Is it possible to have the same functionality here on the support forums as NaNoWriMo has for its discussion forums of deselecting some of the forums so the user never sees them? Over on NaNoWriM for example I set my account to quietly ignore the Word Wards forum (as it has no interest for me). The same feature here would be useful too. I could ignore the Windows and Linux forums because as a Mac user those other platforms have no interest for me either. And not being a beta-tester there isn’t much point in my accessing the Beta Testing (Mac) forum either.
Just created an account so I could take a quick look. I’m not sure what software they use but it doesn’t really look like phpBB. Used my GoogleFu and I found this:
“The forums have been around since 2002 and originally ran on PhpBB. The tech team used Xoops and later Drupal for the forum software. As of 2011, the site and forums now operate on Ruby on Rails.”
Although I too am a Mac user, I do read all the forums and contribute occasionally. Often, I merely look at the titles of posts in the Windows Technical Support and only look at those that I might be able to contribute to or which might be of interest. I then mark the rest as read from the button at the top of the page.
If you really have no interest in anything other than those you mention, I suggest you just look at them and then use the “Mark as read” button at the top of the Board Index page, which will remove the highlights from all the rest. I used to do that with the OmniGroup forums, but they’ve moved to “Discourse”, and I loathe it, find it much more cumbersome, requiring many more clicks, and hideous to look at.
Mr X
That’s what I do at the moment but the presence of the red flag for unread material in forums that I have no use for causes me cognitive problems. I’ve Meares Irlen Syndrome amongst other components of dyslexia and these red things are distracting and intrusive (just like the animated smilies I can see in my peripheral vision as I type this). That there’s a red indicator for the forums I do access isn’t a problem because I can clear that quickly by reading relevant material. But having dealt with all the useful stuff the red indicators for irrelevant stuff remain and increase my cognitive load. “I know I read all the useful posts why are there still red indicators present!”
I do not read the Windows or Linux forums; I have nothing to contribute. If there is a bug common to all versions that will appear (probably already appeared) in the Mac forum. If there is a bug in the WIndows or Linux version that is not going to affect my Mac Scrivener usage one jot. I haven’t used the Windows version at all (I don’t own a machine with Windows on it and the only time I do use one is on client sites were installing third-party/unauthorised software—no matter how useful—is strictly forbidden and a contract termination event) neither have I used the Linux one because all my Linux machines provide (headless) server functions. Therefore anything I wrote in Scrivener for Windows/Linux forums would be misleading or more likely baiting and flame warish.
I know that; I too have looked at their forum software copyright. That they once used phpBB isn’t the issue. The difference in user-level functionality is.
I don’t think there’s an option for anything like this in PHPBB, although we can look to see if there’s a mod available when we get chance. We’re very busy with code and testing at the moment, though, so it will be a while before we get chance to look. By the way, the “Beta Testing” forum is for everyone - it provides links to the latest public betas so that anyone can test them. Private beta-testing is all done off-forum.
I’m not well versed in phpBB, but try this.
Set up a “Can’t See Windows Forums” usergroup - allow users to self select membership.
Set the permissions on that group to All NEVER for the Windows forums.
Repeat as needed for Linux and/or other areas.
I tested this in the phpBB live Demo and it seemed to work - YMMV of course.
There would need to be a group per forum and per forum collection. In my example I’d want all the WIndows and Linux support forums for Scrivener hidden but for the Scapple forums only the Windows sub-forum. (And likewise for its Bug hunt and Beta forums.) Others might want Mac-specific forums and sub-forums hidden. There may even be users who want the Hot Cocoa, Reading, Writing, and Coffee forums to be hidden too. If phpBB usergroups could provide this wish that would be really useful.
Bumping this. There has been an update to the forum software since I last asked but my desire (to suppress irrelevant forums) has not changed so asking again whether it would be possible to have some way to remove forums for users. The only alteration is I would like to add the Scapple forums to my list; I have a licence for it but I don’t use it.
Not quite what you asked for, but you can accomplish this indirectly with a javascript bookmarklet.
For example, a bookmark containing the following minified code, if invoked on the forum index page, will suppress the Scriv for Windows and Scriv on Linux subforums as well as the entire Scapple forum.
javascript:for(var%20targetForums=["Scapple"],targetSubforums=["Scrivener%20for%20Windows","Scrivener%20on%20Linux%20(Unofficial)"],forumOptOut=!0,forumTestDepth=7,subforumTestDepth=4,nodes=document.getElementsByClassName("forabg"),i=0;i<nodes.length;i++){for(var%20testNode=nodes[i],j=0;forumTestDepth>j;j++){for(var%20babies=testNode.children,k=0;!babies[k].hasChildNodes()&&k<babies.length;)k++;testNode=babies[k]}forumOptOut==(-1!==targetForums.indexOf(escape(testNode.textContent)))&&(nodes[i].style.display="none")}for(var%20nodes=document.getElementsByClassName("forumtitle"),i=0;i<nodes.length;i++)if(1==(-1!==targetSubforums.indexOf(nodes[i].textContent))){for(var%20targetNode=nodes[i],j=0;subforumTestDepth>j;j++)targetNode=targetNode.parentNode;targetNode.style.display="none"}The code is adaptable in the obvious way to exclude your choice of forums and subforums. The script is based on some tender DOM analysis, so, needless to say, phpBB version updates may break this bookmarklet.
(I myself usually just follow the forum via a newposts call which I have outfitted with a customized list of the subfora I regularly follow. Of course, that just gives me a flat list of threads which might not suit your needs/prefs.)
best,
GR
P.S. It is not really in the interest of Lit & Lat to facilitate such blindering, so I hope no one minds my posting this code!
Thanks for that. As you say not exactly what I suggested but would be better than the “have it all” approach with the standard software. Will try it out … and if successful will add in a couple of additional forums that are irrelevant to me.