The web interface could use a little work!

1. Tabs - I know that tabs are designed to move to different elements but you can override the default behavior and make life quite a bit easier for most people(since most people have access to a mouse).

http://stackoverflow.com/questions/3362/capturing-tab-key-in-text-box

2. When sending a thread, the page is refreshed and if it doesn't met the requirements, it requires input.

Instead, put some elements on the page, a few buttons that say things like "fix me" which will reduce the quote like it normally does, but does not require a page reload(which can be a few seconds sometimes and sometimes the site goes down in the middle).

Also, the captcha could be added the first time if it is required instead of requiring another page load for it to pop up.

3. D code highlighting!

Since this is a D coding forum and a lot of code is posted, it would be nice to have highlighting for it.

simply put:

any time a [Code] and [/Code] blocks are used(or whatever) the text between them is treated as D code and highlight and auto formated!

e.g.,

[Code]
import std.stdio;

void main()
{
   test
}
[/Code]


would show up properly as formatted code. It would not add much overhead and isn't ugly for non-compliant viewers.


Along with that, an [Img]url[/Img] could be added

[Url]http://forum.dlang.org/newpost/general[/Url]

etc..

Adding a button to disable these "features" would allow users to op-out.

Improving the quality of the forum and bringing it in to the modern era would be nice and this type of thing is a step in the right direction without requiring much work. (Seems it would just require someone spending the time to add a bit of JS code)



Oh, and this post: "Your post contains a suspicious keyword or character sequence. Please solve a CAPTCHA to continue."

Did I say a nasty word somewhere? Is someone gonna wash my mouth out with soap?

Also, If I get the captcha and get the answer wrong, I get a loop:

Your last post was less than 15 seconds ago. Please wait a few seconds before trying again.

Can't do anything but wait ;/ This punishes the law abiding citizens of dlang.org and wastes at least 15 seconds of their life for no reason and one still has to try a new captcha(even if the previous one was valid).

Seems like if one does a valid captcha it should reset and allow the next post to go through without issue.

On Tuesday, 31 January 2017 at 13:11:22 UTC, Profile Anaysis wrote:
> The web interface could use a little work!
>
> 1. Tabs - I know that tabs are designed to move to different elements but you can override the default behavior and make life quite a bit easier for most people(since most people have access to a mouse).
>
> http://stackoverflow.com/questions/3362/capturing-tab-key-in-text-box

Agreed as tabs are useful for code snippets and people not using a mouse (like myself) don't use tab to navigate anyway.

> 2. When sending a thread, the page is refreshed and if it doesn't met the requirements, it requires input.
>
> Instead, put some elements on the page, a few buttons that say things like "fix me" which will reduce the quote like it normally does, but does not require a page reload(which can be a few seconds sometimes and sometimes the site goes down in the middle).

Why not, there is value in this.

> Also, the captcha could be added the first time if it is required instead of requiring another page load for it to pop up.

I don't want to spend my life solving captchas, the current system is good enough as it is.

> 3. D code highlighting!
>
> Since this is a D coding forum and a lot of code is posted, it would be nice to have highlighting for it.
>
> simply put:
>
> any time a [Code] and [/Code] blocks are used(or whatever) the text between them is treated as D code and highlight and auto formated!
>
> e.g.,
>
> [Code]
> import std.stdio;
>
> void main()
> {
>    test
> }
> [/Code]
>
>
> would show up properly as formatted code. It would not add much overhead and isn't ugly for non-compliant viewers.
>
>
> Along with that, an [Img]url[/Img] could be added
>
> [Url]http://forum.dlang.org/newpost/general[/Url]
>
> etc..
>
> Adding a button to disable these "features" would allow users to op-out.

That's not really the issue, the thing is this is not a forum, or not only. It's actually an interface to a mailing list and many people only use the mail so that provides only noise for them and specific formatting would have to be applied when displaying the message through the web interface... Not impossible of course but it's work.

> Improving the quality of the forum and bringing it in to the modern era would be nice and this type of thing is a step in the right direction without requiring much work. (Seems it would just require someone spending the time to add a bit of JS code)
>
>
>
> Oh, and this post: "Your post contains a suspicious keyword or character sequence. Please solve a CAPTCHA to continue."
>
> Did I say a nasty word somewhere? Is someone gonna wash my mouth out with soap?
>
> Also, If I get the captcha and get the answer wrong, I get a loop:
>
> Your last post was less than 15 seconds ago. Please wait a few seconds before trying again.
>
> Can't do anything but wait ;/ This punishes the law abiding citizens of dlang.org and wastes at least 15 seconds of their life for no reason and one still has to try a new captcha(even if the previous one was valid).

No, it doesn't punish the law abiding citizens, it punishes very lightly the fools who couldn't solve a captcha designed to be straigth forward. Just get it right dude, the captcha is there for a reason.

> Seems like if one does a valid captcha it should reset and allow the next post to go through without issue.

If that post you just wrote had be reset because of a typo in the captcha you would have lost way more than 15s of work to type it back from memory. The system is good as it is.

On Tuesday, 31 January 2017 at 13:11:22 UTC, Profile Anaysis wrote:
> The web interface could use a little work!
>
> 1. Tabs - I know that tabs are designed to move to different elements but you can override the default behavior and make life quite a bit easier for most people(since most people have access to a mouse).

That would be a regression in accessibility. At least, I use tabs to navigate website forms.

> http://stackoverflow.com/questions/3362/capturing-tab-key-in-text-box

This solution is an ugly kludge. Sorry, but I will not be implementing this. I would suggest against using tabs in Internet messages anyway, as the way they are displayed highly depends on the user agent.

> Instead, put some elements on the page, a few buttons that say things like "fix me" which will reduce the quote like it normally does, but does not require a page reload(which can be a few seconds sometimes and sometimes the site goes down in the middle).

Page load times should be almost always instant. Unfortunately, the server the forum is running on has been experiencing high load lately, due to it also hosting some D CI systems. I'm looking into this.

> Also, the captcha could be added the first time if it is required instead of requiring another page load for it to pop up.

Whether or not a CAPTCHA challenge should be displayed cannot be determined before the user submits their post.

> 3. D code highlighting!

Some Markdown formatting is planned for the next major update.

> Oh, and this post: "Your post contains a suspicious keyword or character sequence. Please solve a CAPTCHA to continue."
>
> Did I say a nasty word somewhere? Is someone gonna wash my mouth out with soap?

The suspicious character sequence in your post was:

> [Url]http://forum.dlang.org/newpost/general[/Url]

This syntax does nothing on these forums, but many spammers attempt to use it anyway when spamming links to their websites. For this reason, it always triggers a CAPTCHA.

> Also, If I get the captcha and get the answer wrong, I get a loop:
>
> Your last post was less than 15 seconds ago. Please wait a few seconds before trying again.

This should now be improved.

> Seems like if one does a valid captcha it should reset and allow the next post to go through without issue.

No, because then someone could write a solver for the CAPTCHAs, and be able to flood the forum without any rate restrictions.

On Tuesday, 31 January 2017 at 14:56:32 UTC, cym13 wrote:
> That's not really the issue, the thing is this is not a forum, or not only. It's actually an interface to a mailing list and many people only use the mail so that provides only noise for

Well, there's a few possibilities.. my preference would be to just send the content through unchanged to us on email, or even using MIME attachments would work.

> No, it doesn't punish the law abiding citizens, it punishes very lightly the fools who couldn't solve a captcha designed to be straigth forward. Just get it right dude, the captcha is there for a reason.

The captcha is very annoying to me almost every time I use the web interface. I can solve them almost literally at a glance every time... then I trigger the flood protection and basically just get locked out for a bit!

Not a deal breaker, but I agree it is kinda annoying. If you just solved the captcha successfully, I think the flood protection should be bypassed for the next post.

On Tuesday, 31 January 2017 at 15:35:16 UTC, Adam D. Ruppe wrote:
> On Tuesday, 31 January 2017 at 14:56:32 UTC, cym13 wrote:
>> That's not really the issue, the thing is this is not a forum, or not only. It's actually an interface to a mailing list and many people only use the mail so that provides only noise for
>
> Well, there's a few possibilities.. my preference would be to just send the content through unchanged to us on email, or even using MIME attachments would work.

I wish I could use "Content-type: text/markdown" without breaking Gmail etc.

>> No, it doesn't punish the law abiding citizens, it punishes very lightly the fools who couldn't solve a captcha designed to be straigth forward. Just get it right dude, the captcha is there for a reason.
>
> The captcha is very annoying to me almost every time I use the web interface. I can solve them almost literally at a glance every time... then I trigger the flood protection and basically just get locked out for a bit!

Sorry about that. I was going to fix this during the next major upgrade, but since it became a frequent complaint, I went and fixed it yesterday (to use M-attempts-per-N-time instead of a single timeout).

On Wednesday, 1 February 2017 at 07:46:03 UTC, Vladimir Panteleev wrote:
> I wish I could use "Content-type: text/markdown" without breaking Gmail etc.

Yeah. You could do multipart/alternative with the markdown in text/plain and a rendered version in text/html though. Personally, I don't think that's worth it (I have my mail client configured that if I get forced a html email, I just convert it back to a markdown-looking plain text anyway), and Walter has complained about the bloat of alternative formats before.

On Wednesday, 1 February 2017 at 14:18:56 UTC, Adam D. Ruppe wrote:
> On Wednesday, 1 February 2017 at 07:46:03 UTC, Vladimir Panteleev wrote:
>> I wish I could use "Content-type: text/markdown" without breaking Gmail etc.
>
> Yeah. You could do multipart/alternative with the markdown in text/plain and a rendered version in text/html though. Personally, I don't think that's worth it (I have my mail client configured that if I get forced a html email, I just convert it back to a markdown-looking plain text anyway), and Walter has complained about the bloat of alternative formats before.

Markdown for syntax highlighting is really convenient.

On Tuesday, 31 January 2017 at 15:21:42 UTC, Vladimir Panteleev wrote:
> On Tuesday, 31 January 2017 at 13:11:22 UTC, Profile Anaysis wrote:
>> The web interface could use a little work!
>>
>> 1. Tabs - I know that tabs are designed to move to different elements but you can override the default behavior and make life quite a bit easier for most people(since most people have access to a mouse).
>
> That would be a regression in accessibility. At least, I use tabs to navigate website forms.

Then make it optional. Simple as that. The best of both worlds... everyone is happy instead of just you. Most people do not use tab to navigate through controls but use the mouse. Basically it is a JS fix on the client side. A simple button and cookie setting should do it.


>
>> http://stackoverflow.com/questions/3362/capturing-tab-key-in-text-box
>
> This solution is an ugly kludge. Sorry, but I will not be implementing this. I would suggest against using tabs in Internet messages anyway, as the way they are displayed highly depends on the user agent.

this has nothing to do with real tabs but with the interface.

Every time I go to hit tab it takes me to the send button and if I hit space then it posts. This is not good.

By simply having the tab insert tabs or spaces instead of tabbing to a control would be much better and more in line with a coding forum. Even SO does this.

it has nothing to do with anyone that views the reply but on the user interface side of things. If you don't like tab characters then use spaces for the tab key instead. It is equivalent to me having to hit space 4 times anyways and no one on the other end would know the difference.

In fact, I'd rather you completely disable the tab key if you are not going to have to insert tab/spaces in to the document. They way it goes to send and the fact that we can't edit posts makes it much more dangerous for making incomplete posts.

>
>> Instead, put some elements on the page, a few buttons that say things like "fix me" which will reduce the quote like it normally does, but does not require a page reload(which can be a few seconds sometimes and sometimes the site goes down in the middle).
>
> Page load times should be almost always instant. Unfortunately, the server the forum is running on has been experiencing high load lately, due to it also hosting some D CI systems. I'm looking into this.
>
>> Also, the captcha could be added the first time if it is required instead of requiring another page load for it to pop up.
>
> Whether or not a CAPTCHA challenge should be displayed cannot be determined before the user submits their post.

>> 3. D code highlighting!
>
> Some Markdown formatting is planned for the next major update.
>

Cool...


>> Oh, and this post: "Your post contains a suspicious keyword or character sequence. Please solve a CAPTCHA to continue."
>>
>> Did I say a nasty word somewhere? Is someone gonna wash my mouth out with soap?
>
> The suspicious character sequence in your post was:
>
>> [Url]http://forum.dlang.org/newpost/general[/Url]
>
> This syntax does nothing on these forums, but many spammers attempt to use it anyway when spamming links to their websites. For this reason, it always triggers a CAPTCHA.
>
>> Also, If I get the captcha and get the answer wrong, I get a loop:
>>
>> Your last post was less than 15 seconds ago. Please wait a few seconds before trying again.
>
> This should now be improved.

Thanks. That seems to be the biggest annoyance.

>
>> Seems like if one does a valid captcha it should reset and allow the next post to go through without issue.
>
> No, because then someone could write a solver for the CAPTCHAs, and be able to flood the forum without any rate restrictions.

No, because it only happens once. This is to prevent the captcha from acting on the same msg, not different ones.

If I solve a captch for MSG X it should always be solved, not require me to re do it for other things that reset it. It says nothing about MSG Y and hence nothing about flooding(wouldn't change anything in that respect). By "next post" meant the same msg, but one that that required something else like a "fix quote or whatever".

What I'm saying doesn't make anyone's life better but a real human being. I have replied to a thread, solved the captcha, only to be told that I need to fix the something or wait 15 seconds, then have to resolve, and the process repeats... for no good reason. If I can solve the captcha once I can do it again.

And after all, the captcha are easily solvable, copy code in to compiler, get result. Someone could write one pretty easily if they wanted.

On Wednesday, 1 February 2017 at 15:21:38 UTC, Profile Anaysis wrote:
> everyone is happy instead of just you.

You are being overly presumptuous.

> Every time I go to hit tab it takes me to the send button and if I hit space then it posts.

If it's not a problem for Gmail and StackOverflow, it's not a problem for DFeed.

> This is not good.

The opposite is true. It is the expected behavior of any well-behaved web form.

> Even SO does this.

No, it does not. (At least, not in the web form for posting messages, which is what this conversation is about.)

On Wednesday, 1 February 2017 at 15:21:38 UTC, Profile Anaysis wrote:
> Then make it optional. Simple as that.

It is a JS fix on the client side, there's nothing stopping yo from just doing it yourself on your browser.


> In fact, I'd rather you completely disable the tab key if you

I use tab+enter to finish my posts all the time.

One minor change though might be to make the next item be Preview instead of Send. So if you tab+enter, it previews so you have a chance to proofread and edit again before actually sending.

In fact, I think we should encourage people to preview and proofread regardless. On phpbb back in the day, I'd *always* preview before posting because it was the first choice on tab, so it was natural, very little friction, and a logical next step.

So that'd fix your problem and encourage users to make better posts regardless. Then make save next on the list, so you'd tab+tab to send when confirmed.