planter

[pduggan]

Carved Wood thread:

So Gary's just posted a new image (33219 bytes, and I'm not complaining about that) but, to see the whole page (and be able to revisit it as it should be seen offline), I have to wait for 322079 bytes (28160+11095+56171+69581+18188+90293+48586) of forced downloads that should already have been cached at this end. Next time someone adds an image to that thread it'll be 355298 bytes, and for what? It pisses me off big time and it'll ultimately drive me away from these forums (jump for joy if you like), but what will Xara Ltd/TalkGraphics.com have gained from that except a dissatisfied customer?

Peter</p>

Peat Stack or Pete's Tack?</p>

[This message was edited by Peter Duggan on April 21, 2001 at 10:48 AM.]

[jens g.r. benthien]

Ross, Steve, Peter and all the others,

my question to XARA is: why do they run the talkgraphics on a third party server?

We set up the servers for our customers that the forums run on their servers. Period. No hassle, and screamingly fast on a T3. And a lot cheaper than European servers. The forum software is included in the server, only the set up is extra.

This forum set up has two problem areas: the redirecting of the pages, and the check back to the zymodules server for the banners. So actually we are talking about 3 different servers. Based on the nature of HTTP commands, one part of the packets can be send eastbound around the globe, the other one westbound around the globe - even if the servers are located in the same building.

IMHO this is the weirdest set up I've ever experienced.

And if someone from XARA should ever read this thread: you can order your server at http://highspeedweb.net (nomen est omen), and it will be set up in less than 48 hours with your choice of NT, LINUX or BSD UNIX. Prices start at US$ 99 per year incl. 50 megs if I remember it correctly.

Any questions?

jens

[Ross Macintosh]

That never happens to me Jens. Life is full of mysteries but these computer related ones are more frustrating than most.

The TalkGraphics forums are, I would think, one of the very few users of InfoPop that has a emphasis on attachments. That being the case you would think they would be interested in how these forums are working. I just visited their site and I get the impression that in terms of bandwidth, the Xara forums could be one of their biggest customers. If they are asking for it (who knows?) Xara Ltd./TalkGraphics.Com should get service from InfoPop. Perhaps Xara should be encouraged to complain.

Also noted on the InfoPop site was the fact that they've released a new version of their boards. You can find info here. Still no tree structure from what I see, but it is more customizable. Some of their customers are using it now. Perhaps we will be soon???

In another thread there was talk of the humble "Esc" key. My three-year old son discovered that if he presses it while Dad is composing a reply to post - the Esc key deletes the message. There is no undo for it. Grrrrrrrrr!!

Regards, Ross

<a href=http://www.designstop.com/>DesignStop.Com</a>

[jens g.r. benthien]

I know why I hate this forum software. It's a real drag, because I faced the problem with image uploads for several times.

Another post, another luck :-)

Thanks Gary, but I really hope the company will be visible now :-((

[Steve Newport]

Oh, Ross, by the way, all you have to do when your six-year old hits escape while your replying to a message is hit Ctrl+Z. Com'on Ross, Xara instinct!! I know that button combination better than the back of my hand, God only knows I use it enough (the button combination that is)!!
Also, if you still wanted that galaxy on a wall file, here it is, see if you can find the hidden message.

Steve Newport

[jens g.r. benthien]

Hi guys,

thanks a lot for your input. Seems I really have to work on the shadows and highlights.

BTW Steve, the palm tree is a bitmap (aaarrrgggghhh). A plain photograph taken with an old fashioned SLR, scanned, background to alpha in a png file format, then imported into in XARA. I tried to keep a similar angle for the lightning. However, it's not 3D, because in 3D I don't have too much control on the shadows (feathering, transparency).

The HANSA reflection: the reflective floor unfortunately does have almost the same color as the logo type, so I guess I need to apply some tricks for this one.

Overall: thanks for your input! It always helps to have more than 2 critical eyes on an artwork!

jens

[Ross Macintosh]

<BLOCKQUOTE><font size="-1">quote:</font><HR> so you can remove threads? Great, go ahead if you don't like my comments <HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

Jens, I'm sure you've misunderstood Peter. He was refering to his regrets that your thread that was originally to be about your fine illustration has, in large part because of him, [img]/infopop/emoticons/icon_wink.gif[/img] turned into a discussion of the forum itself. ie. regrets that your great drawing has been lost in the shuffle - the thread has already been hyjacked by the change in focus. He was appologizing to you and is not critical. He admires your willingness to take on the status quo when it sucks. I am sure of these things.

Regards, Ross

<a href=http://www.designstop.com/>DesignStop.Com</a>

[pduggan]

Here's an example:

I look at a thread with ten 50K images (by no means untypical), let the whole page load, and I can revisit it offline. Next time I'm on, it's gained another 50K image and, unless I hang around for all 550K, the whole page is ruined for offline viewing. Maybe Xara Ltd/Talkgraphics.com is being fleeced for all that unnecessary bandwidth (I dunno), but I'm sure as hell paying for it my end and that sucks big time! (To come back to one of the points of my Modems thread, I know it's a graphics site, but I wouldn't really have a problem with images of almost any size if they weren't being forced to reload from the blinking server every time. Linking to images at your site or mine by posting the appropriate HTML doesn't cause this problem, so why should uploading directly to here?)

Peter</p>

Peat Stack or Pete's Tack?</p>

PS Another thing (got me going now) - when threads have more than one page, I have to go through page 1 to get to any subsequent pages, which means that I lose the offline use of page 1 and all its images if I visit it just long enough to click on whatever page (usually the latest) I'm looking for... [img]/infopop/emoticons/icon_mad.gif[/img]

(Even bookmarking the original page 1 and being prepared to type in the URL with a new last digit wouldn't really help here, but it would be an intolerable footer even if it did!)

[This message was edited by Peter Duggan on April 21, 2001 at 08:16 AM.]

[Soquili]

Hi Jens,

I like the overall drawing. The only thing that doesn't seem exactly right is the reflection of the three spheres. I can't decide if they need to have some perspective added because of the floor angle or if simply adding some reflection of the word HANSA would make it more accurate.

Soquili [img]/infopop/emoticons/icon_smile.gif[/img]

[jens g.r. benthien]

Gary,

thanks a lot for postsing my image. Superb service, I really appreciate it.

However, where did the (1) come from? I definitely didn't add it to the filename, that means the forum software does have a bug. Pls. inform the devlopers - this is bugging me like hell.

And now pour in and send the comments !

jens