this editing system at DIYAudio. It stink!

[peranders]

Originally posted by WaltJ
All that said, some comments on this editing system at DIYAudio. It stink! I doubt that I'll answer any more mesages where you can't quote a big block of text, can't spell check, etc. This is near torture!

It's a standing request to have unlimited editing time. Now it's only 30 minutes. Moderators, can't you give people which behaves unlimited or at least longer editing time, one week for example?

[PRR]

From another thread:

WaltJ> this editing system at DIYAudio. It stink! I doubt that I'll answer any more messages where you can't quote a big block of text, can't spell check, etc. This is near torture!

I too have wondered why I can edit right-away, but not a little later. (I never see the critical typo until I Post, sometimes not until 45 minutes later.) I understand why there should be some limit, both mechanical and social (it shouldn't be too easy to reverse my position after being shown wrong). But this configuration annoys me more than others that seem to work fine, mechanically and socially. I know one similar forum let me edit my post a year afterward (a URL changed and I was able to correct it).

> quote a big block of text, can't spell check

On most boards, I don't try to deal with the dinky edit-box. (On CompuServe, it is only 20 characters!) I need room to spread out. Sometimes my old eyes need a better font than the browser. Sometimes I need a Search/Replace. Sometimes I use templates and macros. Sumtimes I eeven want tu spell-chuck.

I run the forum and a good text editor at the same time. Cut quote(s) from forum or other sources, paste in editor, compose my words, read them over full-screen. When ready, Select All, Copy, switch to forum edit-box, Paste. (In Windows: Ctrl-A, Ctrl-C, Alt-TAB, click, Ctrl-A, Ctrl-V. There is a similar key-sequence for Macintosh.)

That works really well now that I setup a dual-monitor rig. Old eyes need the space. But on the single-monitor rig, Alt-TAB switches to foreground window as fast as I can crane my neck to the other monitor in dual-monitor life.

Oh, and I think the "Quote" feature on most forums is over-blown. If I want to feature the other guy's words more than my own, it makes sense to have blank lines, boxes, and colors. Sometimes that's right. But sometimes I just want context; the other guy's words are available up-page, let people read the original. That's why I normally quote very-short snippets and minimal formatting that dooes not waste space. I like the Italic tag, but for your long back-and-forth with EUVL I might just put "E> " in front of the snippet you are commenting on, just so we know who said what.

Even NoteBook or SimpleText is a better text-whacker than a browser text-box. Anybody who whacks a lot of text should look at better editors. I run UltraEdit: it is way over-kill for forum messaging, but I have it for program and HTML code editing. I hear good things about NoteTab, and it has a Free version ($10-$20 for spell-check and programability).

[Fred Dieckmann]

PRR,

Your advice is great and I take back the kidding I gave you post on semiconductor physics for poets. I have been using my Email composer as a text editor and find it very little trouble to cut and paste between windows. I find that it helps considerably
in getting my message across. The chance to reread what you are going to post once or twice does wonders for making your point clearly. I think that the one shot stream of consciousness belongs in chat rooms. I would like to see the edit time limit go up to an hour. Much longer than that probably justifies a new post with clarification about changes. There are a few members that the ability edit at will, would drive us all into hysterics....... and they know who they are. They won't even admit that their last post is what they actually said as it stands now. Edditing with no limits in these people's hands is just too horrible a thing to imagineble!

[SY]

Fred, I'm sure this is something that we'll be discussing. In the meantime, if you run into a problem, drop me an email and I'll do whatever edits you need.

There are definitely some things in the software that I'm not crazy about, either.

[Christer]

Perhaps one could consider a solution where free editing of a
post is still limited in time, be it 30 min, an hour or whatever.
However, what if we could still edit after that time limit, but
then only in the form of adding new text to the end of the post
and with an automatically inserted note that this is text added
later. But perhaps it is better to just do that addendum in a
new post.

I don't really know why I don't use the method of writing the
posts in my preferred text editor Emacs, and then copy them
into this box, especially since I hate the M$ style editing
commands. Maybe I am just to lazy to do it, but on second
thought it would probably save me time since one can work
so much quicker and more effectively in Unix-style environments
like Emacs. Your mileage may vary of course. Emacs is, despite
its age, in my and many other computer peoples opinion still
state of the art in editing tools, although I do realize that many
users "destroyed by growing up with Windows" may find it a bit
awkward for a start. However, contrary to the haphazard M$
editing commands, most common Emacs commands are very
logical and easy to remember, and it is so much more powerful.
I recommend anyone who is prepared to spend som time to
try it out. It has a very good interactice tutorial. Note though,
it is a text editor, not a typesetting system, so it doesn't by
itself replace, for instance, Word, which is another disaster
Bill Gates has caused us. For full document processing it
must be combined with a typesetting system, eg. LaTex,
a separation of taskt which I also happen to find preferrable
since it encourages you to focus foremost on content, since
LaTex is very good at automating the typesetting for you.
I do realize this might be overkill for many of you , though.

One more point, I understand the view some of you have, I am
a perfectionist too, but don't overdo it. Some sloppy typing and
some spelling errors aren't really so much to worry about as
long as it is still clear what you mean. We are not writing
journal articles here. When I do that, I spend a lot of time and
effort on proofreading them and thinking about subtleties in
phrasing, but here I think it is preferrable to have a more
swift discussion-style interactive communication.

Just my two cents (US ones or Euro ones, pick your choice ).

[randytsuch]

This is just my opinion, but if I was going to spend an hour or more writing a post, there is no way I would do it online, either here or on any other board.

I have lost long posts before (not here), when I was almost finished, and it is really annoying, to say the least.

If I am going to write a long post now, I do it in word, then paste it over.

Randy

[Jocko Homo]

I dont't think so.......no way in h***!

I would rather see all my typos, perserved forever for all to see, than to run the risk of SomeonE changing all of his posts to:

"When did I say that?"

"That is not what I said!"

"You took that out of context!"

Etc.

Yeah, a spell check, for the short posts, would be nice. The long ones are best done offline, where they can't disappear.

Jocko

[fdegrove]

Hi,

I would rather see all my typos, perserved forever for all to see, than to run the risk of SomeonE changing all of his posts to:

Guess we both need a pair of glasses?

Persevere as you may, I don't feel spelling checkers are going to cut it.

At school we didn't use any calcs, neither did we use spelling checkers either...

That's just stuff for the lazy folk...Exercise your minds for a change and learn a foreign language.

Lazy people...yuk...

Cheers,

[roddyama]

I think that once you're aware of the limitations and develop a few (very few) work-arounds, the current system is fine for getting your message across.

[grataku]

I gots biggest problem those the the edityng sstem aat diyaudio.com, if you ain't, you can smily and tank your lugcky starr.