Quoting?

sumeet

I feel so intimidated by the geniuses on this forum that I was almost too scared to say anything, so if what I say is stupid, my bad. Would JS be necessary? Can't you just use a PHP get function and get the post's text? So the url would be something like http://forums.myserver.com/thispost?quote_postid=23 ...or something like that. The 'Quote' button below each comment would just follow the same logic in the loop that spits out the comments, so defining the postID wouldn't be too tough (I think). And the text of each post is right there in the database. So if you grab it, and then change the code of the textarea for the reply to <textarea><?php get_quote($postid); ?></textarea> wouldn't it work? Of course the get_quote function would wrap the <blockquote> tags around the post text.

patrix

yeah sumeet that could work, except I think we're tryign to make it work with vanilla's current "Add your comments" box that's already there at the bottom rather than loading a seperate page. lech: your idea #2 that preloads all the quote text in javascriptr.. eeeek that could lead to potentially huge page downloads. If all else fails we can always do it sumeet's way I suppose!

sumeet

I'll have to momentarily set aside my shock of not being heinously wrong... Is loading a new page that much different than calling a JS function? It seems to me that, given the nature of Vanilla, new page loads would be quick and painless. And, of course, I try to use as little JS as possible - whever possible ;-)

garvin

Or, you can just tell your users to get a life and just deal with it. That, or learn some HTML. </sarcasm> I really think that the [quote] function is an excellent idea. But, in the end, it's unnecessary to spend gobs of time if this forum wasn't meant to include. Just a thought. </negativity>

jsanders

i'm not really sure why you'd want to avoid using javascript on a board that is built on a solid foundation of javascript. besides, making a proper quote function out of javascript is very, very trivial. seriously, all you need is one anchor for each post that references the post (which, by the way, the actual markup on the comments pages is extremely difficult to work with in javascript, and i've been meaning to mention my suggestions to mark) and puts the proper text in the reply box. i understand that there are browser compatibility issues to be passed, but i'm pretty certain that vanilla also uses an ajax backend, and might be able to asynchronously and dynamically update this using php by way of ajax. but i'm not in any position to comment on that.

Minisweeper

p.s. it should work like the 'whisper back' thing

lech

I think I just realized a flaw in this whole idea... max page limit vs post reply box being on last page if the thread is already multiple pages. The one idea could indeed lead to a larger page download but it's a sure-fire way of quoting and I've done it before. however because of what I just said, I'm not sure if this will even be possible because once there are say 50+ posts and the reply box is on the next page, you're dead in the water.

sumeet

Using the PHP get function would solve that problem. Simply link the quote button next to each post to #addcomments... oh, wait now I understand where the problem lies. Hmmmmmmm.

stuart

Instead of quoting as such, couldn't we come up with a way of 'referencing' different posts. This way, you would something like: ref:post_13 to your comment, and that comment, along with the name of the member who posted it could be added wherever you want within your post. This wouldn't be ideal as you couldn't do any sort of editing, say if you just wanted to quote a small part of a post, or you wanted to highlight a certain section of it. ut it would seem to go someway to solving the problem.

Minisweeper

i thought something like that stuart, it'd help keep db size down too (for what it's worth)

Ghazi

A much needed feature indeed. The discussions could easily get confusing, when you don't know who the person is replying to.

ichigo

push

moe

tiny donation. feel free to flesh it out

oops, u got an old browser?

lech

...

nathan

nice. thanks moe

patrix

doesn't work at all, and I tired in opera and IE.

nathan

works for me in safari. highlight the text, then press the button.

unfortunate

Worked for me in Firefox.

moe

@patrix might need a bit of tweakin. i hacked it up from memory ;) i know i had it workin' in IE6 and safari once. maybe a few lines of DOM madness are needed but i can't remember right now.

ichigo

yeah safari works