New Format Sucks!

babowa wrote:

Topher Kessler wrote:

What "like" feature? There's the little thumbs-up button at the bottom of each posting already, if that's what you mean.

I read in another thread that this "thumbs up" = "like" will be implemented at some point to show the most popular posters in all windows (the more likes = the more popular). That is what I was referring to; right now, indicating that I liked your post does nothing (except to show that I liked it). If it does result in names being splashed somewhere showing that so-and-so is "popular", I will re-visit my decision to participate. I don't need or want a Facebook like atmosphere in a tech forum.

It's implemented already:

But as you can see it's popular content not posters.

A yes. I though I was referring to that when I replied to babowa earlier. I personally wouldnt care at all for an effort to make certain individuals be "more popular" than others (like having more friends, or something), but do think that a message rating of sorts would be good, to give that specific reply or response more of a thumbs up than others, so it will help folks find it if needed.

I think I got confused by babowa's description of it as "popular posters," which I somehow read as "popular posts"...

Colin,

I see what you mean (unfortunately). I'm not even going to ask how that is determined (I don't want to know). Hopefully that is a widget one can get rid of (just like the top posters which can't be deleted). And, at least, in my case, the "top liked content" does not represent anything I like - it is showing some iPod or iPad thread which I've never visited since I don't own either one of those.

T. Kessler,

I personally wouldnt care at all for an effort to make certain individuals be "more popular" than others (like having more friends, or something),

Your statement surprises me somewhat after having read some of your other posts (i.e. liking the social networking site atmosphere) in a positive way.

In looking back on it I think I misunderstood you. I like the idea of building "Popular Answers" and promoting them on this site, and as such see many of the tools that social sites use as applicable in doing that, but limiting the scope to being for questions and solutions, and not for boosting an individual's popularity. Frankly I dont think anyone here (including Apple) cares about who's a popular person with more likes and items on his "wall"...etc. I dont see that in the current design, and dont see things progressing that way at all.

I like the tools like having a personal homepage (which is in a way similar to social networking sites) but enjoy that the idea is to promote questions and anwers and other tech help rather than social status. Now whether or not they're successfull at this or have the potential to be seems to currently be the biggest question here, but I think the idea is to falls in line with tech help, and not who's who (though there is a little bit more of that than before, but it appears to be easily ignorable).

One possiblilty I see in the "People like you" option is that if you need to find answers on tasks and items you do, then you could root out a specific person who's answers might be helpful to you. If I'm a server admin and see in the "people like you" list that there are three other folks who deploy similar services as myself, then I could choose to follow their postings to hopefully learn more and get more involved with the discussion.

I imagine that's the more focused goal of the "social atmosphere" here, instead of it being a superficial schoolyard status ranking of individuals.

OT:

What the H E double hockey sticks

I know that you are upset right now, but I have to say I had never heard that expression and find it absolutely and positively priceless. I have added it to my repertoire (with your permission)...

😁

Topher Kessler wrote:

I think Apple's tutorials for using the site are quite thorough enough, and they're quite easy to locate.

They're inadequate. Every one of the eight I see deals with details. There's nothing that gives an overview of how the site works. There's nothing that defines the terms the site uses (document, announcement, widget, etc.).

Topher Kessler wrote:

I can see where having multiple discussions going can be tricky to manage, especially if you are a regular contributor.

Precisely. In the old scheme I posted perhaps 10 messages a day. I didn't use e-mail notifications for those. Instead I would scan "My Posts" in batches of hundreds for any that had a reply. In 10 minutes I could scan all 7000+ of my posts. Now in "Your Discussions" I only see about 100 of my posts, in no obvious order, and they all appear to be flagged as "unread", even those that are years old.

Precisely. In the old scheme I posted perhaps 10 messages a day. I didn't use e-mail notifications for those. Instead I would scan "My Posts" in batches of hundreds for any that had a reply. In 10 minutes I could scan all 7000+ of my posts. Now in "Your Discussions" I only see about 100 of my posts, in no obvious order, and they all appear to be flagged as "unread", even those that are years old.

Couldn't have said it better myself; I'd post anywhere from 3 - 15 and although I haven't been posting a lot because I've been wasting most of my free time on trying to figure out the new UI, there is no way I can remember all of those threads or find them again......

And, it appears that I've lost all of my 80+ subscriptions and have to assume that they are somewhere in cyberspace, but not in any list I can find, so they are lost to me. Apologies to anyone waiting for an actual additional suggestion or answer.

The "Welcome" tutorial does this. This is the one that's linked to by the big blue "How it Works" button at the top of the initial discussions page; however, I guess it depends on specifically what you're looking for.

You can count me as one of the two steps forwards, 42 steps backwards observers... just as OSX has been itself. 🙂

Topher Kessler wrote:

The "Welcome" tutorial does this.

That tutorial does give a quick overview, but doesn't address my specific comment: "There's nothing that defines the terms the site uses (document, announcement, widget, etc.)." Near the end of that tutorial is a section titled "Personalize your experience" that mentions "Use widgets ..." But it doesn't describe what widgets are and nowhere have I found anything that describes how to work with widgets.

Edit: I did find some material on managing widgets in the tutorial "Personalizing your experience". I'll have to read that again to see if it helps me.

My biggest problem with the new format is it is incredibly difficult for me to find new content in discussions I'm trying to follow.

For example, my home page told me that this discussion had new activity so I clicked on the link to it. That took me to an undefined page of this discussion (no page number highlighted) which turned out to be neither the first nor the last one. As best as I can tell, that page did not have any new content. Even when I click on the "Latest Post" link at the top of every page it doesn't take me to the page the latest post is on but instead right back to the undefined page.

Where the in-line reply box pops up has become increasingly unpredictable as well -- sometimes it is immediately below the reply I am trying to respond to & sometimes it isn't even on the same page. I now often have to use the quote tool just to see the content of that post, & I have learned the hard way that I can't page back to other replies without losing my reply in progress.

Basically, as long as the entire discussion fits on one page the new format is at least manageable if far from ideal, but as soon as the discussion breaks into multiple pages it becomes ridiculously hard to deal with.