Topic: Forum navigation back arrow

When I want to read the latest posts in the forum I usually use the "Latest Posts" list on the right side. A click on the topic loads the topic with the last post in the viewing area. If there have been several new posts since I was there the last time I have to scroll up (which is perfectly fine) or go to a previous page. Now a click on the previous page number or the left arrow "<<" always displays the top of the page. But usually the unread posts are at the bottom of the page.

Now my suggestion is to make the left arrow "<<" link to the last post of the previous page. I hope that is not too difficult to implement.

I thought of filing a bug report for that, but I'm not sure if the forum readers would like the change. And I assume a thread here would be read by more affected people than a bug report. I know that this will introduce some kind of inconsitency as the arrow will behave different from the page numbers. But I wouldn't change the behaviour of the page numbers because I think there it is wanted to have the first post of the page in view. Especially if the selected page number differs by more than 1 from the current one.

Maybe someone can tell how this is handled in other fora. I think widelands should behave like people are used to it.

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I think the "first unread post" thing wl-zocker suggested would be the best solution. Usually, this is done by having an extra "new" link beside the topic title.

I have spent time on lots of different forums and none of them go to the bottom of the page when hitting the back arrow.

Busy indexing nil values

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The "first unread post" would be the best solution.

The only concern I have is that is needs cookies and/or being logged in. As I usually try to avoid tracking mechanisms in the internet I only log in to a site if I need to (writing a post). And I delete cookies after I close the browser. But that's a special problem of my personal internet usage: privacy vs. convenience

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I would dearly love a "first unread post" feature like most forum software has.

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Let me explain how I read new posts:

Currently:

• I look at the latest posts and check which ones I have not yet read. Since I mostly use the same browser, I can easily see this because visited links are shown in a different color.
• I click on those links (Ctrl + LMB, which opens them in a new tab), and scroll upwards until I find the last read post (based on the date and time when I visited the forum last). This makes it sometimes necessary to go to the previous page, which is an extra click and some scrolling.
• Only if all entries are new, I go to forums, look for fora in which new posts have been made, then go to the last post of the threads which contain new posts (that little arrow the the right, after the poster's name) and search backwards for the last read post. I do not use this way if not really necessary because it involves three links, some scrolling, plus the search for the last read post.

Ideally:

• The section "New posts since your last login" (which replaces the "Latest posts") contains a link to the first unread post in every thread. It would be nice if the number was not restricted to five, but would adapt to the actual number of threads with new posts (so one link per thread, not per post).
• We could limit the number to ten (I suggest something greater than five) to prevent very long lists. If there are still more (e.g. because I was on vacation), there should be a link at the bottom "Show the whole list" (or whatever) which links to a wiki-like page. This number (ten) could also be the default value for users that are not logged in and have no cookies.
• By doing so, I would have everything with one click. It is not required anymore that I navigate to Forums and I would not have to scroll upwards anymore.

"Only few people know how much one has to know in order to know how little one knows." - Werner Heisenberg

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