Way to Load First Post In Topic Through "Latest Topics" Widget's URL Link

Technical Details

Forum version : #phpBB2
Position : Founder
Concerned browser(s) : Mozilla Firefox
Who the problem concerns : All members
When the problem appeared : Always
Forum link : https://pwgenesis.forumotion.com

Description of problem

When clicking on a topic that has multiple posts (not pages) the browser always loads up the latest post at the bottom. Is there a way that when clicking on a topic it force loads it from the top?

Just to be clear, I'm not talking about the "first post always appearing" on other pages of the same topic setting. What I want is when clicking on a topic it loads me into the top of the topic instead of the last post/bottom page of the topic.

We are a roleplaying forum so it is inconvenient for new readers of the topic to have to manually scroll all the way back up to the first post to start reading. I couldn't find anything in the control panel or personal settings when I looked. My apologies if I missed it.

Hi,


That's already the normal behaviour

On a topics list or on a search results


On a forum list


In any case, clicking on topic title brings you to the top of first page. Shown in green on the screenshots.
Clicking on the last post icon should bring you to the last post of the topic. Shown in red on screenshots. If the topic has only one post, it will bring you to that post instead of the top of page with header and navbar.

One specific case, topics with unread posts :

Clicking on the icon before topic title (shown in blue) will bring you to the first unread post. If there are three unread posts, it wont bring you to most recent post but the oldest you hadn't read yet.

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AnyColor wrote:it is inconvenient for new readers of the topic to have to manually scroll all the way back up to the first post to start reading.

You can explain to your members they do not need to scroll (especially on very long pages).



Key 19 (Home) does not bring you home but at the top of the page.
Pressing key 20 (End) doesn't kill anyone but brings you to the end of page (footer)
Keys 21 and 22 (PgUp and PgDn on some keyboards) doesn't change the current page but brings you upper or lower in the page.

Using mouse is quite recent (in the beginning of the nineties and the rise of Microsoft Windows) and people who knew computer with just a keyboard can tell you there is many things done faster with keyboard shortcuts than with a mouse or any pointing device like trackball or touchpad (examples Alt+F4 to close a software, Ctrl+S to save a document, Ctrl+X Ctrl+C Ctrl+V to cut, copy and paste)

When numeric pad is disabled, use 1 or 7 for bottom and top, 9 and 3 as Page Up and Page Down.

Thank you for the hotkey tutorial @Neptune- I'll be sure to share those with members who may be unaware.

However, I noticed the issue seems to be from clicking the topic title from the Portal tab part of the site. It takes you to the furthest bottom post of that topic. It adds on a # with a few numbers onto the post's original URL. For example "Roleplay-Rules" would become "Roleplay-Rules#8764" when clicking the link through the portal page. If I erase the #8764 from the URL and hit enter then it loads the post in at the top normally as you said.

Our members almost universally check the portal page anytime signing onto the site as its the easiest way to see the list of most recent topics/posts, especially when a member in our chatgroup announces they've recently posted a new one. Is there any sort of coding or settings that would allow the default url to be loaded when clicking topic titles through the Portal portion of our site?

Thanks again for the help!

Are you referring to the latest topics widget?

Yes, the "latest topics" widget that's accessible through the portal tab button on our site. My apologies we've always just reference it as the portal since it has the other widgets too.

I've updated the title of the thread to more accurately describe the problem.

bump

But why would you want that widget to load the first post of a topic?  You're talking about the first post that someone creates when you start a topic. correct?

Yes the first post of a topic when it is first created.

We are a roleplaying site, and when members click on portal tab to access the Latest Topics widget to see what new content there is - including a brand new weekly show - it loads them into to the last post/ending of the show (topic) where they can see spoilers until scrolling (or hotkeying) back to the top of the topic.

It would be an quality of life improvement for how we use the Latest Topics widget with our sites content essentially.

Ok.  I would create a customized widget with the links to the first posts of topics.

Yes, that could work. Are there any tutorials on how to do that? I'm not familiar with setting up a customized widget.

maybe this will help you

https://help.forumotion.com/t129060-widget-recent-topics-of-a-specific-sub-forum?highlight=widget

hello is this solved?

Not really still trying to figure it out with using that widget link you posted.

did you try it ? you do not get the results you want ?