What do Dopers think about using spoilers inside quotes to ease reading? For instance we might have the first line or paragraph in the clear and the remainder spoilered as below:
I don’t like the idea; it takes an extra click to read it. Why not give a URL for the complete text?
I think people would include a link anyway in most cases (my example above is one where a link is not appropriate). But clicking on a link means loading a new page with all the adverts and so on that that entails.
But just to expand on the example I gave, I think many - if not most - Dopers would have understood the reference, but also many would not and putting the text there is a matter of convenience.
Huh, this is totally not the thread I expected it to be. I thought this was going to be yet another complaint about the bug in the mobile theme that spoilers inside of quotes don’t work.
I wasn’t aware of such a bug but that’s a very good reason for not doing it!
Spoiler boxes are generally pointless to begin with (especially in a thread that is specifically about some current entertainment where trying to read it without spoilers ends up being completely pointless), they work poorly if at all with mobile browers, and periodically they tend to spawn a bunch of spammy modal windows and redirects when clicked.
I would be completely fine with disabling spoiler boxes entirely. Adding more of them out of some kind of desire for visual compactness is just dumb. It would make more sense to have a rule that in quoting a previous post it should only contain the relevant portion instead of doing a whole post quote and response like “I agree!”, but even that is pretty subjective depending on the extent of the response.
Stranger
I am reading using a desktop with Firefox and spoilers don’t work for me either. For example, the spoiler in the OP is completely visible.
Clicking on “Show/Hide” in the OP in mobile mode makes absolutely no difference to me.
So I have no idea what this issue is about.
Huh. I’m using a desktop with Firefox and spoilers work fine for me. Are you by any chance using the Sultantheme’s Responsive theme? I use the classic Straight Dope theme. Because, while I can’t speak for the baby Jesus, Sultantheme’s makes the adult Doug K. cry.
What are you attempting to accomplish. I’ve put my own WOW (wall of words) in spoilers to make it read, but I can’t imagine doing it to a quote. But I’m a firm believer in not altering quotes. Granted, that’s not really altering it (that much), but I try to stay away from it as a general rule.
As a side note, I really, really wish people would give us some hint as to what’s in a spoiler. For example if someone makes a thread about your favorite twist endings in movies and everyone just makes lists like:
This is my favorite:
(spoiler)
Also, I love what they did with
(spoiler)
I totally guessed what was going to happen when
(spoiler)
There’s plenty of other variations of this, but, to me, this makes for an unreadable thread. If you spoiler something without any context, I have to open the spoiler to see what it says, thus making the point of the spoiler moot.
rant over.
Why, yes I am. I have never paid attention to that and didn’t even know I had a choice. It was just what showed up by default.
I changed it and, lo and behold, spoilers inside quotes work. Thanks.
This is indeed an issue with the theme, and one we were trying to get Ed’s tech guy to fix before he left. Since then, I’ve not really received any replies on trying to fix it, despite Tuba saying she’d push it up the chain and ask.
I actually have the exact code necessary to fix all of the functional problems of the theme, as I incorporated it into my “theme fixer,” which I still use. So it’s just a matter of getting someone who has the access and is willing to make the changes.
If by chance anyone sees this post and is willing to fix it, please send me a PM for the CSS, as I probably won’t check this thread very often.
:o 
I often post tables with CODE, also destroyed by SultanBugs, usually with a reminder to disable SultanBugs to view the table. So either you
- saw my tables and thought ‘doesn’t this ape-shit septimus even look at his own posts?’ or, even worse,
- ignore my posts altogether.
(As a connoisseur of faulty software, I’m curious how SultanBugs came about, especially since BigT has offered fixes for most or all of the bugs. Was this some coder in BanglaDesh who underbid all comers and did it all for $59 ?)
I presume you have already sent the CSS to Tubadiva so she can pass it upstream?
If only we could vote for you as our Lord and Savior.
He made it available in previous threads about the issues with the theme.
They used a preexisting theme (called SultanTheme), and it apparently wasn’t designed with spoiler and code tags in mind. Those tags both appear to be special options that have to be enabled.
The person adding the theme was actually hired to fix up the main Straight Dope website (and they seem to have done a good job). Adding a mobile skin for the forum was just an additional thing Ed needed. The guy wasn’t an expert in vBulletin, and was out of his element trying to fix it up.
Once they enabled the old theme, they stopped concentrating on the theme and went back to working on the main website. I presume Ed had to start the process of leaving before the coder was ready to go back to the theme. Or, possibly, due to other concerns, wound up forgetting.
I’ve never sent it to her directly, just mentioned it in a thread, and she said she’d contact the tech people. In that thread, I included all the fixes.
If she needs me to send it to her directly, I will gladly do so. But I don’t want to become a pest by continually asking her about it.