UBB.Developers Forums UBB.threads 6 V6 Modifications V6 Mod Ideas Open Instant Graemlins in New Window

My members love graemlins. Problem is, now we have so many that it's causing a lot of scrolling and page loading time (for those with dialup) needed to see them all in the new post and reply pages.
What would be nice is if instead of displaying them all on those pages, there were just a link on those pages to open up the instant graemlins in a new window that the members could leave open in the background during their posting session. That way, they could refer to it while posting/replying and even when using the Quick Reply (from the hack) or composing Private Messages.

That would be pretty cool.

Don't know how to make the JavaScript side of things works. Maybe Gardner will have thoughts on this.

The "window" would need to be opened for each page that they would be used on for the parent < > child scripting to work. If it's just a reference for the ubbcode needed to create the smilie then it could just be one single window.

Just as a reference, showing the ubbcode, would be sufficient really. Or even a drag/drop kind of interface.

Oh that would be doable for sure.

If their browser is set to grab images from cache, like it should be, then they should just have a bit of a wait on the first time they visit the page. Later visits on the same browser session should fill the images in from cache. Are some of these people maybe requesting all images downloaded on each visit to the page? That would surely slow things down on a dialup connection.

posted by mrnocal:

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Just as a reference, showing the ubbcode, would be sufficient really. Or even a drag/drop kind of interface.

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The reference bit should be quite easy, just create a html-page containing the graemlins and open that with a link with javascript window.open. The graemlin page would need something like a input field with the same name as the textarea as well, for the reference to be shown in.

A drag and drop interface would be a bit harder to do, but I'm quite sure it's doable at least in MSIE. I've never done anything like that myself before though so I don't know how hard it is.

I also believe it is possible to update the textarea directly even though the popup isn't opened from that page. You just have to name the window and then it is possible to reference it using that name. I think this is possible at least, it's been ages since I did anything like this.

It is absolutly possible.

I have another site that I use InvisionBoard on and it uses DHTML to do this exact thing.

It give a set of 12 or so Greamlins and a more button. When you click the more button it pops up the Full Greamlin list.

Then when you click the Greamlin that you want it fills the appropriate UBB code into the box.

They even include the feature in the Quick Reply Box that they have.

I know it's possible. What I had stated above though is I don't believe that any other page other than the parent of the child window that is opened displaying the graemlins can be accessed by the child window to dynamicly add the code. Each page, newpost, newreply and what ever else would need a link to open a related child window to be used for that page only.

I could be wrong as it has been a while since I have done much javascripting but if I do recall correctly the communication between pages is only possible between the parent and child windows. Opening page 1's child window will not allow that child window to access page 2.

Does your invisionboard allow for the addition of the graemlins to any page with just one child window or do you have to open the window for each new page? As I said it's been a while so I could be completely wrong. LoL

http://www.childrenofcain.com/forums/

You add the Greamlins through the control panel and check wether or not they are "clickable".

Then the DHTML pop up page is generated with each view of a post or reply.

Therefore the child knows who's its parent is.

ahhh ok I understand how that one works.

The problem is that we don't want to load all of the graemlins each time and to reduce the size of the page. DHTML will still add to the page size as will the loading of the graphics. I believe what is wanted is to load the graemlins as an option and not automaticly.

If you check the source it does not load the images on that page.

Maybe I am incorrect when stating that it uses DHTML maybe it is all javascript.

The "feature" list called it DHTML

The graemlins are on a seperate "popup" browser window. JavaScript is used to open the window but as far as I can tell it's not DHTML related.

The newpost/preview/reply screens seem to all be under the same page... index.php. This may be the reason why the child window can still communicate with all of the screens.


I guess the only way for me to know this answer defninatively is to set something up and test it... lol

DHTML is javascript+html

A link to a pop-up window that would have the smilies should be sufficient. If the images are already cached client-side, then it would work fast after the first time it was used. Shouldn't be any more code than the links about html/ubbcode for each page. Would make the posting pages load faster for those that don't need to see the images as well

Wow! Thanks for all the replies!
Looks like I got you all thinking on this one.
Admittedly, I'm not well versed on javascript and some of the other things you're referring to, although I'm not totally in the dark.
Just a link to open up the new window displaying the smilies is what I want. I don't really need the smilies on the composing pages at all. As it is, a lot of members go to other websites for different smilies than what are offered (such as http://www.plauder-smilies.de/) and just copy the code needed and put it in their posts. I like the idea of being able to click on the picture and the code pops up in a little text box, like it does on the Plauder site, but instead of the full URL for the image it only would need to be the UBB Code for the smilies in our database ([smilie] or whatever).

Since vB and other scripts do this, it's certainly doable (by someone obviously more talented than I! ) Our members really want this. We are changing graemlins in and out of the panel every few weeks. If we could have a pop-up window it would be perfect, since it could load the extra 30 or 40 that everyone seems to want. But it would have to be clickable. We never really remove the graemlins, just replace the code on the new post / reply pages, but most of our members just couldn't/wouldn't type the code (I had thought of just making a list of the markup codes and their pic, but realized very few members would actually use it.)

Displaying only X number of graemlins and a link to open a window with the full list looks to be rather easy to do. I'll see what I can come up with.

I got part way with this under 6.1 Had it displaying 20 graemlins..... with a "more graemlins" link (if there were more than 20) and had designed a template and popup etc...

It was rough (as I didn't really know what I was doing) but I never could get the javascript to put the code in the other window.

I can visualize it well.... I just haven't the javascript ability to pull it off.

If someone did this, it would be much appreciated.

(or if someone didn't have time, and could design the javascript for the popup, I could pull the rest off I'm sure.)

I got this working. I'll clean it up and get it posted sometime today. The only drawback was that the graemlin will be appended to the end of the text. I haven't figured a way to access the insertcarret from the child window.

He he... it always works that way on the mac. So I won't notice the difference.

You are a Genius dave.

Cool, Dave.
This is highly requested on my board also.

I'll have it up in a couple hours. I decided to add in the ability to configure how many are displayed before the "more" link is added. Probably should make the "more" link language dependant as well... lol

[]I decided to add in the ability to configure how many are displayed before the "more" link is added [/]

That sounds great.

[] Probably should make the "more" link language dependant as well... lol
[/]

this sounds even better!

Ok I have the refined version up and running here

I'll start putting the "how to" together after dinner.

I think we need more graemlins here to make this more usefull as a demo... Allen?

Here it is:

https://ubbdev.com/threads/php/...mp;Number=64685&Main=64685#Post64685

Have fun

[]I think we need more graemlins here to make this more usefull as a demo... Allen? [/]

Steal some of mine from here.