Hover text (title attribute) missing in question title

Question

Perhaps this is an intentional user interface change, but it appears that the title attribute has been removed from the question link on the main page of at least several SE sites (cs, electronics, writers, etc.). Given that question titles are often less than entirely clear, this makes it more difficult to decide whether the question is of interest or not without following the link.

(While hover text may be undesirable for touch-based devices, the removal of the information reduces the quality of the interface for some users.)

This happens on multiple sites in multiple browsers with all userscripts disabled.

Answer 1

As this feature has been disabled for now due to the load it caused on the infrastructure I have created the following userscript to re-enable this functionality for those users that don't mind running userscripts in their browser.

Here is a direct install link. Please log issue on the Github repository

Or copy the below code in your Userscript manager:

// ==UserScript==
// @name         add title
// @namespace    https://meta.stackexchange.com/users/158100/rene
// @version      0.3
// @description  Add titles to links on the frontpage of an SE site
// @author       rene
// @match        *://*.stackexchange.com/
// @match        *://superuser.com/
// @match        *://serverfault.com/
// @grant        none
// ==/UserScript==

(function() {
    'use strict';

    // build api url for an endpoint and its optional parameters
    function apiBuilder(endpoint, params) {
        var url = 'https://api.stackexchange.com/2.2/',
            urlPath = url + endpoint;
        params.key ='Kdg9mxpgwALz)u5ubehUFw((';
        if (params !== undefined)  {
            var query = [];
            for(var prop in params) {
                if (params.hasOwnProperty(prop)) {
                    query.push( prop + '=' + encodeURI(params[prop]));
                }
            }
            urlPath = urlPath + '?' + query.join('&');
        }
        return urlPath;
    }

    // build url for /sites api endpoint
    function apiSitesBuilder() {
        return apiBuilder(
            'sites', 
            {
                pagesize: 500,
                filter: '!*L6SijN-EORrs4rs'
            });
    }

    // build url for /Question endpoint
    function apiQuestionBuilder(site, qid) {
        return apiBuilder(
            'questions/' + qid, 
            {
                site: site,
                order: 'asc',
                page: 1,
                pagesize: 100,
                sort: 'activity',
                filter: '!w-2nxYBnAP3ZrgppIq'
            });
    }

    // do a get on the API for the given url
    // and invoke the callback with the JSON result
    function API () {

        var backlog = [],
            getfunction;

        // simply push the params on the queue
        function cacheget(url, callback) {
            backlog.push({ url: url, callback: callback});
        }

        // this makes the actual xhr call
        function realget(url, callback) {
            var xhr = new XMLHttpRequest();

            // handles pending calls by invoking realget
            // and resetting the getfunction when 
            // the backlog is cleared
            function handleBacklog() {
                var item = backlog.shift();
                if (item !== undefined) {
                    console.log('from cache');
                    // handle this single item
                    realget(item.url, item.callback);
                } 
                if (backlog.length === 0) {
                    // if the backlog is empty 
                    // use realget for the next call
                    getfunction = realget;
                }
            }

            xhr.addEventListener('error', function () {
                console.log(xhr.status);
            });

            xhr.addEventListener('load', function () {
                var response = JSON.parse(xhr.responseText);
                var backoff = response.backoff || 0;
                // backoff received
                if (backoff > 0) {
                    // start caching calls
                    console.log('backoff recv');
                    getfunction = cacheget;
                }
                if (response.error_id === 502) {
                    console.log(reponse.error_message);
                    getfunction = cacheget;
                    backoff = 120;
                }
                // process pending backlog
                setTimeout(handleBacklog, backoff * 1000);
                // invoke the callback
                callback(response);
            });
            xhr.open('GET', url);
            xhr.send();
        }

        // calls either xhr or the cache
        function get(url, callback)
        {
            getfunction(url, callback);
        }

        // initially we start with a realget
        getfunction = realget;

        // return the public api
        return {
            get: get
        };
    }

    var SEApi = new API(); // keep an instance

    // hook the mouseover event on the titles
    function bindMouseOver(api_site_parameter) {
        $('div.summary>h3>a').one('mouseover', function (e) {
            var questionTitleLink = $(this), 
                id = questionTitleLink.parent().parent().parent().prop('id'),
                idparts = id.split('-');
            if (idparts.length>2) {
                // call the api for the question to get the body
                SEApi.get(apiQuestionBuilder(api_site_parameter, idparts[2]), function (data) {
                    if (data.items && data.items.length > 0) {
                        // html encoding
                        var text = document.createElement('span');
                        text.innerHTML = data.items[0].body_markdown.substring(0,200);
                        // set title
                        questionTitleLink.prop(
                            'title', 
                            text.textContent);
                    }
                });
                $(this).prop('title', 'loading ' + id);
            }
        });
    }

    // match the  hostname against site-url to find api_parameter
    function findApiSiteParameter(items) {
        var i, site;
        for(i = 0; i < items.length; i = i + 1) {
            site = items[i];
            if (site.site_url.indexOf(document.location.hostname) !== -1) {
                bindMouseOver(site.api_site_parameter);
                return site.api_site_parameter;
            }
        }
        return null;
    }

    // cache site list
    var cachedSites = localStorage.getItem('SE-add-titles');
    if (cachedSites !== undefined) cachedSites = JSON.parse(cachedSites);
    
    var day = 86400000; // in ms
    if ((cachedSites === undefined || cachedSites === null ) || (cachedSites.items ) ||
       (cachedSites.cacheDate && (cachedSites.cacheDate + day) < Date.now() )) {
        // fetch sites
        SEApi.get(apiSitesBuilder(), function (data) {
            if (data.items && data.items.length) {
                var site = findApiSiteParameter(data.items);
                localStorage.setItem('SE-add-titles', JSON.stringify({ cachedDate: Date.now() , site: site  }));
            }
        });
    } else {
       bindMouseOver(cachedSites.site);
    }
})();

This is tested on Chrome and Edge with TamperMonkey and FireFox 51 with GreaseMonkey, all on Windows 10.

This User Script is also published on Stack Apps

Answer 2

We took the titles off as part of mitigating a DDoS attack on our servers - removing the title attribute has reduced the page size dramatically, meaning we could cope with the attack better.

There are no plans for re-enabling it in the short term.