New Feature: Live Topic (Auto Thread Updating)

**Shane** · January 23rd '09

The guy that created this made a video explanation, watching that is the best way to show you exactly what this is/does.

Here's the video:

Explanation:
If a thread has been posted in X seconds then its now "Live", if you are viewing the Live Thread and are on the last page you will experience a clean ajax experience while talking to other members. Once the thread is older than X seconds its no longer Live and it will now act like a normal thread. Also if you edits one of your posts that's inside of the thread, it will be updated too so there is no longer a reason to ever have to refresh.

There is also logic for the viewer, the viewer of the thread has to be in an active state to see responses. An active user state is determined upon the users actions, if no actions were made in X seconds then the user is marked as inactive. Therefor if you don't reply for so long then you will be marked as inactive and will stop seeing "Live" replies. It sort of urges you to be a little more active in each Thread, making each Thread slightly more like a chat room.

Test it out by replying to this Thread straight after someone else and leaving it open for them to reply again. Thread replies should show up automatically.

**Leon** · January 23rd '09

Best quote of that video;

'I'm gonna be...err....adding.....some shit'

Really cool idea, I love it.

It'll definitely help with threads getting several hits in a short period, and like the guy says it'll save the server from doing extra work so the site will get a better overall spread on loading times.

Now, quick someone reply!............

**Leon** · January 23rd '09

...or not haha.

**Shane** · January 23rd '09

I guess I'm too late to reply?

**Thok** · January 23rd '09

what is the time it takes between being active and not?
"X" seconds as you call it

**Leon** · January 24th '09

Yeah do we know this amount then, can it be altered or anything?

**Shane** · January 24th '09

Thok wrote:

what is the time it takes between being active and not?
"X" seconds as you call it

It's 300 seconds at the moment. But I can change it.

**zakarius** · January 24th '09

maybe change it to a lil bit more?

**Shane** · January 25th '09

zakarius wrote:

maybe change it to a lil bit more?

5 minutes should be long enough, no one leaves threads open for that long anyway.

**Leon** · January 26th '09

Shane wrote:

It's 300 seconds at the moment. But I can change it.

That's pretty decent, especially if it's going to be effective for popular threads, I don't really see a need for it to be more than 5 minutes, I wouldn't really call it active after that.

At first I thought you were gonna say 30 seconds or something, after keeping referring to it as 'X seconds'.

**Claireapillar** · January 26th '09

That's awesome!

**Shane** · January 26th '09

No threads have been active enough for me to even check that it works yet though. :/

**Claireapillar** · January 26th '09

lol, try in here?

**Shane** · January 26th '09

Hey! It worked! :O

**Claireapillar** · January 26th '09

yep! awesomeness!

I feel like a guinea pig. I want a guinea pig now

**Shane** · January 26th '09

We could kill it, cook it, eat it.

**Claireapillar** · January 26th '09

haha! i dunno if you'd get that much off a guinea pig though...they're only tiny

**Shane** · January 26th '09

A sausage maybe?

And cool, this auto thread thing even looks nice.

**Claireapillar** · January 26th '09

heehee yep it does

great idea, yeah lets have guinea pig sausages!!!
This is gonna be really helpful for when the forums are extremely busy and stuff,
thanks for adding this to tf shane