Thanks, UT.

It is what I have become accustomed to over the years.

Flint, if you're adamant about not using the New Posts button, the icons on the left hand side of each thread title will tell you if a thread has unread posts or not. The colorful icon indicates new posts.

Flint, Ibram;

If the name under "last Post" at the right of the thread ain't yours, someone has posted since you did.

If the envelope is open to the left of the thread and the thread title is in bold type, then someone has posted since your last log in.

Wolf mentioned the magic button.

What's the problem? :confused:

You know how that goes xoB. They're concerned that if they let us do the soft stuff, like your date/time stamp, it will lead us to doing harder stuff like International Date/Time Groups [312353RJUL06] and Julian Dates [2453948.49514]. They just know that they'll have to watch us hit rock bottom (when we start using Star Dates and all become Trekkies) before they will be able to save us through some 12 step recovery program that leads us back to the AGO system.

Squares. :crazy:

the problem I have is once I go into the thread that I can easily tell has new posts... before the swich, I just scrolled down till the numbers were sooner than the last time i checked... now I actually have to look at my clock, figure out what time I was last on, and scan the end of the timestamp, instead of looking at the very first number on the stamp.

Ah, I see how you were operating. The "view first unread" button will put in in the right place.

Griff nailed it.
If the envelope is open to the left of the thread and the thread title is in bold type, there will be a check mark to the left of the thread title.
Clicking that check mark will take you to the first comment in the thread you haven't read yet.

How do it know!?!
vBulletin Version 3.5.4, knows all, so always wear clean underwear..... Bwahahahahaha..... :ninja:
.....Uh...you're shoe's untied.



NoBoxes....:thumbsup:

@All: Thanks for your suggestions.

Now, just humor me: Why do you prefer the timestamp? What does it do?

Thank you in advance for your answers. I'm not asking a rhetorical question here.

It's simply more precise, and it really comes into play after a day or so. The "hours ago" feature would simply say "one day ago." It wouldn't tell you what time of day.

If there were two similar threads with common themes, and some crossover, you could compare times that posts were made. With the "ago" feature you would only know they were made the same day. That happens not infrequently.

In the association thread, days after the fact, you might see a post griping that they had to change their answer because two people responded to a post at the same time. With the time date stamp, you can see if they really were close in time instead of just occuring on the same day.

It's more information.

I'm SO confused!

Once I figured out what "ago" was, I thought perhaps I would prefer it. So far, I still do (count me in the 17%) but that may be because it's what I'm used to. But, for example, Brianna posted after me but I had forgotten my post because hers was timed at 8 something AM and it is already 9 something AM here...I guess if you don't post a lot you don't have to keep track so much. I think I need to learn more of the features!

This is difficult for those of us who have a certain tendency towards what I call "time/space/direction dyslexia!":D

So, the timestamp adds meta-data to the post. For dispute resolution and to prevent the reader from getting confused between different posts made within a 24 hour period. Fair enough, thank you for your answer.

But, conversely, you do have to keep cross-referencing against your clock in order to calculate that information. Not to mention your calendar, as I noticed today: "What is the date today, is this post from five minutes ago or 24 hours ago?" I know this sounds lazy, but I'm not here to work, this is supposed to be light entertainment.

As I've said, people obviously prefer the timestamp. But, I will say that, in my opinion, ease of use of the site outweighs the additional level of information provided by the timestamp.

Sure. I agree that ease of use is key. But I find the "new posts" button is the easiest thing in the world. The time stamp is for information, not navigation.

That's your problem.

And you still get a 'today's posts' button when you are not logged in, sissyboy.

In confunction with this, I've set the system up so that it gets accurate time from the net constantly.

It had been getting the accurate time every night at 4am, but the system time was fast, and timestamps could be off by as much as 20 seconds.

Now the time is set constantly, using the Network Time Protocol via a set of rotating public servers that Redhat provides. It should be more accurate.