We just got done adding some more new features to the site that have been requested. The first being Avatars to the comments! They use the MyBlogLog and Gravatar service, so if you’re signed up for either of those, your avatar should display. One of the nice things is that you can change your avatar at any point, and the changes will be reflected on your previous comments.
The second feature is an email notification system. This isn’t the same as the email notifications systems on other sites, and you have to be a registered user in order to take advantage of it. Once you login there is a new option available for getting notified of new comments of the articles you’re tracking. Here are some things you should know about how it works:
- You must be tracking comments using the "track comments only on articles I comment on" or the "track comments only on the articles I pick" option. We didn’t enable this for users tracking all comments because it could result in a large number of emails everyday.
- Once you receive an email indicating that there has been a new comment on an article, you won’t receive any further emails until you visit the article. After you visit the article, the email notifications will resume automatically.
- Comments will still be tracked on the site for you.
A third new feature is a page dedicated to managing the articles that you are tracking. This makes it easy to see all of the articles you’re currently following, and therefore easy to stop tracking comments on some of the articles.
Lastly, we have fixed the Microsummaries which was a concern that some of you had who are using Firefox. These were actually fixed like two-weeks ago, but we never got around to mentioning it.
Enjoy the new features!
Yay! I want to see my avatar!
It would be cool if we could upload our own avatar through the dashboard (if the file is under 150kb or something for example) instead of having to make an account with either of those 2 sites.
The bonus with those sites is that loads of people use them. So your avatar will work on more than just this blog!
Yeah, that’s one of the reasons that I wanted to use those other services. That way the casual visitors that are just stopping by will be more likely to already have an avatar uploaded as well.
Not only that, but then we don’t have to worry about hosting and managing the avatars ourselves.
Nice job guys!
I like the avatars. I don’t have an account at either of the two services. I’ll have to look into it.
Thanks Chris…work begins on the Learn Firefox theme now! We’re gonna start sketching things out today and hopefully have some graphics done by the end of the week.
Unfortunately Gravatars is erroring out when I try to associate the avatar with my email address. It let me setup an account no problem, but it is just not associating avatars. Their error page is a default one too. Pretty lame site in my opinion if they can not at least do a basic customization on error pages.
Hey Ryan, could you make it so that the avatar that is used in the CyberNet forum is also used as the avatar in comments (or an option to choose between Forum Avatar/MyBlogLog/Gravatar)?
Those new features are pretty cool. Which avatar will the comment pick if you have avatars on both sites?
I love MyBlogLog. Your blog design is nice. It would be nice to have our avitars work on any site without having to upload to each of them.
BeachBum
That kinda sucks that I have to sign up for either mybloglog or gravatar to get an avatar. Couldn’t you just let us upload images to your site?
Or at least some system to use the image from the forum and the option to link from our own personal websites?
Gravatar sucks! It does not work and there is no way to contact whoever runs it.
@Ryan – Did you test with Gravatar before setting up to use them?
BUG: Unread comment tracking system…
I have my unread comment tracking set to “Track comments only on articles I comment on.” So, the site should automatically track comments on an article if I comment on it. I just checked, using your new “comment tracking” page, and two articles I commented on are not being tracked. This article had new comments, but I wasn’t alerted. I’m only here because I came to this article manually.
Note: I do not check the box to track new comments at the bottom of the comment field. Comments should be tracked automatically on articles I comment on, since I have the option set. I shouldn’t have to check that box each time.
Note: I am not referring to the Email notifications, nor do I have them enabled
I could probably make it so that you can specify an image URL from any site. That would allow you to use the one in the forum as well then.
I believe it will pick MyBlogLog first.
I used a WordPress plugin to do it, and from what I gathered the Gravatar service worked. The site seems to not be responding right now so they are probably just temporarily having problems. I should be able to implement it so that you can specify a URL to your own image for an avatar.
I thought I fixed the bug, and the box located next to the “Submit” button should automatically get checked if you’re setup to track comments on the articles you comment on. If that box isn’t getting checked then there is definitely something fishy going on. I’ll look into it again.
I just thought it all out as to how I want to do this, and I should have it done tonight…I’ll keep everyone posted.
@Ryan
RE: Specify image URL… If you set it up like that, I’d be able to link to a picture on Flickr, right?
RE: Comment tracking bug… The box used to automatically be checked most of the time. Now it’s never auto-checked. I’ll try changing the option, then changing it back.
@Ryan – I have been noticing that the box does not always auto check for comment tracking as well. Tonight, it was not aut checked on one comment posting I made, but on the next one it was.
So netster007x is not nuts.
Something is not being consistent with the system.
OK, I changed the option then changed it back. Now the option is auto-checked. Hopefully it’ll stay like this. I’d kinda like it if the check box just wasn’t there. If we have it set to track on articles we comment on, we want it to do that for all articles we comment on. If we have it on a per-article setting, we’ll use the track button next to the cybermark button.
Okay…the bug should be fixed now. If you have any doubts about some of the previous articles not being tracked that you’ve commented on just go back to the options and resubmit the settings for unread comment tracking. It will reset the status of all the articles.
The checkbox is auto-checked this time… a good sign
Wow, when I posted my comment, it didn’t say all-star, the comment was gray which made two grays in a row, and it didn’t have my pic. I reloaded the page and it went back to normal.
Sorry for pointing out all these bugs, if you even want to call this one a bug.
Ha! Did the exact same thing again. That’s kind of funny the way that works. I bet it’ll happen again when I post this, but I won’t post again to tell that it did.
Thanks for pointing those out…I do know what that is happening.
Okay…fixed those bugs that you mentioned and eliminated the checkbox next to the submit button. Also did a few other smaller things that weren’t too major.