[Pan-users] Re: how should pan let users sort by active threads?

[Duncan]

"Charles Kerr" <address@hidden> posted
address@hidden, excerpted
below, on  Tue, 04 Jul 2006 19:05:35 -0500:

> Right now the header pane's date column shows that row's article's date.
> This is straightforward, but when sorting you get the date of the first
> post in a thread.  But what if you're looking for active threads?
> In that case, you really want to sort by the newest followup's date.
> 
> I'm leaning towards adding a second date column named "follow-up".
> The good thing is that it's obvious how to use it.
> The bad thing is that it's yet another column. :)
> 
> Can anyone think of a cleaner, but still obvious, way to do this?

Interesting conundrum. <g>

This isn't a direct solution but the way I've always handled it is by
viewing unread articles only, by default.  In old-pan, I had customized
the "R" hotkey to toggle view read, and "N" to "next article" (instead of
next unread, so basically I switched N and Ctrl-N), which by moving to the
next article, refocused the header pane on the thread I was in.  That way,
I could immediately see where the message I /had/ been reading was in the
current thread structure, and could go up if needed.

Talking about which...  If view-read or any of the other view filters is
toggled, the header pane displays the top of the listing once again. 
Shouldn't it re-center on the current post, if it's still in the list? 
Also, when toggling to view unread only, IMO, the currently displayed
post, altho it will normally be marked read as it's displayed, should
continue to show in the header pane, which should continue to be centered
on it.

So anyway... the above works for me because the sort is naturally right if
only unread posts are shown, to be sorted.  When necessary, I'd toggle
back to view all, but view unread only was my default, so the problem you
described didn't occur.

Meanwhile, that leaves two requests, well, one that could be viewed as a
bug, and one request.  (1, bug or new feature, your pick) When toggling
filters in the header pane, re-center the display on the post still
displayed in the body pane, if possible.  (2)  I'd sure like my
customizable hotkeys back!  =8^)

PS:  I'm sure you've been amazed/astounded/frustrated as much if not more
than I have, at all the different ways folks use to manage newsgroups.  I
know I've "had my mind expanded" several times over the years, when folks
described ways they use or want to use PAN that had literally never
occurred to me as even possible/desirable, and from your comments, I've
noted the same "total lack of personal reference point" when trying to
understand requests, from time to time.  =8^0

-- 
Duncan - List replies preferred.   No HTML msgs.
"Every nonfree program has a lord, a master --
and if you use the program, he is your master."  Richard Stallman