Leaving aside the front end eye candy for a bit...
One thing I noticed recently is that in 3.3.x the U_MCP template var is fundamentally broken. It is hidden on quite a lot of pages, even though it is used for a fundamental and essential function: providing admins and moderators with direct access to the MCP. The reason it gets hidden on some pages is that on those pages it simply does not work. For example, if you have forced the U_MCP menu link to display everywhere, and if you are viewing your PM inbox and think of something you should do in MCP, clicking the MCP link will send you to...
...your PM inbox.![:lol:]( "Laughing")
Umm, no, that is not where I wanted to go. It's not even vaguely logical.
So, recently there was a thread about MCP link on all pages, in which it was pointed out that using U_MODCP would work on all pages. The catch with that is that I have played around with permissions and, although it can easily be hidden from guests and bots, it seems impossible to hide it from registered members who are not moderators or admins. If it is possible, it is certainly not clear. AFAICT the only way of doing it would be to call group_id as part of the IF conditions, but of course group_id is not an accessible default var in the template. Consequently U_MODCP will display to everyone. It's harmless, because non-moderators will just be denied access if they click it, but it's dumb because menus should not contain links to areas you can't access.
My point here is that it would be great for a future version to fix the fundamental illogicality of various things in 3.3.x.
As another example, there are various tabs that will send you to mode=front in MCP. These are Main, User notes, Warnings, and Moderator logs. These all display different content, so are really different modes by any reasonable definition. It is distinctly odd to have the MCP navigation telling you that you are on the "Front page" when the content is dramatically different depending on which "Front page" link you click. If they are all going to be lumped in under the same mode then they should all be clearly accessible in that mode via the MCP sidebar navigation, as is the case with other areas (ie: PM and subsections).
tl:dr; Please consider fixing the weird stuff and making it normal.![:)]( "Smile")
One thing I noticed recently is that in 3.3.x the U_MCP template var is fundamentally broken. It is hidden on quite a lot of pages, even though it is used for a fundamental and essential function: providing admins and moderators with direct access to the MCP. The reason it gets hidden on some pages is that on those pages it simply does not work. For example, if you have forced the U_MCP menu link to display everywhere, and if you are viewing your PM inbox and think of something you should do in MCP, clicking the MCP link will send you to...
...your PM inbox.
Umm, no, that is not where I wanted to go. It's not even vaguely logical.So, recently there was a thread about MCP link on all pages, in which it was pointed out that using U_MODCP would work on all pages. The catch with that is that I have played around with permissions and, although it can easily be hidden from guests and bots, it seems impossible to hide it from registered members who are not moderators or admins. If it is possible, it is certainly not clear. AFAICT the only way of doing it would be to call group_id as part of the IF conditions, but of course group_id is not an accessible default var in the template. Consequently U_MODCP will display to everyone. It's harmless, because non-moderators will just be denied access if they click it, but it's dumb because menus should not contain links to areas you can't access.
My point here is that it would be great for a future version to fix the fundamental illogicality of various things in 3.3.x.
As another example, there are various tabs that will send you to mode=front in MCP. These are Main, User notes, Warnings, and Moderator logs. These all display different content, so are really different modes by any reasonable definition. It is distinctly odd to have the MCP navigation telling you that you are on the "Front page" when the content is dramatically different depending on which "Front page" link you click. If they are all going to be lumped in under the same mode then they should all be clearly accessible in that mode via the MCP sidebar navigation, as is the case with other areas (ie: PM and subsections).
tl:dr; Please consider fixing the weird stuff and making it normal.
Statistics: Posted by Gumboots — Sun Mar 23, 2025 9:14 pm