Brand New Forums & Gallery

[Graytail]

And I learned somewhere that it's only the new photos that load slowly - old posts with pics load fast.

Think of the discs that hold allllll those pics, churning and humming continuously as they index ... they be smokin'!

 

[TorturedSoul]

Try this TS, Amy Gardner's First Journal - Outdoor - Critical Cure & Chaos In The Forest

Yeah, I see your point now, Amy. That's kind of a trainwreck, huh? TWO MINUTES AND FIFTY ONE SECONDS to completely load page 16 (of 17). And I immediately saw a big chunk of the reason why. After about five seconds of still seeing the "page still loading" indicator, I thought to check my bandwidth monitor and saw that I was getting decent download speeds - there was just a hella large amount of data coming down the pipe.

I checked one of the images at random and it's like 7 megabytes in size. I'm guessing that quite a few members who access the forum via their cell phones and who have to pay for their actual data usage are going to be PISSED when they get their next bills, lol. Unless they're on prepaid plans, then they might just run out of their monthly data allotment a little early.

It looks like the forum is sending out the images at the same (file) size that they're getting uploaded. I thought all forums either "optimized" JPEGs or had some file size restriction of around 1.5 megabytes or less? OR merely sent a thumbnail (often, of decent resolution so that most people don't even bother to click one in order to get the full-sized image) in the thread.

Gee, I sure hope no members have one of those ultra-expensive 40+ megabit pixel digital cameras - a thread full of images from one of those might start a riot, ROTFLMFAO.

 

[Graytail]

How about pics in older journals? Have you checked those for speed and size? I'm hearing that it's the new photos that're the problem. I've always loaded full resolution pics in the past.

The new ones definitely look sharper - mebbe that's why.

 

[TheMadDabber]

Agreed. It's taking me between 20 seconds and 2 minutes for a single click to load...

Here is a link for anyone confused about how to upload pictures. I don't know how it's not front page posted. I have members messaging me confused....

Scorpio's Cavalcade Of Horrors With Hempy, Genetics, Perpetual & Much Much More

And finally as I'm sure you all on the "other side" have noticed... It's the apostrophe that kicks me out of the keyboard... any autocorrected word using one it kicks me out. Must be in relation to the way they transferred over as I noticed they came out as 3 different symbols

 

[Amy Gardner]

Yeah well, certainly my phone shouldn't be being fed full size images - eeek! I'm not even sure my images were that size when I uploaded them. I've deleted them all now so I'll have to check my new bunch for file size.

How about pics in older journals? Have you checked those for speed and size? I'm hearing that it's the new photos that're the problem. I've always loaded full resolution pics in the past.

The new ones definitely look sharper - mebbe that's why.

All the older pics in my journal and others load super speedily!

the camera I use is only 6MP - it doesn't even take very hi-res shots!

 

[TorturedSoul]

Oh, geeze, I'm not going to suffer through loading that page again unless it comes with free Taco Bell. I think I might have saved it, let me check...

It looks like it's a close-up of the top (or one of the branch ends) of a cannabis plant, not what I'd call buds but a bunch of flowers with whitish pistils showing, I can see trichomes here and there, it's a sunny day, it's in front of a fence or wall made of half verticle bamboo(?) poles and half air, with some kind of horizontal wire, string, or a shadow running across the fence/wall. Oh, and it's 2112x2816 pixels & 7,301,579 bytes in size. Does that help identify it?

 

[AKgramma]

OH! OH! OH! I LIKE the options that come with the WATCH button (watch with email)! This saves SOOOOO much time! TY! TY!

 

[Amy Gardner]

On a totally different topic, some other observations re. possible tweaks:

- The 'Jump to new' function is starting to work really well as I visit more threads. However, the only threads it doesn't give me the option to "jump to new" is my own journal. I get landed on the front page every time with no "jump to new" button. All other threads are fine.

- I find it disconcerting that we have such easy access to others' media when inserting pics.

- Is there a way to please add a link to the next page at the bottom of pages? EDIT: ooh! that was like magic! suddenly it's there - must've been being coded as I typed!

- This looks excellent! I was just on a thread (420 Fotographer's thread) and many of the images there load super-duper fast and are like large thumbnails (but full size in the window) which you can click on to open the pic in it's own window. Is this the result of the image optimisation/thumbnail generation that going on in the background? I hope so!

- Is there a way to not be 'followed'... The friends and contacts t functions were good. But 'following' members seems unnecessary (bit creepy too?), especially when we can follow threads. I s'pose some folks might like it...

:cricle-of-love:

 

[Amy Gardner]

Do you think we're the most unruly beta test team there's ever been... ?

 

[Old Salt]

Do you think we're the most unruly beta test team there's ever been... ?

Unruly? Isn't that a requirement for beta testing?

 

[SweetSue]

Amy, being followed is just the terminology for subscribing, or at least that's what I assumed.

I'm missing that cute emoticon with the batting eyes. Lol! Can't believe how often I start to code it in.

Ok, on a more serious note, I was answering a message today and was trying to link posts from my class notes thread, but every time I left the compose page to go to another window to retrieve the link I lost everything I'd already added to my narrative after the second paragraph, which was when I left the page the first time.

Copying the links to another app and adding them from there to my original message broke the links. *sigh*

I worked it out by sending him three messages instead of one. I'm not sure what's behind this, but it would be nice if I could leave the message being composed to bring in other material. This was never a concern before. I typically have a dozen windows open on the site, and I'm usually working in all of them. Lol! If I'm asking for too much I'll understand, but it was possible up until now.

One other thing, we have no way to jump from one page to another by page number. I've had to backtrack or inch forward one page at a time. My study hall alone has 295 pages. You can imagine the frustration.

If these issues have been brought up already, forgive me for repeating them.

The emoticons spread joy all through the community. Thank you for that work.

 

[Amy Gardner]

Amy, being followed is just the terminology for subscribing, or at least that's what I assumed.

I'm missing that cute emoticon with the batting eyes. Lol! Can't believe how often I start to code it in.

One other thing, we have no way to jump from one page to another by page number. I've had to backtrack or inch forward one page at a time. My study hall alone has 295 pages. You can imagine the frustration.
The emoticons spread joy all through the community. Thank you for that work.

High Sue
Following means following a member (watching is the equivalent to subscribing). E.g., I am now following you - am curious to see how it functions. I get the idea that I’ll get an alert every time you do so much as scratch yourself somewhere on the forum!

Just keep coding in that emoti! It’s practically your signature and they’ll get it added eventually - especially now you’ve asked for it!

For page specific jumps, touch/click in the page number box and there’s an option to insert a page number.

The other thing - hopefully someone else can help. That sounds very frustrating, esp considering how you are called upon to assist people in this way so often.

 

[Amy Gardner]

So ‘following’ SweetSue simply added her to a following list that seems to be my old friends list (which was tiny, I never really did much with it). So that means anyone can ‘follow’ (‘friend’) anyone, whether that person wants to be followed by them or not. At least with friend requests one could be discerning and accept requests from those with whom we’re actually friendly with.
So far no alerts about what Sue is doing tho ...

 

[SweetSue]

It occurs to me that I could stop letting my threads get so long. The Study Hall presents challenges, but I'll give it my focus and see if I can lighten the load.

 

[SweetSue]

I'm right here beside you Amy. Lol!

Thanks for the tip on jumps. So....... many of our frustrations are because we're an impatient lot. I guess that means it's time for a breather.

 

[overlord]

I have followed everyone who is regular in the brix and some of the med threads including you Amy.
Like you I wondered what does this do, and so far nothing.

 

[SweetSue]

I just discovered the coolest feature.

I was composing on my iPhone and decided I wanted to do it on the iPad instead. I'd just started, only a couple sentences in, so I figured I'd just start all over.

When I opened the page in the iPad the composition I was work on was there waiting for me. Now that is a feature I can appreciate.

 

[Weaselcracker]

Yeah it's really amazing. You can start a post in a thread, or several threads, wander off wherever you want to gather info, and those incomplete posts will still be there waiting when you get back.
Pinch me I'm dreaming.

 

[Amy Gardner]

I know - it’s super hey!? It works going from mobile device to PC (desktop) and vice versa as well.

I’m spending some time now using the iPad for the first time on the new platform and it really is super. The image loading thing is still killing a few image heavy pages but we know that’s going to get sorted. But in general, the site looks really slick - in a good way - and images are sharp. Navigation and typing are better on the iPad then the phone for sure. It really does feel like a big step up in terms of the quality of the UI. And I really like that the views are similar - rather than the app being so wholly different to the desktop site. The app was convenient but I’m probably in the minority who would say it was pretty annoying really. As this settles in and we all get proficient with it it’s fast becoming superior. Streaking into the 21st Century we go!

So hey, @420 I know there’s precious little room on th phone screen, but is it possible to have navigation at the top as well as the bottom (like it is on the iPad)? (Not saying it should be a huge priority, but it would help - esp while Jump to view is still catching up).

And - some way of hanging the thread title to the top of the screen as you scroll down would be awesome, on all devices. The moments of “hang on, which friggin thread am I in” are happaening all the time. I know I mentioned it already but - just in case it was lost in the fray.

 

[SweetSue]

Hahaha! I thought it was just me Amy, and look at the number of threads I maintain. Lol! So many times I've had to jump to the top because I wasn't sure which thread I was in. We get around fast and sometimes I'm carrying on two conversations with the same member at the same time on two different threads.