Disappearing unread

[AnneK]

One thing I've noticed is I'll occasionally lose unread messages.  For example, today, I had 9 pages of unread messages.  When I came back just now, I was down to 2.  What happened to the others?  Is this a "feature" of this site.  There have been times when I've had just a few unread topics listed.

[Devlyn]

This is tragic! You have a clear cut case of stazupolnitis. You're a sleepreader.

[Laurie]

  Yes, this is a feature of the site. Those unread items reset about once a day I believe.  Perhaps Dena can explains just what happens to then for us.

Hugs,
   Laurie

[Dena]

I have ask Susan about it but I really haven't received a good answer. I know the list is cleared completely off and I have seen it clear in the morning, noonish and in the evening. It looks like it's a manual operation but if so, I haven't found it in the manual. There is a setting that limits the size of the list but it's an administrator setting that's not visible to me. Without administrator access, I have taken it as far as I can.

There is a reason for limiting the size of the list. Each member has a copy of the list and with the number of users we have, each entry in the list would take at least 120,000 bytes of storage. With the current size of memory, that actually isn't that much memory. More likely a linked list approach is used and that would up the memory requirements to about 500,000 bytes per list entry. This makes it desirable to maintain a reasonable list size to avoid eating up all the processor memory.

If a copy of this list is retained on permanent storage, a fair amount of hard drive bandwidth would be required to take periodic backups of this information. This could interfere with the performance of the site for the up  to 1000 users who could be on the site at any given time. At that is one of the reasons why Susan needs your donations to maintain the site and upgrade the hardware as needed.

[sarah1972]

Dena: if I understand correctly, the OP is asking about PM's.

I do understand what you said applying to posts in threads.

For Messages I could understand removing the status but I have never seen messages disappear...

[Laurie]

Dena: if I understand correctly, the OP is asking about PM's.

I do understand what you said applying to posts in threads.

For Messages I could understand removing the status but I have never seen messages disappear...

  Nope Sarah I disagree. She is talking about the unread since last visit and she does mention topics in her post. So she is talking about threads with new posts and new topics. I am sure she meant posts instead of messages.

Hugs,
  Laurie

[Devlyn]

I stand by my diagnosis. 

[Dena]

If it's PMs, I have 78  pages of PMs and they date back to July 5,2015. If they are unread, the moment you look at your messages they become read. I also have retain sent messages check in my profile so as a moderator I have a record of all my correspondence should my actions ever be questioned. You can delete your PMs but you shouldn't lose them.

[AnneK]

Dena: if I understand correctly, the OP is asking about PM's.

I do understand what you said applying to posts in threads.

For Messages I could understand removing the status but I have never seen messages disappear...

I am referring to the threads, not PMs.  There doesn't seem to be any pattern to it.  Both the interval between it happening and the number of unread I lose or have left varies.

[Dena]

The pattern is when the threads are cleared, they are all cleared. How many you will have is determined by the traffic and the length of time from the last clear. To find when the clear occurred, look at the oldest post on the list. The clear probably occurred shortly before the oldest post on the list was made.