Passingby

Of course, remembering ID numbers is not the way that it's done – and I'm sure you know that.
And I'm afraid this probably sums up the problem that everything seems to be done on the basis of your perspective or whether your chief architect believes that it is useful to your clients.
This is not at all customer-facing.
 
I hope no one has suggested that you did say this – I certainly haven't noticed– and I certainly appreciate the CEO of Invision getting involved in this discussion.
 
I can't imagine that this is anybody's perception and I'm not sure that it has at all been suggested here that you are simply out to alienate people. However, I think that to a great extent the forum software is managed according to your own perception of what people need and what people should have – and as I have already said, this is not a customer-facing approach.
I have a sense that Invision is a sort of benevolent dictatorship – which is okay, but it doesn't always get things right.

Anyway, for my part, somebody has modified the previous plug-in so that we now have post numbers on our new version of Invision so from now on it's merely an academic discussion.

Go check out how many apps Slack supports today, hundreds. Come back in 5 years from now and tell me how many of those same companies that are so "modern" are still in business. I'll bet you at least 30% or more go out of business. It takes a lot more than being modern to sustain and keep customers.

[oh, and let me spell it out. No, I did not say that in some attempt to have you put back some old feature, my point is please try to be respectful to your customers as well as build good software]
I really wasn't even going to reply again because it's like beating a dead horse...
 
 
 
 
 

So, this plugin existed in 4.4 and I sorely doubt that they will deny it in 4.5. Its a cosmetic change that doesn't affect performance. When they speak of "removed functionality" they are talking about things that are detrimental to the health of a site and thus why it was removed (Re: the topic title of the next unread post at the bottom of a thread:

which was removed due to major performance issues on large communities)
As for the link on time.... that's been a feature since IPS was in version 1.x. Honestly most platforms have the feature to click or copy the link from the time as its been a building block of forums for as long as I can remember for over the past 20 years.
 
IPS isn't depriving you of choice. YOU have the choice to add it yourself. All IPS did was remove the fact that they offer it as default functionality. I personally removed post numbers even in the 2.x days and find softwares that use post number a little archaic and aged. Yes. Even Xenforo is getting a little behind in the UI times.
 
Unfortunately, that's not how time works and using referencial time makes what you're looking for impossible but its cute. If you find the time clutter then remove it. I find the time a good reference for me to know how long ago something was posted. Its my best reference IMHO.
 
Overall, I've seen this come up a few times since it was removed in the 4.x days and its a circular conversation.
"I want it because I think its useful"
People provide "reasons why its not useful"
"BUT I WANT IT BECAUSE I LIKE IT!"
"Okay but its not useful... here are more reasons."
"But I think I deserve to be able to keep it despite your reasons."
"Well then use a plugin. Its not coming back to core."
"BUT I WANT IT because...." return to step one.
 
 
This whole conversation so far has been that and if you go back through it, it really exemplifies what I just put into laymens terms. I understand that you feel its useful for your community but really it would be more "useful" overall if you taught your users how to use the newer more advanced features then asking for the more basic archaic features back.
Education is king in a community environment, don't teach your users that this is a bad thing, teach them that it both helps THEM as its faster and it helps the end user because its easier.
Hell.... teach them how to use quotes. Quotes link to the original post.

I'm all for choice but can you imagine how daunting the settings in the ACP would be if IPS offered a choice on everything? I'll fairly certain the software isn't 100% perfect for most of us right out of the box, hence the marketplace.. and if this particular mod wouldn't be allowed in the marketplace you do have the choice to have one of the devs make a custom plug in for you (or make it yourself). That's your choice.

Yes but if you have a post number plug-in – which you can switch on or off – then you have three choices. You can either refer to the number – simply not displayed at all, or refer to a post by your method.

How wonderful to have three choices. Far more likely to address the diversity of needs – and is that such a bad thing?
And of course nobody yet has managed to explain why having a Choice is such an undesirable thing.
It all sounds a bit Republican to me  

I think you hit the nail on the head here. Often it seems frustration can be interpreted as arrogance. Like with the handling of Sparkpost-gate. (Too soon?) 😋
There's also a difference with legacy and tradition. It's interesting that the default view of forums is still the traditional view, and not the more modern, space saving and attractive grid view.

Thanks for this.
 
However, you haven't explained how depriving your clients of Choice is not compatible with a modern forward-looking approach.
Also, let me ask you this:  If a developer comes along and puts a new post-number plugin on the Marketplace, will you prevent it?

I'm sorry it's felt that we were dismissive and it's never our intent to insult anyone who are trying to provide us heartfelt feedback. Admittedly, I think our frustration with demands for legacy functionality does bleed through on occasion, for which I apologize. It is taxing at times when you are moving forward, the vast majority of your clients are happy, but there's the occasional desire to pull us backwards and believe me, cluttering up the interface with inconsequential numbers, is by ALL modern web standards - a step backwards.
I know it sometimes feels like we make decisions in a vacuum and without regard to clients, because you are the client that feels passionately about a given issue - it IS an issue to you and we get and expect that. Nonetheless, I sometimes wish some of you had the vantage point of being in our office and on our internal systems in which we gather collective feedback from various avenues, technician notes, sales notes and see the exhaustive vetting that goes into something. You would see that this, for example, was removed because:
1) It's 2020 - post 390 right now, may not be 390 5 minutes from now or may not even be 390 right now to another user.

2) There are legacy forum platforms that have grown to be quite successful in maintaining legacy functions for a niche demographic and that's great for them, but we our goal is not at all to compete with legacy forum platforms. Consider us the FedEx of Communities: Moving Foward. 😉 We are a modern community platform and very respectfully, there isn't anything modern social related that uses arbitrary, visual IDs. I can't imagine you would tell a colleague "Hey Bob, check out tweet 9832441068311 on Tim's twitter feed" - nobody does that, right? 🙂 You send a link to the tweet and save Bob 10 minutes of needing to energize the flux capacitor to find content. Same with Facebook, Instagram, Reddit and other platforms the majority of customers and their end users are going to be familiar with.
3) Because, as noted in #2, it's inconsistent with literally the rest of the Internet, it caused confusion. "How do I remove this?" "Why is this here?" etc. It all prompted the question "why IS this here? it serves no functional purpose beyond familiarity and personally speaking, I would be extremely annoyed if someone sent me an arbitrary ID number for content I'm suppose to find myself when they could literally click the date of the post and send me the link to it.
I realize it used to exist and at one point, it was a good idea. Hand cranking an old Model A was also a good idea too before electric starters. I think we can mostly agree ehhh, maybe we'd rather just jump in and turn a key and/or push a button. Likewise, most agree they don't need an arbitrary number as a visual cue or as directions to a post - that's not how the 2020 Internet works. Simply click, copy and paste the link. Bob thanks you in advance.
@BankFodder I could see how that number could be misleading. I just looked, as I was curious too, but there are folks who have downloaded i 10+ times and it counts each one. This is the number of reporting installations that have ever had the plugin:

Also, to add to this conversation – which apart from the other reasons seems to be suggesting that it's not useful and that people complain et cetera, I've noticed that the plug-in which now doesn't work on the new version of Invision had 659 downloads.
by the standards of any third party plug-in or application in the marketplace – this is a huge amount. I can imagine that the number of people who have complained or the number of Invision software architects who have decided that posts numbers must not be available, pales into insignificance against the 659 downloads which presumably have been made by forum administrators and their probably hundreds of thousands (and maybe millions) of forum members who are seeing this "visual clutter" every time they are browsing their respective forums and have no problem with focusing on content.
Go figure.

To be honest I rarely use a 6" screen phone except in an emergency. Using a phone to read, make, use posts is very slow and not productive at all for me. I would much rather use my 32" 4K monitor to do work. 
We have a few topics with over a couple hundred pages and it is extremely easy to reference the ID 393 in that topic and if you cannot find it then you're probably already challenged using a forum. 
As I also said, it is their choice to add it or not. But it's not like they need to add a lot of code (the code to do it was already provided). Now its just a matter if they want to do it or not. Based on replies so far it sounds like they have zero desire to add it either which is okay, I have it working already.
 
@BankFodder I'm new here but dear God if this is the normal feedback expected I cannot fathom how one gets more advanced help here. I suppose if you want real help beyond some basics it would seem you may need to hire a professional to assist you and simply stop visiting here. Very  disappointing when people even reading what you've posted don't understand what you're even talking about. Myself I'm glad that @Mr 13 came along and posted how he did it.
 
 
 

If it is simply included as an option, then there is absolutely no reason why it should bother anyone who doesn't want to use it or that it would get in their way.

I don't see what the problem is with choice.

The people in favour of post numbers are simply advocating choice. In other words we are proposing a facility which will satisfy you if you don't want it – and would satisfy us who do want it.

The approach of the nay-sayers is simply to say "we don't think it's useful – so we don't think anyone else should have it".

No one said or tried to say it was a legal requirement (though it really is for Federal institutions, they cannot use software that does not follow certain ADA requirements by a Federally mandated law) that is not and was not the point. I have a handicapped adult child so I'm aware of how difficult many software applications are. Not trying to say the program needs massive changes to support ADA.
My point is/was that the ID tag number being shown @Mr 13 does in fact (in my opinion) provide the exact same purpose of a visual cue that post # have/had in the past. I've manually edited our forums to show it. All I'm providing is FEEDBACK which is the purpose of this forum. It would be very nice if allowing this to be shown by some setting within the ACP so that users did not need to manually edit their code.
As for the date in every post providing a permalink I'm sorry you just don't seem to understand what people are talking about. VISUAL cue just like I created all uppercase. You don't have to copy anything, you don't have to click a special button. You easily see there is something. Telling someone go find post where the date says Posted August 13 does nothing for anyone as there could be several posts made on that date. Why people are complaining it is a PITA to have to now copy and paste a special link to refer to. 
In my example here

I can tell the user to check out post ID 393 and most people can very easily find that number in the topic thread. I didn't have to copy, quote, or paste anything. 
If you don't wish to add such a feature that is your choice but to tell people they don't need it is YOUR personal opinion which may or may not be shared by others.
 
 

We removed post numbers about 5 years ago and although we get the odd request here and there, it’s not something that is raised very often.

Not a thing.

However, we have to be mindful of adding settings for minor things like this as each setting accrues technical debt.

Let's hope that the developer who produced the excellent post number plug-in for the previous version comes up with modifications which make it work in the new version.

Then we will have choice and everybody will be happy.

I don't see what problem Invision have with customer choice

The date in every post provides a direct permalink to the post. Incorrect post numbers based on a user's individual permissions would certainly present more of a usability issue for both disabled and able-bodied users.
It's absolutely fine that some people would like to have post numbers back - we understand people don't always like change - but please let's not try and justify it as being a legal requirement.

And the amount of "visual clutter" is really quite minuscule.

I have a sense that the software architects have made a decision and prefer not to make a U-turn.

 

Good points!  No disrespect to the devs...they are doing an awesome job!  But sometimes it is easy to over think stuff!  I have found that my members don't like to click and search for stuff...it is extra work now for them to look for the edit button or report button.  Sometimes visual clutter can be more efficient...LOL!

Yes, the code provided by Mr 13 does in fact work @BankFodder . We have implemented it on our forums. I do agree though that making it an option or available to Administrators from within the ACP would be nice. Thank you @Mr 13
Regardless of how one views it Visual cues are sensory cues received by the eye that many people process and understand better than text or menus. 
Referencing a post or ID# seen onscreen without having to copy or quote and paste it would help reduce clutter as well as I would find it difficult to believe that making a handicapped person perform an additional 3 or 4 more clicks to obtain or reference the same thing would meet muster for the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990 (ADA) 
Designing Software that is Accessible to Individuals with Disabilities
https://www.washington.edu/doit/designing-software-accessible-individuals-disabilities
 

You are absolutely right to recognise that there is a diversity of users. As a forum administrator I definitely don't want to impose a way of doing things on our users. As far as I'm concerned they are entitled to make their own choices that we need Invision support behind us to allow this to happen.

I don't know about people being "hung up" about them. It's simply that some people find them useful – and others don't but it's their choice
This certainly seems to offer one solution – and we will probably try it. However, for ordinary people who aren't necessarily particularly computer-confident, they may find it a bit geeky and a simple plug-in to produce the post numbers would be very handy.

There was a plug-in available for the previous version of Invision. I'm hoping that somebody will produce a new one

I can assure you that writing the above posts took very little time indeed

If I were in your shoes, I would just hire a developer to update that existing plugin as a custom plugin outside the Marketplace. “Problem solved.” 😉
Probably takes less time than writing the above posts which are unlikely to change IPS staff’s mind.

I've shared these comments with our site team and some of the members on our forum.
The action has been incredulity and hilarity.

If you are really concerned about "visual noise" then what's wrong with putting the post number in the pop-up under the three dots . . .  with all of the rest of the moderator/editing options. That way you clear out this offensive and objectionable "visual noise" allowing the "post content to be the focus" and also you return a very useful function to people who want to refer quickly to information contained in a previous post in a very long thread.
Once again, surely it is reasonable to let the forum administrators decide how much "visual noise" should appear on each post. Surely it is up to forum administrators to decide how far to go in resolving the balance of interests in helping members to focus on post content.
Surely it is the forum administrators should be able to make these choices. Surely it is the job of Invision simply to provide options and not to make decisions for forum administrators.

In fact one of our members said:
and that's true. The problem of "bloat quoting" is already significant and it simply adds a great of length to an already very long thread and makes it much more time-consuming to get round.
Being able to refer to post numbers is simplicity itself and makes navigation of a thread much easier.

I suppose that if Invision went into the book publishing business we would be told that in future, books would not carry any page numbers or even chapter numbers because they were simply "visual noise" and it was important to let the page content be the focus.

Bravo.

We've been operating forum software for 15 years with post counts and we don't have any problem and most importantly our users like it.

There are only about 10 or 15 members of the site team – whereas there are getting on for half a million ordinary members. Because of this, I don't find that the argument that the numbers reviewed by moderators are different from the numbers reviewed by the half a million members to be at all compelling.

We prioritise the interests of our users and as I say, we've never had a problem. Most other platforms have post numbers. We've used post numbers with Invision now using a plug-in which unfortunately doesn't work any more with the latest version of Invision.

I don't see what is wrong with choice. Invision is a pretty good platform and well supported but one thing I find quite unpleasant about it is that the Invision team seem to consider that they should make choices for us and deprive us of choice.

We are all adults – I don't have an option to use post numbers which I can either switch off or switch on. It's also not beyond the wit of someone with the right technical ability to have the member Post number in the corner and then to the left of it in a slightly different colour moderator post number.

Problem solved. People don't like it can switch it off. People who like it can switch it on.

Problem solved – what's not to like?

 

It's just meaningless clutter.

The question comes up now and again, but it really doesn't get a lot of traction from fellow Invision Community owners. You can share the post permalink via the three dot menu, or by the post time link.

We're keen to keep visual noise to a minimum and let the post content be the focus.