Threads already read question

[roadranger]

Is there any way to get the threads you've already read in a forum to 'dim out' so you can tell at a glance where you've already been??



Thanks for any help.

 

[Steve St.Laurent]

That isn't an option in vBulletin. What it does do is put the down arrow next to the subject area on messages that are new since the last time you were logged on. If you click on that down arrow it will take you straight to the first new post on that thread.



-Steve St. Laurent

Webmaster

 

[roadranger]

OK, I get it...

Kinda like DC and the crew cab issue.



This feature is offered on all the other forums,

but you just can't get it HERE.

 

[Steve St.Laurent]

I beg to differ with you. That options is not available on all other forums. It isn't available on vBulletin and there are a lot of vBulletin forums out there. I didn't write the software, I just try to make it work the best I can with what they provide. There are pluses and minuses to every forum package out there and when they were looked at in the past (we were on UBB originally, and switched to vBulletin) it was decided that vBulletin had the best overall features for our use. I've also installed quite a few hacks to improve it even more. Here is a link to the vBulletin support site where many webmasters are requesting this and an explanation why it isn't feasible: http://www.vbulletin.com/forum/showthread.php?threadid=49868&highlight=unread . Here is a quote from one of the vBulletin developers:

The shear amount of data that needs to be stored to do this doesn't really make this feasible... Each row in the table (with indexes) would take up approximately 28 bytes (based off the searchindex which has a similar schema) and that records a read for one thread for one user. When you have 10,000+ users or 1,000,000+ threads, that adds up *very* quickly.

On our system right now that would take up 14 GB and that would increase with every single thread and every single user. On top of that every time a thread was posted to 12,561 records (the current number of users on the system) would have to be edited to show that as an unread thread again for all the users. That would slow the system WAY down.



-Steve

 

[Dave MacArthur]

Steve,



Is there a tutorial on how to use the forum features? I looked at the f. a. q. but didn't see everything. I would like a more detailed explanation of the new posts arrow. If I get it right; The down arrow means I have read the post before and now there are new posts since the last time I logged on. No arrow means no new posts (if I have read the post before) or that I have never looked at that post. Is this correct?



Thanks again for all the hard work; it's appreciated,



Dave

 

[Steve St.Laurent]

That's all there is right now, that's the FAQ that is bundled with vBulletin. When I'm looking around at other vBulletin sites (I do that to get ideas for ours) I'll keep my eyes open for a more complete FAQ. If I can't find one I'll try to add some things to the existing one. One of my weaknesses is writing documention though, even for my own programming projects, so no promises .