Technical reasons why we can't have no-bump/yes-comment Classifieds?

Here is where we can discuss just how problematic or perilous it might be for the Lindens to change the Classifieds to allow comments, but the threads would stay in the order in which they were posted, but with no bumping.

coco

LL did not create this forum software... it's just vBulletin. Whether or not it even has that option is beyond me, but there should be docs on that for you to read: http://www.vbulletin.com/docs/

I'm not going hunting for it, but Torley made a post specifically about this yesterday or the day before. It's one of vBulletins most requested but not available features, and though you could easily mod your board to do so, it would invalidate any and all support contracts until you returned your install to an unmodified state.

So technically possible, though pretty unlikely

To clarify: This is a conversation which started in the petitions thread, with what Torley had said there. We were asked not to have that conversation on the petitions thread, so I made a new thread for it.

To find out what has so far been said, and where we left off, consult the petitions thread.

coco

Yeah, I've seen people mod vBull to make it deliver babies and serve toast, but the support issues end up making it not worthwhile for a company that has better things to do than worry about a sub forum that is used by a tenth of a percent of its customers. I wouldn't hold breath.

I'da know. I actually took a dive into the vBulletin docs to see if I could make it work in this way.


Now. I know you can sort forum posts in special ways. For example, click back to General and press "Last Post."

I tried toying with that to see if I could get it to sort by "First Post," to no avail. If it has that built in somewhere, making a forum "no bump" is as easy as a specified sorting link.


In theory, anyway.

There's a very simple hack that adds in a $thread[creationtime] variable, which you can then set the Forumdisplay template to sort by on a forum by forum basis.

However, I still don't think you're gonna get it.

Well, that's my point. I don't WANT to get it if it means that the Lindens can no longer have support for the forums from vbulletin/whatever.

And especially not if it means that a small glitch somewhere would then mean they'd have to wipe the whole thing, from not having support.

If thorough investigation shows this is definitely the case (and thorough investigation will be required, since my question in the Hotline goes unanswered so far), then it will be time to think of new plans to (a) give us a way to comment somewhere, which will hopefully clear up the mess of individuals posting one comment per thread going on now, and (b) get rid of the star system, which is apparently being abused.

If this really isn't the case - i.e., there's only an infintessimal chance bad things would happen and/or even if they did, they would probably get support anyway - then I would sign that petition.

coco

I looked through the documentation for the current version LL has and also the new version, and granted, the documentation sucks, but it does not seem to support the feature. For the uninitiated, a forum with this feature turned on would look like this (taken from the SLU classifieds):



I am surprised that vBulletin does not offer it. If it is as easy to implement as Kris has suggested, I wonder why they don't integrate the option into the base product? I didn't have to hack anything to set up my forums that way - each individual forum has a sort option. Either way, if it is as simple as changing a setting somewhere in a configuration file, then by all means they should do so - unless they cannot do it on a forum by forum basis.

Thanx for starting this, Coco.

For easy summary, Kris and anyone else, my own blog post relating to the matter at hand.

I will preface this by saying I don't know about vBulletin's guts and I'm prolly missing a lot out here, so I'm looking to learn more in hopes of gaining a better understanding of this system. I'm curious, it's what drives me, and it's certainly nice to say "YES, I WANT A FEATURE!" but what goes understated is the research behind realizing the pragmatic feasibility of it, amongst other things.

I'd also like to say, as has now been pointed out here (and which I'm glad for), that LL didn't make vBulletin; they don't have as full control over this environment as they may like. Which provides a fascinating parallel to our own continued existence inworld.

Anyhoo, I digress.

Zack Massiel has graciously said he'll be testing on his own vBulletin boards to see what happens. I look forward to his fruits!

Fruits? Fruits are good . . .

cocoanut

The whole not wanting to hack vBulletin because it would void their support idea doesn't float. This *IS* a modded/hacked vBulletin -- all our usernames are set by the Linden Labs database connected to our avatars. Someone at Linden Labs knows who to tinker with vBulletin.

Thanx for the observation, Zack brought this up to me as well. Let's see where it goes...

What mod or hack is used to do that?

It's something custom and it really isn't hard to do. All they'd have to do is make it input the info (name, pass email etc) into the mysql db which is a simple sql query.

Vbulletin does state that modifying a board does void certain support, however I should clarify that it would only void the parts they changed. So for example if they modified forumdisplay.php, if something went wrong they would say well you installed a modification remove it then we'll talk.

I'm at work at the moment so I dont have my ftp password to my 3.0x board but once I get home i'll give this mod a shot.

Now, if LL doesn't want to install it then blah at least i'll have it hehe

FYI, it's not a technical reason, it's a LL choice!



apparently they want us to take up more space starting threads to discuss new products rather than just letting us do it in the origional thread. Personally I dn't get it, content creators in-world IM's end up capped before they get in or their PM boxes on the forums get full, or they have to go in search of a thread to discuss a product they made, which may or may not be there?? SHEESH! havn't seen any of the other classifieds hotline topics replied to yet.

Well, I'm fixin to conclude from the above that it would be no problem to do it, and they have done other alterations to the forums already.

Maybe they aren't answering because they are thinking about it, cause they know it's possible and reasonable!

coco