I regularly check my tab that has Writing Forums loaded to see if I have any new messages or alerts. Often the indicators are blank, but when I refresh the page, several show up. Is there some sort of setting or software update that will improve the reliability of the indicators? Also, as a feature request, I'd like to see a total count of alerts (Inbox + Alerts) as a prefix to the page name in the browser. This should be a simple substitution value in the string that's used to describe the page name, which is clearly dynamic, and would end up looking something like (%totalAlertCount%) %PageName . Facebook and LinkedIn have this functionality, and it's helpful in a multi-tabbed window environment. Google's GMail goes as far as to re-draw the tab icon, which is a nice feature, but a steep technological hill to climb unless there's a plugin to do it. Apologies for the pedantic explanation if this is all clear to you. Finally, the page timeout with respect to security seems to be very short. Often I click on an alert link and I'm forced to refresh the page to re-login. It's a nit, of course, but annoying nonetheless. Thank you again for maintaining such a useful site. I realize something of the level of work necessary, and don't think it's as easy as many might. Cheers. JD
I don't know enough about software to speak to the middle bit, but I think parts 1 and 3 are from your end. My browsers (Chrome on Android, Opera on Windows) don't automatically update, so the first thing I do when I go to WF is to hit the logo at the top to force a refresh. The second part, WF timing out, I've never ever had happen to me. I've had so many devices floating around that I don't think I've ever been logged out of WF fully, and none of my machines have timed the page out on me, even if I don't check that one (my phone, for example) for days.
I thought I had already replied to this long ago, but apparently not... That alerts don't always show up until after a page refresh is probably caused by the XenForo internals. I know that new alerts sometimes show up (with a "You have a new alert" notification in the bottom left or right), but I think that only happens if you actually have the forum in an active tab (as in, the currently open tab in a window). Hopefully XenForo 2.0 has improved this behaviour. Having a notification counter in the tab name could be nice, if it can be turned off. While I sometimes have use for it, I often find it annoying and distracting. I do understand why others would want it, though, so I don't see why not. I think it would have to be implemented within XenForo (or as an add-on, like this), so there is a bit more effort behind it than at first glance (unless XF2 has it built-in). Finally, I might know what you are referring to as a "time-out", but I'm not 100% sure. Sometimes when I load a page I get an error ("You don't have permission to view this content") and it looks like I'm signed out, until I refresh. Is this what you mean? (It is very rare that it happens, though, and it will probably be fixed when we upgrade to XF2.)
It's not, and I've been on the forum regularly enough lately (actively refreshing the tab often) that it hasn't happened. I'll see if I can induce the behavior and capture an image of the error. Again, any of this is small nits in the face of the much-welcomed functionality of the site. I have built a career on enterprise-scale software implementation, and so I know something of the level of effort it takes to maintain a site like this. Cheers to you. JD
Got one, Chrome on iOS. I had the tab open, and the Alerts had a red “1” over it. I tapped that, and found an alert that a reply was posted in a discussion. I tapped the discussion link and got the following error. I refreshed the Chrome tab, went through the steps again, and it opened fine.
