Thank you for being a valued part of the CNET community. As of December 1, 2020, the forums are in read-only format. In early 2021, CNET Forums will no longer be available. We are grateful for the participation and advice you have provided to one another over the years.

Thanks,

CNET Support

Alert

Welcome to the newly redesigned forums!

Apr 14, 2011 3:59AM PDT

Hi everyone,

Welcome to the newly redesigned forums! If you missed my announcement a week ago about the changes, no worries, click here to read about all the new forum features and redesign.

Now with everything in place, please have a look around, let it all the changes soak in, and if you want to give the forums a test run with all the new features, please go ahead a post in the Test forum .

Our team has worked very hard to get these new forum features and new design in front of you and we hope you really enjoy them. If you have any questions, feedback good or bad, bugs to report, please feel free to submit them in this discussion thread here. Thank you everyone for your continued support of our forums here. I appreciate each and everyone of you!

Sincerely,

-Lee Koo
CNET Community

Discussion is locked

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(NT) I will consider it.
Apr 18, 2011 12:39AM PDT
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An imperfect solution
Apr 18, 2011 11:28AM PDT

An imperfect solution, but still I suppose an imperfect solution can be better than none. I do tend to agree with the person in the linked discussion that this really shouldn't be necessary, but sooner or later I'll have to get off that particular high horse if I want to actually use these forums.

The larger issue seems to be that the new design is a bit to "busy" with too many different elements competing for the user's attention. We already have the attention span of a fruit fly with a really bad case of ADD in the western world, no need to try and make it worse. All the core elements are there, and that's good, but this new design still feels like something you'd use as a prototyping UI for making sure all the elements work, and then refine before subjecting the rest of the world to it.

If I had more time I'd consider making my own mock up, but sadly I don't. My initial post here did have a number of suggestions that one could consider constructive criticism, so hopefully those can get passed along to the developers. Along with one more thing: Can we please, please, PLEASE, stop with this absolute positioning nonsense and go to a relative positioning system? So those of us with larger resolution displays don't have these enormous ugly gray borders flanking either side of the screen. On my 27" iMac, each of those two borders is probably about 1/3 of the screen with the window maximized, so only about the middle 1/3 of the display is being used for actual content. And there's no need for this. If you used relative positioning, you could let the browser do all the heavy lifting on the page layout, and it would automatically adjust to pretty much any size browser window there is. People with crappy old low resolution displays, or viewing things on say an iPad or some other tablet, would get largely the same experience as someone like me with a higher than full HD resolution display.

And that stupid bar at the bottom of the screen has GOT to go. Usually I just use AdBlock to get rid of the thing, but those kinds of stupid JavaScript tricks will really bog down older systems. What's easy to forget if you have a fairly high end development system as a web developer, is that every time you scroll up or down the page, the browser's JavaScript engine has to figure out what to do with that stupid bar, and that can suck up an impressive amount of CPU cycles... Which your average dual or quad core system tends to have in excess, but not all those people still holding onto P4s and Athlon64 systems, running an OS where there's no real option for hardware acceleration in the browser to offload some of that processing from the CPU, and the user might be using an older version of a browser with a far less optimized JavaScript engine.

Which kind of gets back to the whole aspect of it just being one more thing that seems to primarily about chasing some kind of web development fad instead of focusing on good solid design, and only implementing those things that make sense for what you're trying to accomplish with your particular site. There's no shame in having a simple, rather spartan, site that doesn't have all kinds of cool JavaScript and AJAX elements, Flash animations, and other whiz-bang crap solely for the sake of being there. Web developers should always be asking themselves whether or not they're adding some feature because it adds to the overall function of the site, or just because they think it's cool, or some OTHER site is doing it (probably the worst excuse possible). If people can't find the CONTENT, which is why they came here in the first place, then what's the point?

And I can see this turned into a rant, so I'll end it here. But I reserve the right to continue when I have more time.

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Quick comments, Jimmy...
Apr 19, 2011 8:02AM PDT

1.) They are using relative positioning, cleaning up the HTML and CSS dramatically in the process of the last few overhauls. The catch is that they're still applying fixed widths, with some assumptions now and then, rather than a truly fluid layout.
2.) I doubt we'll see a fluid layout anytime soon because a.) all CNET pages share the same general format, making such a change a massive undertaking and b.) control over the width makes design, ad placement, etc much easier.
3.) Simply removing the fixed widths and relying on floats and such creates more problems due to other formatting. That led me to use calc() from CSS3 for my custom overrides, but such requires Firefox 4 or IE9. (Webkit guys are dragging their feet, delaying it in Chrome and Safari.)
4.) That 'toolbar' at the bottom isn't a Javascript trick; it's using fixed positioning, which is why you don't see it in IE6 - no support. That reduces the performance impact (vs Javascript) but not the annoyance factor for those who dislike it.

Thankfully, width:calc() and display:none statements largely do the trick.

John

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+1 to the list of that is ANNOYING of 2 post reply limit
Apr 17, 2011 6:47AM PDT

it is just going to make more of a mess of stuff if it is limited to 2.

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Reply twice in a thread, reposted?
Apr 15, 2011 6:20PM PDT

I wanted to reply twice in a thread to two different people, but I noticed that when I replied to the second person, the content of my first message appeared in the box.

Using IE8 on XP Pro.

Just me, or are others seeing this? Reply to me and then try to reply to someone else on the same page and see if your message to me reappears for that person.

I'm not wild about the helpful votes. I'd rather people have to include their screen name if they're going to suggest that I'm an unhelpful slob. Laugh My only solace is that it's not tallied in my profile. Yet. I think.

--HDTech

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Rest reply
Apr 15, 2011 6:48PM PDT

I've seen similar. I was typing a reply, saw errors so I cancelled out of the window. I then hit Reply again and my previous text was there.

I will try a reply to someone else on this page.

Mark

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No I couldn't reproduce it
Apr 15, 2011 6:52PM PDT
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I wish I'd noticed this second page first
Apr 16, 2011 12:49AM PDT

nevertheless, I had the same experience and I outlined the method of it in a post below.

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Another oddity
Apr 16, 2011 12:55AM PDT

I clked on your link Mark and it's a permalink. That takes you to just your post and a notice to clk above it to go to the thread where it's at. Yes, it works to take you to the thread, but if the thread has more than 1 page you are delivered NOT to one of the following pages that post is on, but to the first page, where it doesn't actually appear. Before this change didn't it work to take you to the page in the thread the post was actually on?

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I think it is always been that way...
Apr 16, 2011 3:30AM PDT

At least, for as long as we've had permalink pages, though I could be wrong.

John

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Ahh I wonder if that's new.
Apr 16, 2011 5:19AM PDT

Unlike John I don't remember seeing that before, but I can't say for sure. I think its confusing. In fact when my 'Permalink' post is displayed, on it's own which I don't particularly like anyway, I have always then clicked the "In reply to" option to see how it fits in with the rest of the discussion.

Personally I would have preferred my post highlighted in some way, but still in its position in the thread.

Mark

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Confirmed: Lee, it is a bug...
Apr 16, 2011 3:33AM PDT

I am replying to several posts in this thread using Firefox 4 and have just experienced the same thing for the first time, though several times in a row. The subject line was cleared, but the message body is being copied into every reply form on the page, even after the text was successfully submitted - the form should have been cleared/reset but was not.

John

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Thanks for reporting this. This is now fixed!
Apr 20, 2011 4:30AM PDT

Sorry about that!

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One more thing...
Apr 15, 2011 8:09PM PDT

What are these two snappy features designed to do? Wink

http://i397.photobucket.com/albums/pp60/samsung_hd_tech/reqc.jpg

What happens if people click either one of these options? I love the idea of requesting clarification, but I don't think that's the same kind of clarification request that I'd be asking.

By the way, I love the real-time "read" status. Now when I click the "back" button, the previously green therads are now clear. Awesome, and less time wasting.

Bonus: Not having to click on links 2-3 times before getting to the page. I'm in love so far. Love

--HDTech

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Those features...
Apr 16, 2011 3:38AM PDT

Clarification requests are separated from answers so that members can readily differentiate helpful replies from discussion of content omissions. Great for use should the poster forget to include product specifications and you need to ask for more info before answering the question.

As to "I have the question to," it is a way of gauging how common a particular question is. I do not believe there's anything we can do (sorting, filtering, or searching for posts based on that) with that information at the moment, but I can see a lot of possibilities for using it to create future features.

John

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something odd happened on a reply
Apr 16, 2011 12:46AM PDT

I wish I'd made a screen capture at the time, will next time it happens. Using FF 3.6

I had replied to a post, then went to reply to another post in the same thread. For some reason what I'd replied to the first one appeared in the reply box presented. I hilighted it and tried to "cut" and also tried the backspace key to remove it. Nothing would make it go away to make blank space for new reply. I toggled the format box to off, and only then was I able to hilight and remove the previous text which was there and do that second reply.

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This is now fixed.
Apr 20, 2011 4:35AM PDT

Shift+refresh if it is not working for you.

The reply body form now should not be pre-populated with your previous reply post if the browser page has not been refreshed.

Let me know if you still see the issue.

Thanks!
-Lee

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Corrupted text in case of uncommon chars combination
Apr 16, 2011 1:31AM PDT

Hi, noticed during replying that I cannot use some combination of chars, like:
->
=>


Picture of real text in CNET forum post is here.

Thank you

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Re: Corrupted text in case of uncommon chars combination
Apr 16, 2011 1:33AM PDT

Mea culpa. Issue is only with post preview... here
->
=>

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I see it...
Apr 16, 2011 3:42AM PDT

Looks like the HTML character entities are being displayed instead of the actual characters. Adding it to the bug list.

Thanks!
John

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Thanks for reporting this. Bug has been filed for this.
Apr 20, 2011 4:35AM PDT

Thanks!
-Lee

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Some odd counting going on ...
Apr 16, 2011 2:37AM PDT

The 'next unread post' link is not reliable, which is not a new problem. My impression is that the link frequently fails when the next unread post is not on the same page of a multi-page thread but I'm not sure. That's not new. There is a new oddity. As I write this, this thread shows 'post 1 of 61' in the right hand corner of the OP but on the bottom of the page it lists 'Total Posts 60' and 'Showing Page 2 of 2'
However, I know from a few minutes ago that there already is a Post 61 (I got there via 'next unread') that displayed on 'Page 3 of 2'.
There are apparently multiple page/post counters that are not all in sync.

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along that line
Apr 16, 2011 3:16AM PDT

Don't ever tell anyone to look at the nth post in a thread, because the number of a post changes everytime one is added or deleted in line up above it. What purpose then does it serve putting a number by each post? We can't count? None I can see, since that considered the only thing that might matter is the total number of posts. If it wasn't for the permalink, you'd have to quote part of a post instead, since you couldn't just say the 2nd or 3rd or 25th post as the one you might have referenced in a reply if it wasn't one you directly replied to. Sure would be nice if once a post number was assigned, it would stay there, even if others were added or deleted.

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Got it...
Apr 16, 2011 3:48AM PDT

The "Page 3 of 2" was likely a short-term glitch as someone had just posted a new reply, pushing it over to the next page; it can take a minute for that information to be fully processed.

However, I am seeing the "total post" consistently off by 1, something I am adding to my personal list.

John

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(NT) Bug has been filed for this. Thanks Bill!
Apr 20, 2011 4:36AM PDT
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Congrats!
Apr 17, 2011 5:01AM PDT

Glad to see the forums continue to improve. Well done!

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Not too happy......
Apr 17, 2011 7:53AM PDT

The pleasure and ease of posting has disappeared...I already have a problem in Windows 7 Sad .....miki

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(NT) Could you explain what problem you're having?
Apr 17, 2011 9:16AM PDT
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Windows7 Forum thread
Apr 17, 2011 10:15AM PDT

My post in Windows 7 Forum, subject Windows Update 04/12, tells the complete story......my "not too happy" comment here was from total frustration due to a lack of communication and consideration from a Moderator. That said, Grif changed all that with his informative and constructive post. It seems I should have posted as "General Discussion" instead of "Question". Thanks to his post, I understand the problem.....miki

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new version
Apr 17, 2011 2:35PM PDT

thanks