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When I find a question that I want to answer, I look at the user's profile to understand whether it is feasible to wait for a response or not. The same with comments, answers and so on.

How do I do this now?

This question: Some changes to the profile while we make it responsive says that:

  1. Dropped the profile views metric entirely. It’s a vanity metric and we don’t think it’s worth keeping around.

This answer offers a solution: LegacyProfiles that works well for now. It simply uses JavaScript and the Stack Exchange API.

Can this be implemented as an additional option in the user profile, so that people can decide for themselves whether it is vanity or not?

What does this script actually do? This option, whether to show this information or not, can be implemented in the frontend to reduce the server load, if this is the problem.

What kind of application should it be? If the application has become too complex to maintain, then it is time to go back to its beginning, i.e. to the problem definition.

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    This isn't a reasonable method of giving people the option to display this additional data. It is significantly more load on the system to both serve additional JavaScript to determine if the option has been set and then fetch the data if needed than it would be to have the data included in the page when the page is constructed, even if inclusion, or not, of the data is based on a user preference. In other words, while providing the option to show that data might be reasonable, implementing it with the same logic that's in the userscript isn't an efficient method of implementation. Commented Aug 10, 2021 at 6:58
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    @Makyen efficient? Of course not. Easy to develop for SE developers? Yes, that's the goal. Reason they removed it was because it became too complex to maintain. Commented Aug 10, 2021 at 13:04
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    @ShadowWizardWearingMaskV2 I don't recall "it became too complex to maintain" stated as a reason to remove anything other than the calendar popup. No, this is not easy to develop (implemented in the suggested way). They already have all the code to include it directly in the page. They already have code that can check a global preference when the page is generated. Adding the option to have it included directly should be trivial compared to writing/vetting code to do completely new things, and then maintain in multiple places all the HTML formatting necessary for those lines added by JS. Commented Aug 10, 2021 at 13:14
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    @ShadowWizardWearingMaskV2 - I don't buy the "it was difficult to maintain" reason. In general developers are paid to make what wasn't previously possible, possible and make it happen. Commented Aug 10, 2021 at 16:14
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    The only bit of evidence I can find to support "difficult to maintain" is that the last iteration of the profile page hadn't meaningfully changed since its original introduction in April of 2015. But this could simply be because SE didn't see it as worth changing, not necessarily that it was difficult to do so. Commented Aug 11, 2021 at 19:15

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I think - in a sense, that anything removed has a reason (whether or not we agree on the validity of it), and adding it back isn't a "userscript" - its a "option".

SE has had a long tradition of userscripts, and even extensions for features that we felt were wanting, or changes we didn't like, some of which even made their way into sites proper.

The correct approach here, where folks don't see the utility of a specific feature is to make a case for the feature.

A profile page is a public feature, meant for view by the general populace, whether they're seasoned SE veterans, folks who pop in when they have a problem (registered or otherwise). Having options, or worse expecting users to use a userscript doesn't make sense.

As a moderator (and I do have the same view regular users have), trying to feedback on these things, I found myself needing an alternate account to actually understand the changes made. In a sense diversity of how we view pages - even if its between sites - is a maintenance burden.

This is a long winded way of saying "we should generally see the same thing in a profile" - and stuff hidden by default is unlikely to be seen. Its probably much better to make a case, and talk about the utility of the missing fields in your day to day workflow than to have a special profile option for an 'old style' profile.

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  • What does this mean: to make a case for the feature? How do you usually make this? Commented Aug 12, 2021 at 3:03
  • In this case the post that talks about this change might be the right place. If someone hasn't already, or you have something new to add, you might want to post an answer about why a specific removed part of the profile is useful to you (or its important to you, but utility is probably more convincing here), and why adding it back would be good. Often asking a new question is useful, but you might notice we have tons of questions about these - so sticking to the ongoing question is a good idea. Lots of users have asked about this so its also worth reviewing those and voting appropriately Commented Aug 12, 2021 at 3:13
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I think there is no need for "an additional option in the user profile" or some kind of optional user script. Stackexchange should simply reactivate the removed profile fields for everyone (or at least the "last seen" field) - just the way it was before the change.

As already discussed in the answers to the forementioned question, the staff's opinion "this was only a vanity metrics" is not shared by large parts of the community, quite the opposite, so in my opinion SE should simply listen to the community.

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