Super Secret Blog · 6:04am Jan 23rd, 2017
Hey guys. This isn't a site post, because it's not really worthy of one, but I'm kind of excited by some of the features I've worked on that are finally going to be pushed live in the very very near future (much testing is required) and you guys who follow me get a treat I guess? :V. I worked on a lot of stuff a few months back but have to admit to my own chagrin that, as always happens, I burned myself out and ended up not finishing what was so close to done. Planet Coaster may have also had an influence.... Anyway! This is not a comprehensive list because it's sort of off the top of my head but here goes
Performance
One of, it not the most important changes this update is performance. I don't mean backend performance, I mean front end rendering, ie. what your browser does. Currently the site is "slow" (though still faster than most sites) for a variety of reasons, the primary one being our use of jQuery. jQuery is a powerful javascript library that makes a lot of things on the front end of the site easier, but its featureset incurs a substantial performance hit. With modern javascript it isn't especially needed if you don't care about supporting outdated browsers (which we don't). Consequently I have rewritten out ENTIRE front end to no longer depend on jQuery. But who cares about that, numbers matter. Well, depending on the page, rendering can be anywhere from 2-5x faster. On slower machines and phones this is a game changer, and even on a beefy desktop like I have, pages are far simpler and take rarely over 100ms compared to sometimes 400ms on the current site. I'm really excited about this change and I hope it will impact you guys on lesser machines positively. I wish it was more exciting than that but....hey, it's exciting for me.
There are some other performance boosts too. We're upgrading to the latest version of Elastic Search which from my testing gives us up to 10x better performance in places, so faster searches!
Backend Architecture
Not done with rearchitecting though, I've redone the entire backend code that deals with generating pages (most of it) to make it infinitely easier to extend (for the nerds it's a proper MVC setup rather than my half baked thing before) and I'm really proud of the solution I came up with to handle a lot of the foleys of backend PHP. I won't bother going into the specifics but it involves how I handle the page layouts that individual pages sit within.
Chapter revamp
The bookmarks button always sucked. Clicking it and then having to click a paragraph was messy and poorly implemented. In coming up with a better system it's expanded out to a lot more fun stuff.... Basically you can now click on arbitrary paragraphs and you get a few options:
I'll get to "read" in a minute.... but bookmark will bookmark that paragraph (crazy huh) and quote will automatically copy that paragraph into your comment for easily adding comments about specific content.
So, read.... Well.... Text to speech is a thing in html5 and I couldn't resist....
Some things need work still, like the volume buttons don't work (and the html5 api support is garbage for it anyway) and I need to build a voice selector, but it works great so far. It highlights the paragraph you're currently on, scrolls when necessary (the button on the left toggles that scrolling on and off, and disables automatically when you scroll yourself) and has the ability to be paused and resumed. Clearly not everyone wants to listen to TTS for stories but personally I have a low attention span for reading and TTS helps me follow along without my eyes drifting ahead or reading too fast. I hope a lot of people get good use out of it!
User Boxes
Eh, not a huge change but I think they're a lot more polished now. Amazing what a little redesign can do.
Groups
Groups have had some smallish quality of life changes. Can't take screenshots right now because the page is currently broken...derrrr, but I can explain them!
Users page: This page has been revamped to removed the icons to set level. These were always messy and crappy. Members actually now have their own little page which shows how many stories they've added and how many stories they have in the group! The users list also shows some of this information, though you can't order by number of stories added I'm afraid.
Folders: The drop down for folders at the top was a holdover for how groups used to work and always sucked, because if you clicked a folder and went back, you'd have to open the box again. Bad! So now the top level folders have a page that also shows every story in the group!
Forum: I've added a neat feature to the forums so you can see what threads have new posts. There are some "limitations" but about the same as other forums I think. Any thread you view will always show whether there's new posts, but if you haven't ever read a thread, it'll only show as new for 3 days. Really handy to have!
Groups...Part 2?
Groups were always a second class feature on the site because searching them was hidden in the user cp. Not anymore! There is now an up front search page for groups which anyone can use.
You can search by name, groups you've joined and whether to include/exclude/only include mature rated groups. You can even order them too. The former page with group threads is now a dropdown under the groups button, so it's still easy to get to (hell, it's one of my most used pages) though it might take some getting used to.
Account Pages
Entering your password to change your bio sucks, I know. Hence why you no longer have to! Account management has been broken down into 3 pages:
Settings - Minor things like bio and notifications, no password required
Account - Name and email, pass required to change
Password - Change password, pass required.
This is a lot more intuitive and less annoying. The password page even has a password strength identifier:
This uses some fancy advanced stuff to actually genuinely work out how good your password is, which is pretty rare on the net still. A new password is required to be a certain strength with this system (don't worry it's nothing crazy, and doesn't have any requirement for numbers or punctuation!)
Private Messaging
I don't have any images for this because...well....I don't have any fake private messages... But to put it simply, the PM page has a ton of fixes for annoying stuff like it'll now mark all messages in a conversation read when you click on any message, and you can actually scroll back and forward in a chain now! No more being stuck to 50 messages or whatever it is... Still got some work to do here though.
Minor
There's now a global font size setting in the settings.
Bug Fixes
Honestly....I don't have a changelog, I'm sorry. But I can tell you there are a load of fixes for weird bugs, but I'm sure my rewritten code is gonna have bugs too :/
I'm pretty sure I've forgotten a load of stuff because seriously, I've done so much with this update but....meh, I wanted to get you guys excited because it'll make me more likely to be less of a lazy bum :)
I was hoping to get this update out in the next week but writing this I realise it may be a teeny bit longer but I'm working really hard to get it done asap!
Addendum
I'm trying to be a bit more social on the site. I feel like I'm disconnected with the site to be honest. I feel like I've never really made any friends here but I'm trying to be more talkative, which some of you may have noticed. If you want to "shoot the breeze" as they say, feel free to hit me up on Discord (preferably, just join the Fimfic discord https://discord.gg/JxVYc6k and message me) or PMs and I'll try and chat with you :) Can't promise I'll be your BBBFF because I'm a grumpy bastard who hates everyone else's opinions and tastes but let's see what happens.
Hey knighty this is kind of a weird question but...do you think there will ever be a FIMFiction app?
4393122 There is an Android one I got a ton of work on but...kind of got abandoned....again. It'll happen eventually (tm)
4393123 Cool.
Sweet stuff. My biggest question is when we'll go general fiction. I've been waiting forever to chuck FF.net out the window once and for all.
I think it's pretty cool that you're engaging the users on a more personal level.
4393127 All this stuff is always working towards that.
4393151 Cool, cool. Keep fighting!
Looking forward to trying out the new 'read' function when I'm at wor... uh, I mean, when I have some free time and aren't supposed to be doing anything else important,
s6.postimg.org/5pzpmopep/Pirate_Approved2.jpg
Liking the new bio boxes.
Weird, I know.
~Skeeter The Lurker
Whoa wait... Hold the phone... There's going to be, and I'm pinching myself here.... A bookmark feature?
Oh how I've waited for that feature. Yay! 
I'm looking forward to seeing all the changes in their entirety upon release. It's something to be excited for.
Glad you were able to fix up the site knighty.
4393160 There's actually already a bookmark feature ;p It just sucks the way it's implemented. There's a button in the toolbar in chapters for it
4393163 How long was that a thing?!
Well you learn something everyday. 
Still I can't wait to see all of your hard work become public, it'll be a real treat. 
Sweet! Love the new changes!
(I'll be honest: I didn't understand some of it...)
*Looks under "User Boxes"*
Wait a second... is that me?!
...
HOLY SHIT! I'm shown on the Site Admin's BLOG?! How the name of Samwise Gamgee did that happen?
*Clears Throat*
Sorry, didn't expect that, is all...
I was looking for a feature the other day that I couldn't find recent documentation on--is there still an accessible RSS feed for either a user's blog or your feed?
Also, have you heard tell of a mobile bug that prevents the user from scrolling on the bookshelf page sidebar? Like, I hit the button to pop it out and the sidebar bit won't scroll, only the page behind.
In any case, always looking forward to new changes! Your dedication to never calling this site done is part of why I love it so much.
4393169 you reminded me I forgot to mention I've redesigned most of the mobile site.... >_>
Will you ever implement color themes on the site?
Looking forward to the updates. I appreciate all the hard work you put into the site. Also, I can't wait to check out the general fiction site when it eventually comes into existence!
Ooh, I really like that.
That seems like a neat idea.
Cool.
Ooh, now that'll come in handy.
Thank you very much for that little fix.
Thanks for everything you've done, Knighty. I hope you enjoy what you're doing and I know your hard work will pay off. The new stuff looks great and it can only get better from here. Especially the change to the PMs. It was kind of a pain having to always click each individual one or "Mark all as read" each time someone sent me more than one. Love you, man.
4393151
Can you make it so that people who type in the word "dick" will get the message, "This isn't long enough"?
hypehypehypehype roundstable.com/forums/images/smilies/excite.gif
Isn't that the reason for most things? xD
Well, anywho, you sure got me hyped for this big update, and don't worry take your time. If you rush it, then it will only suffer, so if it takes you until the middle or end of next month I'm cool with that. ^^ Thanks for all your hard work, and I'm looking forward to a better bookmark feature. :)
That way I don't just leave the story, and my computer, on all night long.
New user cards look a little cleaner. It's especially nice that the external accounts box isn't shown when it's empty. (or have you just removed it's background?
)
Not sure I'm on board with the (further) pudgification I see around the user avatar. It would be better if you gave them the same border-radius used at the top of the usercard than the bottom simply because it's closer to that. My eyes are constantly seeing the disparity between the two.
I actually never liked the site's excessive use of 'pudge'. It add a lot of visual noise and seems to be going the opposite direction of most modern sites.
The coloured bar being substantially taller than the buttons it contains, without any content in the space, also looks odd. It's almost like the online indicator should be in there, or both that and the username and have awkwardly been displaced by the avatar that's shoved itself in.
I can see that highlight and popup on every paragraph becoming very distracting, sorry.
Is it something you can turn off (or, better, something you need to click to turn it on?)
Major improvement on the groups/private messaging/settings pages!
4393170
Oh yay!
Does that mean you've fixed the bug where you can't click on any of the bookshelf links, or the user page link in the left hamburger menu?
Or the bug where you can't reply to a comment (or click anything to the far right) because the stories sidebar slides out over them?
This all sounds super!
HAHAHAHA Down with jQuery!
But seriously, how is it that just one guy can somehow make a site that kills nearly anything else out there, especially the ones made by development teams? I don't think we have enough appreciation for the fact that this site has such a top notch design and interface.
Excellent! Sounds like you'll fit right in with everyone else.
But seriously, thanks for the work, Knighty.
You mentioned some of these changes in Discord.
I'm pretty excited about the groups changes personally. And the fix for unread PMs is nice.
Woohoo thanks knighty senpai we love you
Yay, performance!
Good job knighty, your site is one of the most solid working ones that also work on mobile fairly well.
Oh, regarding mobile: is there going to be a way to check a chapter's publication date?
4393170
Sounds exciting. Will a search box be added to the mobile site?
Ah yes, I well understand the temptation to half-ass rather than go true MVC, but it really is worth the trouble. Thanks for continuing to make one of my absolute favorite sites on the Internet even better, knighty.
Good changes coming... Any chance there's groing to be a more granular filter besides the 18+ one on the site in the future?
Would be nice if I could drop stories that have tags that don't interest me out of my lists and searches (Anthro and EQG for me mostly).
4393211 Hey, jQuery was great for its time. :) I still have a jQuery t-shirt from 2013
o-oh
A way to get the site to read fics to us?
I'll never want for audiobooks again! :O (Well, not true, the quality is way different, but still.)
I like the sound of that Javascript change, I'm nearly always on one mobile device or another when using the site.
Neat.
I'm really curious about how that text to speech works out for me, I currently use a separate android app for that but direct site support would be wonderful.
Would you be willing to share any technical details on this? For job related purposes I've been looking for a good and modern password strength checking system for a few years.
Also curious about the mobile site rewrite as mentioned in the comments, that's likely to have a big impact on my user experience. Will there be a mobile friendly user page layout?
Oh my god, I'm in this blog post!
4393318 Sure, here you go: https://github.com/dropbox/zxcvbn
4393292 Yeah it'll come when we have the tag system rolled out
Does that mean you're getting rid of the limit or am I reading it wrong?
Edit: I think I read it wrong, you mean it won't just show the 96 messages? it will show the whole conversation?
Thanks a lot for all the work!
My old iPad will appreciate performance improvement.
Great work on keeping the site functional and loveable as always. And I'm glad you've decided to be a bit more sociable. You have many fans you've neglected!
Anyways, on a serious note: is there going to be a way to move chapters around on mobile? Like, shift their placement up or down? It's difficult and time consuming when you write most of your stories on mobile and you want to move chapters around or add a new chapter and you have to get on your PC just to move those chapters around.
Oh awesome! More updates. The bookmark part looks helpful. I've never been able to use it (maybe because I have an i-pad) so maybe now I can. The group part is really cool too.
YEEEEEES
You have absolutely no idea how much I needed this. And it's limited to a hundred.
4393168
Lucky you
I was just about to go tell you when I saw your comment
4393552 Writing functionality in general is extremely low priority for me on mobile I'm afraid.
4393558
Oh, okay. That's fine. It's not a major deal, but I was wondering. Thanks.
4393556
*Totally masculine squee noise*
*Golf Clap* Congrats!
This is awesome to hear.
Not just that we will no longer have to enter the password to change our bios 
(Though that's amazing! XD) But also that you're working on the site and trying to be more social. 
I'm always trying to improve the site by being friendly and positive, but there's only so much I can do.
So go, knighty, go!
4393151
But hopefully you'll separate the two sites in some way? I'd still like a place for only pony stuff.
I find you rather amicable
4393714 The site will be the same but it will be on a different domain, and fimfiction.net will only show my little pony stuff, so you don't have to worry.
4393779
Thanks knighty.
Ah, that's good!