On Friday I noticed that I was still logged into OLO having not been here for a few days. I was pretty sure I logged out after my last visit but of course with middle age creeping in I may have forgotten.

Would it be helpful if the OLO site logged you out automatically if there was no activity after a period of time?

(On the assumption that the person had forgotten to logout)

Good question Pelican, especially in the light of the fact that on one of the pages, I think its the 'New Post' page, the site tells you "Welcome, you are logged in as 'userID'. You will be logged out after 120 minutes of inactivity.", or words to that effect.

Some time ago on the OLO site the automatic logout purportedly took effect after only 45 minutes of inactivity, resulting, for those who type direct into the pane, in frequent losses of irretrievable, unrepeatable literary gems. I think the longer period is better for a number of reasons, but I suspect that other software dependencies may not have been exhaustively adjusted when this change was made.

Perhaps this apparent glitch has something to do with the automatic log-on cookie, or the absence thereof.

Another thought I have had is that the apparent failure to log a user out after a period of inactivity may be in some way connected to the recent adoption of animated advertising. Are the incessant transfers of data to your computer from this animated advertising in some way eliciting some feedback transmission of data that is read by the OLO site as user activity?

I am suspicious that my broadband usage rate has recently shot through the roof because of this. I frequently have had different OLO pages up in a number of tabs at the same time, and I have noticed that in some the load-up indicator remains on even if I have not switched to that tab for a long while.

I have been of the habit, running Ubuntu Linux as I do, of leaving my computer on and my browser (Firefox) with OLO on multiple tabs for weeks and months at a time. The broadband usage has only rocketed since the animations began, I think.

When I have viewed OLO from a different user account in my Linux, and not clicked 'set a cookie' but have logged in as if I were at a public terminal, I have experienced erratic inability to post on occasions.

I sometimes wonder if OLO understands why?

Interesting Forrest - I didn't think I had imagined reading about the automatic logout.

I don't click on the Ads but their existence on the site may have an effect as you say but as a bit of a technical Luddite I wouldn't know the answer to that one.

OLO might be able to offer some insight. I guess it does not really matter in the scheme of things except possibly the effect on 'traffic congestion' for others wanting to use the site.

This observation made by Ludwig may not be out of place in the context of your question, Pelican. See: http://forum.onlineopinion.com.au/thread.asp?discussion=1954#40527

I have noticed too that whilst I have clicked 'set a cookie' when first logging in to OLO after an operating system installation (something not infrequently done if one is into Linux, just to test new distros), my userID does not always show up in the 'Users Currently Online' area on the 'Welcome to the forum' page, even though I may still be online and active. I don't understand this.

Should it be that I am using someone else's computer to just view OLO, my userID as being online naturally enough does not show up unless I log in to make a post, and then it only shows up for that session. If I do log in under these conditions, I do not click 'set a cookie', but 'do not set a cookie, I am at a public terminal'. That way I leave no cookies on a borrowed computer, nor do I run any risk of some other person subsequently using that computer being able to post on OLO in my name.

Explaining the behaviour of such OLO features is where a page page button on every page would be really useful. That idea is suggested in this summarized list of ideas for OLO. (Had a hard post number facility existed, I could have listed the post number in which each idea was first proposed beside the summarized description, so contributors could check the faithfulness of the short description in this list, but it doesn't and I couldn't.) See: http://forum.onlineopinion.com.au/thread.asp?discussion=1954#43279

I sometimes wonder whether, via spyware inserted in advertising, or by other hacking (cracking) activity, the smooth operation of OLO is not interfered with from outside when sensitive subjects start attracting posting (or viewing) activity. I suppose that's just my paranoia and lack of proper understanding of computers talking.

But thanks for opening it up anyway, Pelican.

Pelican,

Further to the curious absence of one's userID from the 'Users currently online' display at times when one IS online and actively viewing pages, is this irritating little consequence.

When your userID IS displaying, you can, by clicking on it, be taken direct to your posting history page.

When the userID is NOT displaying, this little convenience is not available.

You then have to get to your (or any other user's) posting history via the 'Users' button near the top left of any thread, which takes you first to the alphabetical summary, then to the users index, a page that takes forever (even on Bigpond Broadband) to load. When eventually the users index is loaded, you then have to find and click the userID you want in order to be taken to the posting history page.

This is a pain.

Surely, if you are online, and do at least one thing every 120 minutes on OLO, your userID should continue to display for both your convenience and the information of other users? Why is this only partially occurring?

Should it be that one wishes deliberately to only lurk, and not have a userID display reveal that lurking, then that is easily enough achieved (at least under Linux) by simply having a different user account from which one views, but never posts. No cookie gets set in this account, so no userID display ever comes up in the 'Users currently online display' any time you may look in on OLO.

I've tried to work around the ease of access problem to the posting history by bringing up OLO in a separate tab in my browser (Firefox), getting to, and then leaving my posting history page on display there. It seems these days that second or subsequent tabs displaying OLO pages are slow as a wet week to load up or move between. It was not previously so. I have made no changes to my OS or browser, and am using the identical hardware upon which OLO formerly worked well.

All this makes me wonder, why, why, why?

Forrest

You can directly access a poster's posting history by clicking on the first icon at the bottom of each post.

Bronwyn,

Thanks for that tip. Being the iconoclast I am, unfortunately I have broken that particular icon on my display, and it no longer works for me. Hehe. (BTW, from a web page design point of view, have you noted the identicality of that icon with the 'user list' at the top and bottom of the comments pages? Identical icon, but takes you to different pages, if you aren't noting the content of the mouse-over bubble on the icon below each post. Just a small point.)

Seriously, though, I realise I expressed myself poorly when talking about getting to a user's posting history from the 'Users currently online' display. Whilst you can easily enough get to your own user history via the icon you mention, should you see a userID come up on the display of a particular poster in who's posts you have an interest, you can quickly reach THEIR user history to find out in what connection they may have recently posted.

Now of course this can only be done if their userID is actually displaying on the 'Welcome to the Forum' page. It is the paucity, to an unknown extent, of the userIDs on display that restricts this convenience of direct access to user histories. In the absence of a full display of users currently online, you will only find posts by users of interest to you by scanning all threads exhaustively, by stumbling upon them, or, I suppose, by ordering the index page displays in order of recency of posting and checking out that reduced field.

I would have thought it in OLO's best interests to have as extensive a display as legitimately possible of users currently online. The old 'people drive into full service stations' principle, you know. Subliminally enhances the perceived relevance of the Forum.

PS Yesterday I noted R0bert's post, the 48th and currently last post to the "What we have here, is a failure to communicate" thread, had had the red posting flag turn to black at least 45 minutes early. Wonder why?

Forrest

"Seriously, though, I realise I expressed myself poorly when talking about getting to a user's posting history from the 'Users currently online' display."

My fault too, for misreading. I did think at the time you would surely have figured that out for yourself, though then decided to risk stating the obvious in case you hadn't!

I still don't really see what the problem is though. But, as has happened several times now, I may again be missing something in your post!

Surely, the only time you would wish to check a poster's history is when you are actually engaging with them in debate, in which case their icon will be there right in front of you. Won't it? What am I missing now?

Bronwyn: "Surely, the only time you would wish to check a poster's history is when you are actually engaging with them in debate, in which case their icon will be there right in front of you. Won't it?"

Not necessarily Bronwyn.

There may well be posters on OLO with whom one may not be about to engage in debate, but who's views one may be interested in.

For example, OLO userID 'DIS' might be such a one. I breach no confidences if I reveal that that userID is Sir David Smith, former Official Secretary to five former Governors-General. He indeed reveals his identity himself within his posts on OLO. I sometimes see him, presumably, viewing posts. (I have to guess which ones.) He is a man of few words. Occasionally he may post something. It's normally well worth while being one of the first to see it if he does. His OLO articles are always a good read.

At least one former Governor-General. and one High Court Justice, have been believed by me to post on OLO. Likewise, without necessarily presuming to engage them in debate, it is interesting to observe what they may perhaps have been viewing, or indeed saying, with respect to some specific issue. You may not yet have stumbled upon the topic upon which they may have posted, and thus not have immediate access to the 'Find out more about this user' icon.

However, should it be that one did wish to engage in debate with a specific poster, would it not be simple prudence to first observe their manner of delivery and the consistency (or otherwise) of their views in other posts expressed? You're right in thinking the patchiness of this OLO feature is not a big deal: I just find it odd that sometimes one's userID does not display when one is online and has the OLO cookie set to recognize one's presence. You would think it in OLO's best interests to have as large a display of users currently online as possible.

Ah, Forrest, you take OLO far more seriously than I do. I treat it as a pleasant and relaxing diversion, you seem to see it more as some sort of highly complicated military exercise!

I prefer to engage with the argument that appears before me on the screen. I'm not swayed by a poster's credentials or lack of them, nor am I interested in 'stalking' other posters and anticipating their responses. (I realise 'stalking' is not quite the right term to describe what you have very openly explained, but it seemed to be the one that overwhelmingly came to mind as I read your post!)

I think the posting history is as accessible as it needs to be. Raising it to the level you outline, in the interests of satisfying the needs of what I think would be a very small minority, will only further slow and clutter the system for everybody.

Pelican,

Getting back to your original observation: is it possible that someone else had been using your computer less than 120 minutes before you noticed you were seemingly still logged-in to OLO after having not been on the OLO site yourself for several days?

All such a third party would have to have done is perhaps clicked on a bookmark and landed on the OLO 'Discuss' page, and the cookie on your computer would have automatically registered the presence of your computer (ie. 'you') on OLO at that point. There need not have been any attempt to post.

I don't know whether your computer is accessible to other people in a home or office situation, but such could explain what you saw.

Bronwyn,

Stabbed in the portico while stalking around the Forum! The pain! The pain!

Taking it all too seriously! Oh dear, and here was I thinking I was already lightening up. http://forum.onlineopinion.com.au/thread.asp?discussion=2063#43768

What must I do? How can I get dumbed down so I wont notice these irritating little inconsistencies? Tell me, tell me, tell me. It's so lonely down here on these technical support threads. Everything else just pales into insignificance compared to the problem of being too serious. Seriously!

Should I try to be more, well ..... feral, or something?

Forrest

Please don't go 'feral', whatever you do. We've already got a few of them around here and we don't need any more.

When I first struck up a conversation with you, I was actually having a bit of a go at the length and opaqueness of some of your posts. But I have since come to see them as total gems. So, no, don't change and, certainly, no 'dumbing down'.

You might just need to keep a reign on that 'stalking' though. If you don't, the duel on the High Veldt might be repeated in the portico and you might be the one taking the metal!

You do take things seriously but, yes, I agree, you are 'lightening up'. You are also a perceptive reader of others' posts and have an interesting and self-deprecating sense of humour, which I particularly appreciate, as I'm sure do many others.

So, in my humble opinion, you should stay exactly as you are, dear Forrest. And long may our paths continue to cross on OLO!