I’m not crazy about the new posting format. The bold category before the posting title is distracting. It Doesn’t seem to add anything when a calling up the site to read the postings.
Of course, that’s just my opinion.
Mark Gearhart
s/v Godspeed
I think the addition of categories is a great improvement to the forum. If making a search that could include several years of the forum, the categories will be a big help.
If everyone would keep in mind the topic of the original thread, and start a new thread if diverging, it might also help with future searches.
Maybe we need a category on the forum?
Dan Shaula BCC 58
Hi Mark:
This wasn’t a quick meaningless fix; it took three programmers and about 140 hours of work to complete. I then spent another 30 hours categorizing most of the messages 8,000 messages on the board.
The purpose is to categorize all messages so that you can do a search for all articles by category, for example, if you want to search all articles on “Hull Maintenance” over all dates, you will find 177 posts discussing this topic, some of which may answer a question you have.
It wasn’t a whim of the webmaster; it was a response to requests we have received to create the capability to search by subject. There is a fund of knowledge available from the site, but there have been complaints by users that they could not find the particular message they were seeking.
However, it is YOUR responsibility to categorize your message; the system is not automated, and therefore, if you have a shred of wisdom to impart, it is valuable to all users that you categorize you message. If you don’t do this, and you are talking about “Hull Maintenance”, then your post will not appear in an category search.
At the end of the day, it is up to the users; I can remove the search ability in way less time than it took to create it!
John,thanks very much for a great improvement to the forum. I will look back through the forum and try to put a category on any thread I started. Thanks for reminding us.
Since BCC’s and FC’s share the “Who’s Where”, how about we put ‘BCC’ or ‘FC’ in front of our boat’s name? The Database is so out of date that it’s sometimes not easy or even possible to find out what’s what.
How about a category of the forum that could include the Who’s Where, the Gallery, and other samlmorse.com subtopics?
Dan Shaula
As one who has searched for hours for details, I think the categories will be of tremendous benefit, thanks for everything John.
Thanks, Dan:
You are absolutely on the ball!
However,if you change topics mid thread,it won’t make any difference. It is ABSOLUTELY the onus of the poster to define the category.
Categories cannot be automatically created. Even in response to a previous categorized message,it is essential,if you wish for you message to be retained in the original,or another category, to index your message.
It’s not difficult; when posting any message, or reply, simply select your topic from the available Category pull down. I think there are currently 24 options in there.
WHEN SEARCHING: All you need to do is select your category and “All dates” in your search and you will receive the benefit of all relevant posts since the forum started, way back in the days of Yahoo Groups.
Five years ago Jeremy of Calypso gave us tremendous assistance in importing all the old Yahoo messages. and translating them into the format that we now use.
Subsequently, We have endeavored, as a consequence of Jeremy’s help, been able to categorize massages according to content.
John,
I’m also very much in favour of your work on forum categories - turns it into an even more valuable and accessible research tool.
Many thanks!
Derek Lundy
BCC “Gertrud”