I have noticed something unexpected with the clicking of links into threads.

Image: https://i.postimg.cc/9fjCF1M1/Rpol-Threads.png

When clicking the title of the thread (underlined), when the page loads, it loads, then immediately jumps to top of the last post on the page.  This also happens when clicking the [first| link in a multi-page thread.

What I would expect is:

• clicking the thread title > top of first post on the most recent page
• clicking the "first" link > top of post #1 of the thread (regardless of pagination)
• clicking the "last" link > top of most recent post on most recent page
• clicking the "new" link > top of first unread post on whatever page is appropriate (acknowledging first unread post might be a few pages back...)

I suspect this is a bug.  It's possible I have misinterpreted the design.

It's been doing that for a while (at least a year, I'm pretty sure), so I don't think it's a bug, per se.

The intention when the change was made, I feel, was to default take the reader to the most recent post upon clicking the thread title - which is displayed at the bottom of the page - so that they didn't need to scroll through an entire page to get to the one post they hadn't read or to make a post of their own. The links aren't as easy to click as the title, after all, and 'new' only works if you have unread posts in the thread. Speaking only for myself, I certainly appreciate going to the bottom of the page and only scrolling up if I need to versus going to the top of the page and having to scroll down regardless.

I do agree though, it would be great if 'first' could take you to the very first post of the thread.

(Edit: After glancing around my games for a bit, it seems that clicking 'first' on a Locked Thread DOES take you to the very first post of the thread. It only takes you to the bottom of the first page in a thread that's still open for posting.)
This message was last edited by the user at 00:01, Thu 25 Jan.

That only works if there's at least 26 posts in the thread.  Otherwise the "first" link doesn't show up and you're stuck with the default behaviour.

I will point out the double-handling though.  If clicking the thread title behaves exactly the same as clicking the "last" link, why would you ever click the "last" link?  After all, it's small, and harder to target with the mouse...  My expectation was these would perform differently (else why put a last link -- which is present on all threads with more than one post).

Can we:

• expand the logic that makes the "last" link to include the "first" link, so you always have both options?
• fix the "first" link so that is takes you to the first post of the thread (regardless of whether the thread is locked or not).  We still have the thread title (and the last link) for their behaviours, as well as the "new" link...

This message was last edited by the user at 07:17, Thu 25 Jan.

I'm reasonably sure that the current behaviour is:

• clicking the thread title > first unread post (on the most recent page ?) OR the last post on the most recent page if I've read them all
• clicking the "first" link > last post on first page
• clicking the "last" link > last post on the most recent page

Less sure about what "new" is doing/supposed to be doing, but your take on what it should do sounds good to me:

• clicking the "new" link > top of first unread post on whatever page is appropriate (acknowledging first unread post might be a few pages back...)

So thread title and "last" behaviour is similar, but not the same.

I'm -1 on changing the behaviour of thread title or "last".  For these options I prefer the positioning to default to the bottom of the page rather than top because the most recent posts are going to be closer to the bottom than the top for all the games I'm in, so that means less scrolling for me.

But +1 to your suggestions to default to top of the first page when "first" is selected (as it does for locked thread, thank ye kindly Sunruaner) and to the first unread post when "new" is selected.

While we're looking at navigation ... I think "Older" should move to the last post of the previous page (ie current page - 1) as it does now but "Newer" should move to the first post of the next page (ie current page + 1) rather than the last post as it does now.
This message was last edited by the user at 09:13, Thu 25 Jan.

What I found is that when you click on the [first] "button" of a thread, I'm directed to the bottom of its firs page (if more than one), except on closed threads, where it really directs me to the first post.

One problem is that if you click on the page number, it puts you on the last post of the page instead of the first. That...can't be desired behavior, can it?

Agreed.  More, the page needs to load fully before you can take it to the top (whether by the Home key or by the "top" link, or by the scroll-up image link in the bottom right corner).  Most of the time, that's only a half-second delay (for my internet connection), but it's repeated every time I need to load the page.

This is another thing that behaves differently depending on whether or not a thread is Closed. In Closed threads, clicking the page number takes you to the top of that page. (It's becoming clear to me that non-Closed threads take you to the bottom of pages because that's where the option to post a reply is, and the presumption seems to be that you might want to post to a thread that's available for posting, perhaps?)

What would be even more desirable (at least to me) is if clicking the page number took you someplace different depending on what page you were on previously, regardless of whether or not the thread was open or Closed.

If I'm reading a thread backwards, and going from page 6 to page 5, I /WANT/ to go to the bottom of page 5, because that's where the "next" post is.

If I'm reading a thread forwards, and going from page 4 to page 5, I want to go to the top of page 5, because that's where the "next" post is.
This message was last edited by the user at 14:48, Tue 30 Jan.

I'm afraid this is not how it's working for me. When I click the thread name, it directs me to the last post in this thread, even if there are several unread ones on it...

This forces me to scroll up, looking at the time posted, until I find the first one posted latter than my last logging in to read the unread ones.

Not incapaciting, but disturbing...

Not sure whether it goes to your last post in Games only ie not in Forums.

It's specially disturbing (albeit, again, not incapaciting) when you want to see a post in "Wanted-Players", if the GM has other games, as you're sent to the lowest part of the GMed games list...

Just curious, is still under discussion?  Ever since the responsive site went up, the thread links haven't been behaving as they used to, which is confusing.  (The "First" link seems to direct to the last post on the first page...   why would we ever want a dedicated link to a random post in the middle of a conversation?  What is that the "first" of?)

Pending jase to get a chance to look at it and make a decision on it.

One could argue that it's the first of the pages, and therefore, possibly taking you where intended? From there, you can use the little up arrows (or the top button) at the bottom righthand side of the window to go to the top - which would get you to post #1. Alternatively, 'All' and the same little up arrow/top combo will get you to post #1.

In fact, it would make sense that the 'first' is *intended* to be 'first page', since the 'first' option doesn't show up until a thread HAS more than one page. (And clicking on the thread title itself always takes you to the most-recent posts/last page.)
This message was last edited by the user at 13:06, Mon 29 July.

Thanks Skald, looking forward to hearing his thoughts.