Just one question about basic performance

[Jacob Bugge]

Will the free flow of unified threads be retained, with successive posts filling the entire width, and with simple forum lists of threads, or:

A) Are we going to be put in boxes with forum member information to the left and possibly buttons to the left/right/bottom, so the flow is broken up and takes up far more space?

B) Will the threads be branched, so everything may become fragmented, and so subjects deserving their own threads will be buried deep?

C) Will the forum lists of threads be furnished with dividing lines and possibly arranged by subject rather than latest posts?

I believe those are the most fundamental question about the new forum; most other issues can be solved within the right frame, if needed.

Several times, strong pleas for mercy have been raised concerning threats A) - C).

It is so nice to easily find and pick a thread with new posts in the forum list, and then to run/read through and partake in a coherent and focused thread of successive posts, without things fading away in different directions, without the disturbance of having to cross unnecessary lines and perform unnecessary scrolling because of disturbing information, which might as well be reached by clicking the poster name or some popup button next to it in the line containing the poster name and time of posting.

Question(s) asked while anxiously waiting to see a preview.

[Jacob Bugge]

What Ann, Bill, and Freeagent said, with the following additions:

The post headings in the threads correspond to about 6 lines, so there is a waste of some 5 lines; and the low density of useful information would be even lower if the locked message text size were not forbidding for people with less than optimum eyesight. Mentioning the subject of the thread in every post is also unnecessary, unless you need signs about the order of putting on shoes and trousers (or was it trousers and shoes?).

The list of threads has a density about half of what we see here.

A comforting answer to the questions in posts #26+63, maybe based upon the user option mentioned in the 8th bullet in post #14, would be comforting.

I am fine with small text sizes, but will they be adjustable?

[D__McCahill]

Well, the thread says "just one question" and we are all asking just one (at a time).

My question to John is ... will there be any beta testing of the look and feel of the proposed new forum? Hopefully by some of the regulars who come to the About the Forums pages. I'd sure feel better if some of those folk could come out in the week before the change and say ... it looks good, or it looks good except for ... etc.

[Guest]

Don, yes. There will be a public preview starting sometime in March, giving about 3 weeks worth of tire kicking.

Everyone needs to keep in mind that John and his team are working with the best software that they could find to meet our expectations... but it's not this software and may not be as adaptable as we'd like it to be. Or... I should say, that it may be totally adaptable... if we expect Adobe to pay for a rewrite of the code... which would lock us into the same trap we ended up with in this software... something so customized that it became somewhere between difficult and impossible to apply updates to it reasonably.

In short... let's not lean on John to make demands that won't be reasonable to fill, and accept that some compromises to the ideal will likely be necessary.

That said... I haven't even seen what he's putting together yet. It ain't even alpha beta yet. I expect that we will likely be happier then our worst fears but still be left with stuff to grumble about. You guys know him well enough to know that he'll bend over backwards to make it good for us. But he has a lot of other people to answer to as well, and he's busy as all get-out during this period. It increases my volunteer workload as well, but I'll try to keep up with things and let folks know what's happening as best I can as well.

[PJonesCET]

I don't see the problem with Avatar's. They are small (or should) and no big deal AS ugly as homemade soap as I am I find it interesting to see other's pictures. Adds a Human touch to the dialog.

[Guest]

The "Human Touch" is clearly transmitted by the WORDS which a User chooses to post.

Our choice of words say everything that is needed to convey our personalities.

I have no need to see someone's cutsey Comic-cut Avatar let alone a mug shot which may or (more likely!) may not, be a truthful representation of the current appearance of the Poster anyway.

PLEASE NO AVATARS!

[Guest]

I don't see any advantage in avatars but it doesn't have to a mugshot does it?

[PJonesCET]

Well my Avatar I use on a lot of my groups that use them is genuine true representation all 360 pounds of me.

[Guest]

this may have gotten buried and missed:

dave milbut, "Just one question about basic performance" #58, 17 Feb 2009 11:39 am

john, what about that? has anyone considered that there's no real need to enforce unique screen names here as long as unique adobe.com names are being enforced on the back end?

it would save all the squabbles along the lines of "which buko is the real buko?" (for example... XD)

[Kath-H]

No, it would just make sure they take place in public ;)

[John_Cornicello_Photo]

The forum doesn't have your name stored in it. It picks up your name from your Adobe ID account. If you change your name in your Adobe ID it will get changed in the forums the next time you log in. It is part of the sign-in process.

And even if we didn't use your ID, I believe that the forum software still imposes the unique value.

[John_Cornicello_Photo]

>Another question: My Adobe ID is linked to one e-mail address and my present forum account to another. This is because I first signed in with a completely ridiculous name that I instantly regretted, but I couldn't change it. So I had to set up a new account.

First signed up where? In this forum or for your Adobe ID? I can delete any old, unused accounts you have here in the Forum if they are preventing you from updating your email address.

[Guest]

>. It picks up your name from your Adobe ID account.

it picks up the nickname associated with that name, no?

> I believe that the forum software still imposes the unique value.

that's probably (not 100% sure) an option...

as long as uniquness is associated SOMEwhere, so the forum can tell one poster from another, i don't think it matters what the display name is...

[John_Cornicello_Photo]

Right. Your nickname is the name you say can be used publicly to identify you.

[Guest]

so then there's nothing stopping us (assuming the forum sw allows it) from letting that publicly viewable "nickname" be non-unique.

[John_Cornicello_Photo]

It is forced to be unique in the Adobe system. You can't change it once you are in the forum software. The forum software picks it up from the Adobe ID system.

[Guest]

> It is forced to be unique in the Adobe system

even though the adobe id is itself unique and separate? seems like that would be an option as well. that's like saying the first name field associated with the adobe id is unique. there can only be one dave. so, pick another name.

it's arbitrary. and not required if uniqueness is already maintained as the adobe id. i just thought it would be a great way to avoid the hassles we KNOW are going to show up when 10 people show up who want to be "buko" and have been since forever...

[_Phos_four_dots_]

Nevermind (for now).

[Guest]

The name on the Adobe ID is unique. The MM forums are already set up to use one, so they are good to go. These forums also have to use one. If people have posts on both sides, they will want to associate their posts to the same account that they use to log in there, so all the posts from both sides will be attributed to them. I have 2 Adobe accounts... I'm hoping I linked to the correct one (DorothyK), tho it's not the one I've used for the few posts I have on the MM side (Dorothy_K). Flashback... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=29BoqCMRBFk

[Claudio González]

I was under the impression that one used (and still uses) the same ID and screen name for the Adobe store and the MM forums ...

[Guest]

Claudio, yes. But when I first signed up for the Macromedia forums, I ended up creating another store account and those forums are tied to that one. I want the posts here tied to the first one, and don't care if my posts for both forums get tied together. In general tho, people that have accounts for the MM forums will want posts here linked to the same account.

[Guest]

I think i have 2 store ids. <sigh> i have all my registrations up to cs2 (dozens) under one. i need to check to see if my cs3 registations are under the other.

[Guest]

Tying our Adobe accounts and IDs to e-mail addresses seems to be the cause of the problem.

E-mail addresses change.

We had successive take-overs by ISP companies in our area: RCN was taken-over by SUSCOM who were then taken-over by COMCAST so my e-mail address changed three times in about five years and resulted in my software registrations being scattered through those accounts.

[Kath-H]

Yes. It's years since one email address was a reliable identifier for one person.

[Guest]

I still have email addresses from two previous ISPs going back over 10 years. They still work.

[Claudio González]

Well, when I registered in the Adobe store -many years ago and long before I started visiting the forums- it wasn't compulsory to use an email address as ID. Luckily, I didn't, and flatly refused to change my ID for an email address through successive campaigns almost forcing one to do the change.

Also luckily, I used my own name as a screen name both at the Adobe store and here. I should therefore have no problem when I finally link my forum and my Adobe ID, unless the system informs me that my name is already taken ... by me of course.