users can specify how many messages to display

[dschwab9]

An option in the profile to specify how many message to display in the board view, and how many messages in the thread view would be nice.  I've seenother forums that have this.

Of course, there would need to be a limit so someone couldn't put 2000 messages on one page.  Some users with dialup may prefer to only view 10 messages at one time, but someone with broadband could view 50 on one page.

[Tomer]

Nice idea, doesnt seem that hard to do.

[Owdy]

3th vote from here!

[pulpitfire]

yeah, why not.

[bostasp]

If you could cap it... say you can't enter a number more than 20... then it seems perfectly fine to me

[Sir McDuck]

If you could cap it... say you can't enter a number more than 20... then it seems perfectly fine to me :)

Why just 20? I would like to view for about 50 posts on one page.

[bostasp]

We'll couldn't the total number be variable at the choice of the admin?

[[Unknown]]

Why not make it so it can't go over 5 times the default?

-[Unknown]

[pulpitfire]

how about users can specify how many posts they have? 

[Ben_S]

Why not make it so it can't go over 5 times the default?

-[Unknown]

Sounds like a good compromise to me, if you set it to a value you are happy with as a default then the server can probably cope with 5*s that, assuming not everyone does it.

[dschwab9]

Why not make it so it can't go over 5 times the default?

-[Unknown]

I guess that would work.   I think the default is 20 topics and 15 messages per page, so that would mean 100 topics or 75 messages max with the default settings, which seems reasonable.

It could also use the "max posts for ALL button" setting.

[Symetrix]

Why limit it, in a way. If setting it too high is stupid, surely thats the same as clicking the 'all' pages link?

And most threads dont have more than 40 posts on average

[[Unknown]]

I knew someone once who set the message count to somehting like 10000.  The forum crashed immediately.

-[Unknown]

[Ben_S]

And most threads dont have more than 40 posts on average

Depends on the board, some people have threads with thousands of posts.

[dschwab9]

Why limit it, in a way. If setting it too high is stupid, surely thats the same as clicking the 'all' pages link?

And most threads dont have more than 40 posts on average

The "all" pages link has a limit.  It's under "Layout" in the forum preferences.

[dschwab9]

I just ran a test on mine.  The first page of a 67 post thread was generated in .115 seconds, clicking the "all" button took .401.   Not bad at all, but say I had 670 post in the thread - that could get ugly if there was no limit    On YaBB SE, if you run a search that has more than a few hundred posts, PHP times out and you get errors.

[Ben_S]

although smart users realise that they can add ;all to a threads url and cause mayhem

[dschwab9]

although smart users realise that they can add ;all to a threads url and cause mayhem

Well, the code really should be such that they can't do that.  Maybe we can talk [Unknown] into fixing it 

[[Unknown]]

Unless I'm entirely mistaken, all won't work unless the topic has so many posts - if not, it will only show the max of all.  But I might be wrong, that's just what I remember doing.

-[Unknown]

[Ben_S]

in beta 2 (not tried 2.5 yet) a user could add the ;all to the end of a thread url. I beleive that was just a temporary way of doing the all thing though so it may have changed

[[Unknown]]

No I just checked and I was wrong... but it's fixed now.

-[Unknown]

[Brian Lacy]

I knew someone once who set the message count to somehting like 10000.  The forum crashed immediately.

-[Unknown]

How is this different from having an "All" link? If the topic has 10000 posts, that's just as bad.

Anyway, I do like the idea of letting people customize the number of posts to display per page in their profile, and letting the admin customize the absolute maximum number allowed. The default would of course be the same as it is now. (If people haven't noticed, I'm a big fan of having tons of customization options for everyone!)

Edit: Please note, I still feel that anything that's not already planned should be considered for a SimpleMod or future release.

Edit Two: I just did an "All" request on what I suspect is the biggest topic on this forum -- the Welcome to Simple Machines topic under News and Updates. The result: 26853 Posts in 0.927 seconds. Not too shabby! Still, there was a noticeable wait for the whole thing to adtually render in I.E.

[Ben_S]

I knew someone once who set the message count to somehting like 10000.  The forum crashed immediately.

-[Unknown]

How is this different from having an "All" link? If the topic has 10000 posts, that's just as bad.

Because the all link is implemented such that it is only available if there is less than x posts in a thread

[Owdy]

And most threads dont have more than 40 posts on average

Depends on the board, some people have threads with thousands of posts.

Yeah, just look WAG thread

[Symetrix]

Because the all link is implemented such that it is only available if there is less than x posts in a thread

But surely the max posts to display user setting should be similiar, it will only come into effect if it is needed, and only go up to the amount typed in? Otherwise, if it works when it shouldnt, and goes higher than it needs, surely that would slow down page creation?

[Omar Bazavilvazo]

maybe a combo?
5,10,20,30,40,50...

something like that

[klumy]

I second the combo suggestion.

[dschwab9]

maybe a combo?
5,10,20,30,40,50...

something like that

I'm confused.  What are you talking about?

[[Unknown]]

He means, maybe a select box with those options.

-[Unknown]

[dschwab9]

He means, maybe a select box with those options.

-[Unknown]

In the profile for the user setting?  That would make sense, and would eliminate the million posts on one page problem I guess.