Ancient Threads

[jbeng]

I routinely see threads which are several years old resurrected by a new member (generally) who posts an answer the o/p's question or posts a similar question of his own, instead of starting a new thread.

Just curious - is there any way to automatically "lock" a thread once is it reaches a certain age, for instance, a year old? This would eliminate four or five year old threads being re-activated when the o/p may or may not even be on the board.

Also, would it be possible to display the date of the original post next to the name of the o/p in the thread list? This may also reduce the number of old threads being re-activated in this way.

Just a couple of thoughts...

Jeff

[Sceadwian]

I like the auto-lock feature idea, it would allow people to still search old threads and avoid people that accidentally touch ancient threads. A simple color code for the date of the post might be good. Right now the date of the post is listed in the thread for every post in it. But color coding those dates might be a good idea. Such as a no highlighting for posts no older than 2 weeks, a yellow highlight for posts over 2 weeks, and a red warning for posts over 1 month.

[microtexan]

I'm all for it. I have embarrassed myself on occasion by not noticing the original and last post date.

[Sceadwian]

Now just to get Electromaster to notice this thread when he has some free time to alter the PHP code =)

[ElectroMaster]

I always notice I usually click subscribe to threads like this and wait for a few members to respond so i can see how important an issue is. Then decide on how to respond.

I have thought about auto locking threads older than one year (as in last post) this way they will be preserved. Or maybe just a warning like Sceadwian's suggestion.

[Sceadwian]

I do like the date colour coding idea myself, it would allow users familiar with it to catch old posts really fast, and alteration to the PHP code should be virtually trivial. Usually when I see those new users touching threads like that I don't notice it cause I look back at the original poster or the last few comments and find something worth responding too. True the dates are right there, but they just don't stick out.

[giftiger_wunsch]

I'd be all for the automatic locking of old threads idea (say threads with no replies in more than a month or something). I have regularly noticed that new members have found old threads, probably via google or something, and just appended questions to the end and dragged up very old threads.

A lot of people, most notably new members, need to be encouraged to create their own threads, with suitable titles, rather than appending their question to others, either old or new.

[JimB]

Sometimes a thread may lay dormant for a month or more only for the originator to come back and ask further questions, re-start the project which has been interupted by work, domestic activities or whatever, or even say "hey thanks guys, I got it working at last!".

On that basis I dont like the idea of locking threads which have no replies for a month.
Alternatively, would it be possible to lock a thread to all except the originator, say after one month with no new posts. That way the thread could be re-opened to allow for the situations which I described above.

JimB

[ericgibbs]

Originally Posted by JimB

Sometimes a thread may lay dormant for a month or more only for the originator to come back and ask further questions, re-start the project which has been interupted by work, domestic activities or whatever, or even say "hey thanks guys, I got it working at last!".

On that basis I dont like the idea of locking threads which have no replies for a month.
Alternatively, would it be possible to lock a thread to all except the originator, say after one month with no new posts. That way the thread could be re-opened to allow for the situations which I described above.

JimB

hi Jim,
I would second that suggestion, it covers most possibilities.

[Sceadwian]

I'd say 3 months is more than reasonable, if the poster decides to revisit it at some later point they can contact a moderate to have it unlocked, no big deal, and you could put some automated note on locked threads with a link for contacting the administrator to have it unlocked. It would take relatively minor PHP code changes, then again I'm not a PHP programmer =)

[giftiger_wunsch]

Originally Posted by sceadwian

I'd say 3 months is more than reasonable, if the poster decides to revisit it at some later point they can contact a moderate to have it unlocked, no big deal, and you could put some automated note on locked threads with a link for contacting the administrator to have it unlocked.

I agree.

Originally Posted by sceadwian

It would take relatively minor PHP code changes, then again I'm not a PHP programmer =)

I am a PHP programmer (among other languages), but I don't know what the source looks like so it's anyone's guess how long that would take to implement Either way it shouldn't be a particularly tall order though.

[Vizier87]

Um.. A little bit of a kid's thought here: Why not have a script which will match the questions of newbies to the older posts which bear the same details, and I mean proper matches, not just garbled ones, and visitors can just type a question in a 'Quick question' space ( just like the 'quick reply' ). It's like an advanced Googling, with better matches? Just conceptual suggestion, I don't have the expertise on that kinda thing.

That way the ones who don't intend to become members ( just-droppin'-by guys) don't need to post questions, they can find answers first, and if that doesn't help them, then a page replies "Sorry, but your question is quite unique. Please login as a member and post your question again".

I'm just seeing quite a lot of one-timers, that's all. One post and they're gone. Just a thought.

[tcmtech]

I would personally go a bit further than the three month time scale for a lockout of a thread.

Many of the posters here have seasonal work and seasonal off time , me included, where they only then can pursue their hobby work that is relative to further information in many threads.
Because of that I would go with a one year time frame before locking out any thread just to be on the safe side.

For a personal reference heres why.
I have a fair amount of GTI related work I need to catch up on thats relative to several threads that I dropped for the summer due to limited time and money. For me now the money problem is for the most part solved but the time aspect wont be until the snow flies and I shut down for the winter and thats probably going to be closer to mid December or later this year.

However I like the idea of the color coding system to represent a 1 month and perhaps a 6 month time frame. Maybe green for current stuff, yellow for 1 month, orange for 6 months, and red for the 1 year lock.

Just my thoughts.

[Sceadwian]

Becuase Vizier, such advanced post searching would involved going through the ENTIRE forum for the last number of years and identifying and cataloging every thread that shared important information.
Even if you're not a memeber of the forum you can use the basic search or even use google to search through previous posts. It's getting the users to do this that's the problem, the bulk majority of noobs are just that, they want answers now and are constitutionally incapable of learning for themselves.

[Vizier87]

Originally Posted by Sceadwian

It's getting the users to do this that's the problem, the bulk majority of noobs are just that, they want answers now and are constitutionally incapable of learning for themselves.

Mmmm. That's very true.