You must be kidding, Rob. I pray for feedback that detailed. I’ll be returning to your post as I groom the site.

“I want to know what’s new” is a nice succint statement of your requirements. I can generalize from that guidance.

You and lots of people will be happy to know that I worked out how to do a “latest activity” search: Composite of post editing and comments on the post determines its “last modified” timestamp. En Ingles: “thread[s] popping up to the top of the page when someone comments”. Should show up later tonight or tomorrow everywhere; for now it’s just on Oz.

The middle of your post is full of insightful comments about what works at the Zone. And it’s encouraging to think that just as the technical degradation of the Zone the last couple of moves drove away members, improving the place might bring a few people back. Worth a shot, and I’m having fun, anyway

The software does shape the social aspect of the Zone. I saw that in a bit of serendipity today: I started using Frank’s personal blog to have a conversation with him that, while not really personal, wasn’t really of interest to anybody else, either. Just some business about his testing of the new design. So having created these blogs pages, I’ve inadvertantly created little “nooks” where people can have side conversations on a more intimate level.

Thanks for your feedback, Rob.

I want to know what’s new. I don’t want to open each board and search through each thread (even to the next page) for new comments.

I hit the taxonomy node filter button to see all new comments on all posts by all members.

I don’t want email notifications.

I want the old Zone behavior of a thread popping up to the top of the page when someone comments. This lets you know instantly if there is a new comment and, as i have said before, it keeps hot topics in the forefront. And yes, it allows two people to converse and not lose the conversation to page two.

This will sound odd (maybe really odd) but to me, the old way felt more personal than just jumping to a list.

Even though you still had to open each board to see what’s new, you might read something you skipped or missed that actually interested you. If you have a list, you glance at it and probably move on to another website if nothing is happening.

Put another way, the Zone is a place to hang out, not just a quick reference to skip through. The place has a depth that’s not found everywhere. Granted the members are what makes it special but it’s the software that facilitates things. During the last two “moves” I think we saw evidence of what can happen to membership with a change in function.

And as long as you have your monkey wrench out, inserted links are not underlined. Maybe I’m doing something wrong?

And could the edit page open in a new tab. It’s incredibly cramped on a Netbook. I don’t think you should have to rt. click and “open in a new tab”.

That’s what I want.

(Well you seemed to want a challenge )

I’m pretty adaptable. So far I’ve gotten about half a dozen different Zone interfaces, and eventually made all of them my bitch. Eventually.

The problem is, this is not the best use of my time. I’ve noticed this trend in major software makers, things like Facebook, Microsoft, Apple, you name it.

At some point they just have an irresistable need to “fix” things and “update the interface.” And we all spend a month trying to figure out how to do things our hands did instinctively the week before.

Out here where I live, we just want to be able to work with something we worked with yesterday without having to retrain. It’s like somebody deciding they really need to move all the keys around on a keyboard every two years because it would increase typing efficiency (look at the history of that sometime).

We’re not talking about just adding new features on top of old ones, or fixing problems. We’re talking about redesigning everything over and over again.

Windows 8 is rolling out soon. I suspect all the interfaces will be shiny and new. Hell, I don’t even like it when a favorite product in the grocery store changes the box so I have to read all the damn labels to find out how to get something I’ve been buying for years.

God knows how much productivity we lose to Endless Upgrade Syndrome every year.

Let me ask instead, what capabilities do you want? How useful is the list of your own posts? (I’m curious, ’cause the Zone isn’t that big you can lose posts) And have you checked out the list of your own posts that appears on the newly-rebuilt author’s page? You: http://habitablezone.com/author/robvg/. Is that a useful format? I left out the pencil icon thinking you wouldn’t want to edit there, but au contraire, that may be exactly what you want. ?

I don’t think I’m so baffled about the comments list: You want to see who’s commenting on your posts so you can go continue the conversation, right? Would you be interested in email notifications?

I’m wondering if the way you and Tom and others work those lists isn’t because you miss the visual indication we used to get, right in the TOC, about “visited” messages? That worked when the browser had to go to another page to view a post, which it recorded in browser history; but I broke that with the fancy-schmancy load-on-demand post bodies.

Is all this really a yearning to get that feature back? If so, that’s what I’ll try to fix, instead of your access to the WordPress lists. Which way do I go?

Big picture, I’m resisting more use of the dashboard because it’s really meant for administrators, and the design shows it (read: rough on normal people), might leak administrative capabilities to users ordinaire, and it’s generally a jumbled mess that confuses everybody. How do you like that editing page, eh? So my long term goal is to replace the dashboard features normal people need with user interfaces for those things designed for normal people. We’ll all be happier long term. Even us Abnormals in the backroom.

OK, “long term” probably rings alerm bells, doesn’t it? I can change the silly-ass link in a minute for a short-term fix. But I still want to make the long-term redesign too.