Myself personally, I don't think that such an addition is really necessary. As it is, you can click on anyone's username within the Other Users nodelet to see their XP level. Also, I don't like the idea of having more text on my screen than I need. The numbers would just make the list look odd and misshapen (sp?).

Now, as I wrote the above, one idea did occur to me. The chatterbox has already seen an improvement that could help with this. If you hover your mouse over the name of the user posting the message (and you use a browser that shows such things correctly), you'll get one of those popup hints saying how long ago that message was submitted to the CB. This is made possible by the wonderful html 'title' attribute. How about placing each monk's XP in the 'title' attribute for each name in the CB?

The only question that remains in my brain now is whether this would create any additional strain on the database. Would another database query have to be executed to get user XP values in the Other Users nodelet, or is this information already loaded and ready to access? If it requires another database hit, I'd lean towards the direction of no, let's not add this functionality. But hey, if it's sitting there waiting for us to use it somehow, I say add it as a 'title' attirbute :)

      C:\>shutdown -s
      >> Could not shut down computer:
      >> Microsoft is logged in remotely.
    

How about placing each monk's XP in the
'title' attribute for each name in the CB?
[download]

I like the sound of this idea, as for creating extra strain on the servers, I agree this is important, but I do tend to click on peoples screen-names a lot just to see what XP they have (and see their other write-ups etc.) Maybe this feature would cut down on this type of server request?
Martymart

In the chatterbox if you move your mouse onto a user's name and wait, the "hint" tells you when the user posted his message and how many seconds ago it happpened.

In the "Other Users" nothing happens if you leave your mouse on the user's name. Some info could be put there (like XP or something else for example). Of course that would increase server load.

I think that XP is already plenty visable enough. Entries in Other Users are already sorted by XP, so it would only be a very tiny amount of additional load to show the XP, either in a title attribute or in the text. I just don't think it's a purticularly good thing to do.

I'd actually rather go the other way and remove visible XP numbers from homenodes. (I'd leave it for the actual node owner.) Making XP more visible seems to perpetuate the illusion that it actually matters.

Perl Monks is a land of options. Let the node owner decide if he wants his xp displayed or not.

Can someone new get voted down and wind up with negative experience? We could make them wear it for life like a Red Badge of Courage or a Scarlet letter, depending on their fancy ;)