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Joined: August 30, 2008
Posts: 3058
Submissions: 20
Location: Burlington, ON, Canada
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| MAIL 3.0 Feature Requests |
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| Posted on Sun Mar 21, 2010 9:24 pm |
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AND... GO!
No promises on anything... But I will attempt to address any and all feature requests put forth.
I know what MAIL 3.0 will entail, mostly, from a technical standpoint... All the big building blocks have been covered... But what little niggling features would you like? The ability to comment on Gallery Items for example? Or a 'Friends List' perhaps?
I'll probably end up babbling about technical aspects that would allow or prevent specific features, as well as going 'Hey, that's a great idea!' a lot...
MAIL is for you, the membership, so what would you like to see?!
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Joined: August 14, 2006
Posts: 1890
Submissions: 50
Location: McPherson, Kansas
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| Posted on Sun Mar 21, 2010 9:31 pm |
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Dates of submissions and last edits in the actual submission, if possible.
Okay, one little bit of immaturity:
WOOT! First!
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Joined: March 3, 2002
Posts: 4378
Submissions: 79
Location: tres piedras, new mexico
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| Posted on Sun Mar 21, 2010 10:01 pm |
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i realize that people can go library>articles>beginners, but a link to the beginners page would be really useful.
recently we had someone try to submit an article that basically had links to the beginner pages aggregated together with a short explanation of mailling (iirc)..
i mean, is there an old-hat reason that i'm forgetting about that we haven't linked it prominently yet? do we not have a convenient location to put it that doesn't cause clutter?
what about a permalink at the top of the "newest articles" feed area...?
really, some day i'll quit harping about this..
half-sorry to nag,
kim
PSA: remember to stretch.
3.o is fixing everything. |
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Joined: July 17, 2009
Posts: 451
Submissions: 76
Location: Denver, Colorado
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| Posted on Sun Mar 21, 2010 11:48 pm |
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I would like to see a use-specific toggle on each library entry so I could flag the ones I want to see again later (or not see). It takes a long time to look through the entire gallery so it would be nice if you could mark each item somehow. I am imagining maybe like the "Flag" feature in PhotoShop. Sometimes when I have many photos I go through them just once and toggle the flag on the ones I want, then "show flagged items only" to hide the items I don't want to see for a particular purpose.
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Joined: March 3, 2002
Posts: 4378
Submissions: 79
Location: tres piedras, new mexico
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| Posted on Sun Mar 21, 2010 11:54 pm |
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pfeiffer, i like that idea.
and, possibly, have a "show items most commonly flagged" feature..
we've discussed having a voting system or a rating system, but it always seems to have both positive and negative aspects.. this might be a reasonable alternative to a vote / rating system.
kim
PSA: remember to stretch.
3.o is fixing everything. |
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Joined: August 30, 2008
Posts: 3058
Submissions: 20
Location: Burlington, ON, Canada
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| Posted on Mon Mar 22, 2010 1:16 am |
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| Pfeiffer wrote: | | I would like to see a use-specific toggle on each library entry so I could flag the ones I want to see again later (or not see). It takes a long time to look through the entire gallery so it would be nice if you could mark each item somehow. I am imagining maybe like the "Flag" feature in PhotoShop. Sometimes when I have many photos I go through them just once and toggle the flag on the ones I want, then "show flagged items only" to hide the items I don't want to see for a particular purpose. |
This is a great feature in a single user system... However, for a multi-user database, it gets out of hand quite quickly...
There are (currently):
585 Articles
991 Weaves
6206 Gallery Items
=7782 Total Items
10980 Total Members of MAIL...
The database table to keep track of this would thusly be...
10980 Rows x 7782 Columns
=85446360 Distinct Cells.
Even at one byte per cell (True or False), you're already looking at roughly 81.5Mb for the table.
To put this into perspective, the ENTIRE Forum Database (ALL the contents of ALL the posts) is only 57.4Mb with 11.8Mb of Index Data.
Performing a 'Next Row' read on a table of that size would put an enormous strain on the database... I've personally never actually run a table anywhere CLOSE to that size... But I hazard a guess it wouldn't turn out well...
That's not to say this feature will never exist... I think it's a great idea, and I'd love to find a way to impliment it... But we're talking far future here 
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Joined: August 30, 2008
Posts: 3058
Submissions: 20
Location: Burlington, ON, Canada
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| Posted on Mon Mar 22, 2010 1:19 am |
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| sakredchao wrote: | possibly, have a "show items most commonly flagged" feature..
we've discussed having a voting system or a rating system, but it always seems to have both positive and negative aspects.. this might be a reasonable alternative to a vote / rating system. |
'Items Most Commonly Viewed' might be a better way to go?
I, personally, don't see the issue with a voting system. Same as I don't see the issue with a forum reputation system... But that's me...
IMHO a voting system would be handy, it would give one more 'sort' option for the (literally) thousands of Gallery Items, for example...
One could go 'Sort by: Rating, Highest First' and then, see all the best examples of armor in our gallery.
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Joined: August 30, 2008
Posts: 3058
Submissions: 20
Location: Burlington, ON, Canada
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| Posted on Mon Mar 22, 2010 1:21 am |
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| ElementalDragon wrote: | Dates of submissions and last edits in the actual submission, if possible.
Okay, one little bit of immaturity:
WOOT! First! |
*gives ED a Pin for posting first*
Date of Submission/Last Edit been brought up a few times, and is in the works. Capturing the details of the edit is a little trickier, but possible... Leave it with me.
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Joined: August 14, 2006
Posts: 1890
Submissions: 50
Location: McPherson, Kansas
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| Posted on Mon Mar 22, 2010 1:22 am |
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Excellent.
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Joined: April 29, 2002
Posts: 3213
Submissions: 93
Location: Albany, New York
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| Posted on Mon Mar 22, 2010 3:39 am |
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| Daemon_Lotos wrote: |
The database table to keep track of this would thusly be...
10980 Rows x 7782 Columns
=85446360 Distinct Cells.
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Not that your math isn't impeccable, but couldn't each user record get a single field containing a comma separated list of the keys for the items they flag? Certainly still a DB hit, but about 5 orders of magnitude smaller than what you describe...
"The fact that a believer is happier than a skeptic is no more to the point than the fact that a drunken man is happier than a sober one."
— George Bernard Shaw
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Maille Code V1.0 T5.7 R5.1 Fhd MCu Wc Cd G2.03/.56 I9.75/3.25 Pn Dacdjs S97 CCi |
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Joined: August 30, 2008
Posts: 3058
Submissions: 20
Location: Burlington, ON, Canada
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| Posted on Mon Mar 22, 2010 4:57 am |
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| Blaise wrote: | | Not that your math isn't impeccable, but couldn't each user record get a single field containing a comma separated list of the keys for the items they flag? Certainly still a DB hit, but about 5 orders of magnitude smaller than what you describe... |
But then you need to break that Comma Seperated list out into an array...
Shifting the load from an SQL Query over to a PHP Sort.
Or, scan it as a string... A very long string...
That's one hell of a foreach loop...
I'm not saying it's impossible... But no matter how you look at it, it's fairly resource intensive.
Then there's always the danger of the loop running long, and the script execution hitting the max_execution_time variable as well... Unlikely, of course.
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Joined: July 17, 2009
Posts: 451
Submissions: 76
Location: Denver, Colorado
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| Posted on Mon Mar 22, 2010 5:25 am |
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I appreciate you guys looking at my idea in earnest. I can see from the response that it might not be feasible. Thanks for considering it.
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Joined: March 27, 2009
Posts: 1015
Submissions: 4
Location: Southeastern Minnesota
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| Posted on Mon Mar 22, 2010 2:07 pm |
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| Daemon_Lotos wrote: | | Blaise wrote: | | Not that your math isn't impeccable, but couldn't each user record get a single field containing a comma separated list of the keys for the items they flag? Certainly still a DB hit, but about 5 orders of magnitude smaller than what you describe... |
But then you need to break that Comma Seperated list out into an array...
Shifting the load from an SQL Query over to a PHP Sort.
Or, scan it as a string... A very long string...
That's one hell of a foreach loop... |
If a comma separated list would be too long, how about just a number? The binary equivalent of that number would be the list (1=true, 0=false). Could you perform some sort of logic on a number easier than the other options listed? |
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Joined: July 25, 2006
Posts: 958
Submissions: 3
Location: Klamath Falls, Or.
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| Posted on Mon Mar 22, 2010 5:20 pm |
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This may get the same arguments against as the csv method, but....and to re-specify the function/feature: a way for a user to flag or select a number of images for reviewing, together on a page for comparison....we sometimes need to do this when researching/experimenting with a concept.
Being able to compare 3-4 images/weaves together on a page goes to the kind of site this is supposed to be, research, experimenting, creating....this feature would be huge.
Would it be possible for each user to have like a 12 image queue, a sort of pick-list, stored on a temp basis, on their user profile page....I suppose it would be the same as a favorites list, but the user could change the picks as they change projects and the images that they're using for reference.
Kodiak-
"Out of clutter, find simplicity. From discord, find harmony. In the middle of difficulty, find opportunity."
Chaincraft Mandrels |
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Joined: August 30, 2008
Posts: 3058
Submissions: 20
Location: Burlington, ON, Canada
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| Posted on Mon Mar 22, 2010 7:59 pm |
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| kodiak wrote: | This may get the same arguments against as the csv method, but....and to re-specify the function/feature: a way for a user to flag or select a number of images for reviewing, together on a page for comparison....we sometimes need to do this when researching/experimenting with a concept.
Being able to compare 3-4 images/weaves together on a page goes to the kind of site this is supposed to be, research, experimenting, creating....this feature would be huge.
Would it be possible for each user to have like a 12 image queue, a sort of pick-list, stored on a temp basis, on their user profile page....I suppose it would be the same as a favorites list, but the user could change the picks as they change projects and the images that they're using for reference.
Kodiak- |
On a small-basis, for comparrison it's totally doable. And something I can look into.
The CSV list that Blaise suggested is also the way to go for a 'flag as favourite' feature... We would just need to impose a reasonable limit... A dozen, or two seems reasonable enough... Thoughts anyone?
ANYTHING is possible, as long as 'limits' are introduced into the equation... 
The problem with Pfeiffer's original request was that they wanted to be able to flag EVERYTHING... On that scope, it's simply not feasable.
| Vorondil wrote: | | If a comma separated list would be too long, how about just a number? The binary equivalent of that number would be the list (1=true, 0=false). Could you perform some sort of logic on a number easier than the other options listed? |
The problem with a number, from a database standpoint, is it has no index... No real indication of what each digit refers to. Great if you can keep track of everything perfectly... But the moment a hiccup occurs, and something gets out of alignment, it becomes useless....
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