Browsing forums in Safari problem

[BenCO]

So I got my iPad on Saturday and it's great. I really have no complaints at all with the device itself. For what i do, it actually fits a perfect niche.

That being said, i can't get past this glaring issue in Safari.

The problem:

I'm browsing a forum, click a link, read it, then hit the back button. Safari then automatically refreshes the forum. When i'm browsing busy forums and hit back, threads i had intended to click on are completely off the first page of the forum. If i hit a back button, i intend to go back to where i previously was, not to a refreshed page.

I've looked in the preferences and don't see an option for this, or am i missing it? To me this is a big problem for browsing forums which is the bulk of use my iPad will see.

 

[Meever]

I've heard it's because iPad doesn't have enough RAM accessible. It can't keep the cache so it dumps it and reloads it everytime you go back into the page.

*sigh* it's a big problem and has me worried. I am considering selling it because of this ram problem. It can't even keep three pages worth of memory on the ram, how the hell is this thing going to multitask without exploding. You'd think with the insane profit margin and low price of ram Apple would at least throw in a gig of ram.

 

[BenCO]

I've heard it's because iPad doesn't have enough RAM accessible. It can't keep the cache so it dumps it and reloads it everytime you go back into the page.

*sigh* it's a big problem and has me worried. I am considering selling it because of this ram problem. It can't even keep three pages worth of memory on the ram, how the hell is this thing going to multitask without exploding. You'd think with the insane profit margin and low price of ram Apple would at least throw in a gig of ram.

Ok that would explain the issue if that's the case.

This is a huge glaring issue for me. 95% of what i will use the iPad for is forums. I can't expect to hunt down threads i want to click and keep up with new replies if they're all over the page after each thread i view.

It's not even an issue of being lazy, if i want to find certain threads on fast moving forums i'm going to have to constantly be checking if it's at the top with a new reply, or pushed back to page 3 already.

 

[lilo777]

I've heard it's because iPad doesn't have enough RAM accessible. It can't keep the cache so it dumps it and reloads it everytime you go back into the page.

*sigh* it's a big problem and has me worried. I am considering selling it because of this ram problem. It can't even keep three pages worth of memory on the ram, how the hell is this thing going to multitask without exploding. You'd think with the insane profit margin and low price of ram Apple would at least throw in a gig of ram.

If you are a "real" Apple fan, you'd simply buy multiple iPads to do multitasking

 

[M87]

When you're browsing forums can you not just open the threads you want in new tabs? That's what I do on the desktop a lot. Go through a forum and open all the threads that interest me in new tabs, then I go through them all. You could even bookmark them temporarily if you run out of tabs.

I don't have my iPad yet, but I'm sure there are ways to manage this.

 

[Meever]

When you're browsing forums can you not just open the threads you want in new tabs? That's what I do on the desktop a lot. Go through a forum and open all the threads that interest me in new tabs, then I go through them all. You could even bookmark them temporarily if you run out of tabs.

I don't have my iPad yet, but I'm sure there are ways to manage this.

The mobile safari browser doesn't support tabs, you can only open new "windows" but see the problem is if you have more than two windows open the ipad will "dump" the page to free up ram and only refresh when you go back into the page.... which basically takes you back to the first page/top of the page/etc

It's a real headache.

 

[BenCO]

When you're browsing forums can you not just open the threads you want in new tabs? That's what I do on the desktop a lot. Go through a forum and open all the threads that interest me in new tabs, then I go through them all. You could even bookmark them temporarily if you run out of tabs.

I don't have my iPad yet, but I'm sure there are ways to manage this.

Sure i could probably do that, but why waste my time with a Macbook sitting on the table? I'm not really looking for a work around, i was hoping i missed a setting or something. Maybe if there were tabs that would work, but the way it's setup now just isn't conducive for the type of browsing i do.

I've been using it since Saturday and while i've been annoyed by this issue, it hasn't been a deal breaker for me......yet. But if it can't cache a few pages, i'm no longer as excited as i was for the potential of multitasking.

 

[foxnews1]

this refresh/reloading issue on the ipad will make sure that people with 3G ipad will have to pay unlimited $30, instead of 250MB/month for $15.

 

[matthewHUB]

if it's anything like the iPhone hold down on the link and it'll offer a prompt to open in a new page. thus, your original search remains intact.

another user had said that with multiple tabs open, the iPad doesn't have enough RAM not to refresh the original page after coming back (maybe with 4 pages open), so i would advise to open all the links you wish to read in one go.

 

[Meever]

That didn't even occur to me. Wow, that's BS! Those people with 250mb are going to take a nasty beating in their data budget.

 

[BenCO]

if it's anything like the iPhone hold down on the link and it'll offer a prompt to open in a new page. thus, your original search remains intact.

another user had said that with multiple tabs open, the iPad doesn't have enough RAM not to refresh the original page after coming back (maybe with 4 pages open), so i would advise to open all the links you wish to read in one go.

Ultimately that defeats the purpose of the iPad for me. It may seem like a minor gripe to some, but the bulk of what i do online is just browse forums. Doing something like that affects the pace and flow i have on forums. Again it may seem ridiculous to some, but i'm in and out of threads really fast. If the first post doesn't interest me i hit back right away. That is why it is so annoying, because if i have my eye on 3 threads i want to check, when i go back i need to go and hunt them down.

And it's not like i have a mouse over option to preview the thread either, so a lot of threads i click on turn out to be uninteresting and i'm in there for maybe 5 seconds. Having to go through the trouble to bookmarking it, or opening it, or moving out of it without tabs is just a waste of time.

And good point on the 250mb plan, you can forget about that.

 

[lilo777]

That didn't even occur to me. Wow, that's BS! Those people with 250mb are going to take a nasty beating in their data budget.

There was a relevant thread on this forum. Some guy tethered iPhone to iPad and used it for a few hours for browsing. He noticed that iPad pulled a few time more data than what he usually got by browsing on iPhone directly. The reason was not clear and one suggestion was that that iPhone in some cases goes to mobile versions of web sites whereas iPad uses full versions. Anyhow, this is something people will have to watch once they get their 3G iPads.

 

[hazmatzak]

I'm browsing a forum, click a link, read it, then hit the back button. Safari then automatically refreshes the forum. When i'm browsing busy forums and hit back, threads i had intended to click on are completely off the first page of the forum. If i hit a back button, i intend to go back to where i previously was, not to a refreshed page.

I'm on a Mac at the moment, and desktop Safari does the exact same thing. The reason is that the topic list page (and even these content pages) are live, and can change at any time. The alternative is to force people to manually hit Refresh when they "really" want to get the latest. That turns out to be worse in terms of user experience. (There are ways to try and optimize this: request headers for content, check the dates, and request the whole content only if it is newer. But on a site that depends on page views, it's not surprising they want more hits.)

As mentioned, opening links in new tabs or windows is the way around this; although on the iPad, there is IIRC the hard limit of nine windows, and even before that, the cache limit which forces reloads. Also, you can't open a new window "in the background", which would minimize some of the back-and-forth.

But I was still able to open the iPad topic list in the first window, then open eight links in new windows, going back to the topic page after each one. The topic list did not reload. After they were all open, I visited each of those windows, and there was no reload. That could just be dumb luck that they all fit in memory. How typical that is, I can't say.