Forums Automatically Marked as Read - Not Good!

[Petef56]

PCMechanic Tech Forums are great and I try to get here every 2 or 3 of days to read
"New Posts". Vbulletin is also great and probably the best forums software on earth.
I attend many forums run on Vbulletin software. HOWEVER, I'm having a problem here
at PCMechanic Tech Forums that I don't have at the many other vBulletin forums I
attend so I assume it can be solved by reconfiguring the software.

The probem is when I use the "New Posts" feature...
Even if I have not read all the posts it marks messages as being read when I quit
the session. This is a big problem for me becasue many times I come to read New Posts
and don't have time to go through all of them, but soon as I quit the session and come
back to use New Posts, they have all been automatically marked as read and New Posts
feature no longer displays them. So I end up not seeing many of the new posts
whenever that happpens.

In all the other vBullentin Forums I attend, I can use New Posts over and over again
in separate browser sessions and it won't mark all new posts as being read until I
go to Quick Links and select.. Mark Forums Read.

My suggestion is to trun off the feature where all new messages are automatically
marked as being read when a user ends his session.

Anyone else with me on this?

---pete---

[glc]

Thread/Forum Read Marking Type

This option controls how threads and forums are marked as read.

1. Inactivity/Cookie Based - once a user has been inactive for a certain amount of time (the value of the cookie timeout option) all threads and forums are considered read. Individual threads are marked as read within a session via cookies.

This option is how all versions of vBulletin before 3.5 functioned.

2. Database (no automatic forum marking) - this option uses the database to store thread and forum read times. This allows accurate read markers to be kept indefinitely. However, in order for a forum to be marked read when all threads are read, the user must view the list of threads for that forum.

This option is more space and processor intensive than inactivity-based marking.

3. Database (automatic forum marking) - this option is the same as a previous option, but forums are automatically marked as read when the last new thread is read.

This is the most usable option for end users, but most processor intensive.

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We are using option 1. We don't need any more space and processor overhead than we already have.

[Petef56]

Originally Posted by glc We are using option 1. We don't need any more space and processor overhead than we already have.

Ok, I understand your reasoning now, just be aware that it's probably causing
lots of messges to go unread by anyone who does not have enough time to
go through all the new posts in a given session or if they are interruped while
reading new posts. I can only speak for myself and can tell you that it occurs
often.

Thank for a speedy reply

---pete---