Verily, cool it would be.

Did they solve the "hammer the server" problem? And wouldn't you end up getting your comments more slowly?

Did they solve the "hammer the server" problem?

This is part of the feasibility question; as is your second question, for that matter.

Doesn't the world around you change enough, ogged? Can't this one eclectic online ongoing attempt to kill m-fun hold?

I have no clue what you're saying now. Don't harsh my 2.0 buzz in comment 4, dude.

What you propose is, frankly, utter wankage. I expect w-lfs-n will have it working by Friday.

I don't understand 6, either. It's probably time for bed.

At ogged's house, turning in for the night requires the use of a Rube Goldberg contraption that ultimately drops a bed on top of you and calls an ambulance.

You're trying to say that you don't think it would be cool, aren't you? I should have remembered that the late night crowd is surly and hates progress.

I do hate progress; and don't call me Surly.

If you do add ajax to the patented Unfogged Excellence Engine, remember to add a gradient to the banner image. Mmm, and a lens flare couldn't hurt.

Bridgeplatosaur, indeed. You know, if it sucks, we won't use it. Unless you keep this up.

And now I'm really off to bed.

I'm not a real coder, web d00d, or person in any way qualified to say, but I can't imagine it would be completely difficult to do what Nathan Williams suggests. Periodically say to the server, hey, I'm on thread so-and-so and the last comment I have is such-and-such; the server returns any new comments and they're incorporated into the page. Rinse and repeat. In fact, I think that would be kind of easy, which may indicate my overweening confidence or utter incompetence.

HOWEVER, in order to make that work for the end user, you'd have to have open all the threads you wanted to track (maybe this is how y'all do it, but I refresh the main page). And in order not to keep hitting the server you'd have to remember to close the tabs/windows you weren't using (even if no new comments have come in, you'd still be sending periodic requests*). Maybe there would be other issues, too, like conceptual ugliness. I don't know. I'm not a web d00d.

* unless you did something totally clever and had the script change its polling interval based on the rate of incoming comments.

Honestly, it's not at all clear to me that this would be a "net win". And without the thrill you get from hitting refresh, wouldn't we lose some of our I don't know what?

What for? I'll hit refresh when I'm damn good and ready.

Also, note: CHANGEBAD.

I am sad because I used to live on the East Coast and could watch in real time threads developing. Now I live in Europe and everyone is asleep when I read the commments. Poor me.

But I do think some sort of auto-refresh would be sweet.

I like me the idea of a custom Unfogged reader but young Benjamin has put his finger on the reason it wouldn't be that sensible to use a browser as the application host. We need a new program dedicated to Unfogged; indeed a custom OS might be the way to go. HTTP also, not sufficiently good: Unfogged deserves its own protocol. Emerson can design it.

Another problem is that the AJAXy-thingie would have to be smart enough to know your position on the page and whether to scroll. If I'm at the bottom of a thread and comments are coming in slowly, I'd want it to put the new comment where I can read it so I don't have to scroll the window. If the comments are coming fast and furious or are being appended to the bottom of a page where I'm still reading thhe top or the middle, I wouldn't want it to lose my place.

Clown is just being silly.

I think this wouldn't be too hard to do. For you front page types, it would be the front page's recent comments that refreshed at a decent and proper interval.

Following a single thread adds the complication Becks notes above, but that seems solvable to me. (Worst case, we use the solution that web-based chat rooms have used since time immemorial, and add an "auto-scroll" checkbox to the page.)

I say, yes, coolest thing ever. Let's go. I'd even help. But tom should weigh in first.

I resent that. I am the best person to write the new protocol, and Clownae should be praised for recognizing this fact.

But after this rebuff, I refuse to do it. Write your own stinkin protocols.

We aren't doing aaaaany of this until we move the server.

I reign in scope creep for a living, Ogged. I spend all day saying preempting "Wouldn't it be cool if..." with a determined "NO!" I'm not afraid to be a wet blanket. I've got plenty of practice.

Every organization needs someone to think inside the box according to the archaic Second Millenium paradigm. Sort of a devil's advocate to show us what our baseline of failure would be if we failed to respond to the challenge of our times -- a hapless cautionary example of the terrible results of old-world peasant timidity and refusal of risk.

Around here, those devil's advocates would be Becks and M. Leblanc, plus two guys to be named later to forestall charges of sexism (probably Apo and FL, or maybe Kim Jong Il and Saddam Hussein).

Do we really want to be the laughingstock of all the rad teenage blogs? We're probably already losing marketshare, or if not that, at risk of doing so (or at least, failing to expand at the necessary rate).

I hit refresh and John Emerson's comment is still the last one, Ogged.

I don't understand you wet blankets. If we do this, and it's not good, or everyone hates it, we'll just CHANGEBACK. The failure to see that this could be the coolest thing ever is a sad commentary on today's Democrat party.

smart enough to know your position on the page and whether to scroll

mIRC handles this, for example, by auto-scrolling if you're at the bottom of the window, but not if you're not. Works well.

Periodically say to the server, hey, I'm on thread so-and-so and the last comment I have is such-and-such; the server returns any new comments and they're incorporated into the page

This part should be easy (says ignorant I), since we already publish rss feeds with new comments, and, presumably, we could even parse those for new comments (in case that's easier than getting the server to only send new stuff).

* unless you did something totally clever and had the script change its polling interval based on the rate of incoming comments.

Yeah, or stop refreshing if there have been no new comments in n minutes. (And maybe put a "refresh to see new comments message at the bottom of the thread.)

So what you're saying is that I could have 7 different comment windows open, each to its own thread, and type "oops, wrong thread" in each of them?

Oh, brave new world!

Another problem is that the AJAXy-thingie would have to be smart enough to know your position on the page and whether to scroll.

No, this is easily solved. Never scroll. If you're at the bottom of the page and new comments come in, then guess what? You are where you should be in order to read them. (Especially if many comments come in; you'd just have to scroll back up to read them all if you wanted to read them in order.)

Maybe before you get all excited about auto-updating comment boxes, someone could work to make the "Recent comments" sidebar on the main page update a little more reliably. Often it lags several comments behind the threads, even after I refresh.

This recommendation brought to you by someone with zero technical skills.

"Recent comments" sidebar on the main page update a little more reliably

This is of a piece with the Happy Fun Page and other server troubles. When someone gets an internal server error, the rebuild doesn't happen properly, and their comment doesn't show up in the sidebar until someone else leaves a comment that goes through properly, and rebuilds. We hope the new host will make this better, but can't be sure. Anyway, more or less out of our control.

"Anyway, more or less out of our control."

Why don't you say, "We were just following orders"?

There's always an excuse available, but this path leads inevitably to genocide.

We start with the elderyly.

FWIW, sometime today my bloglines Unfogged entry changed from "Unfogged (x)" to "Unfogged w/comments (x)". I presume the 2nd x is new comments.

Bloglines is cooking, improving every day. As I scroll the panes, know what's depressing?

"Refreshing.....200 New Entries."