info

[[cyb]]

any chance of instead of the post or thanks bumph to the right of members posts we could have some camera/equipment owned and used info?
I think more members would supply this useful information if it was more visible

[[Geoff Slocock]]

I believe it would be possible to get it up in the header bar of each post.

Recently, I was surprised at what I could do with my PHP "hacking" skills. You see there are plugins that do similar things; and what I would do is duplicate, modify and tweak and rename such a plugin. I have done this sort of things a couple of times now.

However, one issue that gets in the way a bit is that this forum is getting ferociously busy (at least to my standards ).

Geoff

[[morleyp]]

(06-01-2012 09:46 PM)cyb Wrote:  any chance of instead of the post or thanks bumph to the right of members posts we could have some camera/equipment owned and used info?
I think more members would supply this useful information if it was more visible

I second that.

[[Geoff Slocock]]

I have now opened this thread again. I want to rearrange some of my earlier posts and bring everyone up to date with work I have done in rearranging the information required at registration and the software changes I have got planned.

To some extent this thread dovetails in with http://bridgecamerausers.co.uk/mybb/thread-2149.html

We have had two members leave because they felt that their civil rights were being infringed. I can't argue with their decisions, but I can say that this is a photography forum and that it is down to us to get the policy steer together that we both want and what we believe will attract suitable new members.

I have always had problems with trolls popping up and communicating with members so as to enlarge on differences of opinions amongst members. I locked this thread earlier for one thing because, whilst I respect the rights of folk to believe that civil rights are being infringed, I don't believe that is the intention. I am inclined to think too that, whilst we all want this forum to be exactly as we would like it be (and heaven forbid I, too, must surely have some peccadilloes in this area) it must retain the character of being a photography forum that encourages debate in some fairly free way. Some people do protest that a forum does not need rules; but show me a forum that has lasted for more than a year without rules!

Changes of policy can be protracted when software needs to written; and I would always hope that debate could be effected smoothly. But in the event this did not happen. To some extent, too, the forum is still in its settling in stage and it can be properly hoped that similar difficulties will not arise again.

So I will add some more after I have stripped out some of my earlier comment.

[[cyb]]

Civil rights? ...that sounds a bit heavy? Wouldn't it have been more productive to have had a forum debate about the problem?
After all isn't that what forums are mainly about - discussion?

[[Geoff Slocock]]

It was a also coupled with issues about off topic posting. And this subject is an entire beast because it can never be defined and it simply relies on everyone having more or less the same understanding. I think it was also being claimed that I was trying to be too neat and tidy and was "over managing the forum".

Again, everyone has the right to an opinion. One never knows and it may have been possible for evrything to have been better managed. But, of course, trolls getting involved is also an unfortunate complication that puts some limits on debate.

Again, forums rely on the good will of their members. And if that runs out then you either have divisions or worse.

Geoff

[[Geoff Slocock]]

Going back to your original suggestion, I have a question.

Did you realise that you don't have to go into the Memberlist and find someone's profile (that really is several clicks away). And that you can get straight to that member’s profile, just by clicking on their user name (in big formatted lettering) in the header of their post.

Now the second part of the query was really about reminding members to keep that part of their profile updated; and I agree.

I could say this somewhere in the Useful Information page. But, also, when someone buys a new camera or gets one as a present we could jokingly drop a hint saying, you have updated your profile, haven't you?

Thirdly and, lastly (and, yes, you guessed it, I could do my Waffen SS Re-Enactment Society thing. ) I could make it a condition of membership that everyone keeps their main camera info up to date.


How would all of that sound as an alternative? If that was acceptable, I could change back the alteration to custom profile fields... it is clunky!

I've got to say it too, it's been a bad week for me and I've had dental abscess. I think that there was an unreasonable attitude that I was faced with, too. (Obviously, as a teacher I was used to being politically correct but just because someone is entitled to hold an opinion doesn't always mean they are entitled to assert that opinion. In other words there has to some reasonable order on the forum.)

Geoff