A question for Lord Heseltine

[Lord Braykewynde]

Can you do me a favour please Your Moddyship?

Can you ask your Lord and Master, Lord Heseltine, that if an ordinary chap off the street can run a caravan forum....

http://www.carryoncamping.org/.....
which is all singing/dancing, hardly any lag, no income from advertising yet Haymarket Towers, with all it's multi-millions and revenue from advertising runs a pathetic excuse of a forum such as this? The site is so basic it should have no problems loading but is so slow Dial-Up looks super fast.

We realise it's not your fault Your Moddyship and that you are just as frustrated having to moderate using tools that were invented by the Neathanderals.

This really is bad though, certainly the slowest site I ever use. Perhaps the PP6 battery needs changing in the server. If Hezza finds it hard to justify the cost of a replacement PP6 battery I'm sure the members will have a whip round.

 

[Legsmaniac_374344731]

LMAO!!!

 

[nrdonnelly]

Dear All,

We are painfully aware of our current forum software's limitations and we are currently going through a process of designing an entirely new website, which does the Practical Caravan brand justice.

Don't get too excited just yet. It will not arrive until later in the year but rest assured that the forum will be a major part of the new site. To that end, if you want to post a wish list of functionality and features for the new forum, please do.

And thank you for making your point about the forum in such an amusing way. Lord H loves a good joke. And ones like yours too... ;-)

Nigel Donnelly

Editor

Practical Caravan

 

[ShadySadie]

"functionality"

Just having a forum that worked when you clicked on it would be a good start.

Login and Submit that takes minutes to load at times is the bugbare! Whatever Tarzan's IT crew come up with it needs to works instantly and be on a suitable cutting edge speedy server.

Haymarket publish numerous magazine that include motoring and technology based subjects.

For a publisher who promotes speed and technology through their publications, would it not be reasonable to expect to get a modern fast up to date forum with all bells and whistles sooner rather than later from -

"haymarket - A global media company"

Caravanners get blamed for being slow on the roads and doddery yet members here are up to speed with mobile internet, satelite/digital technology, solar power and a wide variety of the latest car technology.

PC's new web site and forum should reflect that and today's latest technology otherwise it is an embarrassment to its global media claim,its publications and caravanners.

 

[RogerL]

Designing your own forum? That won't work properly for a while then will it? Why not just use an off-the-shelf bulletin board like other forums do, not just caravanning.

I spent 40 years in what became known as IT, developing software, so I'm not just sniping - there's good BB software out there that allows good response times and promotional facilities - why re-invent the wheel?

 

[nrdonnelly]

Roger L,

Sorry I wasn't clear - we're not designing it from scratch, but we have the facility to turn on or off certain functions on the platform we are using. Things like IM, avatars and so on.

We'd just like your views on what sort of functions you need, what you'd like if it's available and what you're not bothered about.

Regards

Nigel Donnelly

Editor

Practical Caravan

 

[Dustydog]

Hi Nigel

I'd like more speed and the idiots ability to post pictures.

Cheers

Alan

 

[RogerL]

Thanks for the clarification, Nigel.

 

[Lord Braykewynde]

Thanks for your reply Nigel. A big plus would be to have the option of staying logged on instead of having to sign in each time. Avatars give a personal touch to those who want them and emoticons help to convey to others the point of the post, whether one was joking for example.

Another nice touch is when replying to a post one has the ability to quote from the post you are referring to.

You say "not to get too excited" but some of us who have used the forum for a few years now have fine tuned our will power while waiting for an upgrade so are not expecting it next week ;O)

 

[Gumbo]

The ability to " edit " your own posts would be good

 

[ProfJohnL]

Hello Frank,

I don't think that the ability to edit your own post after you have posted it is such a good idea:

You may submit something which is displayed, others read it and respond. so far it should make sense, but if you then re edit you initial post, it might change the meaning and and make the responses worthless or contradictory.

it is better to spend a little time on the text before submitting rather than to try post editing.

 

[ProfJohnL]

Hello Nigel,

A wish list eh?

A new job that where I can work from home and earn enough to keep the champagne flowing? Well they say if you don't ask you don,t get so..

Seriously. I have always disliked the way the forum headings reorder whenever a new post is made. For me I would prefer the headings to remain in a set order.

Within each heading, I prefer the more common practice of having the headline, and retaining the original posters ID and date against it, followed by the number of replies they have received. This makes searching for threads you are interested in easier.

Whilst this forum still operates using a membership with anonymity and nicknames, from time to time we may need to to pass specific details to another forum member but not to the public viewable pages. It should be possible to have a members message board where only the named member can open messages for them.

A spell-checker on the composition pages,

I think that will do for now, as I ve got open another bottle ready for elevenses.

 

[Guest]

A 'deleted' section. Not with the whole shooting match but the thread title. At least then you could have an answer to 'I wonder where that one went?'

 

[Lord Braykewynde]

I like your thinking SL but I don't think the money will stretch that far. They would need a dedicated server just for the deleted section :O)

If it was forthcoming "Politically Correct Deletions" would be a good title ;O)

 

[Guest]

What brought it to mind was that I am sure last week there was an extensive thread on some bloke not wanting to rent his pad to certain members of society. Then it just disappeared with no comment, or i missed it.

 

[Guest]

Sorry, just noticed someone else asking the same question. Must try to keep up, must be old age.

 

[rob_jax]

HiJohn

"I don't think that the ability to edit your own post after you have posted it is such a good idea:

You may submit something which is displayed, others read it and respond. so far it should make sense, but if you then re edit you initial post, it might change the meaning and and make the responses worthless or contradictory."

I disagree, but only if the new BB software supports "quotations" - so the respondent can take a snapshot of the original thread. Then that is visible to everyone later on.

And it works really well on our Eriba Forum - now that people have got used to the "quote" feature... Robert