I don't know where to ask this, but I am wondering if putting lines of text under a spoiler tag reduces the size of the post (reducing paging) or just changes how it looks and won't help with paging. Anyone know?
it's just a couple of kilobytes of difference. hardly makes a difference. The JS needed for the button would have more of a performance burden, but probably also insignificant
sorry, I misunderstood. I don't think the forum software takes the spoilers into consideration for how many posts there can be in a page, but it could, if modified? it's closed source so i have no idea of how it decides how many posts to put in a page. But it's not constant At least you have to scroll less on each page now.
OK, so I created a test thread called "Experimental thread ignore" and I filled it with VERY VERY long spoilers that included images, and I still got to complete 25 posts before it went to another page. I then went and looked at several other threads and they all started the second page on the 26th post. So I am beginning to think that the software allows 25 posts to a page, no matter what the content of those posts... So, I guess, what we really have is a situation where using a spoiler will reduce the scrolling for an individual page, but the number of posts is what determines a new page, not the amount of data the posts include.
OH haha, I thought that wasn't the case because I searched for the number of instances of "Location:" in each page and found it wasn't always the same. But not all users have a "Location:". Duh
As further confirmation notice that the post number of the last post of any but the last page in a thread will be a multiple of 25. And, BTW, if any Mods want to delete that experimental thread for wasting bandwidth it has served it's purpose and is no longer necessary.