New Post Icons

[Scott_F]

Doug (or other fourm experts),
What triggers the "new posts" envelope icons on the left of the forums and the "go to last new post" arrows to reset? It seem often that when I click on a link that opens a new window, when I come back to the forums all the new post indications are gone so I have to look at date tags to find what I haven't read yet. It's really cutting into my surfing efficiency Is there a setting I can change, or is it just the way the forum software works.

Not a big deal, just curious.

[RVbySDI]

I cannot answer your questions that you pose to Doug but I can tell you what I do. If there are a great deal of new threads that I wish to read I will click on a particular thread and read it. Once I am finished reading that thread I will use the "Back" button to navigate back to the thread list page I was previously viewing. By using "Back" instead of clicking on "Today's Posts" I am going back to a previous cached view of the page that will have all the same formatting that showed which threads I have read and which ones I have not read. Once I have read all the threads of interest from that view instead of clicking on the "Back" button, this time I will click on the "Today's Posts" link to refresh the view. Once I do that all the older threads I have already read or that have not been recently posted to will be changed to a non-bolded font and the new posts will show up bolded and/or at the top of the list. I then get a good view of what I have seen and any new posts I may want to view.

Just the way I do it but works for me.

[Davepar]

I believe vBulletin uses a timer. As long as you are clicking around (opening threads, replying, etc.) the arrows won't be reset. If there's no interaction from you with the forum server for a certain amount of time (15 minutes?), the arrows will be reset. It's not pretty, but there's no easy way to implement sessions.