Forum Update - April 21, 2010 - Timezones, 24 hour clocks, quick options, and more

from Stardock Forums

Hello everyone,

Another update this month, this time to add a few much-requested features.  See the change log below for details.

Note: If you notice any of the below features are not available or not working properly, please do a hard refresh (hold CTRL and press F5) to retrieve the latest javascript and css files.

1. Timezones!

An oft-requested feature is the ability to set a timezone.  You can do so in your My Account page under Options.  You can also set it in the quick options menu (see item 3 below for more details on what this is).  

The default timezone is Eastern time, which is where Stardock is located.

2. 24 Hour Clock option

This option allows you to set all of the times in the forums to either a 12-hour clock (with AM/PM) or a 24-hour clock.  

3. Quick Options menu

After implementing the flatten categories option, we realized that not many people know that we even have an options page.  The problem is because the options are buried under a couple links and aren't exactly easy to find.  The solution was to add a quick options dropdown menu in a place that people will see.  This dropdown menu is located below the forum search.  

Click on it and select an option to immediately change it or view a page explaining what it is (depending on the option).

"Switch to 24-Hour Clock" will immediately switch your clock (you can change it back to 12-hour by clicking on the option again). "Flatten Forum Categories" and "Change Timezone" will redirect you to pages explaining what they do:

4. Other minor changes and bug fixes

The only other visual change is a link at the top of the page for the Recent Posts list:

Note: If you notice any of the above features are not available or not working properly, please do a hard refresh (hold CTRL and press F5) to retrieve the latest javascript and css files.

As always, if you notice any bugs or problems, please let me know by posting in the Forum Issues forum or contacting me via PM.

Bara

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Reply #1 from Stardock Forums Top

:thumbsup:

Reply #2 from WinCustomize Forums Top

A very nice update to go along with the new WC site.  Thank you very much. :thumbsup: :sun:

Is there any chance of the Dark option for the forums, as we saw in the Beta, coming back?

DeskScapes - Bring your desktop background to life.
Reply #3 from Elemental Forums Top

In the Sins of a Solar Empire the "Options" text appears as white (default font colour?). Not very eye friendly for me but being a simple text...

Loving the time zone and 24 hours clock. :thumbsup:

Reply #4 from Stardock Forums Top

Quoting Wintersong, reply 3
In the Sins of a Solar Empire the "Options" text appears as white (default font colour?). Not very eye friendly for me but being a simple text...

Loving the time zone and 24 hours clock.
End of Wintersong's quote

Fixed.  Sorry about that, juggling CSS files for multiple sites can be a pain sometimes :)  (be sure to press Ctrl + F5 if the text is still white)

Bara

Reply #5 from WinCustomize Forums Top

:thumbsup:

Reply #6 from Demigod Forums Top

Thank you very much Bara :thumbsup: k1

I had to do a hard refresh, but now everything is perfect :)

Keep up the good work ;)

Reply #7 from WinCustomize Forums Top

Oh crikey, I can see what time it is at last!

:thumbsup: :thumbsup: :thumbsup:

Reply #8 from WinCustomize Forums Top

Oh crikey, I can see what time it is at last!
End of quote

You're still an hour slower than me, though ;)

Reply #9 from Elemental Forums Top

There's some sort of a bug with the timezones / 24h clock. I set my options to 24h clock and GMT +2. It is at the moment 00:50 on April 22nd. On all forums, it displays Apr 21st posts as "Today <timestamp>" and posts made during the last 50 minutes as "Apr 22nd <timestamp>".

In other words, it somehow doesn't understand that the day has already changed for me.

Reply #10 from WinCustomize Forums Top

is there an explanation of why one would use the flatten catagories option, I'm not understanding the what or why.

Reply #12 from WinCustomize Forums Top

Forums still slow and buggy with some new ones to boot. Post don't show up unless you leave and come back...edits don't show up and sometimes now the original post isn't even there.

Reply #13 from Demigod Forums Top

Quoting Sir_Linque, reply 9
There's some sort of a bug with the timezones / 24h clock. I set my options to 24h clock and GMT +2. It is at the moment 00:50 on April 22nd. On all forums, it displays Apr 21st posts as "Today <timestamp>" and posts made during the last 50 minutes as "Apr 22nd <timestamp>".

In other words, it somehow doesn't understand that the day has already changed for me.
End of Sir_Linque's quote

Hey, we are from the same timezone  :D Where are you from?

But I have the same timezone issue as well, its like the forums still "listen" to their original timezone (eastern GMT -5), and show yesterday's posts as today -_-

Edit: I have another issue as well. Even though I have the clock set to 12-hour, it appears as 24-hour on its own! LOL pretty weird.

Reply #14 from Elemental Forums Top

Yay! I posted that I wanted timezones 9. April, and 12 days later my wish is fulfilled. Good job :thumbsup: k1

Reply #15 from Demigod Forums Top

Bara, even though I have set in the options many times, a 12-hour clock, it changes on its own to a 24-hour clock. What should I do? :(

Reply #16 from Stardock Forums Top

Quoting Sir_Linque, reply 9
There's some sort of a bug with the timezones / 24h clock. I set my options to 24h clock and GMT +2. It is at the moment 00:50 on April 22nd. On all forums, it displays Apr 21st posts as "Today <timestamp>" and posts made during the last 50 minutes as "Apr 22nd <timestamp>".

In other words, it somehow doesn't understand that the day has already changed for me.
End of Sir_Linque's quote

I'll look into the problem and see what I can find.

Quoting gmc2, reply 10
is there an explanation of why one would use the flatten catagories option, I'm not understanding the what or why.
End of gmc2's quote

Click here for more information on the Flatten Forum Categories option.

Quoting morpheas768, reply 15
Bara, even though I have set in the options many times, a 12-hour clock, it changes on its own to a 24-hour clock. What should I do?
End of morpheas768's quote

Where are you seeing a 24-hour clock instead of 12?  And what happens when you set it to 24-hour?  Does it change it 12-hour or stay the same?

Bara

Reply #17 from Demigod Forums Top

Where are you seeing a 24-hour clock instead of 12? And what happens when you set it to 24-hour? Does it change it 12-hour or stay the same?
End of quote

When I saw yesterday that there was a new forum update, I changed to 24-hour clock. Then I changed my mind, and changed it back to 12-hour. I did this by the "Options" tab, under "My Account". (didnt use the "Options" under the search box)

After some time (1 or 2 hours), I saw that it was 24-hour clock. I went to Options again, and saw that the "24-hour clock" option was checked. I uncheck it again, to set it to 12-hour. The same thing keeps happening again and again. It always changes back to 24-hour on its own o_O

Pretty weird.

Reply #18 from Stardock Forums Top

Quoting morpheas768, reply 17

Where are you seeing a 24-hour clock instead of 12? And what happens when you set it to 24-hour? Does it change it 12-hour or stay the same?

When I saw yesterday that there was a new forum update, I changed to 24-hour clock. Then I changed my mind, and changed it back to 12-hour. I did this by the "Options" tab, under "My Account". (didnt use the "Options" under the search box)

After some time (1 or 2 hours), I saw that it was 24-hour clock. I went to Options again, and saw that the "24-hour clock" option was checked. I uncheck it again, to set it to 12-hour. The same thing keeps happening again and again. It always changes back to 24-hour on its own

Pretty weird.
End of morpheas768's quote

Quick favor, next time it changes to the 24-hour clock, don't change it back, then let me know so I can take a look at the database.

Also, did you visit the forums on different sites?  That is, did you come in from forums.stardock.com then forums.impulsedriven.com then forums.elementalgame.com?

Bara

Reply #19 from Demigod Forums Top

Quoting GunslingerBara, reply 18

Quick favor, next time it changes to the 24-hour clock, don't change it back, then let me know so I can take a look at the database.

Also, did you visit the forums on different sites?  That is, did you come in from forums.stardock.com then forums.impulsedriven.com then forums.elementalgame.com?

Bara
End of GunslingerBara's quote

No, I am always on the Demigod forums.

It seems ok for now, last time I changed it to 12-hour was this afternoon, did you do something and fixed it for me? If so, then thank you :thumbsup:

I will let you know if it changes again, and thank you again for being so helpful and responsive :)

Reply #20 from WinCustomize Forums Top

I'm a PC and WC2010 was my idea.:grin:  

Seriously, the new site is coming together nicely(albeit with a few bugs) and I'm sure it will get even better with time. Thanks for the updates and improvements.:thumbsup:

Reply #21 from WinCustomize Forums Top

Quoting gmc2, reply 10is there an explanation of why one would use the flatten catagories option, I'm not understanding the what or why.

Click here for more information on the Flatten Forum Categories option.
End of quote

gosh, feeling dense, still don't get it. I saw what it did but...

Reply #22 from Demigod Forums Top

@Bara: Ok, I figured it out: I click to a forum thread to open it, and its 12-hour. I click on the same or another thread again, and then its 24-hour o_O

Weird.....

Reply #23 from GalCiv2 Forums Top

is there an explanation of why one would use the flatten categories option, I'm not understanding the what or why.
End of quote
Basically if you want to see everything that's on a particular site then you would simply monitor the recent posts list which reflects *all* activity on a particular site.

However perhaps you're not interested in *all* the forums on a particular site. For example on Galciv2 the bulk of the traffic is either from the Off-topic forum or from the Impulse forum. If perhaps you aren't interested in Impulse or Off-topic then you can effectively exclude them by simply pushing down into the GalCiv II forum.

Of course you always had this ability however in the case of the GalCiv II forum there are 11 subforums. Using the "flatten categories option" allows you to monitor a forum and *all* of it's subforums without in this case having to monitor 12  forums separately.

Even if there are 2 or 3 forums like this it's far easier to check 2 or 3 forums instead of 2 or 3 forums plus dozens of subforums.

However if there is no particular category on the site that you're on that you wish to ignore then there's no real reason to use this feature and all you would do is to monitor the recent posts lists which effectively already operates in "flatten categories" mode since *all* posts from *all* forums on the site appear there.

Reply #24 from WinCustomize Forums Top

Where are you seeing a 24-hour clock instead of 12? And what happens when you set it to 24-hour? Does it change it 12-hour or stay the same?
End of quote

From your tomorrow which is today for me, but yesterday and a half for Jafo.

Now I only have to apply the Lorenz-Fitzgerald Contraction to comment on a post.

But not to worry, the answer will only appear after I refresh a few times next week.

Reply #25 from GalCiv2 Forums Top

Three points.

One is that I live in the Eastern Time zone and if I recall correctly forum time always agreed with my time.

However with this change I noticed that suddenly it was as if Daylight Savings time was not supported because the time was 1 hour later than it really was.

So I changed the timezone to Atlantic Time and the time changed to the correct value however later on, I didn't notice precisely when, I noticed that again the forum said it was 1 hour later than it really was so I changed myself back to Eastern Time and then I was OK.

This is perhaps just a startup issue that would apply only to those in the Eastern Time zone but for what it's worth I though I'd mention it.

Secondly in the spellchecker if there are multiple words and you choose "ignore all" it will ignore all occurrences of that word *except* the one that you selected and so you need to correct that one again using "ignore word" to ignore *all* occurrences of that word.

Thirdly, since the forum update that preceded this one I have had a lot of issue with what seems to be stale data. I make corrections and they don't appear. I use ctrl-F5 and no good. I can even exit the browser and then call it up and reload the site and still it's not updated. I often find myself going back and forth between IE7 and FF and when I switch browsers then I do get the updated data.

Doesn't happen all the time but it happens frequently enough to be really annoying.