Thanks to DaddyPig for bringing this to my attention. CiF commenter “Kale” has come up with an add-on for Guardian comments that can be used to view the comments in different ways. You may find it useful if the nesting is doing your head in.
Here are links (supplied by DaddyPig)
i’ve been playing with it for a few minutes and it looks useful. Here are some screen shots.
This option allows us to see the comments, still using the nested form, but collapsing the nests. Easier on the eye. The blog is more manageable and you can open up individual nests if you want to.
If you click on the blue + sign (top right – under the options) you get the view that we are becoming used to. All the nests are open. You can collapse individual nests if you want to.
Finally you can choose to view the comments by time stamp (in chronological order). This would be my preferred option if everyone were using the add-on. But they aren’t yet and as a result the comments don’t make much sense because the Guardian doesn’t time stamp replies and it’s hard to work out who people are replying to. If you use the add on, when you reply the comment contains a link to the original comment you have replied to – much like they used to in the olden days. If you look at my second comment in this screen shot you will see that it links to DaddyPig’s comment about the add-ons.
Kudos to Kale for this and thanks to DP for bringing it to my attention.
Thanks (?) … life used to be so simple … sigh
DAMMIT! I get no link, but a ‘this is not available for Firefox 15′ message – I don’t know if this means my programme is too old or too recent, and I don’t have time to check at the moment. But this looks promising.
Time to update Aba!!
Does anyone know of a plug-in that gives you actual formatting buttons (Bold, Italic, Quote, etc) for WordPress pages like the ‘Spill?
It would be far easier than having to manually type out BBCode or cut and paste from a Guardian comment box.
It might be possible to add these features into our WordPress theme format:
http://wordpress.org/extend/plugins/basic-comment-quicktags/
Don’t have a problem with the nesting feature. Can see how using it to make new nominations is cruel & unusual punishment for Gurus.
Using it for a tangent conversation, supporting & donding, expanding upon a earlier justification or to add a link, could actually make the blog a better read.
I don’t think it’s a problem for the guru, it’s a problem for the nominator if the guru has been through that page and ticked it off !
Regarding tangent conversations, they used to draw the community in better when the comments appeared in sequence as they were made – something would catch the eye scanning or reading through and you could pitch in.
see – it took me half and hour to write my bloody reply and DP says it far better and more succinctly while I’m faffing about!
nesting is very inclusive: the conversations only work with the person who first started it (they can look themselves up and track back) and anyone reading it late. That’s not letting others who have read past that point join in.
Say you nominated The Mountain Goats and a discussion started up (by someone catching up on the blog later) when I had passed that point – I never get to have my 2 penneths worth in said chat because I never see it – and I like pontificating over bands I like – if it’s chronological I see the comment and link to it – while having my say/rant – and anyone reading from the beginning or the end will see that next part of the chat… and call me an idiot – that’s the beauty of a conversation that people actually see.
… and that makes it inclusive.
Nesting for buddy bonding is fine – supporting & donding fine – (but it does add to the idea/feeling of cliques)
Expanding upon a earlier justification – that, ends up for JUST the Guru, it’s not recommending to peers, because who is going to go back and read it again?
It’s playing to get listed or typing into thin air.
Adding a link later is fine (if you want to) – but that’s just encouraging ‘type out as many bloody songs as you can find’ – then come back … fun to read?
fun to play? – when your well thought out nomination is there already without any thought, effort or feeling – Is it fun?
I’m not anti nesting – whatever it might come across like.
It works for dumbed down threads and getting hits – this is good – it saves me the effort of wasting my time and makes the G some pennies.
I just miss seeing intelligent people with alternative views joining in a discussion – rather than blogs being overpowered by those who type fast (sometimes before they’ve even had time to think about what they are saying) – I type slow and ponder – I never bother with my slow considered replies anymore because everyone has moved on.
Nesting may not have helped, but think the bigger problems have been the unreliability of “all” comments & the default to chopped up pagination. Loading all comments takes forever & forget about adding a comment in this mode – your computer will freeze. Piling on all that is the tiny font being used.
Been using the GU App to read & post over the last couple of weeks & it’s amazing how much easier it is to read the thread. No CTRL F, but if you are actually able to read what has been posted, it makes a big difference.
Sorry Shane, I’d have held back if I’d known. Nice thoughtful comment though.
Shoey, is that an iPhone app where you pay to subscribe to the newspaper, or something different ? i’ve been subscribing on the iPad, which is a good wayto read the paper, but doesn’t show any below-the-line content.
DP, it’s listed in the App Store as “Guardian For iPhone”, don’t see one for iPad. So unless it’s US only, suspect it’s the same one you already have & you just need the most recent update that included reading & commenting on the blogs.
Don’t use “&” in your comments if you want the whole thing to post. It froze once – had to delete & reinstall to fix.
I was only joking DP, the more comments the merrier – at least here it’s just a quick scroll up and down to see nested chats.
I haven’t worked out how to access the RSS link to comments on my updated system yet… it all worked so smoothly before, I always used to click on that in another tab to see new spill comments – but it just comes up as no RSS reader installed. (and I don’t know which one I used to use)
Oh & it’s free – supported by ads (that are less obtrusive than the actual site).
“Adding a link later is fine (if you want to)”
Actually that can kind of suck. But granted it sucks without nesting too. Not pointing fingers, i’m as guilty as anyone of it.
But when you’re guru, you start with page one. (At least i do). Very few of those have links. So rather that wait, i’ll usually just look on youtube for a link because i want to tick off the page of noms and move on. Don’t want to keep retreading the page.
If anyone has a better method for guruing, i’m all ears.
With you (Shane) and Shoey, i’m not bothered by links because if you don’t have them, i know you’ll probably have a playlist up. And i do check the box too, (and i’m pretty sure that Tinny’s noms will be in there) but there’s also a delay there sometimes, so i have to go treasure hunting a bit there too.
It sounds like the CIFfix can allow you to come back to the blog after a few hours / day away and have a nice read through and catch up with what’s happened since you were last there. And it looks neater too.
don’t suppose they have CIFfix for safari – I’ve been messing about with my new improved! computer for 3 days now trying to find everything – I don’t want to learn a new system – this one is doing my head in enough.
I have the joys of a clean sheet on my iTunes – only 17 songs are in there as yet – there are about 130,000 on a couple of hard drives but they’ll gently be included with playlist ideas.
Are these Shane’s top 17 tunes of all time? Or the latest album you bought along with 5 tunes from Bill Gates’ sponsors?
Am trying to prune my tune garden back to 100,000.
The album is a mix CD free from Ministry magazine – Seb Fontaine vrs Soul Savers (sic) …. my hard drive was replaced and as I find out everything via the internet – I turned on the computer to find out what to do, to get my system back to how it was.
This obviously started up the time machine and did a new computer sweep. Hiding all my data in a greyed out, untouchable void. So I needed to simply wipe the hard drive again and re-sart using the original Mac disc – bloody computer wouldn’t read the original disc – so I found the closest CD = the Ministry one to check if the superdrive was working … it is – for that.
Apple wanted to charge me to sort out something that was fine before they demanded their computer back – because they had built it with a dodgy hard drive.
As I try NOT to increase Apples profit for things that are their fault in the first place I’m working around the problems – means I have to search deep into old hard drive back-ups for all my art, photo’s and music.
But I have a 2 year cycle of clearing out computers – this just did it for me.
I would have backed up a little clearer if I’d known though – pain in the butt trying to find – the computers trails!
Hi shane
No CiFfix for safari yet as far as I can see.
What I like about this add on is that it lets you choose how you want to view the comments, no more no less.
I’m with you on nesting for the same reasons you mention. What I like about this add on is that it isn’t ANTI nesting per se. Its default setting is using the current nesting system but just giving you the option to fold up the nests and only see the first comment. It seems to have acquired a new function, which I reckon is pretty good – on the + button that allows you to open the nests it indicates the number of comments that are nested. If you have been active there and see the number of comments has increased you can pop back in.
The time stamping option is good and would take us back to the system we seemed happy with. The only problem is that we’d all have to be using the add on for it to be worth using this view option. That isn’t going to happen for a number of reasons. Not least the fact that the add on isn’t available for all browsers/platforms and also that not everyone will want to use it. Now if the guardian could at least use the timestamp in the reply function to help make replies make sense (no matter where they appear) I think everyone could choose how they want to view comments. Seems easy, but probably isn’t.
Hi Maki – what I like about it is someone with knowledge of USING the site actually had a go at making it work … brilliantly done Kale.
Rather than the G’s techies – who have been told to make money from it – but don’t seem to have ever been involved in using the sites, EVER.
If they’d come out and tried to do this themselves it would be fine – but they keep doing sneaky – ‘it’s SO much better our way’ posts about it… and using idiot numbers to back themselves up – as if the readers were four years old and could be fobbed off with damn lies and statistics.
I just don’t want to use a different browser because I get the ALL function, it works and (until my hard drive replacement) I got to use cmd F perfectly well too. The other option I use is Opera for a few things – but I’m just picky like that !
As tinny said before – you can’t please everyone. But the screen shots look like the user image is in line when collapsed – that would help my head when scrolling through. It’s them indenting that makes my brain ache – it’s the visual jumpiness.
anyway – interesting developments. cheers for the heads up.
Cheers Shoey, I’ll have a look – though if it were an iPad update, I assume I would have got a notification.
Maki – I’d have thought the time-stamping option would be cool for catching up from where you left off. You know, Sunday out and about with the little one(s), get to sit down with a glass of something red, and see what everyone’s been up to on the blog ?
Totally agree DP. But if there are posts that have gone into nests such as, “Quite right” or “Donds” or “You must be fucking joking” that have been left by commenters who are not using CiFfix, they will appear in chronological order of posting and won’t make much sense outside their non-nested context. Unlike the previous system, where we had to make it clear who we were replying to the nested system allows you to reply without actually referring back to the post you’re answering / commenting on with a simple @DaddyPig. Which off your comments are they replying to?
All this resorting could have unintended consequences of sparking civil war from a one on on one Internet spat.