headelf

You say it would require a custom archive-encyclopedia.php. There are 4002 plugins that alter the theme archive in some way so it appears that isn’t a block to improving your plugin making the “cannot change the anatomy of your theme” argument moot.

You say it would require a custom page template that render the prefix filter above the page title/content. So? Are you saying that’s hard to do?

The same argument applies to #3. You’re saying this is onerous?

Be upfront and say “I don’t want to be bothered to improve my plugin” and we’ll call it done. This is like the lack of documentation issue. It’s either a problem you want to solve or it’s not. In the amount of time I’ve spent trying to solve issues and get it to work the way I need it to work I could have rewritten my scripts. I did learn a lot so thanks for that. I’m sorry I spent the money on the pro version. I thought I would be getting what I need. My fault. Buyer beware.

I’m so glad you asked.

If I were to compile a wish list of updates/changes . . .

#1 would be limiting the sidebar index to the selection from the prefix menu. This would eliminate any need to define a restriction to the numbers shown in the widget settings. It would be cleaner, faster and more logical and give the user a feel for how the encyclopedia works.

#2 would be the ability to have the prefix bar added to a page OR the ability to set/have a archive “starter” page that presupposes the prefix selection is “A”. Look at the website. I don’t really need/want an “about” page but I have to have one for the site not to produce a “page not found” error when it loads for the first time. This is a flexibility issue. How are other sites transitioning from blog (which this site doesn’t have/use) to encyclopedia?

#3 would be to never present in the archive page anything but the individual selected term or terms with the ability to limit the amount of text shown for each if multiple items are displayed. The encyclopedia search would display the searched for term(s) in the sidebar index, not in the archive page. If a single term is returned from the search, it would display the term in the archive. The prefix bar would be shown throughout, regardless of whether there was a term to display.

I’m trying to suggest logical things that would speed up the use and widen the scope of the abilities of the plugin. I hope I’m being helpful and not bashing you over what I need and am not getting.

When the website loads it’s loading 1987 items. Not kidding. Some of them are PAGES long with charts and images.

So, when the site loads (first time accessed) it’s loading 1987+ items in the index and the “about” page in the archive. I haven’t got a redirect to give me a single prefix upon site load. Once the site is loaded, if I hit the letter A (assuming I didn’t get a time out from loading the 1987+ items in the index – yes, this IS a thing), it’s loading those full 1987+ items (WITH mouseover excerpts) PLUS all of the letter A items with full text (or excerpts) in the archive loc. That’s 1987+ items in the sidebar index with mouseover excerpts AND 112 items with full or partial excerpts in the archive loc. The letter A isn’t bad (relatively speaking), but some of the letters have lots of items AND lots of text/images/links. We haven’t even looked at cross linking yet.

Did that help you see what I’m seeing?

I had a “it’s not working again” moment last night. I clicked something in the index and got the “page not found” error. I closed my browser and reopened it and it worked. This is not good.

In pondering what I was seeing I realized it has something to do with timing out before the full index can be loaded. I’m telling you this because it supports my claim that loading an entire index of ~2000 items isn’t logical nor a good practice. If the success of the plugin is dependent on awesome connection speeds, something that many don’t have, then the current configuration is not a viable option.

I can’t have this happen for my client who lives in an isolated location on the Washington State coast. And I can’t arbitrarily truncate the number of index items. All the prefix-selected items *must* appear on the menu. Having them additionally load in the archive portion of the page with an excerpt is great for vanity sites where not a great number of terms are displayed. For my application, it’s not. At ~2000 terms it slows everything down and as shown in last night’s check on function, kills/disables it.

I would prefer, based on the number of entries I’m working with, that the index wasn’t a verbose listing of terms at any time. To my thinking it’s a waste of bandwidth. No one in their right mind is going to scroll through ~2000 entries. Having the number of entries limited isn’t a good option either. X may only have ten entries but A has a ridiculous number and all A entries should be shown in the sidebar.

I can see what I prefer isn’t an option. I have to decide if I am going to settle for something less than the ideal or revive my programming. Life isn’t always full of optimal options, is it.

Please consider tweaking the plugin to give the option of showing in the index only the prefix selected items. I’ll go in and reset the excerpt to something ridiculously short so each entry takes up only one or two lines. This is not an ideal option.

Yes, I know the sidebar displays all entries. I need it to display ONLY the entries selected in the prefix bar. Can I PLEASE get this so I don’t have to write this app again in php/mysql? Please? I love the original work I did and I can convert it from php5.4 to php-native but I would rather not. Please? I’m trying to retire, not write more script I have to maintain in perpetuity.

And then I click E and I’m back to three lines, one single letters and two with two letters!