The Fixins
While we're dealing with house business and waiting for the returns tonight, let me update you on the latest things that should now be working on the site and what's up next. I know things are taking longer than we'd thought, so thanks for your patience. Believe me, we can't wait for it to all be working.
Fixes after the break.
First, the things that are fixed.
Users should no longer have problems being logged out mid-session. This was a really frustrating glitch for a lot of us, but we were able to both change the cookie settings and our tech folks came up with a nice tweak where if you do write a post and aren't signed in it generates a sign in and saves the text.
Users should now experience almost no lag time between when they comment and when the comment goes on the site. This will vary somewhat depending on the load on our servers, but it should never me more than a minute or two now and will usually be just a few seconds.
Also, our tech folks have been going through user accounts that have had trouble generating new passwords one by one to fix them. It seems like the problem is often a result of emails being sorted into spam or folks submitting multiple requests. If you are experiencing this still, or do in the future, don't hesitate to email tpmbugs at gmail dot com.
Next, reader blog archives from the old site are in the process of being transfered over. I know it's been far too long and I'm sorry about that. It's been frankly an absurd process that should someday be made into some sort of screwball comedy for tech nerds, but it's really happening now, I swear.
Also, all bylines on reader posts should now be showing and your recent comments and posts on your profiles should be correctly ordered. If yours aren't, or you see someone else's that aren't, please email tpmbugs at gmail dot com.
That should cover the major outstanding bugs. If you see something we're missing, let us know.
Once we finish this, our development priorities are: 1. creating a page where each of you can track your conversations by seeing each comment that is posted as a response to a post or comment you put up, 2. improve the interface for reader blogging so that you can post html and video and edit and delete your posts once they're up, and 3. creating a "flag" button so that you can let us know if you think someone's posted something that violates community rules against abusive behavior.
What are we missing?
Again, I know this has been slower than all of us have wanted so thanks for your patience. Let us know what else we can do.
Thanks for the update. "Latest Comments" is working fine, and serves as my tracking of topics of interest.
April 22, 2008 8:11 PM | Reply | Permalink
Posts like this one are much appreciated. Let us hope the promised fixes are truly forthcoming!
April 22, 2008 8:16 PM | Reply | Permalink
Thanks for the updates. I wasn't around for the old TPM but the comments appearing immediately is just about the best thing ever.
April 22, 2008 8:28 PM | Reply | Permalink
Is the TPMbugs Gmail account a forever thing?
And yes, you really have made a lot of improvements, much as I still miss TPMCafeClassic
April 22, 2008 8:33 PM | Reply | Permalink
It goes straight to our tech folks. In the long-run, though, you can always email me (andrew at tpm) or the help line (help at tpm).
April 22, 2008 8:40 PM | Reply | Permalink
Thanks for the post. This is not a complaint - heck, we don't pay anything for this - but is there a "preview" option in our future? I'm kind of Special Needs when it comes to html tags.
Thanks
April 22, 2008 8:41 PM | Reply | Permalink
For comments or blog posts? Or both?
April 22, 2008 8:48 PM | Reply | Permalink
See comment below. But since you asked, both, I guess. And while we're on the subject, I'm more of a fan of previews than edits.
Proofread and live with it, that's my motto, even though I've wanted to reconsider that motto a few times.
I have a feeling a lot of people will be saying things like, "What incendiary comment? I haven't the foggiest."
April 22, 2008 8:59 PM | Reply | Permalink
Well, we used to be able to preview both comments and blog posts. We also used to be able to edit both after pub. Any chance of those features returning?
April 22, 2008 10:24 PM | Reply | Permalink
OT, what does that 65 Clinton 35 Obama split mean with 1% reporting?
April 22, 2008 8:42 PM | Reply | Permalink
Nothing.
April 22, 2008 8:49 PM | Reply | Permalink
Duh. I guess "Edit" will take care of it.
As you were.
April 22, 2008 8:44 PM | Reply | Permalink
You are missing a color, or other indication of previously read comments. This was a nice feature of the old site, and so I know it is possible. It is really nice when you have a long thread that people come back to frequently.
Thanks! jAN
April 22, 2008 9:24 PM | Reply | Permalink
Thank you, Thank you, THANK YOU! I thought it wuz me!
April 22, 2008 9:27 PM | Reply | Permalink
Thanks, Andrew. This is a great update.
One question, and I'm not even sure if anyone has mentioned it. Is there any work being planned to fix the ability to see older posts and comments? Not the archived stuff from the old database. I'm talking about current posts and comments. As it is, it seems we can only access the last 10 blog posts, and last 15 comments on the "Your Profile", or "Your Blog" page. There are no links to see anything past that.
Plus, I seem to be missing my last three blog posts on my "Your Blog" link. My last one is listed as February 11th, 2008.
April 22, 2008 10:24 PM | Reply | Permalink
Thanks for the update Andrew.
April 22, 2008 10:44 PM | Reply | Permalink
Is it too late to bring back the old site?
Just kidding (but you did ask).
April 22, 2008 11:25 PM | Reply | Permalink
Remind me again: What problem was being addressed by the change?
April 23, 2008 8:05 AM | Reply | Permalink
Lots of improvements, but the problem is that the site is just to small. Since everything is now just 1/2 wide, it's hard to tell the flow of the comments.
But that's poor site design, not technical stuff. Assuming what you are working on is successful that should address all the major problems but one: rating comments.
April 23, 2008 4:08 AM | Reply | Permalink
Repeating a prior question to Josh, will you resurrect the internal messaging system? (which on at least one occasion that I know of made it possible for Steve Clemons to include TPM readers on a conference call with Bryzinski and Hamilton, among others, on pretty short notice.)
April 23, 2008 8:02 AM | Reply | Permalink
I second the internal messaging system. Wasn't it once possible to contact individual members directly on the site?
April 23, 2008 8:49 AM | Reply | Permalink
Yes, which made it easier for people to be open to communication through a channel which did not have to compete with or expose an email address.
Of course, most of the features that appear to be in the "new build" could be had for free as appendages to a pimped out Myspace page...I'm jus' sayin'...
April 23, 2008 9:16 AM | Reply | Permalink
I want internal messaging back too.
April 23, 2008 9:25 AM | Reply | Permalink
I'm tired of having to try and flirt with *Ellen in the public square...
*Ellen's avatar, actually..or maybe her real eye, hey, you never know...
April 23, 2008 10:28 AM | Reply | Permalink
Thanks Andrew and Crew.
April 23, 2008 12:42 PM | Reply | Permalink
I hope we'll be getting both a preview and an editing function soon along with something like the old Rich Text Editor for individual posts. I'm having a helluva time trying to put everything into proper html format. It's frustrating enough to try to do it in the first place, but doubly so when it's not possible to correct the errors when the text turns out goofy, as it so frequently does.
And I also agree with those who've requested a private messaging system like we had at the old site, and for that matter, some way of accessing all one's old PMs, which disappeared with the change over.
You may find that our requests will continue until you've finally created with the new site a reasonable facimile of the old site. Sorry...we really did love the old TPM. Still, your efforts are appreciated, Andrew, as are these updates.
April 23, 2008 2:01 PM | Reply | Permalink
Am I correct about what I suspect from what you have said on the following:
That with the improvements, we will still only be able to see ONLY the last 10 comments by each user?
What about Blog entries? Are we going to be able to access all of them by author's name?
I know you have all of the Contributor's Blog Entries loaded on the server, because I have found them both by Googling and that they are loaded by date under "Reader Blog archives." But one cannot access them by clicking on the author's name, this traditional forum software feature is not working here. For example, when you click on M.J. Rosenberg's page, you only get his last 10 posts. When you click on "View Talk posts" at the bottom of his last 10 list, you get
The user blog archive for both the Contributors and the Reader Bloggers, once loaded, is simply not very useful if it is to stay this way, if there is no access by author's name.
I think bloggers will be quite upset when they finally discover this if this is going to be the case. Right now many are interested in "current breaking" and are not paying attention to whether their past publication here is accessible. But that will change, especially for the ones who have done the best and/or most popular posts, and I predict you will hear many complaints.
Todd Gitlin tried to refer to one of his own old posts here in one of his recent posts. I, just a reader, had to explain to him that it is no longer accessible at the same url, and that it would take time to find the new url for it if it is indeed still here, that he would have to go searching "Reader Blog archives" by date or try to see if Google had found it again in new spider searches. In my opinion, this is not a very wise way to treat authors--their work should at least be accessible by user name, all the way back to when they began posting. At minimum, the posts, if not comments.
April 23, 2008 4:43 PM | Reply | Permalink
p.s. I mention the Todd Gitlin example because I think it is pretty outrageous that he has to hear that from a commenter and that front page contributors are not aware of the situation, that everything they have written here in the past has basically been moved to a place difficult to access.
April 23, 2008 4:46 PM | Reply | Permalink
Details section on Profile page. This became limited recently to 300 or so characters. No idea what the problem was, but I'd like to see it the way it was before -- I'm assuming there was no limit -- or with the limit substantially raised. Thanks.
April 23, 2008 7:12 PM | Reply | Permalink
No idea how feasible this would be, but what would be really useful is a way to filter out commenters I'd as soon not see at all, except for perhaps a note indicating they'd posted something. Like the killfile ("blocked senders list") I use in Outlook Express for newsgroups.
April 23, 2008 7:29 PM | Reply | Permalink