Account Settings: merge 'Comment Pages' option with 'Entry View Style' option

[ninetydegrees]

Title:
Account Settings: merge 'Comment Pages' option with 'Entry View Style' option

Area:
settings

Summary:
See below as it's quite complicated.

Description:
On Account Settings [http://www.dreamwidth.org/manage/settings/?cat=display], you have two options:

1- Comment Pages - View comment pages in your own journal style

This is the option DW inherited from LiveJournal.

When enabled, clicking on 'Leave a comment', 'Read comments', a permalink or a cut anywhere on the site will append style=mine to the target URL. Comment and reply pages get therefore loaded in your own style or the site skin if you've disabled custom comment pages.


2- Entry View Style - When viewing entry pages (including yours), use this style: Original Style/Site Skin/My own style/Light format

This is the new option Dreamwidth implemented.

When enabled, comment and reply pages always get loaded in the style you've chosen. This is also transparent as nothing gets added to the URL. Magic!


As you can see, the two options are very similar and even overlap in some cases*. The main difference between the two is that option 1 requires you to click on some specific links while option 2 doesn't. If someone links to an entry page in their post and you click on the link, option 1 will not load it in your style. Option 2 will. If you click on the cut text, both options will load the entry in your style. The other difference is that one changes the URL while the other doesn't.

*To prevent this, option 2 isn't used when option 1 is and vice-versa. Except not always. If you have selected the light format for option 2 then it overrides option 1 for instance. As I said, it's complicated.


I suggest the first option to be phased out and to automatically set option 2 to 'my own style' for users who had checked option 1.


Why? I think option 1 seems simple but is actually uselessly complicated, and having these two options seems confusing to me. I also wonder whether many people chose to set 1 but not 2 and did so deliberately. From comments I've seen here and there, some people don't understand that entry pages and comment pages are one and the same, plus the description text for the the first option is vague because explaining how this option works exactly is impossible. It gets even more complicated if you add the fact that once you've got style=mine added to an URL, you're stuck with it so any link you will click on the page will get style=mine too. And let's not talk about Nav Strip overrides.


But what do I know, right? Hence this suggestion to see if it's a good or a terrible idea, and also to know why someone would deliberately use option 1 and not option 2 because it's intriguing. *g*

Poll #7847 Account Settings: merge 'Comment Pages' option with 'Entry View Style' option

Open to: Registered Users, detailed results viewable to: All, participants: 45

View Respondents

This suggestion:

View Answers

Should be implemented as-is.
24 (53.3%)

Should be implemented with changes. (please comment)
1 (2.2%)

Shouldn't be implemented.
5 (11.1%)

(I have no opinion)
14 (31.1%)

(Other: please comment)
1 (2.2%)

Comments

[archane]

I have some days where certain styles and color combinations will give me blinding headaches. On those days, I can easily interact with people via my reading list (and expand cut tags without clicking through and leaving the page) and can comment with comment pages displayed in my journal style.

The styles people use for their journals say a lot about people, however, and I like having the option of seeing that part of them -- the colors, fonts, and layout -- on the other days, without having to go in and change my settings every time.

[denise]

To be completely accurate, the new option does allow you to set the viewing preferences for journal pages (such as archane.dreamwidth.org or denise.dreamwidth.org) separately for the preferences for entry/comment pages (archane.dreamwidth.org/12345.html, denise.dreamwidth.org/12345.html). The "option 1" that ninetydegrees is talking about above adds a URL parameter so that all entries clicked from your reading page show in your preferred entry style (the one you use on your own account's entries); "option 2" lets you set it so that all entries on the site, no matter whether you clicked from your reading page or not, always display in your preferred format, which can be your journal style, the site skin's style, the light format style, or the account owner's chosen setting (which itself can be either journal-layout-styled comment pages, or site-styled comment pages).

So, under this proposal, if you chose to always view entry pages in your style or your chosen site skin, you'd still be able to view the journal's front page style (the one that shows at denise.dreamwidth.org) if you wanted; the viewing preferences are separate. For instance, I have my account set up to always show me the user's chosen journal style instead of my own journal style, but show me every single entry page in site skin (I hate custom styled comment pages with the burning fire of a million suns).

If you still wanted the option to view entry pages in the user's chosen style, there's a one-click link on the navstrip that will let you switch to it. Which only works if you're viewing the entry with a custom-styled comment page, not in the site skin, but there's a URL parameter to add to the end of the URL to turn it from site skinned comment page to user's style of comment page. (I think it's ?style=original.) So, you wouldn't need to go in and change your settings; you'd just click a link in the navstrip. (Or put some text in the URL.)

[turlough]

(I think it's ?style=original.)

It is, I just tested it. I'd no idea this existed so thank you for mentioning it!

[matgb]

Want it as a JS bookmarklet? Make a new bookmark, then put the following in for location: javascript:location.search+=(location.search?'&':'?')+'style=original'

Won't work if it's already got a ?style append, but beyond that useful.

[turlough]

Very handy. Thanks! I use light style everywhere (setting 2) but occasionally I want to know how an entry looks in its original style.

[montuos]

I don't care one way or another how it is actually accomplished, as long as the option of switching from viewing others' styles to one's own style is quick and easy and on-the-spot, for precisely the reasons archane states.

EDIT: Specifically, in order to avoid triggering migraines, etc., the option to view in one's own style needs to be available before one actually goes to that page.

[matgb]

If it's helpful, I have my layout set so that in the bottom of every post on my reading page I can open the link in my normal style, a light background style which sticks to browser defaults and in the users own style, I did this as while I don't have a migraine problem, it can be occasionally problemativ and/or I could be in a low light mode.

I keep meaning to write up a how-to on doing this but it needs a bit of willingness to go into S2 at the moment-if you want a walkthrough to set up something similar, let me know and I'll write one or just point you in the right direction, it's a fairly easy thing to do for most layouts.

[montuos]

I personally am not as painfully sensitive to the styles and color combos or as prone to headaches/migraines as archane describes (and it's far more likely to be animated gifs that set me off when I'm in a sensitive state), but I know enough people who are that I feel it ought to be treated as an accessibility issue for the site, rather than a one-on-one fix if one is geeky enough to manage it.

I'm not terribly comfortable with S2, either, so I'd need a pretty detailed "copy this exactly" to follow, at which point you might as well...would you consider writing something up to publish somewhere like dw_nifty so it could be available to more people?

[zvi]

I am someone who has deliberately set the two options differently. From my reading page, I want all of the links in my style, because while I'm reading my reading page, I want all of t_e links in my page style, whereever I am. But if someone is throwing throwing a link out or I'm bookmarking, I prefer an unappended URL and the light style. (I would do light everywhere, but it doesn't have all of the links I need.)

Also, with the two preferences set separately, I get naked URLs in the entry title link, but not the comment links.

I'm not necessarily saying the options should stay separate, because I can understand why 2 settings might be confusing, but I wanted to point out that there are users who have deliberately set both settings.

[sophie]

My reply is going to be a teeny bit off-topic for this suggestion, so I hope nobody minds.

You say the light style doesn't have all the links you need. What links do you need? Maybe they could be put into the light style.

[denise]

Adding more links to the Lynx scheme is unlikely to happen, because the point of it is to be low-footprint for a) mobile devices and b) screenreaders. There is bug 3460, which will add in the menu roots of the CORES menu, but on the whole, the site map is where most of the links will live in Lynx.

[arethinn]

Thanks for explaining the difference between the two settings. I was really unclear on it myself!

[ninetydegrees]

You're most welcome! I didn't know exactly how it worked before I submitted the suggestion either.