[DISCONTINUED] MATLAB Answers Wish-list #2 (and bug reports)
Walter Roberson
on 29 Jun 2012
This topic is for features you would like to see for the MATLAB Answers facility itself, and also for bug reports about the MATLAB Answers facility.
This topic is the follow on to the earlier Wish-list for MATLAB Answer sections. That topic grew large enough to become unwieldy; and Mathworks has made enough changes to make a number of the past points no longer of relevance. There was also a more limited purpose <http://uk.mathworks.com/matlabcentral/answers/216662-new-design-of-the-forum-grey-on-white-wish-list-3-bug-reports
I suggest one wish (or bug report) per answer, so that people can vote their wishes.
227 Comments
Time Descending
For easy navigation and for the historians,
Anyone with edit privileges should feel free to update this whenever needed.
I sure wish Answers pages would load faster. Navigating the Answers section and sorting forum posts is remarkably slow, especially considering it's only text. And with the recent redesign of the site, there isn't even very much text at that.
Renato, this particular topic is about changes to the MATLAB Answers forum software, not about MATLAB itself.
Matlab lacks a more robust object oriented architecture that is related to how the majority of the myriad of functions are not structured in a hierarchical model, but rather exist on their own, loosely coupled one to another, even when there is a clear relationship between them.
In my simples example above, I compare the "Document Object Model" in a MS Office application (ie., Excel) with MatLab.
As you can see, if I want to graph a simple function, and at the same time change its axes, labels, and title... first, I have to know upfront the exact names of the specific five functions that would provide me those functionalities; Secondly, as I use the 'plot' function (the 'parent' function) by typing its name in the command window, the interface does not prompt me to the dependent ('child') methods and properties associated with the parent function; only allows me to complete the spelling (<Tab>)
What happens in more structured applications such as MS Excel, as you well know, is that beyond helping complete the spelling, there are more strict parent/child relationships between their (VBA) commands (objects). In such environments, a user could assume that typing 'plot' (or other meaningful command) in the command window's prompt, placing a period after the object handle and WITHOUT even pressing Tab, a dropdown list would appear revealing all of the associated / dependent commands (properties and methods) for the particular object/function to be immediately available for use.
In other words, there is no easy way to know what other commands I have available to use to manipulate/modify the graph/plot/parent object being used.
i wish matlab answer forum was quick and responsive as TI e2e community.
Are you talking about the speed of the forum software, or about the time it takes before a volunteer replies? Your post over here suggests that it is the time it takes people to reply that is your concern.
You have been posting questions about Simulink, PWM, Buck converters, PID control, and the like. There do not happen to be many volunteers who work on those topics. That is not the fault of the forum software or of the MATLAB language design.
The "Flagged Content" page is broken. It shows items that have been flagged but there is no way to get to them. When you click "an answer" it should take you to the answer that had been flagged but instead it just reloads the "Flagged Content" page.
It appears, on further reflection, that the case is this:
A Comment or Answer is flagged. The Question is deleted without deleting the individual Comment or Answer. Then the record of the flagging might still be in the list.
You can determine whether the comment or answer is still there or not by hovering over the "a comment" or "an answer" link: if it shows answers/flagged at the end of the URL then it is gone; it if is there it will have answers/######-Title-Here where ##### is the question number.
So at least the behavior is unexpected. I would expect that if a post has been deleted, that it would also be deleted from the "flagged content" list.
The contributor's page is broken, and currently only displays a bunch of # and commas.
Fixed.
I think that it would be better to have the forum adding automatically a target attribute
target="_blank"
to links present in threads, because we often want to keep the question/comment under our eyes when we click on such links.
I like it the way it is now.
Too_many_windows = clutter;
I just put in my vote!
I don't know if it's just the two totally different computers I've tried it on (Dell desktop and HP laptop) or if it's due to some Java "upgrade" but in the last few days whenever I try to type an Answer or Comment into an edit box, the "Preview" box covers up almost all of the Save button. Disabling it doesn't help. All I can see is a tiny sliver of the left side and top side of the button. I've tried two different browsers (Firefox and IE) and tried changing the zoom level of the displayed page (control-mouse wheel) and nothing helps - it's still covered up. The Cancel button is totally covered so I can't see that button at all anymore. I have Java 7 update 25 (the latest version according to http://www.java.com/en/download/manual.jsp)
Is anyone else experiencing this problem with Answers?
I came back in to Firefox, without clearing the cache, and the problem has disappeared. All is normal again. So I guess you fixed it somehow, at least for now.
Clearing the browser cache worked (on Chrome).
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