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I REALLY /DesktopModules/NTForums/themes/mls/emoticons/w00t.gif like the Active Topics feature, but it has me somewhat confused /DesktopModules/NTForums/themes/mls/emoticons/blink.gif as how to maintain control of the span of time it is checking.
Usually, when I log in and select Active Topics it shows the last Date/Time I logged in, which may include several hours of topic additions that I have already seen, since I probably was logged on for many hours the last time I logged in. I tend to log in and check the list every few minutes to few hours over several hours... (sometimes all day long). That is really okay because, in the displayed list of topics, the topic names are in bold type face for the threads that I have not seen the latest additions to, and the ones that I have seen are in the normal lighter face type. Sometimes the list is quite long, but I really don't care about that because of the bold/normal type face differentation.
I am usually surfing other web sites, doing research for some project, or maybe perusing Google Earth. Or I might be using Excel or Word, or writing software in Visual Basic (might also have been playing Solitaire a while... well sometimes too long a while!/Providers/HtmlEditorProviders/Fck/FCKeditor/editor/images/smiley/msn/embaressed_smile.gif) I periodically come back to MLS and refresh the Active Topic list.
I know I can set the time span to different specific periods using the dropdown list in the upper right corner. That is (mostly) okay also. I use it if the list gets too long with topics I am not at all interested in (I cain't read'em all!) and selecting to view only the last 30 minutes or 6 hours, etc. shortens the list.
But recently I have noticed that if I have left the timing selection to be the last Date/Time I logged in, it sometimes changes the Date/Time to some other Date/Time. Like it might start with 'yesterday' (what ever the date was) and say, "05:30 PM", (the last Date/Time I had logged in) then after a few hours it changes that to 'today' at say "02:30 PM". Then, a little later it changes again to another Date/Time. But I have not logged out and back in again.
I don't mind this behavior, as it is often quite helpful in shortening the list of topics! I just have to make sure I check the whole list before I do a refresh or I might miss some updated topic. But I would like to know what causes this behavior so I can have some "control" of it.
I have not found any relationship as to what I was doing or how long it was between my "refreshes", and these "automatic" changes. I have logged out of my account, terminated the browser and started over and sometimes the Date/Time does not change. Other times all I did was leave the computer for a while and when I come back and do a Refresh the value changes.
Similarly, sometimes I set the "period" to, say the last 12 hours, then a logout and restart does not affect that setting and sometimes it reverts to the previous log-in time or some other specific time of day, (but never a different "Period").
Maybe it is associated with how long I am logged out, or maybe I happen to log out during a refresh of the web site and that happenstance affects whether I see a change.
This is not something that "MUST BE FIXED/DesktopModules/NTForums/themes/mls/emoticons/cry.gif" as it is not something that is "broken", nor without simple work-arounds that I have control over (select the time period myself), though sometimes the available "Spans" are not exactly what I "want"./DesktopModules/NTForums/themes/mls/emoticons/whistling.gif Sometimes I'd really like to set it to "4 hours" as "2" is not long enough and "6" is way too long. Not that "3", "5", "7", and, well, all the other possible "number-of-hours" would not be some number my brainbox might decide would be "better" than "1", "2", "6", "12", and the other predefined values.
Given all my babbling... is there some place to learn how this timing of Active Topics works?
Thanks!
Usually, when I log in and select Active Topics it shows the last Date/Time I logged in, which may include several hours of topic additions that I have already seen, since I probably was logged on for many hours the last time I logged in. I tend to log in and check the list every few minutes to few hours over several hours... (sometimes all day long). That is really okay because, in the displayed list of topics, the topic names are in bold type face for the threads that I have not seen the latest additions to, and the ones that I have seen are in the normal lighter face type. Sometimes the list is quite long, but I really don't care about that because of the bold/normal type face differentation.
I am usually surfing other web sites, doing research for some project, or maybe perusing Google Earth. Or I might be using Excel or Word, or writing software in Visual Basic (might also have been playing Solitaire a while... well sometimes too long a while!/Providers/HtmlEditorProviders/Fck/FCKeditor/editor/images/smiley/msn/embaressed_smile.gif) I periodically come back to MLS and refresh the Active Topic list.
I know I can set the time span to different specific periods using the dropdown list in the upper right corner. That is (mostly) okay also. I use it if the list gets too long with topics I am not at all interested in (I cain't read'em all!) and selecting to view only the last 30 minutes or 6 hours, etc. shortens the list.
But recently I have noticed that if I have left the timing selection to be the last Date/Time I logged in, it sometimes changes the Date/Time to some other Date/Time. Like it might start with 'yesterday' (what ever the date was) and say, "05:30 PM", (the last Date/Time I had logged in) then after a few hours it changes that to 'today' at say "02:30 PM". Then, a little later it changes again to another Date/Time. But I have not logged out and back in again.
I don't mind this behavior, as it is often quite helpful in shortening the list of topics! I just have to make sure I check the whole list before I do a refresh or I might miss some updated topic. But I would like to know what causes this behavior so I can have some "control" of it.
I have not found any relationship as to what I was doing or how long it was between my "refreshes", and these "automatic" changes. I have logged out of my account, terminated the browser and started over and sometimes the Date/Time does not change. Other times all I did was leave the computer for a while and when I come back and do a Refresh the value changes.
Similarly, sometimes I set the "period" to, say the last 12 hours, then a logout and restart does not affect that setting and sometimes it reverts to the previous log-in time or some other specific time of day, (but never a different "Period").
Maybe it is associated with how long I am logged out, or maybe I happen to log out during a refresh of the web site and that happenstance affects whether I see a change.
This is not something that "MUST BE FIXED/DesktopModules/NTForums/themes/mls/emoticons/cry.gif" as it is not something that is "broken", nor without simple work-arounds that I have control over (select the time period myself), though sometimes the available "Spans" are not exactly what I "want"./DesktopModules/NTForums/themes/mls/emoticons/whistling.gif Sometimes I'd really like to set it to "4 hours" as "2" is not long enough and "6" is way too long. Not that "3", "5", "7", and, well, all the other possible "number-of-hours" would not be some number my brainbox might decide would be "better" than "1", "2", "6", "12", and the other predefined values.
Given all my babbling... is there some place to learn how this timing of Active Topics works?
Thanks!