Thanks for all the feedback over the last 4 weeks. The idea of this posting is to answer your questions and feedback suggestions.
Can we have a spell checker?
There is an excellent free tool which will spell check your messages. It will work on Discuss Cooking and most other web sites. It's called ieSpell and you can download it by going to this page. Once you have installed it, you simply right click where you are typing and it will spell check it for you.
Can we have birthdays listed?
This has now been installed. Go to your Profile page (link in top right) to add your birthday.
Can we have a live chat room?
There is some excellent software that costs $75. At the moment the forum is struggling to cover it's costs and unfortunately we can't afford it. However, we hope to raise some money at Christmas by getting everyone to buy their Amazon shopping via our link - they then give us a small bonus for each sale. Watch this space.
I would like to send private messages to multipe people
The Private Message system isn't meant to be a replacement for e-mails, it's just meant as a quick and easy way to ask another user a quick, private, question. I'm not sure the need to have private conversations with multiple users, hopefully you will decide to include the rest of us and discuss it on the forum. If not, then perhaps you can exchange e-mail addresses and do it that way - but really, the forum isn't here for mass private conversations.
Could you possibly make a forum where people could come and tell their stories about stuff they've cooked and messed up?
Please post these kinds of stories in the General Chat & Questions forum.
I would ask for some advice regarding the fact that the "new message" icons (the darkened icons denoting new messages) arbitrarily clear.
You are correct in thinking this is a bug. I will check for the latest news on this with the developers of the software.
A special page set up with folders for us to put pictures or even just a photo page...
This is a good idea, but will take up more space and bandwidth. At the moment the forum is struggling to cover its costs and we are hoping that the users will realise this and help us by using our cooking.com and other affiliate links when they shop. The money raised can then be put back in to the site.
How does one post an avatar (image under their username)?
I will post some clear instructions in the site help forum shortly.
It would also be neat to have a "hot topic" in red on the threads that have had the most posts on any given day.
This already happens. Check out the key to all the icons at the bottom of the topics list. You will see that this icon
means it's a popular ("hot") topic.
I wish there was a search function that allowed for keyword or username searches
Just click the Search link at the top right of any page to do all this and more!
Probably not possible, but I would like to know if there has been activity on a post without being swamped with emails.
You can turn off the e-mail feature in your Profile page, see at the top right of any page. Then you simply need to visit the forum. Any topic with an orange icon has had some activity since you last came. Unfortunately you can't see just the ones that you have posted in.
How about moving the "Mark all topics read" thingy to the top?
Good idea, this has now been done. Check out the blue "Topics" bar at the top and you will see it to the right.
Can we have a spell checker?
There is an excellent free tool which will spell check your messages. It will work on Discuss Cooking and most other web sites. It's called ieSpell and you can download it by going to this page. Once you have installed it, you simply right click where you are typing and it will spell check it for you.
Can we have birthdays listed?
This has now been installed. Go to your Profile page (link in top right) to add your birthday.
Can we have a live chat room?
There is some excellent software that costs $75. At the moment the forum is struggling to cover it's costs and unfortunately we can't afford it. However, we hope to raise some money at Christmas by getting everyone to buy their Amazon shopping via our link - they then give us a small bonus for each sale. Watch this space.
I would like to send private messages to multipe people
The Private Message system isn't meant to be a replacement for e-mails, it's just meant as a quick and easy way to ask another user a quick, private, question. I'm not sure the need to have private conversations with multiple users, hopefully you will decide to include the rest of us and discuss it on the forum. If not, then perhaps you can exchange e-mail addresses and do it that way - but really, the forum isn't here for mass private conversations.
Could you possibly make a forum where people could come and tell their stories about stuff they've cooked and messed up?
Please post these kinds of stories in the General Chat & Questions forum.
I would ask for some advice regarding the fact that the "new message" icons (the darkened icons denoting new messages) arbitrarily clear.
You are correct in thinking this is a bug. I will check for the latest news on this with the developers of the software.
A special page set up with folders for us to put pictures or even just a photo page...
This is a good idea, but will take up more space and bandwidth. At the moment the forum is struggling to cover its costs and we are hoping that the users will realise this and help us by using our cooking.com and other affiliate links when they shop. The money raised can then be put back in to the site.
How does one post an avatar (image under their username)?
I will post some clear instructions in the site help forum shortly.
It would also be neat to have a "hot topic" in red on the threads that have had the most posts on any given day.
This already happens. Check out the key to all the icons at the bottom of the topics list. You will see that this icon
I wish there was a search function that allowed for keyword or username searches
Just click the Search link at the top right of any page to do all this and more!
Probably not possible, but I would like to know if there has been activity on a post without being swamped with emails.
You can turn off the e-mail feature in your Profile page, see at the top right of any page. Then you simply need to visit the forum. Any topic with an orange icon has had some activity since you last came. Unfortunately you can't see just the ones that you have posted in.
How about moving the "Mark all topics read" thingy to the top?
Good idea, this has now been done. Check out the blue "Topics" bar at the top and you will see it to the right.
