My.Opera redesign-What I like about the "Latest Comments" feature
By Eddie. Monday, 12. March 2007, 19:12:16
I turned on the "latest comments" feature for a completely different reason which I'll talk about in a second. I initially thought it wasn't going to be very useful, but I'm quickly seeing value in having it around, at least for *this* blog and thought I'd share why I like it.
This might just be too obvious for anyone that's had this feature on a blog before, but it's new to me!
There's this old post I wrote on the RAZR cellphone. Personally, I didn't really like the post all that much (although it did bring about on my own favorite replies if I may toot my own horn), I think it was the first post I put up on this site, not counting a cut & paste job. Anyway- I have reason to believe that it's is somehow linked in some web forum or search engine query as the place to go to ask a question about the Motorola RAZR. I still manage to get regular comments on this post- this is probably the most commented on post on this site, and it's also the oldest.
Now- we have a good number of regular readers that keep up with the pace of the site. I imagine they're all like me in that we just view what's new, comment if need be and move on/wait for the next interesting topic. But like the RAZR, there's still tons of old posts out there that still come up in people's search engines. There's a potential to carry on the conversation- to revisit it. There's nothing "stale" really about most of these posts, and plenty of them are still as relevant today as they were a year ago.
The problem is that I'm the only one that subscribes to all the posts (by default), so I'm the only one that sees it when a comment is published- all my usability "heavy-hitters" have long since moved on...
Until now that is. Like clockwork, this week I got another comment on the RAZR post- But now it showed up on the main page and WillYum jumps on board and we have the makings of a rekindled conversation- Beautiful! Hopefully the Latest Comments feature will draw others into older conversations that are still active.
Of course, based on the site content, tracking comments to older posts might not give any additional value to the site, so your milage may vary. But this might help out User Centered for those times (like lately) when there's not a lot of new content. We can rehash some of the older conversations.
The reason I turned it on in the first place? The old site site design didn't let us auto-magically subscribe/watch posts for other group members that post to the site. Personally, I'd like to autosubscribe to any/every post that gets put up here- since that's not possible, at least this way if I didn't subscribe to a another author's post, I won't miss anything. Also, along the same lines, (an extreme/uncommon case) I have most of my old posts under a different username. This way, I can see responses to posts from those (that I haven't already subscribed to with Eddie_Lopez as well).
WIDGETIZE
kmaage # 13. March 2007, 09:56
Your email ususally says "address-withheld@my.opera.com.invalid" but for this post it says, well, your email address.
Is that by design, or something I should alert the myOpera people to?
Eddie_Lopez # 13. March 2007, 12:02
I use both on occasion- mainly because I haven't subscribed/watched all the posts under my old login, so I occasionally log in and check for comments and messages in my account inbox. That leads me to forget which account I'm currently logged into and I make a new post under the old account, thereby perpetuating the problem of not subscribing to all the posts!
Of course, with the new latest comments feature, I won't have to worry about the comments problem anymore, just the messages.
That said- I'm sure exactly where my email address is listed here? Assuming it's a the one listed in my profile(s), I suppose it's not a big issue. But I don't see it anywhere?
*That I have the same picture & avatar for both accounts probably isn't the easiest way to distinguish between the two
kmaage # 13. March 2007, 15:52
kmaage # 19. March 2007, 08:21
You may not have noticed, but it's a bothersome gotcha. If you simply throw your mouse into this section, there is a 12% chance* that your pointer will not be over the link.
* The math is thus: Comments have three lines with an average length of about 100 pixels. Lines of text have an 11 pixel high active zone. That's 3 x 11 x 100 = 3300 clickable pixels. However there is "dead space" between each line of 2 pixels. 2 gaps x 2 pixels x 100 = 400 "dead" pixels. 400 / 3300 = .12 or 12%. Think about it. Roughly once every ten times you try to click on sidebar comments, you'll hit a "dead zone" and wonder, "Where is the link? Why didn't it work?" Or at best, you'll remember that you have to be precice, and slow down. Your brain will unconsciously go into a tight feedback loop slowing down your hand and visually inspecting the link to "make sure it worked" targetting the sidebar comment snippet.
Try it yourself. Go down the list of Latest Comments and throw your mouse to the right into each text snippet. On average, you'll miss (your pointer will land between the lines) one time out of ten.
kmaage # 3. April 2007, 08:16