h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

not working with frames.

If a tag doesn’t work with part of the site it is a bug in my book

*supports this view fully*

Want to know why?

* User compatibility - good site designers (including myself) design their pages for as many browsers as possible. Shouldn't you do the same with this?

* Confusion - people are gonna get pretty confused about this if it isn't sorted out.

Also, I'd like to ask why we can't use the tags with personal pages. If it's technical, I still want to hear it 'cause the programmer part of me hasn't read much code today.

And what happens on the personal spaces if you edit the Axxxxx version of the page and use the tags there...?

*goes off to check...*

It doesn't work on the U-page.

So, the same thread can be made to behave differently depending on the route you take to get to it... Interesting...

It doesn't work with personal spaces because the mechanism we use to include the article text in the XML for the page (which is how the feature works) would have required an extra database call to extract the ID of the personal space. I wasn't happy increasing server load at this stage. The Guide Entry itself is usually cached, so there's usually no database overhead to add it to regular pages.

What you have to understand about this feature is that it was actually only added to aid development of some future sites. The fact that I hacked-up a use for it in h2g2 is actually secondary. No other sites will use frames, so that wasn't a requirement of the feature.

Also, where would it go? And how would it look? Something that works fine going across the whole width of the page would look horrible cramped up in either of the frames, and would get in the way of the actual functionality in those frames. So adding it is hardly as simple as you all think. Plus, yes, we'd rather people didn't use frames. They're slow, and load the servers unnecessarily. I'd rather have an all-singing DHTML single page solution myself, but that would break BBC guidelines by not working properly on prehistoric browsers.

It was also added *very* late in the development cycle, so the decision was made to limit it to single page forums.

I'm sure I'd care a lot more about this if I didn't have a foot-long wound in my stomach with 26 staples holding it together.

"So, the same thread can be made to behave differently depending on the route you take to get to it..."

Are you *sure* Peet? Because I don't think it can.

get well soon

but a bugs still a bug - even if there is a good reason for it and even if it will never fixed it is still a bug

It works on Axxxxxx pages, as they are articles. Every Uxxxxxx page has an equivalent Axxxxxx page... The conversation threads are common to both... Am I wrong here?

I can't test it immediately, as if I look at Alibaster my head explodes and it takes forever to clean the monitors, but surely you could edit the Axxxxxx page to include these tags, and when you went to the threads via this page they would work, but if you went to the same thread through the Uxxxxx they wouldn't...? Or have I missed something fundamental in your explainantion? Are the Axxxxxx versions of Uxxxxxx pages in some way different from other article entries?

Good news on the frames Front - SOP site now have a frames view http://www.bbc.co.uk/dna/place-london/F48000?thread=186672&latest=1

Sigh...

Changing the A-entry for a page also changes the U-entry, and vice-versa. Therefore, I reckon, they're actually the same page in the Big H2G2 Database thing that this is all in.

Adding one of the tags to the A-page therefore adds it in the U-page. However, the effects of the tag DO NOT SHOW UP on the U-page rendering of the conversation list. I haven't checked the A-page rendering, but I suspect it wouldn't work either.

Also note that the A-pages are AUTOMATICALLY set to 'Not For Review', along with a few other changes.

Therefore, I come to the conclusion that yes, A-versions of U-pages are different from normal entries.

Finally, I will ask this to the Italics: Why is this so?

The forum is the same no matter where you came from, and it's the forum that generates the XML that generates the page.

*realises that he just completly ignored a few of the posts up there*

I'm tired... very tired...

Sorry !

"Finally, I will ask this to the Italics: Why is this so?"

Because your personal space cannot be used as the basis of an edited guide entry. That's not what it's for, so we prevent it entering the process.

Strictly speaking, it's a bug that you can view your personal space as an A12345 entry.

*reads the posts above*



*reads them again*

OK, I get it... But how much overhead would occur if you did let change things?

*reorginizes the posts in his head so they make sense*

OK, so that's my question answered...

*giggles*

What? Just because I take hours to type postings, while Jim answers previous ones and totally confuses me...

Fair enough, Jim. Sorry for making ignorant assumptions.