Long comments truncated

May 10, 2007 1:00 PM

Long comments still being chopped in My Recent Comments, not at a break or a tag. Older threads about this issue contain fixes. Little help?
posted by Ambrosia Voyeur to Bugs at 1:00 PM (24 comments total)

Sorry, I left my full name visible in the taskbar in that cap. I know it's probably not even necessary, but here's the revised image.
posted by Ambrosia Voyeur at 1:07 PM on May 10, 2007

I think that's just how it's supposed to work so that if someone posts, say, the Treaty of Wesphalia (ahem) your Recent Comments page doesn't get completely and totally broken.
posted by jessamyn (staff) at 1:11 PM on May 10, 2007

Hey, if that's so, I think truncating them from the top would make for easier catch-up reading.
posted by Ambrosia Voyeur at 1:23 PM on May 10, 2007

The old issue was that it cut it off but didn't close any open tags. So if you were in the middle of a quote in italics at the break, the whole My Comments page ended up in italics.
posted by smackfu at 1:25 PM on May 10, 2007

Truncating them from the top?
posted by cortex (staff) at 1:28 PM on May 10, 2007

...as in posting fewer comments per thread when the thread in question's recent activity is maxing out rather than eliminating the most recent part of the most recent comment. Is that very very crazy?
posted by Ambrosia Voyeur at 1:37 PM on May 10, 2007

I think truncating them from the top would make for easier catch-up reading.

I may not have been clear, the truncation occurs on a per-comment basis, so it's only if someone posts something longer than (800 words? I don't recall...) will that post and that post only be truncated in the Recent Comments page. So you would have something like this.

RECENT COMMENTS

this is a short comment
username

this is a short comment
username

this is a blalb albhalbhlhalhslahlalaha very long comment but I still have something else to s
username

this is a short comment
username
posted by jessamyn (staff) at 1:38 PM on May 10, 2007

LOLovely that this was a thread about abridgment!
posted by Ambrosia Voyeur at 1:38 PM on May 10, 2007 [1 favorite]

I'm not sure I follow. Let me describe how it works now and what I think you're saying:

Right now:
1) the ten most recent comments in a thread are displayed...
2) unless your most recent comment was the nth most recent comment where n < 10, in which case the n most recent comments are displayed, and
3) comments of length greater than m characters are truncated (and tag-closed) at around m characters.

You're suggesting that instead,
1) the first ten comments after your most recent comments are displayed, while
2) and 3) are unaffected?
posted by cortex (staff) at 1:42 PM on May 10, 2007

Ambrosia Voyer, the query can only grab the first 4,000 characters in a comment. I filter out any HTML within that, then display.

Really long comments will get cut off, and the way the query is set up, I can't go beyond 4k characters, so the best I could do is add a "..." to the end.
posted by mathowie (staff) at 1:46 PM on May 10, 2007

this is a short comment
posted by user c at 1:50 PM on May 10, 2007

Jessamyn caught my misunderstanding.

I thought the truncation was on a post basis, and so thought the truncation would only occur in post 10. When that is the case, it looks a little jarring, since I and probably others read the tail end first to determine what's new in the thread.

This thread was all superlong comments for a while, and not seeing any other truncations about, I made a n00blike assumption in my process of being jarred. I'm feeling better now.

You guys make all kinds of sense. Thank you. Sorry for asking a dumb question, but I just didn't know what was going on there.
posted by Ambrosia Voyeur at 1:50 PM on May 10, 2007

You know what's lame though? That the favorites page always adds "...", even if the comment is short enough that it's not cut-off.
posted by smackfu at 1:52 PM on May 10, 2007

"LOLovely that this was a thread about abridgment!"

My ouvre will be inestimably diminished. If you don't see my zinger at the end, you might as well never read a thing I write!


Also, that thread smells like butt.
posted by klangklangston at 1:54 PM on May 10, 2007

I could swear that it still doesn't close tags.
posted by caddis at 1:54 PM on May 10, 2007

klang, *sigh* I shouldn't have to say this since it's just been said by the functional limitations of the site itself, but stfu.
posted by Ambrosia Voyeur at 2:03 PM on May 10, 2007

That the favorites page always adds "...", even if the comment is short enough that it's not cut-off.

I just noticed that this week! Thre were a few favorited comments of mine that were just a word or two. What's with the ellipsis, yo?
posted by jessamyn (staff) at 2:05 PM on May 10, 2007

And here I thought that the only way to use that abbreviation was in the construction "STFU, n00b!"

Live and learn, live and learn.
posted by klangklangston at 2:15 PM on May 10, 2007

I took the "..." off every favorite, only adding it to long ones, and added "..." to really long comments on the My Comments/Posts page.
posted by mathowie (staff) at 2:19 PM on May 10, 2007

stfu, n00b
posted by cortex (staff) at 2:24 PM on May 10, 2007

That is because you are cool, Matt. Thanks for making something productive out of this!
posted by Ambrosia Voyeur at 2:25 PM on May 10, 2007

Woo hoo...
posted by smackfu at 3:36 PM on May 10, 2007

OH NOEZ I AM TEH NU0B!
posted by klangklangston at 4:59 PM on May 10, 2007

I prefer an OB with a little experience or, ideally, a 52-year-old midwife.
posted by and hosted from Uranus at 5:41 AM on May 11, 2007