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Daniel Widdis
May 25th, 2005, 11:25 AM
Well, I guess I can try to be the first one to post a new "I'm here" thread...

Paul Keating
May 25th, 2005, 11:59 AM
And I'm #2!

Judy G. Russell
May 25th, 2005, 12:29 PM
Hi, Dan! Welcome!

Judy G. Russell
May 25th, 2005, 12:30 PM
Hi, Paul! Welcome aboard!

Bill Hirst
May 25th, 2005, 01:34 PM
I'm here too. It was nice they gave us a week or so to find the new digs.

-Bill

heinz57g
May 25th, 2005, 01:49 PM
so: after seeing those strange mssgs for 7 years+ (?), i dare to ask: what is dixonary?

greetings - heinz -

Dodi Schultz
May 25th, 2005, 01:54 PM
Well, I guess I can try to be the first one to post a new "I'm here" thread...

Sorry, I find this confusing and overly complex. Too much extraneous material--icons, emoticons, inapplicable directives ("calendar", "search", "buddy list", et cetera, et cetera).

I vote for continuing our Dixonary game at the Coryphaeus site at Yahoo, as previously planned. (I'm using the e-mail option there.)

P.S.: "Junior Member"????

--DS

Daniel Widdis
May 25th, 2005, 02:00 PM
Hi, Dan! Welcome!
Thanks. And now that I know I can use my full name as a user name, I've switched profiles to be consistent with everyone else.

Funny there's no "reply" button. I had to hit the quote button to reply to the thread....

Daniel Widdis
May 25th, 2005, 02:05 PM
I vote for continuing our Dixonary game at the Coryphaeus site at Yahoo, as previously planned. (I'm using the e-mail option there.)
I gather that we'll all have to come to a consensus in the next week. I personally like the threaded aspect of this particular forum to the non-threaded Yahoo group. Selecting the options to forward "private messages" to email will make it work much like the existing (for a week, anyway) forum. And no offense to Coryphaeus, but if we are going to work on a Yahoo group I don't see why we don't make an entirely new group with the Dixonary name, rather than a name of one of the (few) dealing programs.

As for the extra stuff here (icons, calendar, etc.) I think it's all optional.

Daniel Widdis
May 25th, 2005, 02:13 PM
i dare to ask: what is dixonary?
The full rules are sticky-posted to the top of this forum.

In a nutshell, it's a game that's been played in the TAPCIS Forum since 1989 (we're currently on Round 1612) where one player (the Dealer) finds an obscure word and posts it, and the rest of the players make up fake definitions for it. The definitions (one real and all the fakes, averaging about 20 lately) are then posted and everyone votes on which one they think is real (or perhaps to reward a creative fake one). Players get 2 points for picking the real definition, and 1 point for each vote their definition gets. Whoever gets the most points (with a few tiebreakers defined) becomes the new dealer for the next round.

Feel free to join us!

Dave Cunningham
May 25th, 2005, 02:45 PM
Only way to reply seems to be using full Quote :( -- so I deleted the original message <g>

I think I made it in -- I tried to re-enter Coryphaeus -- but Yahoo seems to have lost my account --- which I suppose I ought to have expected.

Hi everyone!

Dave

Hugo Kornelis
May 25th, 2005, 03:44 PM
Only way to reply seems to be using full Quote :( -- so I deleted the original message <g>

Hi Dave,

Depends. If you use a chronological display of the messages, there is one "post reply" button at the end of the list. This won't post a reply to a specific message, but to the whole thread.

If you use the threaded display, this button is gone (which makes sense - if you want to use threaded display, you'll have to indicate what message you're replying to).

I agree that a "Reply without quote" button would be nice!

Best, Hugo

Judy G. Russell
May 25th, 2005, 03:44 PM
Switch to hybrid mode, Dave (upper right hand corner of the messages). That'll give you a thread tree and a post reply button. The message that's highlighted is the one you're replying to.

annc
May 25th, 2005, 04:03 PM
Well, I guess I can try to be the first one to post a new "I'm here" thread...I'm here too, and must congratulate the forum staff on their selection of forum software!

Ann

Judy G. Russell
May 25th, 2005, 04:26 PM
Thanks, Ann. We think this will work out nicely, though we're also sure there will be loads of bugs to work out to make it work as much like we want it to as possible.

Tim Lodge
May 25th, 2005, 05:11 PM
I'm here too.

Judy G. Russell
May 25th, 2005, 05:20 PM
If you use a chronological display of the messages, there is one "post reply" button at the end of the list. This won't post a reply to a specific message, but to the whole thread.
Ah, but there is what's called the Hybrid Mode, where you see both a thread tree and a chronological display of messages, and the post-reply button DOES post a reply to the specific message you highlighted (usually the one you were reading).

annc
May 25th, 2005, 05:28 PM
Thanks, Ann. We think this will work out nicely, though we're also sure there will be loads of bugs to work out to make it work as much like we want it to as possible.As it's the same software chosen by DTP and Pets, there's a ready-made network of like-minded people (who understand the CIS model) for brainstorming on
any issues that arrive. ;-)

Ann

Judy G. Russell
May 25th, 2005, 05:33 PM
As it's the same software chosen by DTP and Pets, there's a ready-made network of ike-minded people (who understand the CIS model) for brainstorming on any issues that arrive. ;-)
Thank heavens... the software has great potential, but I do feel sometimes like there's something obvious about how it does / should work that I'm missing!

Toni Savage
May 25th, 2005, 09:19 PM
Me too!

Rats. Has to be more than ten letters!

Toni Savage
May 25th, 2005, 09:22 PM
Yeah... easiest way to reply seems to be to select "quote" and then erase the quote! <g>

Judy G. Russell
May 25th, 2005, 09:47 PM
Rats. Has to be more than ten letters!
Err... what does?

marijke
May 25th, 2005, 11:43 PM
Well, i'm here too. I think. Wherever "here" is...

>> Sorry, I find this confusing and overly complex. Too much extraneous
material--icons, emoticons, <<

Just ignore it.

>> inapplicable directives ("calendar", "search", "buddy list", et cetera, et cetera). <<

I'm advising everybody not to try and make me a "buddy" or send "instant messages" -- i might not like it. I'm the oldfashioned type <g>.

>> I vote for continuing our Dixonary game at the Coryphaeus site at Yahoo, as previously planned. <<

We'll have to see where everybody goes. No point having a few players here and a few there and a few lost and a few fed up... I agree it's all bewildering, our old haunt going and us being spoilt for choice where to go next -- but it's better having too many places to choose from than nowhere at all!

I propose a big thank-you for everybody who worked hard to get us a new home, whichever of the offerings we will finally avail ourselves of.

>> (I'm using the e-mail option there.) <<

That reminds me. Haven't yet found the option to receive all this (well, the text at least) by email as a mailing list. I don't particularly want to spend the rest of my life typing things into boxes on a web site. There used to be this nice program, called Tap or some such... ;-)

Oh, and where's the file upload area? Maintenance release of Dixomatic coming up...

--Regards, marijke [lost in cyberspace without suitable sig]

Judy G. Russell
May 25th, 2005, 11:56 PM
Oh, and where's the file upload area? Maintenance release of Dixomatic coming up...
Just make it an attachment to a message. That's the way "files" tend to work on the web. It's in the Additional Options area at the bottom of your message area.

Hugo Kornelis
May 26th, 2005, 03:15 AM
Hi Judy,

Yep, I know (now). I saw your message right after I posted mine. Thanks for the heads-up!

Best, Hugo

annc
May 26th, 2005, 03:39 AM
Thank heavens... the software has great potential, but I do feel sometimes like there's something obvious about how it does / should work that I'm missing!It does require a slightly different mind set, but we in DTP found very few complaints. The quoting is much better than both the old CIS and new P-CIS methods, and we have been encouraging people to use Hybrid or Threaded view because if the vB quoting is used, in the thread tree, readers can see the first few words of the reply (not the quoted text) and easily determine if they've previously read that message. On top of the ease of differentiation of quoted text, that's a great time saver. But I don't think it's available in Linear view, and we're finding some small resistance in oldtimers to using the vB quotes. ;-)

Congratulations on getting this up and running with short notice. You've done a great job!

annc
May 26th, 2005, 03:46 AM
Err... what does?vB has a feature that counts the number of characters in a reply (excluding quote text). If the number of characters is fewer than that set in the admin control panel, the software pops up a dialogue box in case you've actually hit the Submit button before typing your reply.

In general, it is A Good Thing. I've been grateful for it on many an occasion.

For people who like to acknowledge a reply with a <g> or ;-) to indicate that they're read it but don't feel the conversation needs to be continued, this is a bit of a pain. But you can set it to a very low number.

Chris Carson
May 26th, 2005, 08:22 AM
I've apparently made it as well. Interesting interface. My first thought is that I like it a bit better than the Yahoo Group interface but I'm still fumbling around with the details.

Chris Carson
May 26th, 2005, 08:48 AM
Thank heavens... the software has great potential, but I do feel sometimes like there's something obvious about how it does / should work that I'm missing!

Judy,

You're right about that. After searching around, I have to ask ... how the *&%$ do I change the username to something a little nicer than 'ccarson'? And while I'm at it, I'm not getting any display of avatars or images even though the option is turned on in my profile.

Other than that (for now), so far, so good.

Judy G. Russell
May 26th, 2005, 08:58 AM
Excellent. We're all learning with this, but we'll get there!

Judy G. Russell
May 26th, 2005, 09:00 AM
Congratulations on getting this up and running with short notice. You've done a great job!
Thanks for the kind words, Ann.

I'm sure we'll all adjust to the new format. The fact is -- we certainly hope -- this is too much of a community (in the real no-foolin' sense of the word) not to.

Judy G. Russell
May 26th, 2005, 09:06 AM
I don't think anyone is (yet) using avatars, Chris. As for images, you should be able to see then. Check this message (http=http://www.tapcis.com/forums/showthread.php?postid=194#poststop) and see if you see the jpg there.

Judy G. Russell
May 26th, 2005, 09:07 AM
Ooooh!! That's interesting. I'll have to go check that out. There are literally dozens of controls to this software we haven't completely figured out yet!

marijke
May 26th, 2005, 12:04 PM
Judy,

Just make it an attachment to a message. That's the way "files" tend to work on the web. It's in the Additional Options area at the bottom of your message area.

thank you! Will do that, and/or post a link to a web page for it. BTW, like that style of quote better? ;-)

As i didn't say in my previous message, you can't go on holiday for half a week without something major happening... went to Cornwall for a few days, came back 3 hours past midnight last night extremely tired and just picked up my email before going to sleep to see if there's anything important, and there was this...

I'll go to the old forum now to see if there's any round being played.

By the way, who are our sysops here? I see you. Where are Dick, Frank, Jeff, Lindsey, Pete, Ralph etc.?

--Regards, marijke

lensue
May 26th, 2005, 01:28 PM
>I do feel sometimes like there's something obvious about how it does / should work that I'm missing<

Chris, so I guess you can imagine of uncomfortable a computer idiot like me must feel! Well at least I'm here! Regards, Len [g]

JohnnyB
May 26th, 2005, 03:34 PM
Dan

I tried to be #2 yesterday but it has taken me more than 24 hours to succeed in logging on (and that was via two failed mailto links on this forum (DAEMON failed them as invalid))

I am thoroughly confused by the threading here, I can't see which message I am reading in the thread list, and it is all too 'fussy' for my liking. The email software I am using for non CIS stuff threads quite adequately for me

I also think that it is a little late in the day to disagree with the cory\yahoo setup, we have had months to express our views about that.

Finally, I am with marijke and others -- web browsing on a pay-for your phone calls system - you must be joking! Using redmond geek stuff is totally out of any budget. Even something reasonable like Firefox is not useful in that environment. Do it for something really important, Yes; but despite it being one of the high-spots of my life, dixionary is not affordable on a web base

JohnnyB

JohnnyB
May 26th, 2005, 03:45 PM
Someone - you seem to be unworried..

How do I know what I have read?... I have been round and round and I still don't think I have read all of them. I pass through 'heinz' asking what dixionary is in multiple branches or it seems like that

and a reply button would be helpful too if not an actual requirement for an email system (hit quote and delete the 'quoted' is the only way I can see).

and ....

JohnnyB<confused in the UK having spent a few euro's worth of ŁUK trying to work out what this is about>

Daniel Widdis
May 26th, 2005, 03:59 PM
I am thoroughly confused by the threading here, I can't see which message I am reading in the thread list, and it is all too 'fussy' for my liking.Are you using the "threaded" or "hybrid" modes? It seems pretty clear to me. I can see the whole thread, plus the "new" messages since my last visit are shown in a different color. Certainly different than the old Forum, but 1000 times better than the P-CIS forums.
I also think that it is a little late in the day to disagree with the cory\yahoo setup
I don't think most of us knew that this was an option when we were discussing alternatives. I do not think it is fair to claim that a decision has already been made when the decision was not made with full information.
Finally, I am with marijke and others -- web browsing on a pay-for your phone calls system - you must be joking!
As I have been trying to make clear both on this board and on the yahoo/cory mailing list, this forum has excellent functionality and flexibility. I have asked, and Judy has indicated she will activate, RSS feeds. This will make the forum viewable in a wide variety of programs, all the way from web browsers to instant messaging clients to -- yes -- offline-based email or news readers. I plan to use my server to automatically copy every post from the Parlor into the yahoo group list. The only need to log in to the web forum would be to cast a vote, which would be once every 3 days or so at the rate we play. And if that's beyond the hardware/software/budget of any player, I am certain that most of us would be happy to forward a vote on the email list to the forum.

In sum, I believe that basing the game at this forum, with a consistent "copy" being made to the mailing list, is an excellent solution that will make most of us happy and keep the maximum number of us participating. The best of both worlds, really. That's how Fictionary (the MPGAMES forum's version of Dixonary) has been doing it for a few years.

Daniel Widdis
May 26th, 2005, 04:02 PM
How do I know what I have read?... and a reply button would be helpful too...In the upper right corner of this window, click on "Display modes" and switch to "Hybrid Mode". You'll get both a threaded display (what you have read is in blue, new messages in yellow) and a "reply" button on the bottom.

Judy G. Russell
May 26th, 2005, 08:41 PM
By the way, who are our sysops here? I see you. Where are Dick, Frank, Jeff, Lindsey, Pete, Ralph etc.?
They're around but hanging me out to dry to front this, I think!!!

Tim Bourne
May 27th, 2005, 01:33 AM
Well, I guess I can try to be the first one to post a new "I'm here" thread...

That didn't seem easy, but now I'm here. The "hybrid" view seems to be the only one worth using if threading matters, though for Dixonary I'm not sure that it does.

Tim B

Hugo Kornelis
May 27th, 2005, 01:44 AM
I don't think anyone is (yet) using avatars, Chris.

And let's just hope that this won't change.

Best, Hugo

marijke
May 27th, 2005, 03:53 AM
Dan,

In the upper right corner of this window, click on "Display modes" and switch to "Hybrid Mode". You'll get both a threaded display (what you have read is in blue, new messages in yellow) and a "reply" button on the bottom.

Yellow? My Firefox must be colorblind (hybrid view as before, everything is blue, never yet seen an indication which msgs are new, and yes i'm logged in).

By the way... Tip for people just as clueless as me: LOG IN first thing you do. If you wait with logging in until you try to reply, the system will (a) ask you to log in there and then, (b) promise to get you back to where you were, (c) claim the thread URL is invalid, so you have to find your way back and re-write your reply (if you didn't copy it to the clipboard). This is a forum-end glitch no doubt, but logging in before you have to avoids it.

--Regards, marijke http://web.mat.bham.ac.uk/marijke/

Judy G. Russell
May 27th, 2005, 08:45 AM
Look at the little icon in FRONT of the message sender's name. If it's blue, you've read it. If it's yellow, it's new. See attached, and if you can't see the attached, you may have to go to your UserCP (top left) and change your settings so you can see images.

Judy G. Russell
May 27th, 2005, 08:46 AM
I'm sure some will (a surprising number of people like them), but the avatar size in this software is much smaller than in the PCIS software so it shouldn't be objectionable.

marijke
May 28th, 2005, 04:10 AM
Daniel Widdis:
>>> In the upper right corner of this window, click on "Display modes"
>>> and switch to "Hybrid Mode". You'll get both a threaded display (what
>>> you have read is in blue, new messages in yellow) and a "reply" button
>>> on the bottom.
Marijke van Gans:
>> Yellow? My Firefox must be colorblind (hybrid view as before, everything
>> is blue, never yet seen an indication which msgs are new, and yes i'm
>> logged in).
Judy G. Russell:
> Look at the little icon in FRONT of the message sender's name. If it's blue,
> you've read it. If it's yellow, it's new.

Ah! got it now. In the tree. Thanks.

In the list if messages, that same icon appears to the left of date/time.

And to the right of the sender name there, there is a ball -- mine is turquoise but everybody else's seems to be dark blue. Is that there in case i forget who i am? ;-)

> See attached, and if you can't see the attached, you may have to go to
> your UserCP (top left) and change your settings so you can see images.

Will do that now.

--Regards, marijke

marijke
May 28th, 2005, 04:20 AM
See attached, and if you can't see the attached, you may have to go to your UserCP (top left) and change your settings so you can see images.

I see i had already switched "see images" on, but nevertheless your message only showed a generic Netscape/Mozilla/Firefox image icon -- i had to click on it to see the picture (Ctrl-clicked, so it showed in another tab). Maybe it's just a Firefox thing, or an adblock thing, etc.

That's fine by me! Saves download time unless i *want* to see an image (such as now).

I do see the avatars currently in use (and i know i could switch them off if i so desired).

--Regards, marijke

JohnnyB
May 28th, 2005, 06:48 AM
Judy,

I have to agree with marijke
1. --- in Firefox all messages stay the same colour
2. --- in Firefox all Icons before the name are the same
3. vis-a-vis the latter point, your attachment shows (ie its icon next to its name) correctly, as itself, and the icon next to my name saying I am on-line - so it isn't that images are not working in and off themselves


and as an entirely different point... whats the difference between a 'member' and a 'registered user'?

JohnnyB

Judy G. Russell
May 28th, 2005, 08:03 AM
It may not be an entirely different point: there are differences between registered users (access to public sections) and members (access to private sections) and it's possible the settings for registered users are what's fouling this up. Another thing to look at this long weekend...

Judy G. Russell
May 28th, 2005, 08:04 AM
As I just said to JohnnyB, it may also be one of the 8,462 settings in this software. I have it on the list of things to look at this long holiday weekend here.

Hugo Kornelis
May 28th, 2005, 01:58 PM
And to the right of the sender name there, there is a ball -- mine is turquoise but everybody else's seems to be dark blue. Is that there in case i forget who i am? ;-)

Hi Marijke,

Yours is dark blue now. Mine is green, and I've seen green balls for other people as well (but no orange balls yet?). If you hold your mouse over a dark blue ball, a tooltip will pop up, informing you that John Doe is offline. For a green ball, the tooltip says that John Doe is online. I didn't test what happens if you click the ball, but I'd not be surprised if that takes you to some chat or instant message thingie.

Best, Hugo

Judy G. Russell
May 28th, 2005, 02:37 PM
And to the right of the sender name there, there is a ball -- mine is turquoise but everybody else's seems to be dark blue.
Online user = green, offline = blue. I haven't seen turquoise myself (yet!).

marijke
May 28th, 2005, 10:59 PM
Hi Marijke,

Yours is dark blue now. Mine is green, and I've seen green balls for other people as well (but no orange balls yet?). If you hold your mouse over a dark blue ball, a tooltip will pop up, informing you that John Doe is offline. For a green ball, the tooltip says that John Doe is online. I didn't test what happens if you click the ball, but I'd not be surprised if that takes you to some chat or instant message thingie.

Best, Hugo

Thanks!

--Regards, marijke

Paul Keating
May 29th, 2005, 03:02 PM
I really don't understand why everybody goes on about the Yahoo group not being threaded. It is threaded, just as tapcis.com is. Your options for viewing messages are View: Simple | Summary | Expanded; As: Msg List | Thread: not very different from the facilities at tapcis.com.

Daniel Widdis
May 29th, 2005, 04:52 PM
I really don't understand why everybody goes on about the Yahoo group not being threaded.
I don't think many people are "going on" about it, since it's generally a moot point for Dixonary.

Yahoo only threads replies directly to their parent if you read and reply /on the web page/. For those who read and reply via a regular mail client, it doesn't track replies nearly as well.

But again, it's a moot point. We don't really need threading to play Dixonary. We /do/ need prompt email delivery, something I've found lacking on a consistent basis in the various yahoo groups I'm a member of.

Dick K
May 29th, 2005, 10:53 PM
Judy,

Where are Dick, Frank, Jeff, Lindsey, Pete, Ralph etc.?

--Regards, marijke

Marijke -

Here, there, everywhere, anywhere....

--Dick

marijke
May 30th, 2005, 08:30 PM
Marijke -

Here, there, everywhere, anywhere....

--Dick

Hi Dick! Long time no see. I spotted a message by Frank Haber as well. This place is slowly starting to look a bit more recognisable...

--Regards, marijke

marijke
May 30th, 2005, 08:35 PM
Online user = green, offline = blue. I haven't seen turquoise myself (yet!).

Maybe i was sort-of half logged in... <g>

--Regards, marijke

Judy G. Russell
May 30th, 2005, 09:45 PM
Could be... I'm half-awake most of the time!

Chris Carson
May 31st, 2005, 09:46 AM
Judy,

Hopefully this reply will go into the right place. I feel a little like the time I transitioned from Lotus to Excel or Word Perfect to Word. All of the functions are there, it's finding them that's the trick. By the way, that link you gave me didn't work - got the old IE page not found error.

Chris

Chris Carson
May 31st, 2005, 09:48 AM
Len,

I think all of us feel like computer idiots on a regular basis, I know I do. On a more pleasant tack - picked up a new Vivaldi CD recently - Orlando Furioso - and I'm now a confirmed fan of Baroque opera in general and Vivaldi's in particular.

marijke
May 31st, 2005, 06:04 PM
Could be... I'm half-awake most of the time!

I bet! Must've taken some real effort setting up this thing...

--Regards, marijke

Judy G. Russell
May 31st, 2005, 06:06 PM
There have been a lot of very good people helping, so it's been fun as well as work!