[2020-03-23 01:32:11 UTC Update 1:Ed. Note - updated to clarify location of the skip to comments button.--fnord666]
[2020-03-23 12:56:40 UTC Update 2: Changed link target from "#acomments" to "#commentwrap" per suggestion in: https://soylentnews.org/meta/comments.pl?noupdate=1&sid=36704&page=1&cid=974278#commentwrap; added "Note-to-self". --martyb]
Thank You! Thanks to everyone who provided feedback on a new UI feature to the site; [Skip to comment(s)]" is now live on SoylentNews!
The SoylentNews' Main Page should function and look the same as before. The magic manifests only after a specific story has been opened. Code has been added to a site template so that "[Skip to comment(s)]" should now appear, right-justified, in the first of the two lines in the title bar that appears immediately below the story's title.
[Note to self: see in-memory version of template: "dispStory;misc;default" original implementation target fragid of "#acomments" changed to "#commentwrap" as of 2020-03-23 12:56:40 UTC--martyb]
Clicking the button will bring you to the comment header block. (That's where you can adjust Breakthrough, Threshold, and Threading preferences (either one-time-only, or save it away, permanently.)
Quite frankly, thanks to the community's feedback, it looks and behaves better than what I had originally envisioned!
Previously:
Changing Site UI to Make Long Stories Easier to Navigate -- Input Requested [superseded; see update]
Skip to comment(s) -- Second Try [Updated: 2020-03-21 15:06:00 UTC].)
Enjoy!
--martyb
Related Stories
[20200320_184315 UTC: Update: Made the dept. line longer to better demonstrate space [un]availability.--martyb]
[20200320_202305 UTC: Update: Added topics: "/dev/random", "Code", "Software", and "Answers" topics to better illustrate their use of space in a story. --martyb]
[20200321_175412 UTC: Update: superseded by: Skip to comment(s) -- Second Try --martyb]
First: Please accept my best wishes to everyone during SARS-CoV-2 / COVID-19 / Coronavirus pandemic. Please take all necessary precautions to keep yourself and those around you safe!
Second: I should not have been surprised, but I must confess my admiration at how the SoylentNews community came together in support of each other in response to SoylentNews Community -- How has SAR-CoV-2 (Coronavirus) / COVID-19 Affected You? As of my writing this, there are over 300 comments! community++ This is what I had hoped for when SoylentNews started over six years (Wow!) ago, and so validates my giving of my time to this site!
Third: (and the focus of this story) our virus roundup stories are... long. An AC posted a comment: thanks to eds:
Thanks editors for pulling together this summary. SN for the win!
One comment--it is kind of long to scroll down through, to get to the comments. Perhaps next time some of the longer stories could be put inside the spoiler tag?"
This was quickly acted on by a member of staff, but that was not universally embraced as a "Good Idea". Both Soylentils, to my eye, had good points. If I am visiting an active story again, I have already read the story (both the "Intro Copy" and the "Extended Copy"). Why should I have to scroll through a wall-of-text to get to the comments? The suggestion of using <spoiler>...</spoiler> to bracket the contents of each of the merged stories seemed like a reasonable suggestion. But, when you have a hammer... Right idea, but maybe not quite the right tool.
Aside: If I am reading a review of, say, a movie, then a spoiler is an appropriate way to hide plot details from those who have not yet seen the movie. That is not the situation here. Why hide details of a story about the pandemic? Hmm. A good first try, perhaps, but it looks like we need something different in this case.
Idea: what if there were, say, a button at the top of the story that I could click and be brought immediately to the comment section of a story? Hey! I can do that!
Acknowledgements: At this point, I hereby express my sincere thanks to AndyTheAbsurd for constructing some CSS which allowed the conditional display of a button, and to FatPhil for his testing efforts. Thanks guys!
Read on past the break for details on the implementation and a request for assistance before I attempt to roll it out to production.
[2020-03-21 15:06:00 UTC: Update 1:
(1) Reminder: this has so far been implemented only on our *development* server (https://dev.soylentnews.org/); it has NOT yet been rolled out to this (the production) servers.
(2) The control (now a simple text link, no longer a button) no longer defaults to taking up a whole physical line immediately above the first comment.
(3) Please note that in certain corner-cases, it is possible that screen size limitations may cause an overflow onto the next line.
(4) And the control should now appear aligned-right in the story header. =)
--martyb]
[2020-03-21 15:42:00 UTC: Update 2: Fixed typo in the first of the above two links to our dev server. --martyb]
This is a follow-up to: Changing the Site UI to Making Long Stories Easier to Navigate -- Input Requested.
Wow! Thanks for all the positive feedback to the previous story! I knew the implementation was a bit rough around the edges, so I very much appreciate the positive, constructive feedback that was provided!
Based on your input -- primarily displeasure in having a single button take up a whole physical line -- I have modified the in-memory template on our development server to now provide a textual link in the story header right after the printer icon. It should only appear when viewing the story by itself; there should be no indication of this on the main page.
To repeat, this is only on our development server so far; it is not yest implemented on our production server (i.e. what you see here).
In short, should this get rolled out to production?
- Yes.
- Yes, with these suggested changes.
- No.
Please refer to the previous story (linked above) for test scenarios and reply with any issues you may find!
teamwork++
[2020-03-23 01:32:11 UTC Update 1:Ed. Note - updated to clarify location of the skip to comments button.--fnord666]
[2020-03-23 12:56:40 UTC Update 2: Changed link target from "#acomments" to "#commentwrap" per suggestion in: https://soylentnews.org/meta/comments.pl?noupdate=1&sid=36704&page=1&cid=974278#commentwrap; added "Note-to-self". --martyb]
Thank You! Thanks to everyone who provided feedback on a new UI feature to the site; [Skip to comment(s)]" is now live on SoylentNews!
The SoylentNews' Main Page should function and look the same as before. The magic manifests only after a specific story has been opened. Code has been added to a site template so that "[Skip to comment(s)]" should now appear, right-justified, in the first of the two lines in the title bar that appears immediately below the story's title.
[Note to self: see in-memory version of template: "dispStory;misc;default" original implementation target fragid of "#acomments" changed to "#commentwrap" as of 2020-03-23 12:56:40 UTC--martyb]
Clicking the button will bring you to the comment header block. (That's where you can adjust Breakthrough, Threshold, and Threading preferences (either one-time-only, or save it away, permanently.)
Quite frankly, thanks to the community's feedback, it looks and behaves better than what I had originally envisioned!
Previously:
Changing Site UI to Make Long Stories Easier to Navigate -- Input Requested [superseded; see update]
Skip to comment(s) -- Second Try [Updated: 2020-03-21 15:06:00 UTC].)
Enjoy!
--martyb
On Monday February 17 2014, at 02:06AM SoylentNews announced itself to the world!
(That's exactly seven years ago from the time this story posts.) Does it seem possible? I know it certainly amazes me.
A lot can happen in a year. Here are some items of note. As always, if you are not interested in this kind of stuff, ignore this post — a new story will be along shortly. Otherwise, this story continues below the fold.
- Random Statistics
- Site News
- Staff Activity
- Folding@Home
NB: An earlier version of this story containing much more detail seems to have jumped into a bit bucket. Please forgive any errors that crept into this quick reincarnation attempt!
Random Statistics:
Over the past year, activity on the site comes to:
| Journals: | 2,161 |
| Stories: | 3,927 |
| Moderations: | 114,020 |
| Comments: | 155,098 |
We previously had a great number of posts on the COVID-19 pandemic. It is still with us, but vaccines are starting to be rolled out. Sadly, variants of the coronavirus have appeared, and some appear to be more contagious than the earlier strains. We had let up on our coverage of late, because trying to merge 20-30 story submissions was extremely demanding of time and energy — yet with decreasing amounts of discussion.
In spite of the hit that COVID-19 had on the community, we had a successful fundraiser last year. When we have official results, we will get them to you.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday March 23 2020, @12:29AM (1 child)
I won't believe that until I see the dupe of this story appear tomorrow morning.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday March 23 2020, @12:46AM
Well, it looks/works fine now, at least on this story.
(Score: 4, Interesting) by SomeGuy on Monday March 23 2020, @12:47AM (3 children)
What, you didn't turn long stories in to a side scrolling carousel graphic? And make the page grow infinitely as you scroll while you are at it? Obviously the "skip to comments" should float over the page near one edge and bob up and down all the time, that would make the site "pop". All of the current management brochures clearly state this is the current trend that MUST be followed.
FEEDBACK? From actual people?! Instead of glorious automated metrics?! You primitive barbarians! You will never being keeping a job in web design! :P
But seriously, it works in my older web browser, so good job.
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Monday March 23 2020, @01:14AM (2 children)
Yeah, and I didn't even have to type a single character for that new feature. That's a martyb baby. Code I don't have to write is my favorite kind.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 2, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Monday March 23 2020, @01:33AM (1 child)
Don't be so modest. It is your second favorite kind. Your favorite kind is code you didn't have to write that actually works and you don't have to fix. Got save time so you can put fish in the livewell.
(Score: 2) by The Mighty Buzzard on Monday March 23 2020, @02:59AM
I stand corrected.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday March 23 2020, @01:16AM (2 children)
Thank you, SN, and thank you, marty.
And stay the fuck home, assholes. Don't be patient 31 like them spring break cocksuckers in Florida. Lock them fuckers up in jail and no medical treatment. I don't want a cent of my tax money going to their medical treatment.
Comment below if you want canned soups cheap.
(Score: 4, Funny) by The Mighty Buzzard on Monday March 23 2020, @03:01AM
You don't have to stay home, you just have to stay away from other people. And it started here just when the crappie and flathead started biting again. So a big ole "HA-ha" and a hearty "Suck it!" to those of you who think the universe doesn't love me.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 4, Informative) by takyon on Monday March 23 2020, @03:08AM
Canned soup has very low calories per dollar since it's mostly water. Dried beans + canned diced tomatoes + bouillon + water + spices makes a decent soup.
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 2) by takyon on Monday March 23 2020, @01:21AM (3 children)
https://soylentnews.org/meta/article.pl?sid=20/03/23/0026224#commentwrap [soylentnews.org]
is closer to what you want than
https://soylentnews.org/meta/article.pl?sid=20/03/23/0026224#acomments [soylentnews.org]
Also it doesn't appear on the comments.pl URLs: https://soylentnews.org/meta/comments.pl?sid=36704 [soylentnews.org]
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 2) by takyon on Monday March 23 2020, @01:27AM (1 child)
#commentwrap is consistent with the "N comments" links on the home page (to the right of "Read More").
Another thing you can do is to make "N comments" linked instead of just the number, to make it easier to click. At the same time, bump up the font size of just the number using a span element, to make it stand out more with the whole thing being underlined.
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 2) by maxwell demon on Monday March 23 2020, @06:27AM
Please, don't.
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
(Score: 2) by martyb on Monday March 23 2020, @12:55PM
Thanks for the suggestion, and especially for the suggested link / fragment ID. Quire frankly, I did not see that fragid when I was looking through the page source, and I like you suggestion MUCH BETTER. It is what I was attempting to do. Will update ASAP. (Note to self: in-memory copy of: rehash-master\themes\default\templates\dispStory;misc;default)
Added and servers bounced; should see it now.
Yes, I had noticed that... finding out where that is created has been fruitless, so far. Still looking. Thanks for mentioning it, though, so it (hopefully) does not fall through the cracks!
community++
Wit is intellect, dancing.
(Score: 2) by SomeGuy on Monday March 23 2020, @01:10PM (1 child)
Possible bug. Loading a story that does not have a "from" line like this one: https://soylentnews.org/article.pl?sid=20/03/21/0236256 [soylentnews.org] intermittently seems to cause the story text to get squished, with an empty gray column under the "skip to comments" text. Seems to change depending on how the browser window is sized. Tried this on a couple of recent Firefox based browsers.
(Score: 2) by martyb on Monday March 23 2020, @04:13PM
Thanks for the report! It took a little while to replicate... took a while to understand what you meant by "from" line. (Internally we normally call it the "dept." line, but you had no way of know that!)
I tried some ad hoc changes in my browser and changing the style of the link from: "display: inline-block" to all of its alternative values was unsuccessful. I could put in some more <div> elements to force it to behave differently, but that is a much more challenging undertaking with many potential unintended side effects. I have not given up! Just reporting that I have investigated and am now pondering on possible alternate solutions.
Thanks again!
Wit is intellect, dancing.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 24 2020, @02:54AM
I have reported the multiple times. This new feature is not visible to me. Even tried on difference OSes and Browsers. I use Rasbian, Ubuntu, win10. Firefire, chrome, crromium, ie, edge. My screen size 35" at 1080p. It is just not there.
Increase font size, change color combo, make look like a real button, anything to make is visible.