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Journal heliocentric's Journal: You have 1 (or less) new messages waiting for you 21

Journal by heliocentric

Does anyone else have slashdot reporting to them that they have a new message waiting for them, only to find that there isn't one?

I went through and clicked on all of the old messages I am hanging onto but I'm still told I have 1 new message.

As for an update to my life, the teaching is going really well (except for one really bad student who practically assulted me after I gave him his one grade and my night section is too quiet) and the network at home is doing well. I got my ultra sparc up and running after a nice ebay aquisition. That sparc is nammed smoke to go with the other sparc nammed steam (I use all train related names, I guess sparcs are "things that come out of trains")

I couldn't find all of my lock picks the other day (after much looking) so I bought a new set. Now I just need to get the hang of things again. For those who have never picked, it's kind of a Zen thing, you must be one with the lock and block out all un-necessary feedback of your surroundings... listen to the lock, feel how it pushes you...

Well, I'll end the journal here since my studies of other journals indicate that once they go beyond a "screen" of text there are hardly any replies. I'm thinking people just want short little topics of discussion and skip the longer ones. Do you agree with this "trend" in journal reading?

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You have 1 (or less) new messages waiting for you More

You have 1 (or less) new messages waiting for you

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  • But once I start reading an entry I generaly tend to finish it up no matter what the length. ^_^
    • But once I start reading an entry I generaly tend to finish it up no matter what the length. ^_^

      Ok, but did you ever find yourself not starting a journal due to length?

      I'll admit that I have loaded journals and found them long and I knew I didn't have enough time to read them. So, I just don't delete my message about said journal in hopes I will make it back. It is when I go back that I find I make it to the bottom and there are no comments. Yet, journals I just didn't get to for a little while that are short have 3 or 4 comments by the time I get around to them.

      I honestly try to make it back to read almost all of the journals I get messages about, but I know there are some that are just missed due to time and the message getting old.
  • I even erased all my messages and there is still a phantom message. I am guessing that it was an alert that a comment had been modded up, since one of mine is at +3 and I didn't get any message.

    It is disturbing though to have a message that isn't there.

  • I've had this problem, but they've all pointed to quirks with my browser cache, be it IE or Mozilla. I have yet to figure it out or if it's already solved for me.
    • Well, my level of messages has gone up (and down) with the replies to this very journal. Everytime the lowest I can get it is 1 new message. And just one your suggestion I cleared out the cache of my browser... and I still have that new message.
  • Because you like "things that come out of trains", does that mean you like passenger rail and/or freight trains and/or model rail?

    Regarding the replying to long journals, I'm not sure. I think that I wouldn't reply as much, because I assume that they are just letting off steam or giving an update. But now that I think about it, you're most likely right. By the time we've read a long journal entry, we're probably too tired and forgetful to reply.

    Maybe longer journal entries tend to ask less questions, and thus, encourage less responses.
    • I like tons of things about trains. All of the computer have names, things like steam and smoke, but all century, hudson, nwj, rdgt1, caboose, and tehachapi. There are other names in queue but I haven't had machines to use them... yet.

      My mother tells a story about how I liked trains before I was able to speak... I don't know how true it is, but I do remember having my dad run out with me from my parents house everytime we heard a train nearby (and there were a lot, I grew up at a major junction on the Easy Coast - here is an ariel shot [zimwiz.com] of my neighborhood, you'll notice trackage from top to left and bottom to upper left [and if you look closely there is a train on the tracks at the top]). I then got into HO very young (here is a picture [zimwiz.com] of me with my first trainset).

      When I was a teenager I joined the local model railroad club (the RSME [rsme.org]) and they had a 15" guage live steam, and an 80'x40' building with an O scale on the second floor, a full machine shop, and an explorer run HO modular setup downstairs.

      My latest train adventures include a nice little apartment sized setup (HO) that allows for nice switching of industry and running a few of my nicer pieces of equipment. The tighter curves and smaller frogs mean I can't run my favorites however. I am the proud owner of FOUR (yes FOUR) brass Reading T-1 4-8-4s. They take a monster curve, and this one bedroom joint doesn't allow for the sweeping curves needed. So, I just sit and run them back and forth on the long straight section... nothing like quadruple head of brass for no reason...

      The RSME is now adding a 7.25" and 4.34" live steam setup, and you can spot a pic of my T1 number 2102, a real T1 number 2100, and my friend's 7.25" live steam engine here [zimwiz.com].

      So, I hope that answers your question, I mean, I'm a train nut, so I love riding passenger trains and spotting freight trains and running model stuff. I've even been so involved as to have been the cab too many times for passenger and freight runs on the real thing. May I ask why you asked about train stuff?

      And to anyone who read this far of this post, did you ever dabble in trains? If so, please share your stories. (hmmm, maybe my train history should be posted in a journal... I have been thinking about updates on the apartment sized model pike...)
      • May I ask why you asked about train stuff?
        Oh, because I'm a train nut too. I'm not quite as into it, like you, but frankly speaking after seeing your pictures, I'm very tempted to become like that. I used to have a set.
        ...did you ever dabble in trains? If so, please share your stories. (hmmm, maybe my train history should be posted in a journal... I have been thinking about updates on the apartment sized model pike...)
        Yeah, I think that you should start a seperate journal entry. I have quite few things to say: holidays, beliefs about passenger rail, politics about Amtrak & Via Rail, ideas about train tables for small rooms, etc.

        A while ago, there were a lot of people who replied to those religious journal entries. In the same way, it'd be interesting to see what kinds of people have an interest in rail and it's various forms.
      • I have a friend who is as crazy about trains as you. Of course, he's an engineer (the kind that drives trains, not like a CE or an EE) for CSX. (If you don't know, that's a freight train company.) So, he has an excuse. He makes decent money, too. Ever thought about a career change? :-)
        • Been there done that. I was (and still am licensed, although not certified for any milage anymore) a train engineer, until my friend on the RR was crushed to death. I know how to operate and fire (the firing is the more difficult really) a full size steam locomotive as well as deseils. Trust me, the hard part is stopping. Once you know the route (you have to be certified for the milage, you can't just hop in and be an engineer where you [and your crew] have never been before) stopping is the hardest part.

          And yes, I'm quite familiar with CSX, unfortunitly the split of clownrail (ahem, cornrail, I mean x-conrail, oops, conrail) gave all of the local trackage to NS and not CSX. However, if I ever learn NS is hiring for the lines in my area I'd definately have to give it DEEP consideration.
          • My friend hasn't had anyone close to him crushed to death, although he did work as a yard boss for a while when CSX was going through a rough spot, they busted a lot of the engineers down to conductors, and he went to the yards in Chattanooga. The hardest thing he has dealing with is hitting people. He runs the line from Etowah, TN to some little town in KY. (Jellico, maybe? or was that the one on the TN side?) People around there have a bad habit of trying to "beat" the train and end up as rail splatter. When he's having a good day and is willing to talk about it, he jokes that he has killed more people than smallpox, but most of the time he tries not to think about it. That has to be rough, and we've told him there is no way he could stop a train that is more than a mile long in 10 feet to avoid hitting someone that was in too much of a hurry to wait. But still it bothers him. I don't really know if I could deal with that aspect of the job.
            • Like I said, stopping is the hard part. I never hit any living humans. But I do have a funny story about a deer (I'll post it in a journal perhaps), and turkeys definately are not the brightest of natures creatures...

              A friend of mine split a coke truck on a crossing, and I have seen my share of crossing runners. It has to be one of the dumbest things people in modern times do. I just do not understand it.
              • It has to be one of the dumbest things people in modern times do. I just do not understand it.

                Funny you should mention, I saw the strangest thing I've ever seen over the weekend. I, too, enjoy trains. I've been a train commuter between Philly and NYC for 11 years now, and I never understood people who don't embrace mass transit.. particularly when going to New York City. But I digress..

                We have a train crossing a few feet from the end of my development and on Saturday, as I and a few others were approaching, the lights started flashing and the gates started to come down. But within a split second, the lights stopped and the gates returned to their upright position. Believe you me, no one was about to rush over the tracks after seeing that happen! We all just put our 4-ways on and crrrrrrrrrept up to the tracks.. saw nothing was coming and gunned it over the tracks! :) Very strange indeed. I've never lived this close to a crossing before, and I've certainly never seen crossing gates act like that before.

                One of the things on the long list of "things I plan to do" is to use my GPS and ham radio to have my home automation box (running Misterhouse [sourceforge.net] watch my position and speed and record all the times I get stuck waiting for a train. Then, when I go to leave for work in the morning, and after collecting data for a long enough period of time, I could have one of those red electronic signs giving me a countdown in minutes until a train is likely to come through. I have been very close to missing my commuter train because I rush out of the house only to find a 250-car freight train creeping through my crossing.
  • Have you written a message to the people who are in charge of the Slashcode?

    Maybe you found a new bug. Or maybe it's just a random quantum fluke.
  • What's your message delivery threshold [slashdot.org] for replies to your journal? By default, it's 1. You have an AC posting at Score: 0. I bet it's a bug regarding this.

    The system probably saw a reply to your journal and sent a message saying there was a reply, and then suppressed that message because it's score was below your journal notification threshold. In other words, there *is* a message waiting for you, but it's hidden because of that threshold.

    Try lowering the threshold and seeing if the message magically appears when you return to your messages. If I'm right, it's also a very simple bug for the slashcode guys to fix, but it could also be a "feature" in their eyes: if you change the threshold, messages which hadn't been read yet will dissapear or appear based on the new threshold. This can't happen if the messages aren't sent to begin with. Of course, what do I know about how the messaging system is coded?

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