sugg for fixing over use of quotes?

Boot2TheHead

You know, the actual number of sentences on a page of forum posts is really small. Why is everyone so in love with the quote button? Typically a post has 8 lines of quote for every 1 line of response. It makes reading posts a pain since I end up re-reading the same stuff over and over.

So my idea for a fix is to make the quote show up in a flying div; it would only be visible when you moused over it. That would eliminate a lot of the visual clutter.

Maybe I'm the only one that gets annoyed by this ?

Boot2TheHead

Maybe an option for collapsing quotes? Limiting quote levels?

jothki

Boot2TheHead wrote:

You know, the actual number of sentences on a page of forum posts is really small. Why is everyone so in love with the quote button? Typically a post has 8 lines of quote for every 1 line of response. It makes reading posts a pain since I end up re-reading the same stuff over and over.

So my idea for a fix is to make the quote show up in a flying div; it would only be visible when you moused over it. That would eliminate a lot of the visual clutter.

Maybe I'm the only one that gets annoyed by this ?

That kind of a change isn't going to occur any time soon.

Also, quote trees are awesome. Why would anyone want to hide them?

Echo

I'm from Fidonet. Back then we yelled at people for quoting more than one sentence from each part of the message you reply to.

Alas, if I kept up that level of shouting here I'd lose my voice within the hour.

thegloaming

The problem with your suggestion is that it would require some significant amount of coding and access to the forum software; two things to which 99.9% of the people here have no access.

Also, there's already a thread designed specifically for suggestions like these. Check it out.

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Janin

Boot2TheHead wrote:

You know, the actual number of sentences on a page of forum posts is really small. Why is everyone so in love with the quote button? Typically a post has 8 lines of quote for every 1 line of response. It makes reading posts a pain since I end up re-reading the same stuff over and over.

So my idea for a fix is to make the quote show up in a flying div; it would only be visible when you moused over it. That would eliminate a lot of the visual clutter.

Maybe I'm the only one that gets annoyed by this ?

After you've been here for a while, you learn to just skip over quotes. I would prefer /b/-style post references, but that would probably require some modification to a forum system that is (according to Alpha) held together with duct tape and prayer.

BahamutZERO

Change is bad!

This is unecessary, and I like it the way it is.

Mitten

I trim quotes when need be to be polite. Don't we have a rule that asks the same, or something similar?

Either way, I'd rather it not be automated, I can definitely see that getting annoying. Plus I like a good quote tree from time to time.

Invisible

I think long quote trees stopped being a problem with the advent of the scroll wheel. And honestly, I rarely see someone quoting a huge post just to give a one sentence reply. When it does happen it's usually someone trying to be funny or trying to start a quote tree, both of which are easily ignorable.

Plus having to constantly mouse over to see what someone is replying to would be a pain in the ass. It's better than having to go back several pages to see what someone is responding to, but still stupid just so you don't have to scroll past a few lines of text.

VoodooV

I have to admit I don't understand the obsession with the quote button either. What I really don't get is when someone quotes an OP on the very next post with some short response.

Why would you need to quote the OP? I'm sure some of it is just habit. You get a huge discussion going on with lots of points raised and many simultaneous conversations going on and hey..using the quote button is understandable in that case. But when you are having a fairly isolated conversation and its painfully obvious who you're responding to, why use the quote?

but as much as I don't get it need to overuse quotes unless it degenerates into a huge quote tree..its not hurting anything either so...whatever. I'm just glad to see im not the only one who thinks quotes were overused

Echo

Here's some real quoting stupidity.

JAEF

I thought the exact same thing when I saw it Echo. Let's make quote love.

MKR

Would it be technically possible to have an anchor set past all the quotes in a particular post, and provide a link at the top of said post that skips over the tree?

Edit: The anchor could just be set for the bottom of the post.

Artoria

You could just scroll past the quote tree that you already read and then only read the new additions to it? it's not too hard to roll a scroll wheel or it the page down button.

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Thanatos

The Cat enforced a "five-quote limit" for awhile in D&D. It worked pretty well.

We tend to have several simultaneous discussions going on in the same thread in D&D, so quoting is really, really useful.

Captain K

If you are an intelligent person you will trim quotes as a matter of course. A lot of people already do this.

If you're involved in a conversation with someone who isn't trimming the quote tree, just trim it with your reply, and they'll quote you with the trimmed tree. Problem solved.

Starfuck

Can you just delete the quote button.
Really, we don't need it.

Corvus

Wouldn't that require a code change? Those sort of don't seem to be on the table.

Kaputa

Starfuck wrote:

Can you just delete the quote button.
Really, we don't need it.

It's pretty rare that I hear an idea this bad.

Fallout

Boot2TheHead wrote:

It makes reading posts a pain since I end up re-reading the same stuff over and over.

uh, I just scroll past stuff I've already read. I thought everyone did.

The Celestial

Fallout wrote:

Boot2TheHead wrote:

It makes reading posts a pain since I end up re-reading the same stuff over and over.

uh, I just scroll past stuff I've already read. I thought everyone did.

But you have to hit page down or, God forbid, use the scroll wheel. Do you have any idea how much of a pain that is? They need to code something into the boards so I don't have to do so much work.

Pheezer

Everyone shut the fuck up.

Also, this is a technical problem requiring coding. That just isn't going to happen because the guy who does that isn't around enough to do it. Sorry, that's the beginning and end of it.