"It's been awhile since we've seen [poster], their last post was [months/years] ago"

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1

I like this feature, it’s a nice touch.
Curious a little about it..what’s the longest time of being away recorded so far? Anyone see anyone who had been gone for, like, 10-12 years? Or maybe it only records the time length that these boards have been around making a max possible “been away” date of only 5 or 6 years ago?
I notice it disappears after awhile. I had one announce my return and it had said a good long while (three years or so), but going back to that post, it’s no longer visible, at least to me. Maybe it disappears after a poster sees it? Or after a certain amount of time by default.

I could have sworn I saw one really long time length before, like…seven years, but I could be misremembering.
If it disappears after a certain amount of time, I don’t expect there to be any way to link back and prove times anyways.

That’s it.
No problem with the rules or a mod decision, just plain ol, “talkin about board features”.

2

I saw a 20 year gap within the last 2 years. I have no clue how to find it though.

3

I think it was within the last year - maybe even within the last 6 months.

ETA: might have been a poster following up on a thread they’d started from 20-odd years ago.

4

Still visible to me. Just below the 4 months later message, I see the following:

It’s been a while since we’ve seen Idle_Thoughts — their last post was 3 years ago.

I searched for “It’s been a while since we’ve seen” and there’s no Looking at discourse.org, it seems to be as designed.

These banners are visible to other users, but not the poster they apply to… and by default are only visible to community members who have been active enough to achieve Trust Level 2.

Reading discourse.org, only admins can do a proper search. By looking for, “Welcome back”, I found the 21 year gap.

5

That was the one, nice.

Someone had actually flagged it for some reason, that’s why I noticeed it at all.

6

It was certainly noteworthy, even if not a violation of a rule.

7

Didn’t someone who posted rarely say that it discouraged them from posting,as they wanted the attention on their post, not on how rarely they posted?

8

Can we flag a post just to say, “Hry mods this is a cool post, come check it out.”

(Not a serious question.)

9

That sounds familiar. According to discourse, the post themself doesn’t see the notification. Maybe @Idle_Thoughts could confirm?

10

They’d know it would happen, though, even if they wouldn’t see it; because they’d see it on other people’s posts.

11

I’m back and you can’t stop me!

ETA: And I don’t see any notice.

12

Confirmed.

I can see the notification for BannyMcBanface’s post (he’s one of our test accounts), but Banny couldn’t see it.
(and now he can’t see anything because we banned him again)

13

I HAVE seen my own, twice, actually—that’s how I knew the time gone was three years----but seeing as how the settings make it so that the poster cannot see their own message, I can only presume I must have been seeing them at times when I was logged out.

14

Nevermind, I just logged out to try to verify if one can see their own message while logged out and it seems one cannot.
Which is weird, because I know I saw my own before, back when I first made a comment in TubaDiva’s passing thread. Maybe the feature that hides it from the actual person wasn’t in place yet? No idea…but I did see my own shortly after I made it (on a reread).
Early installment weirdness, I guess.