Adding a topbar. (So can we do this or not Pirate Kitty / Morrus)??

[Dragongirl]

Re: Re: Re: Adding a topbar. (So can we do this or not Pirate Kitty / Morrus)??

And I do know the difference between the two. If you refrain from lecturing me like a child about the differnce I'll refrain from saying you seriously need a real computer.

Real computer? Well then put me in the ranks of those not wishing for this new thing unless it can be turned off easily, or better yet not turned on unless switched on. That news ticker almost did me in, no telling what this will do.

 

[Horacio]

Re: Re: Re: Adding a topbar. (So can we do this or not Pirate Kitty / Morrus)??

It's antiquated pieces of junk like that I am trying to block from loading this script, just in case

And I do know the difference between the two. If you refrain from lecturing me like a child about the differnce I'll refrain from saying you seriously need a real computer.

Sorry, Michael, but there you have been offensive against hundreds of us who can't afford a "real computer". At work I have a sad P350 and I can't change it, I'm stuck with it and I don't want to be unable to browse my favorite forums. At home I have a pc a bit better, but I bet you won't think of it as a "real computer", and no, I can't afford a better one. So please, refrain yourself from doing that kind of comment.

 

[Michael Morris]

Re: Re: Re: Re: Adding a topbar. (So can we do this or not Pirate Kitty / Morrus)??

Sorry, Michael, but there you have been offensive against hundreds of us who can't afford a "real computer". At work I have a sad P350 and I can't change it, I'm stuck with it and I don't want to be unable to browse my favorite forums. At home I have a pc a bit better, but I bet you won't think of it as a "real computer", and no, I can't afford a better one. So please, refrain yourself from doing that kind of comment.

I was joking Horacio - or did you miss the smiley.

I have several computers at the house. I test my pages using my old Pent III 366 Celeron, which is just as bad as what your using.

I understand that not everyone has a high end system. Why do you think I spent the last 4 hours writing a blocker script to prevent the topbar macro from displaying on older browsers that tend to mess up javascript programs? (And for the record, I've never used JAVA applets - those things aren't even reliable or trustworthy on high end systems).

The solution I settled on was to search for MSIE or Gecko in the $HTTP_USER_AGENT string. This weeds out Netscape 4.x (Sorry, but no one should use that piece of crap. I'd go back to NS 3.0 before I'd use NS 4.x) and most earlier browsers. It does not weed out MSIE 2.0 and 1.0 - but I think it unlikely any sane person would use either of those in preference to the NS versions out at the same time and in any event, they can't handle the UUB board code itself anyway, so it's a bit of a moot point. Another possible hole is a browser known as Opera. Opera claims to be MSIE in it's user agent string, but it is not. I've heard that it's earlier versions have rather flaky JAVAscript support.

Doce and I tested the script out pretty thoroughly last night and I think it will work.

The point of all this testing is to insure that the thing will function on the browsers that support it without damaging the functionality of pages on the browsers that do not support it.

As a footnote Horacio, a Pent 350 should run IE 5.x. When I refer to "real computers" I mean anything made in the last 5 years - pretty much Pent II or better. Even with slower machines - it's the MODEM that kills computer speeds, not the processor. Still, I have a relative that constantly irks me because she has problems browsing web pages using a 486 that she put Win 95 on (BIG mistake). That's the kind of system I was thinking of when I was "being snooty."

 

[Horacio]

Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Adding a topbar. (So can we do this or not Pirate Kitty / Morrus)??

I was joking Horacio - or did you miss the smiley.

I have several computers at the house. I test my pages using my old Pent III 366 Celeron, which is just as bad as what your using.

I guess I missed the joke, maybe because the smiley was before the phrase... But then I don't understand your comment when he said he used a PII 300 laptop

Another possible hole is a browser known as Opera. Opera claims to be MSIE in it's user agent string, but it is not. I've heard that it's earlier versions have rather flaky JAVAscript support.

In fact, I'm an Opera user... Yeah, right now I'm browsing and posting it with my Opera 7.0...

As a footnote Horacio, a Pent 350 should run IE 5.x. When I refer to "real computers" I mean anything made in the last 5 years - pretty much Pent II or better. Even with slower machines - it's the MODEM that kills computer speeds, not the processor. Still, I have a relative that constantly irks me because she has problems browsing web pages using a 486 that she put Win 95 on (BIG mistake). That's the kind of system I was thinking of when I was "being snooty."

And what about all those Linux/Unix/workstation users? They have no IE on it, and they are not as few as you could think. In fact, many times at work I connect from a Sun workstation, using sun navigator or a crappy Netscape 4.7.

Please, don't take anything ofthis as an attack. But many people, for many different reasons, are unable to use IE. Specially in enterprise environments when you can't install the programs you would like to. Operating systems, administrators rights, entreprise politics, all that make many people to browse the boards from substandard machines or non Wintel machines, and that people should be able to browse it without problems. If you can do it, it will be great, if not, I wouldn't like the topbar. Ideally, it should be able to be turned off at will, as the news ticks.

Another concern of me is bandwidth. 22 kb can't seem a lot... for an individual user, but what about the boards? 22 kb for each page, with thousands of page loadings every day, couldn't it make a big difference in traffic?

In fact, those 22kb can makea big difference to slow connections, so I'm 100% for a topbar that allows user to turn it off, like the news ticks

Once again, this is not an attack, please don't take as it, only sincere concerns.

 

[Michael Morris]

In fact, I'm an Opera user... Yeah, right now I'm browsing and posting it with my Opera 7.0...

Opera 7.0 is reputed to have stable JAVAscript support.

And what about all those Linux/Unix/workstation users? They have no IE on it, and they are not as few as you could think. In fact, many times at work I connect from a Sun workstation, using sun navigator or a crappy Netscape 4.7.

The topbar won't appear. That's what the blocker script is for. I'm not recommending this be implemented to replace anything. I'm recommending it as a supplement.

Please, don't take anything ofthis as an attack. But many people, for many different reasons, are unable to use IE. Specially in enterprise environments when you can't install the programs you would like to. Operating systems, administrators rights, entreprise politics, all that make many people to browse the boards from substandard machines or non Wintel machines, and that people should be able to browse it without problems. If you can do it, it will be great, if not, I wouldn't like the topbar. Ideally, it should be able to be turned off at will, as the news ticks.

I am not familiar with the UUB code that drives the boards, but if a checkbox can be added to set the value of a variable in the user's profile, it should be able to be turned off. It's a simple matter of querying the variable - even less complicated than querying $HTTP_USER_AGENT since you will know the two possible values of the queried variable.

Another concern of me is bandwidth. 22 kb can't seem a lot... for an individual user, but what about the boards? 22 kb for each page, with thousands of page loadings every day, couldn't it make a big difference in traffic?

I don't think so. And browsers that fail the check wouldn't count - the server skips the includes statements that trigger the download of the relevant files. The same holds true for allowing users to turn this on or off at the profile level - the includes are never issued and therefore they never cross the phone wires. The determining script itself adds about 600 bytes to the files size of the master index file.

 

[Dragongirl]

While you are at it, can you have the AOL browser be banned from loading it? Thanks.

 

[Michael Morris]

While you are at it, can you have the AOL browser be banned from loading it? Thanks.

Any particular reason? If it's Gecko enabled it should display properly.

 

[Dragongirl]

Any particular reason? If it's Gecko enabled it should display properly.

For 2 reasons.
1) I don't use a "real comptuer" so don't want to see it.
but mostly because
2) AOL browsers already have a problem on this board with voting and the old news ticker.

 

[Michael Morris]

The question is, does the broswer run the script properly (Follow the link from the first page to test it). If it doesn't run I can try to find a way to block it.

If it does run the script then, no, I can't block it. Just because you don't want to see it wouldn't mean anyone using that browser would not want to see it. That's the sort of thing that user preferences are for.

The script I'm currently working on is a compatibility filter only.

 

[Horacio]

ok, Opera 7 browses the topbar well.

But I still want it to be optional, I think everybody should be able to choose it. I know that with PHPBB boards it can be done easily, so I guess that here with UBB it can be done easily too (fairly similar software, AFAIK).

Edit: yes, User preferences is the good place to let each person to choose if they want it. If it can be done without problem, as I guess, I'm ok for the bar