Free Republic Update: Page Too Wide/Scroll Bars

[John Robinson]

I fixed the page-too-wide/horizontal-scrollbar problem many were experiencing. This typically happened when either a long URL or string of characters found its way into the article summary, or when somebody posted a very wide image and you're viewing pings or comments using the brevity setting of "Text" (so that you see the comment text.) I'm embarrassed to admit the fix was a lot simpler than I expected, just a few crucial CSS statements seem to have corrected the issue.

In other news, there haven't been many updates the past few weeks. I'm working on the innards of the beast, rewriting the core database handling routines. About 120 hours into this current project with no end in sight. Heh. The code we're using now is good, but not as flexible as I need it to be for future projects. On the plus side, the new database code will probably find itself open-sourced. Any Perl hackers out there?

[ovrtaxt]

IBTZ!!!!

[Clive]

Please consider adding another field as a sub title field, possibly with the same number of characters as the "Title of Thread" field.

Then require that the title be quoted verbatim as in the source article but allow the poster to use the second field to either quote the source's sub title or to insert the poster's own sub title.

[Ruy Dias de Bivar]

M E 2

[8mmMauser]

I am truly grateful for the new fixes. I could almost think you were thinking of my daily posting. Too often in the flurry of posting, I would overlook a ping. It had been a chore to keep track of the many pings and posts each morning and now, suddenly, it is all neat and tidy with the color coding! Just thanks!

8mm

[Clara Lou]

This is one fix I really appreciate. Thanks!

[Kakaze]

Great Idea Clive!

[2ndDivisionVet]

John:

How do I adjust it so that I can see the first paragraph in the threads in articles again?

[Rudder]

Good fix...goood fix.

[gridlock]

Is there a [MESSAGES] button somewhere, that I am missing. I still like to see which thread is getting the most posting by seeing it repeated on the page.

Yeah, I’m a dinosaur...

[Coldwater Creek]

Please return the ‘top of the page’ feature.

Thanks for this site and all that you do.

[deuteronlmy232]

I fixed the page-too-wide/horizontal-scrollbar problem many were experiencing.

Thanks, I thought your name was Jim, but since you sign it as John, I will say, Thanks JOHN.

[LurkingSince'98]

I often read FR on my Palm Pilot, what a blessing.

Thanks
Lurking’

[kitkat]

Oh, THANKS, John.

[Miss Didi]

Here’s another question, John...after reading a thread and hitting Back, the page refreshes and then you must scroll down to find your place. I don’t remember it being like that before...is it my computer or something I can do?

[Freedom Dignity n Honor]

Thank you for the fix. It was an irritation.

[jellybean]

Under the tabs: {Articles | Activity | Comments| You can choose either Headers or Text.

[2ndDivisionVet]

Thanks! I must’ve changed it at some point, by mistake.

[From The Deer Stand]

One confusing thing.... Free Republic on my laptop shows Pacific time on the posts but on my desktop computer shows Central time. My laptop correctly shows Central time in the lower right corner of the screen. Can I change the time zone within the FR site?

[jellybean]

Thanks, I thought your name was Jim, but since you sign it as John, I will say, Thanks JOHN.

Jim is the founder/owner of FR. John is his sadistic son who likes to torture us by playing around with the code and making major changes every few years. :)

Just kidding, John. You do a great job keeping everything up and running smoothly. We don't say thank you enough for the work you do!

[jellybean]

Free Republic on my laptop shows Pacific time on the posts but on my desktop computer shows Central time. My laptop correctly shows Central time in the lower right corner of the screen. Can I change the time zone within the FR site?

I have the same problem on my laptop, but only when using the Opera browser. Firefox shows the time correctly.

[rockrr]

Seconds on the “top of the page” link. It’s a little thing, but missed ;’}

[brityank]

Please return the ‘top of the page’ feature.

Use the "Home" and "End" keys on your keyboard -- top and bottom respectively.

[Coldwater Creek]

Thanks!

[Coldwater Creek]

See post 23. I learned something this morning.

[Fishrrman]

Using Safari on a Mac here.

Whatever has been done in the past several hours has actually messed up the display with Safari.

Previously (before the current changes were made), the sidebars were fine.

Now, everything is “scruched up” hard against the right, making the sidebar topics nearly impossible to read.

How do I correct the display?

Hint: there ought to be a page somewhere offering general tips and advice as to how to set up one’s preferences on the site for usage. It may indeed be there, but I haven’t found it.

- John

[Condor51]

Wow John, thanks for bringing back the 'green' on the Ping (My Comments) Page. Now I can see again what I need to address - or ignore.

And the current shade, doesn't blind you (though I had no prob with the 1st 'brighter' shade).

[SmithL]

I just want to say thanks.

[NormsRevenge]

I just want to say thanks.

—
Ditto from Acapulco! :-)

[Deo volente]

Why do you keep messing with it? It worked fine for years.

I’m using Safari, and now I can’t read the sidebar because it’s so scrunched up.

In all honesty, I don’t see any improvement, only new problems.

[RJL]

Thank you for that fix, it was irritating.

Is there any way to get the thread to show a bit of the posted article, as it used to, instead of the latest comment for that thread?

Thanks

[trooprally]

Still think you, JimR and the MODs should have your own personal sidebar “Topic” for posting these updates. You would be the only ones that could post a thread on it. Also for posting bootcamp, Sandbox and the 3rd. one which slips my mind.

It would be helpful for you as we members would be able to more easily check out what you are doing. Otherwise we just stumble across your threads.

[Mr] T

[greyfoxx39]

posting bootcamp, Sandbox and the 3rd. one which slips my mind.

Updated FR Execerpt and Link Only?

John, I'm having to try two or three times to get the search function to pull up "user" pages...is there a glitch or is it because the pull-down box is so small (at least on my browser) and it slips? I use that feature a lot.

[Let's Roll]

Can I turn the green off in the pings? Not as much contrast as with black on white and harder for me to read.

I never had any problem telling the difference between pings out and pings in. :-)

[ThePythonicCow]

I'm still seeing a horizontal scroll bar -- though it covers over 90% of the horizontal width and only slides left or right just a tad.

I'm also seeing the Topics and Post links under Browse by Forum scrunched together and overflowing into the thin separation column between the left and center columns.

I suspect that the cause is the Popular Keyword "wrightwingconspiracy", which exceeds the 12em width of the left column. When I change the left column from "width: 12em;" to "width: 16em", this improves things.

I have no clue whether the proper fix is to ban long keywords, or to make the left column wider.

[ThePythonicCow]

As you might have guessed by now, John, I have my left sidebar configured to contain Popular Keywords, Browse by Forum, Opinion Poll, and Tools.

[ThePythonicCow]

And moving everything out of my left sidebar into the Top or Right fixes this formatting problem (and surprises me with how big the right sidebar looks -- 30% width.)

[spotbust1]

Do you have trouble posting from your palm pilot? I have a palm treo and I recently have been unable to post from it. It tells me:

“The link you followed was invalid. We don’t have enough information to complete your request. “

Then if offers links to post in general interest or news activism. It offers me a link to log in, which I already am.

Any ideas?

[LurkingSince'98]

spot

I have been able to post from the Palm, but I rarely do.

I believe that I have had to log on again, though.

Sorry I’m not much help, mostly I use it to just read what’s happening.

Lurking’

[spotbust1]

Thanks any way Lurking.

I try to log on when I get the message, but it still doesn’t help. I wonder if it is a device problem or a virus.

Oh well, I’ll keep trying. Thanks anyway.

Spot

[ThePythonicCow]

It's getting weirder. On two systems, both running Linux OpenSuSE 10.3 with Mozilla Firefox 2.0.0.13, one displays with perfect layout, and one has the left sidebar bleeding over to the center with the horizontal scrollbar. Both are being displayed to the same screen (via a high end KVM switch.)

I'm wondering through the various browser Preferences and Add-Ons, trying to see if I can find a relevant difference.

You should probably put my posts above on your queue of "stuff to worry about some other day ;)".

[CedarDave]

Here’s another question, John...after reading a thread and hitting Back, the page refreshes and then you must scroll down to find your place. I don’t remember it being like that before...is it my computer or something I can do?

An easy way to refresh your page without losing your place is to click the post number at lower left. [This usually works great when using Firefox (don't know about IE) but if it doesn't, just click the number immediately above it.]

[Miss Didi]

Not quite following you, Dave. I meant that when I’m in a thread and then go back to the Forum, the page refreshes on me and I have to scroll all the way down to find where I left off. Does that make sense? Maybe it always did that but I’m just noticing it now. I use IE, by the way.

[CedarDave]

O.k. I see what you're saying; I tried it and it does refresh to the start of the page. I have no answer for you as I was describing something else.

Might I suggest that you try Firefox. I have six tabs open and am following multiple threads. I just click on the tab and it opens to where I left off. It's a single window on the task bar; the tabs are on top with names of the thread. Also I find it really easy to post images and link url's, use italics, bold text and use other HTML features without trying to remember the HTML codes. Let me know if wish to switch as I can help you get acquainted with it.

[Miss Didi]

All I do is download it onto my computer via mewzilla, right? Nothing scary will happen???

[CedarDave]

All I do is download it onto my computer via mewzilla, right? Nothing scary will happen???

Nothing scary will happen. Go to this link:

http://www.mozilla.com/en-US/

After you download and open it up, go to "Help" and read the introduction for internet explorer users. After you play with it a bit, come back on here or by FReepmail and I'll suggest which extensions to add to customize it for using with FR.

[Miss Didi]

Thanks...I’ll give it a try! ;)

[CedarDave]

One more thing, you know that FR uses < > to indicate HTML tags. Some other bulletin board forums use brackets [ ] for their tags. One of the suggested add-on extensions lets you switch back and forth depending which forum you are using. Really useful if you browse on a lot of differing forums.

Also, it has a built in spell checker (underlines a mis-spelled word in red as you type) and you can add a dictionary to search really obscure words. I’d be lost without FF. Even our IT people, when they need to check something out, will use Firefox on my work computer.