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+I would like the option to have posts go on chronological or reverse chronological order. I have no idea how they appear now. it makes no sense to me. someone posts at noon, someone else replies at 1PM, another replies at 2PM, a third replies at 3PM, the order is going to be, from top to bottom, what? I have no idea.
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Many users have complained about this since the upgrade. I don't believe it's something that can be made an option for users with the current software.
The posts are ordered in a logical way, but many have had trouble adjusting to it. If you want me to attempt giving a detailed explanation of this, please say so. However, a lot of people have just gone to using flat mode after deciding that the new threaded mode was too confusing. As Chuck said in his sticky, new software is being considered.
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+Also, you click on a thread, it doesn't always show you the original post, it shows you the most recent. But sometimes it shows you the original post
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Check out this thread.
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+There is unexplained variance in how the forums appear. Sometimes threads are dark gray. Often things are in different order. It's not clear to me what puts things in what order.
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This part of your post confuses me a bit, but I'll try to answer it. The darker threads are those that the system thinks contain 'unread' posts. The lighter threads are those the system sees as 'read.' For example, here in this image the forum is (correctly) indicating that I have viewed the posts in two of the shown threads:
Older unread posts aren't tracked for very long, so usually this is only an indication of which threads you've read recently.
Normally threads are ordered by the most recent post. If a thread gets a new response, it gets *bumped* up to the top of the forum. However, you can change the ordering by clicking on the column you wish to sort by.
Hopefully some of your confusion was cleared up by this post. If you want more detailed info. about the current ordering of posts in threaded mode, feel free to ask.