[recommendation] Installing a splash screen

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TW Tones

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Jun 26, 2021, 9:02:42 PM6/26/21
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Folks,

I have currently got the unhappy situation where my broadband provider has failed to move my broadband to my new address. Broken beaurocracy is on of my biggest frustrations. 

What this means is I am running at less than 1MB internet access, and I thought I would share the fact that many tiddlywikis look like they are broken when no loading splash screen is available.

So I would like to suggest not only Add a splash screen to large wikis, a must, but perhaps even add them to all internet published wikis.


Tones

Charlie Veniot

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Jun 27, 2021, 11:48:56 AM6/27/21
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Until a non-technical/friendly solution comes along ...

Sounds like the quickest thing to do at the moment, I think, is to have a dinky "loader" html page that loads a TiddlyWiki in an iframe, keeping the iframe hidden until TiddlyWiki is fully loaded, and showing splash in the meantime.

I imagine that needs some javascript, and me not being a fan, Ieave that to somebody else.

Here's something I cobbled together quickly, just for the giggles, as a starting point  (Largely a copy paste from https://stackoverflow.com/questions/325273/make-iframe-to-fit-100-of-containers-remaining-height):

<html>
<head>
<title>&nbsp;&nbsp; Le P'tit Aurèle, un lexique acadien</title>
     <style>
          body, html {width: 100%; height: 100%; margin: 0; padding: 0}
          .first-row {position: absolute;top: 0; left: 0; right: 0; height: 100px; background-color: lime;}
          .second-row {position: absolute; top: 100px; left: 0; right: 0; bottom: 0; background-color: red }
          .second-row iframe {display: block; width: 100%; height: 100%; border: none;}
     </style>
</head>
<body> 
     <div class="first-row">
          <p>The TiddlyWiki is loading</p>
     </div>
     <div class="second-row">
     </div>
</body>

Charlie Veniot

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Jun 27, 2021, 11:55:34 AM6/27/21
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Oh yeah, "loader" in action:  https://leptitaurele.neocities.org/TiddlyWiki_Loader.html

Eric Shulman

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Jun 27, 2021, 12:06:10 PM6/27/21
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On Sunday, June 27, 2021 at 8:48:56 AM UTC-7 cj.v...@gmail.com wrote:
Until a non-technical/friendly solution comes along ...

TiddlyWiki already has support for using a "splash screen" while loading


-e

Charlie Veniot

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Jun 27, 2021, 1:29:41 PM6/27/21
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BTW, refresh the page for that link, and you'll notice for a split second that the red area displays the TiddlyWiki splash screen (the one Eric points to.)

Tones: I figured you already knew about the TiddlyWiki splash screen approach, and were looking for a little something more ?

Or were you just simply suggesting that splash screen be setup in TiddlyWiki empty.html by default, so that folk just need to customise something that is already setup, instead of having to set it all up from scratch?

TW Tones

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Jun 27, 2021, 5:59:39 PM6/27/21
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Charlie et al,

Yes, My suggestion is to use the existing splash screen method and put a low fi one into the empty.html so all wikis have a minimalistic one installed. Owners/designers can remove or customise the splash screen as they wish.

  • The key reason to place it in the standard distribution is because users with lower internet speeds, or as wikis grow larger, it becomes necessary, to avoid people abandoning the link to a tiddlywiki. It is well known that people can give up following a link if they find they are waiting a few seconds. Because this is not already in place in every wiki, I have already abandoned following some tiddlywiki links with my current diminished internet speeds, and I know they have to load before they become interactive, where every day internet users do not. 
  • We do not want published tiddlywikis to look broken as a rule, it will effect its reputation.
  • Empty.html represents a minimum standard for tiddlywiki from which many build a wiki, thus it makes sense if we are trying to set a minimum standard.
    • The next best would be a core plugin to install a minimal splash screen.
Regards
Tones

Charlie Veniot

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Jun 27, 2021, 7:55:08 PM6/27/21
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Yikes, did I ever take the scenic route.

+1 from me for sure.  That's a great idea.

More user friendly to "blank out" (opt-out of?) a preexisting splash screen if one doesn't want it than it is to set it all up from scratch when one wants a splash screen.

And way convenient to personalise a preexisting splash screen.
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