Site updates

Corin · May 1, 2020, 12:49pm

Yes, Sir!

Corin · May 1, 2020, 12:57pm

One issue though: The list on the main page usually shows whole series, not individual stories.

I don’t want to show the word count of the entire series (that would also slow down the site considerably unless I do some additional coding and extend the database). So I could actually only show the word count on the last part of each series, and that would be a bit confusing.

What I can do is to show the word count on the list of individual stories, though.

thedirtyspiders · May 1, 2020, 1:19pm

Yes perfect. In fact, I reckon if you just left the word count out of the ‘entire series style’ windows, it would incidentally help series stick out via ‘uniqueness by omission’

like “story, story, story, ouu a series”

nycboot · May 3, 2020, 1:32pm

Hey Martin, not only do I like the word counts, but something I don’t recall you mentioning: one can now choose how many stories are displayed on a page. It’s a little thing, but it makes searching the site so much easier. Thank you so very much!!

Corin · May 3, 2020, 6:31pm

Glad you like that little feature, but I did mention it in the update of 2020-04-08!

Corin · May 10, 2020, 12:29pm

Another update which, besides the necessary features to show the story challenge final standing, is mainly focused on improvements of the user experience:

2020-05-10

Implemented story challenge final standing calculation and display.
Several user experience improvements:
- For the rating of stories:
  - Rating panel is now collapsed on touch screen devices to avoid accidental ratings when just trying to scroll
  - Rating panel redesigned slightly
  - Notification “toast” pop-up to remind the user to rate all 5 categories.
  - Automatic reminder “toast” pop-up to rate a story after it has been scrolled all the way down and the reader has spent at least 2 minutes with the story.
- For bookmarks:
  - A bookmark can now be cleared by clicking the paragraph where it’s currently set to.
  - Both setting and clearing a bookmark takes a slightly longer click or touch (150ms), to avoid accidental setting of bookmarks.
Bugfixes
Bootstrap UI framework updated to 4.4.1

It had been a long-standing issue, that both bookmarks, as well as ratings, were obviously created by accidents on phones when the user just wanted to scroll the page. These changes are meant to resolve this. Also, I want to nudge the reader to rate and comment more consistently, because we authors are really craving for reactions from the user!

Please give me feedback if these changes are good this way, if the new “toasts” (the small pop-ups in the upper right corner) are not too much of a nuisance and if they are really helpful.

A_Voyeur_Fan · May 10, 2020, 1:41pm

Have there been some changes to the way ratings are calculated? I know you said that they usually disregard the top and bottom ratings to come up with the average. For some reason (maybe that), the weighted averages on my latest story seem to be a lot lower than the actual averages on any given rating.

Corin · May 10, 2020, 2:20pm

The weighted score also takes the total number of votes for your story into account. Since you only just got 12 votes so far, you’ll suffer from that badly.

But to be honest I just had a discussion and the penalty for a very low number of ratings might be a bit too steep now…

thedirtyspiders · May 10, 2020, 2:21pm

Sure we can drum up more then 12 votes per story easily?

Piko · May 10, 2020, 5:43pm

Hi! Phone user here!

First of all, thanks for the update! You’re always there trying to make our experience even better!

I just come from reading a story and this is what happened:

I got surprised that I had the story bookmarked more than a dozen times, and every time that that happened I had to dismiss the ‘reminder’ of how it worked. It felt more sensitive this time than before, and certainly more distracting. I guess that I was triggering it with each scroll, or when I took a moment to finish a sentence before scrolling down. If only the reminder popped up just once I could deal with all the bookmarking with no problem.
I almost missed the voting! lol It didn’t take long to find that it was collapsed in its usual place, though. I hope that now that it’s semi-hidden it doesn’t become harder to find.

And apart from that, it was a nice experience!

Corin · May 10, 2020, 6:09pm

Thank you Piko for your feedback.

I’ve changed the time you need to click on a paragraph before it tries to set a bookmark. It seems the previous value was too short. Also, I’ve removed the pop up. I think it might be more harmful than useful.

The thing with the rating is problematic. Before people kept accidentally hitting the rating bars when trying to scroll the page. That’s why I hide it now by default on touch devices.

You’re right, there is a good chance that this could have the effect that people rate even less. But I don’t know what I can do to avoid this…

Corin · May 22, 2020, 5:21pm

Today I’ve uploaded a huge update which I have been working on for a long time. I hope you like it.

The most obvious change is the addition of user profiles and avatars. Read more about them here. The avatars will also be your public ‘face’ on all your stories and comments.

Note that it’s absolutely ok to use naughty pictures (nudity etc.) for both the avatar and your profile pic. Only hard core is not allowed. See here for the details of what is allowed

Another, not immediately obvious change, is a tighter integration of the forum into the main site. You’ll now see notification bubbles on the main menu if there’s a new PM or posting for you in the forum:

The user profile has the potential for many other functions as well, let me know if you want to see something.

Also, since the image upload and storage infrastructure has been implemented now, it could be used for other purposes as well, like to be used in stories for example.

2020-05-22

Implemented code to allow to upload and store pictures
Implemented the display of Avatars on all lists (series, stories and comments) and the stories themselves.
Added Profile Pages
Added bubbles for new PMs and other forum notifications to the main menu.
Bugfixes

Dace · May 22, 2020, 6:10pm

I love this! It’s nice for people to be able to keep track of their own ratings and favorites from a central place, and share them with others. I think it’s really cool and appeals to my data hungers

Two questions:

is there an obvious way to change user names like you did for poor, reprogrammed Martin? This user would rather be Dace
are the reader stats and profile privacy things set to on by default, or off by default? I imagine new users (and I’m still pretty new myself) might not realize what settings are available to them when they first log in.

Hypnothrill · May 22, 2020, 6:46pm

What a cool redesign, Martin… I mean, Sexdroid-013!

I noticed that on my author page, the stories I contributed before 2016 aren’t showing up. Is that just a temporary glitch?

thedirtyspiders · May 22, 2020, 6:48pm

I think it’s amazing.

Corin · May 22, 2020, 7:07pm

You can use “Edit Settings” to change your name on the main site (the Author Name). And your forum name has to be changed separately here in the forum preferences.

The settings are on “public” by default. I.e. when the border is blue, and the slider is to the right, that stats is public.

Thanks for the feedback, I guess I have to work on the visual cues

Thanks! Your old stories are probably just not assigned to your account. Which author name have you used for them originally?

Hypnothrill · May 22, 2020, 7:29pm

No, I’ve been Hypnothrill all the way, so I’m not sure why they wouldn’t show up. It’s a lot of stories too, about 20 of them.

Heru_Kane · May 22, 2020, 8:22pm

I admit to feeling like the old guy sitting on his porch yelling about them crazy kids and their new fangled ways while pumping my shotgun and yelling to get off my lawn.

Basically I’m not really a fan of all the changes. (That said thumbs up fkr all the work you put into the site Martin.)

Ps. I’m thirty something and I own no weapons. Lol

nycboot · May 22, 2020, 8:38pm

Whoa…this is scary…but cool! Soon we’ll forget your name and just know you as this drone.

Corin · May 22, 2020, 8:56pm

The old stories imported from NCMC or stories which were submitted without an account are not assigned to an account by default. But they’re still listed under the Author Name you’ve been using.

An “Author” and a “user” are two different things (which doesn’t make things any easier for me … ). Anyway, I’ve assigned all your stories to your account, so you’ll also get to see their ratings and they will be part of your statistics. And man, did you write a lot of stories over the years!

Thank you for being honest, I appreciate that very much. Anyway,I’d love to hear which aspects you don’t like or if there’s even something you actively want to go and why.

No one will miss or even remember Martin soon!