Seeing Who's Online

[shadows]

Is there (or could there be) a way to see who's in the site, from the Etano Admin Panel, without actually logging in to the site itself?
BTW...
Merry Christmas to Dan and all the Datemill members from sunny Australia!

[maverick]

Presently there is no way to view who's online from the admin, and indeed this would be a useful feature in the admin panel as part of the search options. I'm a little hesitant about doing any custom work in the admin section as it's enough of a chore having to manually update the front end because of all the custom work I've done. Maybe Dan will consider adding it in future update.

[Johnboy]

Either I'm misunderstanding the question or a very rare occassion has come up where Maverick is wrong. I thought the Live Site Activity section in admin showed you who was online.

[maverick]

Hi John;

Technically, the "Who's Online" and the "Live Site Activity" are totally different features.

Who's Online specifically let's you know which and how many members are "now" online, whereas the Live Site Activity results includes both members and guests browsing the site and allows you observe what activity is going on in real time. The Live Activity also only shows a single page of results and just constantly updates itself in real time so it's not very useful in trying to determine who's online. The "Activity Log" is a bit different as the results are paginated and therefore you can get a better idea how active your site is at the time, or in a given day, and you could also see who's recently logged in or been online, but still not ideal for trying to determine who's online, as in which members are actually online at the moment.

The Activity features are best suited for seeing what visitors and members are up to on your site, which could be useful in determining how active your site is, what sections or features are most popular, or looking for suspicious activity such as a potential spammer.

I use and view the "Activity Log" daily, I seldom view the "Live Site Activity", but to accurately view "Who's Online" I have to log into the site as a member.

 

[Johnboy]

Thanks Maverick....That explains a lot, I thought my live activity was out of sync with the who's online.

......But Thinking about it,

........isn't the WHO's ONLINE list order based on the points system and not who is currently online. EG if you put up lots of posts, photos and blogs and logged in 23 hrs ago you would show up higher on the list than someone who only logged on say a minute ago is only uses the site for perving, rather than contributing, which I personally think sucks, and I actually paid Dan for a mod to make the most recent member who was active showed up the top of the list.(Like the old DSB did).

It is all very confusing and over complicated, I dunno why Dan didn't just build the whos online like 99% of other dating, social networking sites, where the most recent active member was at the top of the list. I can see his reasoning of using the points system, in hope to make members more active and contribute stuff to the site, but, they dont give a stuff about it, they are there for their own reasons looking for what they want. Only a small percentage really care about building the site and contributing.

[maverick]

Hi John;

Unless I'm mistaken or you've customized the point system, the points system isn't specific to the "Who's Online", the point system is relevant to all search query results, the "Who's Online" is technically just another search query. If you notice, the "Who's Online" results appear on the same page as any search result and just as the following syntax ... http://www.yoursite.com/search.php?st=online

I guess the point system is a personal preference and can have it's pros and cons. I personally like it because when I do a specific search for people based on my criteria, I don't want a bunch of dead beat profiles appearing at the top of the list. I have my point system setup with a strong relevance to those who are logged in (online) so they will always appear at the top of the list for any search results, that's of course if they match the criteria I'm searching for.

The "Who's Online" search results naturally only includes those that are logged in, and the point system would place those that are most active and have uploaded photos to the top of the list. Those that are dead beats or Looky-Loos with incomplete profiles (especially no photos) IMO shouldn't be rewarded. IMO those that are premium members that actively post on the site and have photos, and possibly even paid for a premium membership, should always come before the dead beats.

Again this is just my personal opinion and preference, it can vary depending on the type of site you have and you should customize things according to your preferences and needs. There's really no right or wrong way of setting this up.

[Johnboy]

Well to tell you the truth Mav, I am not sure exactly what mine is like now as it was modded so long ago I can't remember exactly what Dan did, I just know I wanted him to make it like the old DSB whos online, as I didnt feel my site was suited to the points system as its full of tossers lol, and they are more concerned about who actually is online NOW as they are horny. As you say, different sites require different solutions, and I guess thats the beauty about ETANO, it can do that.