Please put the "Reply" button back!

[Doremus Scudder]

The upgraded forum no longer displays the "Reply to this thread" button if you are not logged in. Please put it back. I know, I know, I can just log in when I feel like replying, but often I have a lot of tabs with various threads open and am not logged in. When I reply to one, the reply button does not appear on the others, since they were open before I logged in. This means a refresh and then reply.... One more step for me anyway.

It shouldn't be that hard to just redirect to the log-in page, as before, when one clicks on the "reply" button without logging in first.

Best,

Doremus

[Doremus Scudder]

...And, if I take too long to post and the system automatically logs me out, there is no redirection to a log-in page, or anything, just no response when I try to post. I have to figure out what's going on (not that hard, but...), copy my post to the clipboard, refresh the page, log back in, scroll down, insert the saved text, and click the post button. A bit of a hassle, isn't it?

Best,

Doremus

[Tim Meisburger]

Hi Doremus. Not sure if you are aware of it, but if you click "keep me logged in" you will always be logged in when you visit the site. That's what I do.

Cheers, Tim

[Doremus Scudder]

I'm bumping this whole discussion in the hopes that we can re-examine the problems again...

I just lost a rather long, and well-thought-out reply due to being automatically logged out while I was in the middle of writing it.

Yes, I know I can use the "keep me logged in" check box, but I travel a lot and am not always at my own computer. The restore saved content feature only restored the part I had written up to the point when the system automatically logged me out. I finally just said "to hell with it all" and ended up not replying at all. Just too much work to write it twice.

Can't we fix this some way? Why can't the time to automatic logout be extended a bit? An hour is not unreasonable, and that would surely be enough time. Or, maybe a warning: "You are about to be logged out. Click here to stay logged in." Or something...

And, the system still does not display the "Reply to this thread" button unless you are logged in. I've taken to just clicking "reply with quote" and then deleting the quote, but what is wrong with having a regular reply button that directs one to the log in page when one is not logged in like was there earlier.

I know there are work-arounds to all of this, but user-friendly is important too.

Best,

Doremus

[Ralph Barker]

We're looking at extending the login period. As to the reply button appearing when one is not logged in, we're essentially stuck with the basic features provided by the software, as distributed.

[Kirk Gittings]

I'm not sure I follow this. If you are posting you have to log in and if you are logging in why not hit the "keep me logged in button" no matter what computer you are on and just log out when quitting?

[Ralph Barker]

The time-out has been changed to 60 minutes.

[Heroique]

I do feel some sympathy for Doremus’ bring-back-the-Reply-button-if-you’re-not-logged-in request. Especially if you’re frequently not at your own computer…

However, if you’re in a thread, but not yet logged in, and want to reply, why not go to the top of the page, log-in, see the “Reply” button appear, then click and reply? (And if it makes sense, check the "Stay logged in" button too.) Me, I haven’t felt this process to be inconvenient.

Perhaps it would be a little more convenient not to go to the top of the page, and instead, click a “Reply” button (if it existed) under a particular post you happen to be reading, log-in, and make your reply. If you liked that way better, I can certainly understand how vexing it would be to use the “Reply with quote” if you didn’t want to quote anybody and always had to delete that portion...

Well, either way, for long posts, I always use MS Word then cut and paste.

[Leigh]

All it takes is Ctrl-A then hit Del. That's what I just did to eliminate the quoted text of your message.

- Leigh

[Doremus Scudder]

All it takes is Ctrl-A then hit Del. That's what I just did to eliminate the quoted text of your message.

- Leigh

... and what I didn't do this time... Yes, I know it's easy, just an extra step that wasn't necessary with the old version. I can live with that just fine.

Thanks for extending the automatic logout time Ralph. I'll try to use the "remember me" box too.

For some reason, I was thinking that if I checked the "remember me" button, I would be automatically logged back in even after logging out, i.e., on my next visit. I see this is not the case, so I'll use the feature more often.

This does, however, raise the question of why there is an automatic logout after a certain time at all. If one checks the "remember me" button to avoid being automatically logged out, and then forgets to logout, they will be automatically logged back in at the next visit. No difference from having no automatic logout at all...

Oh well. I'm logged in now, I've checked the "remember me" box and I got here by hitting "Reply with quote" to Leigh's message, even though I really just wanted to make a general comment.

Best and thanks again,

Doremus