Who's online list timeout changed

[Steve St.Laurent]

We have changed the timeout on the who's online list to an hour and a half to be consistent with competitors. We have had it at 30 minutes which is an accepted industry practice all along but that causes problems with comparing traffic levels for the average user. This change will make comparisons more accurate for people looking at us.



-Steve St. Laurent

Webmaster

 

[HeavyHauler]

Is this why it's taking my "View New Posts" list so long to refresh? I could usually scroll through them all and then come back shortly and it would be refreshed. Mine's still showing posts from last night and I've been back and forth to the site all morning - pretty irritating.

 

[Steve St.Laurent]

It shouldn't be showing ones from last night unless you checked into the site within an hour and a half all night long. I do have the cookie timeout set to the same hour and a half for right now because I wanted to see what the response would be. We have gotten a number of complaints from people that 30 minutes wasn't long enough - that they'd go away for coffee and come back and their list was reset. I'm going to gauge how it works at this setting and may turn that back down. Myself I'm in and out all day long so my list almost never refreshes (as in old ones dropping off). But I usually have a good idea of when I was last at the site and just stop reading when I get to that time.



BTW, you are click on "view new posts" again to refresh your list right? If you just keep your list up on screen and click refresh on your browser it will not refresh the list - that list is saved when you do the search and isn't updated until you do another view new posts.

 

[HeavyHauler]

Hey Steve - I think what's happening is that I viewed the new posts this morning and since then I've checked in every hour and a half (I do nothing at work ) So now I'm stuck with all 155 of them until I wait 1. 5 hours so it will timeout. I'd love to have the timer turned back down some but I guess whatever works for everyone else will be fine.



And yes, I always hit "View New Posts" under Discussion Forums.



Thanks for the response.

 

[Steve St.Laurent]

Or you can scroll down to the bottom of any of the pages and click on "Mark Forums Read" which will reset it at that point.

 

[HeavyHauler]

Ahhh ha! Excellent tip Steve - now I can handle that! LOL, I always wondered what that button would do. :-laf

 

[Joe G.]

Steve,



Is this change the cause of the bold text in the thread titles staying on for hours? If it is I would sure like you to put it back like it was. I thought the bold text titles were to indicated new posts since the last time I logged on. I've been on several times this morning and posts from seven am are still bold. It's afternoon now. I, for one, could care less if our current user count is consistant with the "competitors". Especially, if I really don't know which posts are new when I log on without a bunch of fooling around.

 

[Steve St.Laurent]

As I said above Joe:

I do have the cookie timeout set to the same hour and a half for right now because I wanted to see what the response would be. We have gotten a number of complaints from people that 30 minutes wasn't long enough - that they'd go away for coffee and come back and their list was reset. I'm going to gauge how it works at this setting and may turn that back down.

I'm listening to the input from the users and gauging whether more like it at the hour and a half timeout or the 30 minute timeout. Also, as I mentioned above you can click on "mark all forums read" at the bottom of any page which will show all current posts as read.

 

[HeavyHauler]

I'm still for changing it back to 30 min and agree with Joe, but I can put up with the Mark Forums Read thing if I have to. It's still pretty irritating when I forget though.

 

[Steve St.Laurent]

I have both your votes counted

 

[Steve St.Laurent]

I've reset the cookie timeout to 30 minutes. The who's online list remains at an hour and a half.