add-ons, mostly from the repositories but some from Mozilla.
As said above, I installed Chromium 35.0 (underlying open-source part of Chrome), installed CA Assistant, same thing.
Problem goes away when I stop letting WUWT choose the page colors, “visited links” then show up in the comment box in purple, my pre-selected color.
Anthony,
This is what I do for a living (web development) – and I can say I’m with you on this. Chrome, Firefox, and IE9+ account for 98%+ of web browsers in popular use. Web dev companies don’t generally spend time developing for the 2% who choose to use little-known or little-used browsers. At that point, it’s a user choice and if they choose to be that different, they deal with the problems it may cause.
Kadaka – You are partly right and partly wrong. Just from how it’s been described here I can explain what’s going on with CA Assistant: The previous theme was a fairly basic WP theme. WP automatically builds the page with certain HTML tags, class names, and IDs. So, for example, all comments would have the same tag structure and class name. CAA was obviously built for CA, but since WP is standard, it just HAPPENS to work on other blogs that are also using standard themes. Now that the theme has changed, that tag structure is not the same anymore, so CAA won’t work. If you want it to work for WUWT, you should contact the authors of CAA and have them update it. It might have worked before, but only by accident.
Chromium is not the same as Chrome for many reasons,
1. Chrome is up to version 37.0.2062.103 (Stable). Linux Distros are notorious to lag behind mainstream release cycles with third party applications like Chromium.
2. Chromium does not auto-update making it more prone to security vulnerabilities and for long resolved issues to linger because the browser is outdated.
3. Adobe Flash is not included because it is not open-source.
4. The built-in PDF viewer is not included because it is not open-source
5. Chromium does not support the AAC, H.264 or MP3 codecs (Support for other codecs can vary by distribution).
6. Google does not QA check Chromium releases and any distributor can modify the code before it is released.
7. Chromium does not have Google’s massive infrastructure for analyzing crashes and resolving bugs.
Sorry but I prefer to use a browser maintained by a corporation who knows how the Internet works better than any other on the planet, rather than one released by a bunch of hacks who still think it is a good idea to use their total junk, open-source video driver because the completely free ones from NVidia are not “open-source”.
The randomizer for header images has been fixed. Now there are 9 images which will display at random. If you don’t like the one you are looking at, refresh.
No whining.
This is quite sad. As I said previously, if nesting stays I will drop back to visiting at best, once a week.
Robert, 70% of the readers like threaded comments. I’m sorry, but that’s going to stay unless I find a good reason to discontinue it. Threats of not visiting by a single user would not be a valid reason. See you next week then.
Anthony I recommend only supporting the following browsers;
Chrome (latest version)
Firefox (latest version)
Internet Explorer 11
Safari (latest version)
If you are feeling generous: Internet Explorer 9 for Windows Vista users (they cannot upgrade to 11)
* Also make them uninstall all their add-ons, extensions and toolbars before even considering a complaint, no exceptions.
Everyone else can upgrade to one of those browsers (yes mobile users can install Chrome or Firefox)
Android:
Chrome – https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.android.chrome
Firefox – https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=org.mozilla.firefox
iPhone and iPad:
Chrome – http://www.google.com/chrome/browser/mobile/ios.html
Yep, that’s my browser test list now.
Anthony, for part of my last comment I said it was personal, delete it. It was a private message to you. You posted it instead.
Your action is noted.
[Reply: There are several moderators. Maybe one of them approved your comment. Wasn’t this mod, but Anthony has to sleep some time, you know. ~mod.]
Ok Anthony, I get the message. Over an hour after I told you, it’s still up. You knew Poptech was hanging around, gotta make sure he gets a good look.
It’s your home on the internet, I’m just a guest. You go have your laugh with Poptech. Bring in Monckton and Mosher while you’re at it. I’m not worth even giving a mention to for the tip for the ‘SkepSci kidz’ story.
I’m only your guest.
Kadaka, I’ve no idea what you are talking about with a “personal comment”. If you make such comments on a thread, you run the risk of having it published. Whatever it is, I don’t see it.
Nobody is trying to taunt you or have a laugh at your expense, but we ARE trying to get you to give up what appears to be some bad habits for use of Internet technology that cause trouble and can be easily avoided. Just use a real browser like Chrome.
As for tips, I always try to give credit when I can, if you feel that your tip was “the” one that created the story, I certainly have no qualms about adding it, but bear in mind I often get a bunch of stuff about the same time by email and/or comments.
But if it will make you happy, I’ll add it.
I am still trying to figure out why you are bothering Anthony about the “Climate Audit Assistant” script on WUWT? The script was written for CA and is maintained there, go bother “MrPete” about it.
Check your email, I sent you the screenshot.
You tell me not to respond to Poptech, so I don’t. And here you are patting him on the back as he does another anti-open source rant even though YOU recommended open source before. And I can’t reply. No Flash in Iceweasel or Chromium? They’re freaking plug-ins!
Google “Iceweasel”, right there it says what it is. You dredge up an old 2006 Guardian blog entry to make fun of it and me. “Which is reason enough for me to say it’s likely to be flawed.” The truth is five seconds away, what you did reeks of a deliberate smear. Moreso by that being about the browser quickly renamed to IceCat by the GNU Project, not Iceweasel from Debian.
You do all that. You post the personal stuff, pretend it didn’t happen.
And then you keep this whole anti-CA Assistant thing churning, when the problem is simply the visited links color you chose.
Sure, I’ve seen that routine enough. “We just want you go give up bad habits. BAM! You ran into my fist again! Why do you keep doing that? BAM! There you go again! There wouldn’t be a problem if you’d just shut up and do what we say. BAM! Again? When will you stop these bad habits of yours?”
I AM USING REAL BROWSERS, same underlying code. Do you expect me to believe you’re too stupid to know that? Really, is that what you want?
And you finish off the abuse with condescension. “Alright you big crybaby, you can have it.”
Well I added it, and obviously you still aren’t happy. I’m sorry about that.
OK, whatever you want to say is fine by me, but it won’t change anything. We aren’t going to support CA assistant (we can’t we aren’t the developers), we aren’t going to make changes specifically for your situation, and I’m not going to get overly concerned about a comment you left where you didn’t want part of it to show up.
You had my email, yet you ran the risk anyway. I’m truly sorry that your half-private comment got published, but I honestly never saw it, nor did I see your complaint about it. Your emailing me the comment screencap was the first I saw of it. I replied to your email about it yesterday.
It likely got approved by another moderator who didn’t notice that my name was midway down the comment. Normally when people want to get my attention, they put my name at top.
So, it likely got approved with many others at the same time because the moderator didn’t realize it was intended for me and half of it was private. In the future, if you have a private message to me you don’t want published, don’t put it in comment that may be published, email it (you have my email) or use the contact form.
The bottom line: I don’t see every comment that gets made on WUWT and I don’t approve every comment. I also get tips from multiple sources often within minutes of each other. Occasionally, I don’t try to sort out who was on first because I’m busy trying to get the story verified and published. To all those who feel slighted, including you, I apologize for not being able to always keep track of who sent tips and when.
Your view of what you think I am and what I do diverge from my actual day to day reality, unfortunately.
Kadaka, I think you need some time away from the computer, because IMHO you are taking all this stuff way too personal.
If you want to continue to be upset about it there’s nothing I can do at this point.
=============================================
[Note: I deleted the comment that kadaka asked to have private, when I saw his request. But I did not approve, or post his comment. Also, if kadaka posts a comment it will show up automatically in the thread, because he is not on moderation hold.
~ Just one mod’s 2¢.]
kadaka, I already explained that IceWeasel and Chromium are not necessarily identical code to Chrome or Firefox. The known differences I listed for Chromium here,
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2014/09/02/status-report-on-wuwt-updates-reader-poll-on-threaded-comments/#comment-1729615
There can be much more but I would need the source code for each to confirm. You believing the underlying code is identical does not make it so.
You are also almost always guaranteed to be using an outdated browser because of the horrendous way third party apps are maintained and updated on Linux Distros.
You can install Chrome on Debian, so stop making excuses,
https://www.google.com/chrome/browser/?platform=linux
Google also adds themselves to your repositories so the browser actually stays updated.
What part of contacting the author(s) of CA Assistant to fix an issue with it do you not understand? Anthony should not be customizing link colors because some custom script is not working right here.
Here is an interesting rant on the failure of Iceweasel,
http://techpatterns.com/forums/about1435.html
“The problem with Iceweasel and why I am now using Firefox
Because Iceweasel has had a consistent pattern of bugs and major failures in Debian over the past few years, leading up to the most recent set, I decided to finally give up, raise the white flag, and start running Firefox from http://www.mozilla.com instead.
Before I hear from the legions of Debian fanboys, none of whom will pay for my new laptop I would need to get if I kept using Iceweasel on a laptop I run (cpu runs around 70-80% at 1.4 gigaherz) with Debian Testing (as of 11-12-2009), or who will explain how I am supposed to use Iceweasel with my complicated bookmarks if it crashes every time I try to scroll down my bookmark folder list when I am trying to create a bookmark (bug first reported in Mozilla August 2009!, and correctly called invalid because Firefox ships with the correct version of libsqlite), I also want to point out that ever since I switched to Debian as my full time desktop in early 2006, Firefox/Iceweasel has had nothing but problems, so this isn’t some new thing, or an over-reaction to one bug.
I’d like to say, I’m sorry about the Iceweasel groups problems, I’m sorry the dev isn’t into it anymore, and I’m sorry that it’s a complicated package. I understand this is volunteer work, and that we all do this to try to help others, but the simple fact is, Debian Iceweasel is NOT the same as Firefox, and it’s clearly obvious that it’s not trivial work to maintain a package of this complexity. So don’t bother expecting this level, just work around it for good.
So rather than waste weeks, again, on trying to figure out if a bug is an Iceweasel introduced failure, or if it’s rooted in Firefox itself, I decided to finally simplify the process and dump Iceweasel as my default Firefox app. “
No You Haven’t. I used the new Gmail address, same one I’m using now for commenting, no reply. My last email to you is in the Sent Mail folder, I even checked the Inbox right before sending the comment, no reply. Checked just now, no reply. Nothing in the Spam folder either.
And you start your reply here with more condescension. I wasn’t happy about the posting, I wasn’t happy about the pattern. Merely to once again not be mentioned for a tip? Pah.
And now Poptech is dredging up a 2009 blog rant on Iceweasel, rather than actually trying out the thing, while telling me I basically need a label change and I should just use the products, when he won’t even try what he’s denigrating.
Come on, the anonymous hack said back then of the program “…it contributes to global warming and is bad for the environment. Sadly this isn’t a joke.” I’ve used it daily for years and kept it updated, the CPU usage issues were corrected with Adblock and Flashblock thus by keeping the extraneous crud from running, not by my switching names.
Just checked Gmail again. Nope, reply still ain’t there.
LMAO, Kadaka thinks I have not tried Iceweasel recently. No I tried it during a recent Linux Distro eval since it was installed by default with Debian. YouTube among other pages did not work right so I Installed Chrome and all webpages worked like normal. The rant I posted was very important because it shows that Iceweasel is at best outdated and is not code identical to Firefox. Why do you want to use outdated code that is missing potentially hundreds of bug and security fixes?
My evals of Linux keep getting worse as the community still cannot standardize on a desktop and continues to fork more and more, mainly because Torvalds is an idiot and refuses to exercise any authority in this area. Driver support continues to be garbage as the open-source Nvidia driver (nouveau) is about as stable as Windows 3.11 video drivers. I have never seen anything that bad in over 20 years. The official Nvidia drivers that work break the OS boot logo across Distros among other things. Debian Devs appear to be stuck in the stone age, it is stable but not very useful. At least the Linux Mint team appear to be trying to make their Distro work and be user friendly. They are also getting with the program and using an LTS release as standard, so you do not have to reinstall your OS every year and the LTS will be supported until 2019.
The results of the eval was that Linux Mint is still the most user friendly Distro, especially for Windows users but you need to install Chrome or Firefox (included in Mint) to use the web properly, no exceptions. I tried 20 some Linux variant browsers and they are all garbage including Chromium and Iceweasel.
When I am using Linux I feel like I am being punked, sure you are “fighting the man” the only problem is you are also fighting yourself trying to get work done.
You need to specify the Backports repository in sources.list to use the latest version.
Iceweasel through Backports is v32.0. Current Firefox download for Linux is v32.0.
The usual sequence is first install Debian, then add Backports to sources.list, then update and upgrade.
Complaining about Iceweasel being outdated compared to current Firefox when you weren’t even using current Iceweasel… Oh well, guess that’s enough to justify another anti-open source rant.
“The usual sequence is first install Debian, then add Backports to sources.list, then update and upgrade.”
Why should someone have to add a Backports repo to a Distro to install the latest version of a web browser?
How come Linux Mint comes installed with the latest version of Firefox and all the necessary repos added by default so the browser stays updated? YouTube among other websites worked properly out of the box.
Maybe because Iceweasel sucks and Debian Devs are clueless open-source zealots?
Download Linux Mint Debian
Why would people need to reinstall their OS every year? With Debian the upgrades just roll in as released. You reboot for a kernel upgrade, otherwise just keep on running. Every so many years there’ll be a major release, boot as root and apt-get dist-upgrade, no big deal. But it is a good time to wipe and reinstall on general principle, clean out the cruft.
BTW Debian is now trying Long Term Support, see what the demand is, starting with 6.0 (Squeeze).
https://wiki.debian.org/LTS
I was not impressed with LMDE and would rather have an Ubuntu based Distro (for many reasons).
Any update that requires me to use the command line and cannot be done with the GUI is a Linux failure IMO and archaic. I have yet to use a Distro that did not require me to use the command line to fix something.
On CA Assistant:
This was touted for its preview capability. I tried it for a while, but it was really slow on big pages and if I accidentally went to a different page while I had a partially written comment, I’d come back and find it completely gone. I gave up on that, and settled on “ItsAllText” which adds a little “edit” button to text windows and clicking that brings up an external editor of my choice (emacs) where I can edit in comfort. While there’s no preview function, I have an emacs macro where I select some text and use the macro to add blockquote HTML around it. While I still mess up some other stuff, and it’s no substitute for a real preview, at least I don’t loose half typed messages. I’m happy with it. There doesn’t seem to be variant for Chrome or Chromium or whatever.
If only CA Assistant will do, you ought to be able to find the author and encourage him to add WUWT support.
For those that want to try the “ItsAllText” add-on for FireFox, see:
https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/its-all-text/
I’m still undecided about the merits of the nested replies function, as it may increase the tendency of people to simply “reply” to comments before they read further. This can encourage trolling/thread-jacking.
Previously people had to make a bit more effort to move downward and copy/paste a quote to make it clear who they were replying to, which would also make it more likely that they would read another comment relevant to the title and/or the comment being replied to. I admit, though, that I certainly use the function and find it user-friendly.
I guess it boils down to how you want the blog to be read and commented on, but I think there are already some signs of the problem emerging: I write this having just seen that you’ve closed comments on the John Kerry thread, which is unusual at WUWT. I think Climate Etc. suffers from a few number of people who make sure they get their retaliation in early and often. (I also assume that Climate Etc also has fewer active moderators, so I accept that may be part of the explanation.)
Commenters may like the new format (I generally agree), but a consensus is not necessarily true or right, as we know.
Valid points, and I’m considering them.
As for the Kerry thread, it was also unusual at WUWT in that it contained both religion and politics, two subjects I avoid mixing here. But, with Kerry’s inanity, I had no choice (other than not mentioning it at all).
So, don’t use that as an example, as it is a rare outlier.
Kerry laid an egg. You didn’t when you closed the comments.
Nesting is great for corrections and updates of information. Also for a related link. I would keep it for that alone. If we cannot edit a post, a nested self reply is a good alternative.
We are just going to have to learn when to nest and when not to. A nested replay will be focused, but seen by few.
..yes, “a few number of people” should be “a few people” or “a small number of people”.
Slightly OT.
There are 199,433,494 post at this time.
I expect 200,000,000 about Sept 9, 22:00 PDT. (+/- 2.5 hours).
So to summarize:
The new “visited links” color causes white text with CA Assistant. I have a workaround I can live with. The recommendation is to make more work for the mods by abandoning CA Assistant and the Preview function thus making many more formatting mistakes.
I’m also told CA Assistant is specifically for CA and it’s sheer luck if it works with any site but CA. Although from the start it worked for WUWT and other WordPress sites by design. Monday I read a story on deadline-dot-com, saw it was a WordPress site, added it to the CA Assistant list, comment box there now has a working Preview button for me.
I’m running lean updated versions of popular browsers. I am told this is a “bad habit”. Post-Snowden I’m not fond of browsers that “phone home” without permission. So I’m told I would be better off to get the phoning-home name brands. I’m told it’s a major benefit to have built-in features I might not be using nor need, rather than have them as plug-ins I can pick and choose and disable and remove at will, or instead of handling them under system controls like with supporting certain codecs.
Iceweasel, my Firefox-based browser, is being denigrated by 2006 and 2009 blog posts of then-existing versions. In computer terms that’s denigrating the Ford Focus based on reviews of the Model T and Edsel. Except the first one was actually about the Oldsmobile Curved Dash.
And Poptech says “Google also adds themselves to your repositories so the browser actually stays updated.” Thus I should install Chrome.
If he thinks it’s a good idea for a sysadmin to allow in a program that makes its own changes to sources.list and does its own updating based on them installing as it sees fit whenever it wants, he’s a moron.
I run Debian Stable, currently 7.6 (Wheezy). I write my own sources.list. I download from the trusted official Debian repositories as my primary choice, using Aptitude normally but sometimes apt-get. Through Aptitude I’ve installed Adobe Flash and Pepper Flash, and the available Iceweasel plug-ins. For Iceweasel I do use the Backports repository so browser and plug-ins are the latest possible versions. I do use plug-ins from elsewhere that are otherwise unavailable, as for Chromium, installed from trusted sites, namely Mozilla and the Google Chrome Store.
I have a good running system that I control that does what I want. My only major problem is a slow connection. The consensus of the learned gathered experts is I trash all that and switch to their preferred products which are loaded-up versions of what I already have, to get the fancy official logos and popular names. And I should also make lots more formatting mistakes on WUWT and elsewhere for the mods to fix. Because WUWT now uses a conflicting visited link color.
With experts like that, no wonder there’s a consensus.
To Summarize,
Kadaka does not understand who is responsible to make a custom script work with WUWT.
Nor does he understand that CA Assistant was designed to work with the Climate Audit layout which runs on WordPress and they updated it to support various other skeptic blogs 4 years ago. Just because it works on sites it was never tested on means jack. No I am not going to fix it for you.
Running Iceweasel or Chromium is not going to protect you from NSA snooping.
Yes Chrome adds itself to your repositories so it stays updated with bug fixes and security patches (an obviously insane idea),
https://www.google.com/linuxrepositories/
“Google’s Linux software packages will automatically configure the repository settings necessary to keep your Google Linux applications up-to-date.”
Obviously Google is an extremely evil company and allowing them to keep Chrome updated is an incredibly dangerous thing that only a Moron sysadmin would do. LMAO
Why should we be impressed that you waste your time micro-managing your own PC? Why not use a platform (like Windows) that you can simply install a piece of software because it is compatible with your OS, instead of wasting time adding repositories first?
How do you know the Official Debian repositories are trusted? Did you review all of the source code for every piece of code you downloaded from them?
“I do use plug-ins from elsewhere that are otherwise unavailable, as for Chromium, installed from trusted sites, namely Mozilla and the Google Chrome Store.”
Wait you trust their “stores” to install plugins but you do not trust these same companies to use their browsers? Are you insane?
It has already been explained to you multiple times that there are more differences between Iceweasel/Chromium and Firefox/Chrome than simply the name and logos. I gave you an example in the post I quoted aboveve. Since you obviously have never had to deal with or worked in tech support I am not surprised you are so thick headed like this.
WHAT PART OF YOU SHOULD CONTACT THE AUTHOR OF THE CA ASSISTANT SCRIPT TO FIX THE ISSUE YOU ARE HAVING DO YOU NOT UNDERSTAND?
REPLY: to Kadaka
I replied from my phone, perhaps it ended up in the bit bucket. I can’t control what happens in the Internet transmission/reception after I press “send”.
As for your concerns, you’ll just have live with them, as they are about your choices and not about any failings of the WUWT website. I have made one other change today, to reduce the size of the captions in images, but the color choices for text will stay. I’m still undecided about comment threading, it has advantages and disadvantages.
I’m closing the thread, since it has become mostly about you and the odd choices you’ve made in software, rather than discussions of improvement to the website.
– Anthony