Greetings, Cranky Users! This diary is mostly in response to requests, because I aim to please! We'll open with a few thoughts about aluminum nut rivets (or "rivet nuts", as they are alternately known), because in last week's Cranky diary, Horsefeathers and elfling demanded such an essay. I had never even heard of aluminum nut rivets, but in a few minutes with teh Google, I learned more about them than Michele Bachmann knows about Elvis and the Soviet Union put together. Which is, of course, not very much.
However, as I've observed before, it can be amusing to read the words of experts about mysterious topics, which explains my lifelong determination to remain entirely ignorant of the game of bridge. I'm sure it's a fine game, but it cannot possibly be as much fun as reading in the Bridge column, "The only way to make the contract was to duck the first trick," and having it still sound, to my un-bridged ears, like dialogue from a Godfather movie. As a friend of mine used to say, "Blessed are the easily amused." But I digress.
When we investigate aluminum nut rivets a bit, we find that, in point of fact, they have much in common with the aforementioned Michele Bachmann and her followers. It develops that "Blind nuts can be used in a wide range of applications." Well, and who among us, observing the machinations of Dick Armey, has not noticed that?
Let's review the other points offered and see if they do not apply equally well to tea partiers (emphasis mine):
- Designed to provide a very efficient and cost-effective method of placing permanent threads in thin materials
- Installed from one side, blind nuts are perfect for metal, fiberglass and rigid plastic previously too thin for tapped threads
- Provides a neat appearance and once in place, the internal threads are ready for a screw or bolt
There you have it, my Cranky friends. The "internal threads" of the Vast Right-Wing Conspiracy have reached out and enveloped aluminum nut rivets. And if you think this material was "previously too thin" to support such a theory, please reflect on which politicians are most "ready" to "screw" us and then "bolt".
Please view with me this short inspirational video, and then join me below the squiggle for some entirely different matters.
I often wander about here dispensing unsolicited advice about using Daily Kos, because it's my best shot at being helpful. I had a conversation the other day with dear ursoklevar, who has been unwell and was trying to catch up with the previous day's diaries. She complained that she was trying to rec comments in such a diary, and some of them seemed to "take" and others to fail, or rather, FAIL. I thought her question and its answer might be helpful to someone else.
After 24 hours, you can no longer rec a comment except for a tip jar. The comments in a diary are of mixed age. If you open a diary roughly 24 hours after it was posted, when you open it, the unexpired comments at that time have rec buttons, and unless you close-reopen or refresh the page, the appearance of existing comments will not change. But as you are reading, some comments are hitting the 24-hour mark and expiring, yet they still appear on your page with a rec button. If you try to rec one of these comments, it looks like you should be able to, but you get the "FAIL" message. It's not you, not your browser, not the server; it's just the Life Cycle of Comments. (It's also why some of the comments don't have a rec button at all -- they had already expired before you opened the diary.)
Here's another item that might be helpful for someone else. In a very Cranky recent diary by gchaucer2, sceptical observer sought to "follow" someone who had not yet written any diaries but writes good comments. It's apparent that you can follow a diarist by clicking the little heart by their name at the top of one of their diaries, but suppose there are no diaries?
Anywhere you see a user's name in orange, such as at the bottom of one of their excellent comments, you can click that name and it will take you to the user's profile page. There, to the left of the big box headed {user's} Profile, is a small box with the user's avatar, mojo rating, etc. That box has a follow heart. Here, for instance, is that box for the estimable Granny Doc, to whom the Cranky Users send many Cranky hugs.
And, last for today, here's our other request. Last week, our Cranky Users diary discussed the issue of using CTRL-click to expand or shrink an entire comment subthread at once, which can have a million household uses. (Read about it if you don't know how to use it!) We were pleased to be visited in the comments by oh, the Daily Kos Products and Technology VP. He wanted to hear whether people were aware of the CTRL-click feature before reading the diary, and whether we use it. But he arrived rather late, so I promised I would ask again this week. Please respond to the poll, and comment further about it if you like.
UPDATE (mostly for oh's benefit): I write this on 8/24, after kos published a dairy last night about planned improvements in site moderation (and "diary" vs. "story"). When I saw a comment from wytcld with this statement:
There have been a few threads though where an easy ability to collapse the subsequent thread would have saved having to page down through it when the idiocy gets competitive.
I felt compelled to respond about CTRL-click. I drew a couple of "never knew" responses that made me think that feature could use more publicity than we can give it here. Those arrowheads are so unobtrusive as to register visually as bullet points to the unsuspecting reader. Not that I want them all garish or anything! They just might need pointing out by someone with a bigger megaphone than I have. I'd suggest that, when kos rolls out whatever the new moderation plan is, he point out that people can collapse threads in that way. It really does have materially to do with people's ability to ignore stuff they'd be better off not responding to. |
Please use the comments, as always, not only to respond to
oh but to discuss your new or ongoing issues with DK4, ask questions, help others, and say whatever else you like as long as it is kind to your fellow Cranky Users. Amusing remarks and animal photos are welcome.
WHERE TO TURN: LINKS
☀ For more stuff sort of like this, the Cranky Users group.
☀ For lots of official detail about the site and its workings, the DK4 FAQ (frequently-asked questions). The main Daily Kos FAQ is still here.
☀ To get immediate response for technical help or urgent site problems, the contact form (be sure to select the tech support radio button). Note that THE BUG REPORT FORM HAS BEEN DECOMMISSIONED. To report a bug to the dev team now, you can use the tech support form, or you can comment in an elfling diary or send her a personal message. Congratulations to the development team for reducing the bug collection to a size where it can be drowned in the bathtub.
☀ For immediate catharsis, complain in a Cranky Users thread. These threads are regularly scanned by kos and developers, but it's not a guaranteed way to bring an issue to the attention of these folks. But sometimes you just need some sympathy from other cranky people! (And sometimes, other cranky people have advice that can help you.)
Our thanks to kos, the development team, and the Dkosopedia contributors for their vigorous efforts to deliver a site that works well and to help us know how to work it!
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