Script Summary: Another way to view comments on The New York Times website.
Features:
- View all comments on the original opinion/blog page where the discussion originated.
- Long comments are shortened to scannable 140 character "tweets" that can be expanded to read.
- Editor's choice comments and the highest recommended are highlighted and expanded.
- Option to expand all comments.
- Ability to "follow" commenters (by clicking the ★ next to their name) and always have their comments highlighted and expanded.
- View any commenter's TimesPeople recommendations or comments they have made elsewhere.
- Displays the date and time each comment was written and moderated.
About:
This script makes use of the New York Times community API, so not everything that is commentable on the nyt site will be in here. Most blogs, for example, are not in the API, save Dot Earth http://dotearth.blogs.nytimes.com/. Movie and restaurant reviews are also not included.
After installing, you can see the comments on any page that uses the API, for example:
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/07/opinion/07fri...
http://dotearth.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/12/31/to...
Please note that this is still a demo with some rough edges. I'm posting it here to get some feedback as I finish it.
What's keeping this in BETA?
- Responses to comments are not displayed.
Changelog:
0.9.1 - Fixed sorting for good, thanks to those who helped me.
0.9 - Refined sorting; reinstated comment numbers; scrubbed html from user signatures; added "expand all" link.
0.8 - Added the ability to load other comments made by any commenter, or their TimesPeople recommendations.
0.7 - A speed tweak suggested to me by Alan Mclean makes this much faster.
0.6.1 - Minor css tweaks; removed comment number for now, as it can be confusing.
0.6 - Added ability to "follow" a commenter and have their comments always highlighted; many small bugs fixed (dates, "hot comments" after the initial 25, comments now need at least 6 recommends before being considered "hot").
0.4.2 - Fixed a small mistake in the way minutes are displayed.
0.4.1 - If the comment is too short to tweet, the original is displayed.
0.4 - Added commenters' TimesPeople profile links and reformatted dates.
0.3 - Editor's choice and most recommended comments are highlighted.
0.2 - Some code optimization; comments better displayed; editor's choice comments opened automatically.
0.1 - Basic functionality: comments are loaded.
Full disclosure:
I work for the New York Times.
