Expandable cut tags for www.dreamwidth.org/inbox/

[archangelbeth]

Title:
Expandable cut tags for www.dreamwidth.org/inbox/

Area:
Format of the Inbox

Summary:
Put in expandable cut tags automatically for long posts that show up in the inbox, like the News.

Description:
I tend to read the DW_News in my inbox (which I maintain much better than I maintain my LJ one...), but I like to leave the notification there until the next News post comes along, or as a reminder to think about something, make a suggestion, give feedback, etc.

DW_News posts can be very long. I wouldn't want them to be terser! But does make a lot of scrolling up and down if I want to see if I replied to a comment someone made or not. (I delete after replying.)

But this News post included the joy of expandable cut-tags, and I thought, "You know, it'd be really cool if long posts in my inbox could just have those cut tags..." Because then I could click on 'em and read, or click to close them and see if there are notifications I should be deleting.

And then the News post had this handy link to "make a suggestion"...

Poll #4419 Expandable cut tags for www.dreamwidth.org/inbox/

Open to: Registered Users, detailed results viewable to: All, participants: 57

View Respondents

This suggestion:

View Answers

Should be implemented as-is.
42 (73.7%)

Should be implemented with changes. (please comment)
0 (0.0%)

Shouldn't be implemented.
1 (1.8%)

(I have no opinion)
14 (24.6%)

(Other: please comment)
0 (0.0%)

Comments

[goodbyebird]

I track a lot of fic tags as well, so this would be super handy.

[noracharles]

I don't understand your suggestion. What is it you want to do which you can't do with the current expand/close triangle in the inbox?

[kate_nepveu]

That's for the entire entry. Entries with cut tags do not have an expand/close option for that cut tag, the way they currently do on the reading page.

[noracharles]

No, I understand that. I don't understand what good it would do to have cut entries in the inbox, maybe because I read my inbox in a different way from how I read my reading page.

In the inbox I have the option to sort messages in various ways, fold them, unfold them or delete them. I can't think of any circumstances where I wouldn't either want to see the message or not see the message, since I don't browse or skim my inbox.

I'm going to vote no based on this.

[kate_nepveu]

For me, That's precisely it, the lack of browsing or skimming my inbox--right now, if there's a cut-tagged entry in my inbox, I can only see what's behind the cut by _leaving_ the inbox.

[archangelbeth]

And the DW_News stuff goes into my in-box without cut-tags, generally. I'd like my in-box to put an automatic cut tag on posts over X words. Being able to open and close the cut-tags without leaving the in-box would be whipped cream with a cherry on top.

[kate_nepveu]

Heh, I was so excited by the "expandable" that I went right past the "automatic"!

Yes, I like that too.

[archangelbeth]

And, I realized I forgot to clarify that my eye skips over one-line stuff. Bad me! Typing in haste and on little sleep or something. Sort of a ...

News!
Here is a paragraph of news! It is Dreamwidth news, so it is very cool and makes most all of us happy to be here. And there's an update on the holiday and we're all fine and so is the cat. Now, on to the rest. In bugfixes, we have...
[automatic expandable cut-tag where there was no cut tag in the original]

[noracharles]

Oh really? I thought the suggestion would make it so that we would not be able to see the entire message?

I'm even more confused now. I want to vote for whatever lets me see a whole entire uncut message at once in my inbox, without having to click expand or leave the inbox.

I thought that was the current behavior, since that's how the newsposts look to me in my inbox, but maybe I'm remembering it wrong.

ETA, after reading the other comments. I definitely do not want any cut tags inserted. It's fine with me if other people have them, as long as I don't have to have them.

[fu]

I think that newsposts are a special subscription, and will always display the full entry.

To get newsposts to respect the cut like a normal entry, hmm, probably the best option is to unsubscribe to news announcements, and then subscribe to all entries posted in dw_news via the profile page.

And to always see the full entry in your inbox, without a cut, uncheck the "Cut tag in inbox" option over in http://www.dreamwidth.org/manage/settings/?cat=display *g*

[noracharles]

Thank you fu :-)
I do already see the full uncut entry in my inbox, and I hadn't realized it was a special setting, rather than what all people see.

I have no objection to an automatically inserted cut tag as long as it's optional.

[fu]

Oh right, now I'm the one misreading *handwave*

Glad that things are well here *G*

[kate_nepveu]

Sorry, it seems I misread the suggestion and thus misunderstood your comment--I was so excited about expandable cut-tags that I went right past the "automatic" part of the suggestion.

[denise]

So, we checked into this a bit more, and it turns out you can already do this, kinda. :)

Go to http://www.dreamwidth.org/manage/settings/?cat=display -- there's an option marked "Cut tag in inbox". If you check the box, your inbox entries will be cut-tagged!

[archangelbeth]

Dreamwidth: so awesome that sometimes one's suggestions are ALREADY THERE. O;D

Thanks.

[denise]

You're welcome! (I was tearing my hair out trying to get the official post notification to work on my dev server, and Fu said "huh, my news posts are already cut-tagged in my inbox". *facepalm*)

[archangelbeth]

Even knowing it was there, I had to read it twice, carefully. Veddy odd! Yay for finding it! O:D

[denise]

Yeah, the various settings pages are kind of a mess -- I have an open project to rearrange them and fix up some of the most confusing bits / the bits that are hardest to find, and we did a card sort a while back that should've helped but totally didn't since everyone who answered had a different set of answers. I'm planning on putting together several different options and posting them to dw-design to poll people on what they think is most usable.