Announcements Response Topic

[Chipster of Noonvale]

I switched to Minimal theme.
Not a fan of new font size, but I'm glad the option to change it has been preserved.
I like how quick reply is now shown by default.
Like the new buttons.
Like the "who's online" list being at the top, but not a fan of having it show up for every single thread instead of just on the main page like before.
Don't mind removal of tagging system.
Don't mind removal of flags, it seemed pointless since there is already a "location" field on everyone's profile.
Don't really mind the PM thing either, but then I hardly PM anyone.
Spent most of last night going through my thanked posts to process them all; was quite stressful.  I was really...irked...when they were all destroyed during the forum merger, and now it happened again... *thanks Rosie's post*
Not a fan of the big list of news at the bottom, especially since it is still there at the top, feels cluttered.  I honestly thought you were going to remove the news at the top.
Miss the quick "home" button near the top of the page; I know clicking "Redwall Abbey Community Forum" does the same thing but I still instinctively reach for the nonexistent home button.
Really not fan of the new font; I know I didn't object when we discussed this privately but now that I see it in action I really hate it, especially with the big text like usernames, and section names on the main page.  And all caps text like my signature.
If there are unread posts in popular forum games but no unread posts in forum games, two icons will overlap.
Sorry for the rather harsh feedback, but I've been feeling pretty rotten recently and no I don't feel like talking about it so please don't ask.

[MeadowR]

When I scroll up to the top of the page I feel like I should be able to scroll a bit further to see the banner/forum title which is now not there. :0

[The Skarzs]

Seems that when clicking the last post on a topic, it doesn't go to the last post, either. Somewhere near the top of the page.

[James Gryphon]

Yeah, something a bit darker might be nice.

I'll see what I can do about it.

Also, I love the update, but I was wondering why you got rid of the features like flags, and thanks. They seemed like a pretty consistently used feature.

The plan when I first started to do the installation was to keep the flags. I actually installed them along with the rest of the mods. The trouble came up when I looked and saw that the old bug of displaying '00' when people haven't selected a flag was back. It was at that point when I decided that it was not worth the trouble of keeping them in.

Removing thanks is, I expect, the most controversial change. I will take full responsibility for this, as it's not something that I discussed in depth with all the other staff, although I did talk about it to Sierra a bit. Y'all deserve an honest answer, so I'll do my best to give it.

I was antsy about going forward with the thanks feature for some time anyway. I've not been entirely happy with the effect I think it's had on the forum, which is reducing the amount of thankfulness and appreciation that people write in response to others. Reducing all of that to pressing a button is a trend borrowed from social networking, and in my opinion, not a positive one. This feature was somewhat 'gamified' even at the beginning -- some of y'all with long memories might recall that it originally came with its own stats, which were turned off shortly afterwards when we decided the stats were not a good feature for this community. Since then, I've drifted towards thinking the same about the feature on the whole.

This isn't because of technical reasons. I did wonder for a little bit if it might have been a slight pain to reinstall. After all, I remembered having a little bit of trouble with it during Core. I did a trial run of installing it, though, and it turned out that it would have installed just fine. I didn't test it out after the trial, so I suppose it might have had some problem lingering under the hood, but I doubt it. The reason for getting rid of it was the other one, not because it didn't work correctly.

It occurred to me after the fact that the like feature does have another benefit, one that I hadn't considered at the time I decided to remove it. People do use thanked posts as something of a bookmarks list, to look over their 'favorites' again. This was not something that had crossed my mind when I evaluated the feature, and if it had, I very likely would have done things differently. Removing this mod so quickly and decisively, without taking that into account, was a mistake. Not announcing this aspect of the change and giving you the opportunity to save those lists was a great mistake. I did that incorrectly and have to take the blame for it. I can only hope that the experience of looking through the forum for those liked posts will be a pleasant enough time to compensate you for the inconvenience.

Like the "who's online" list being at the top, but not a fan of having it show up for every single thread instead of just on the main page like before.

For what it's worth, if you look closely, the functionality was actually sorta there before. What I changed for the threads and boards was to put the "Who's viewing this board/thread" into the "Who's Online" box, so that it has a consistent appearance. There is a quick link to the Who's Online page, which is new, but the same functionality is in there now that was there before.

Miss the quick "home" button near the top of the page; I know clicking "Redwall Abbey Community Forum" does the same thing but I still instinctively reach for the nonexistent home button.

This might not be well known, but if you click the logo, that actually serves the same functionality as the home button.

Really not fan of the new font; I know I didn't object when we discussed this privately but now that I see it in action I really hate it, especially with the big text like usernames, and section names on the main page.  And all caps text like my signature.

The usernames and section names could stand a tweak in size, I think. I've noticed some cases where they are too large, and mean to look at doing that.

As far as the font itself goes, I know it takes some getting used to. In your case, you're using grey, so I can't blame it on the backgrounds, as tempting as that might be. I thought of using Verdana, the old font, but the trouble is that it looked ugly to me at larger sizes. Georgia might not be perfect, but Verdana was even worse. That said, that was on different backgrounds, and color makes a difference. The text entry box still uses Verdana, and it looks okay to me there -- albeit typing it, not reading it.

I will change the background color, but I'm curious what y'all think of the new body font and if you have any suggestions as to its improvement. Perhaps I'll post up some pictures with side-by-side comparisons for y'all to look at.

If there are unread posts in popular forum games but no unread posts in forum games, two icons will overlap.

If you're talking about the double-diamond thing, that's technically a new feature, not a rendering error. I think it displays either whenever there's posts in child boards, or posts in both child boards and the main board -- which, I'm not sure; I haven't used it much.

When I scroll up to the top of the page I feel like I should be able to scroll a bit further to see the banner/forum title which is now not there. :0

I wondered if I could find a place to put the banner in. I ended up leaving it out because I figured that doing so would save space, and that it's somewhat superfluous -- after all, people know what site this is -- but that decision needn't be set in stone. I don't think putting it up top is a good idea, for the same reasons, but I could make the 'lookbox' (who's online) smaller and put it on the left or the right side of that.

Seems that when clicking the last post on a topic, it doesn't go to the last post, either. Somewhere near the top of the page.

I will definitely look into this.

Thanks for your honest feedback. I know that not all of this is popular, and there will probably be some understandable irritation in response to some of this. All I can say is that I did what I felt was best for the forum at the time, and that I hope the positive changes going forward will outweigh that which was lost.

[Chipster of Noonvale]

it's not something that I discussed in depth with all the other staff, although I did talk about it to Sierra a bit.

People do use thanked posts as something of a bookmarks list, to look over their 'favorites' again. This was not something that had crossed my mind when I evaluated the feature, and if it had, I very likely would have done things differently. Removing this mod so quickly and decisively, without taking that into account, was a mistake. Not announcing this aspect of the change and giving you the opportunity to save those lists was a great mistake. I did that incorrectly and have to take the blame for it. I can only hope that the experience of looking through the forum for those liked posts will be a pleasant enough time to compensate you for the inconvenience.

I spent most of last night attempting to sort this out, but honestly I feel sorry for those who didn't get a chance to do this.  And considering the huge size of the forum, going back might not always be a legitimate possibility

Would temporarily re-installing the mod allow everyone to access their old thanked posts again, or is the data completely lost?

For what it's worth, if you look closely, the functionality was actually sorta there before. What I changed for the threads and boards was to put the "Who's viewing this board/thread" into the "Who's Online" box, so that it has a consistent appearance. There is a quick link to the Who's Online page, which is new, but the same functionality is in there now that was there before.

It appears that there are now TWO boxes: once at the top, and once at the bottom, both of them with the same content.  This seems to me like pointless redundancy, like with the news.

This might not be well known, but if you click the logo, that actually serves the same functionality as the home button.

Good to know

If you're talking about the double-diamond thing, that's technically a new feature, not a rendering error. I think it displays either whenever there's posts in child boards, or posts in both child boards and the main board -- which, I'm not sure; I haven't used it much.

Here is what it looks like for me:

Not much of a fan, but I doesn't really bother me as much as some of the other things I mentioned.

I wondered if I could find a place to put the banner in.

Possibly unpopular opinion: I think the site looks better without the banner.

[The Skarzs]

Well, I kind of liked the banner.
The text font doesn't bother me a whole lot, just the size. That and the color changes of the background are distracting, as I said before. Everything else I will be able to adapt to.

Thanks for all the work, James.


If using "thanks" as a way of saving posts is what people want, perhaps there would be a way to still save those posts without publicly showing the equivalent of an "up-vote".

[Chipster of Noonvale]

If using "thanks" as a way of saving posts is what people want, perhaps there would be a way to still save those posts without publicly showing the equivalent of an "up-vote".

I like this idea, if it is technically possible

[Rosie Willowwater]

One way I use thanks is to show someone I saw their post, like with my Mafia. If someone doesn't want to bother saying something, seeing them like it is a good way to gauge how many people know that PMs had been sent, or something of the like.

[James Gryphon]

Made some tweaks (refresh the page to get the new CSS file) to help mitigate the last post bug. It is better than it was before, but it isn't perfect yet. I hope to keep working at it until it's good.

The double diamond thing looks as SMF wants it to; if you opened the image in a new tab, it's a separate icon.

I mean to address your other comments/questions in a bit.

[Ashleg]

Not a fan.
Again, if there is a theme that could exist to make it more like the old version when enabled on a user's account, would earn a huge "yesss" from me.

EDIT
Eh, you know, though, you do you. I'm not really using this site much anymore, anyway.

[shnoodlec]

I've already said most (all) of this in the chat, but maybe it's worth putting here as well? Idk.

So, outsider's view on all this! I have no attachment to the way the board used to look.

I mostly agree with the decision to remove the thanks button. There was a topic created a while ago that was a very meta in-depth look at an aspect of how people interact online, and how to improve it. Even after being moved to a part of the board where more people would see it, basically no one responded to it, just thanked it. (Including myself.) I think there was one reply, and people just thanked that to show their agreement.... I think this topic could've become a really interesting discussion had people not been able to easily just click the button to give it a thumbs up.

The "saving posts" idea is super valid, and I echo Chip and Rosie in wondering if there would be a way to "bookmark" a post to save and not have it show up on the post itself. A super weird workaround to this would be to have some system of manually "tagging" posts. Then the list of your saved posts would be public in a "tags" section, but you could tag them with something obscure so that it's only relevant to you.

Georgia is... Okay, I don't hate it. It's fine.

EDIT: sorry, my font size did wacky weirdness.

[Lutra]

Hey, I'm not really an active mod, but I do agree with all the changes here.  That old background with the parchment would load funny depending on where I tried to load the forum from.  Glad that's not the default anymore.

Also, getting rid of "thanks" is a great move.  I posted a couple of things the past week, and I guess people were thanking them.  Why???  Because I said something funny?  Why not talk to me, or say "hey good to see you again" or "haha, that's Lutra being funny again" or something like that.  That's conversation.  Upvoting is not conversation nor does it really say anything.  Its lazy.  Forums aren't for lazy things.  Forums are for messages, and posts, and thoughts.

I've said my peace.  Please don't thank my post; reply to it.

[Jetthebinturong]

+ The theme has been changed to a new one based on Curve, SMF 2's default theme, rather than Core, its alternate. There are a lot of changes, but one that should stick out to you the end user are the new drop-down menus present in some parts of the interface.
The new buttons are just kind of dull. The old ones had character, these are just typical and condense everything into fewer buttons, which leaves more blank space, which looks worse.
+ There are now three theme styles, Default, Classic, and Minimal. Default is the one that you all are seeing at present, with a largely borderless design, lots of colored backgrounds, neo-parchment, and bricks. Classic is based on the design of the original RAF. Minimal is grey and resembles early '90s Mosaic.
To be blunt, I hate them all. The lack of borders in the default theme makes the forum look cluttered and unorganised and the alternating colours for the rows seems tacky. The classic theme is way too wide. And the minimalist theme is just dull.
+ Who's Online box is now at the top of the page, rather than the bottom.
Making the top of the forum wider is not a good idea. It looks cluttered.
• Font sizes generally larger in default settings.
The only problem I see is in usernames with posts. When names are two lines long, the text overlaps.
- Thanks feature removed.
I agree with Chipster. Also I would like to say that consulting Sierra, who does not even use the forum in a general capacity, just seems silly. This isn't something anyone asked for and means that not only have people lost posts that they've thanked, but also lost posts thanked by other users.
- Tagging system removed.
That seems like a good idea. No one really used it.

Overall I feel that when implementing aesthetic and functional changes you should always consult the community first. It basically just feels like you're editing things to suit what you want without any thought to what the users of the forum think.

[James Gryphon]

Would temporarily re-installing the mod allow everyone to access their old thanked posts again, or is the data completely lost?

Unfortunately, this data was lost during the process.

Here is what it looks like for me:

Not much of a fan, but I doesn't really bother me as much as some of the other things I mentioned.

Yeah, that's what it looks like.

For what it's worth, this icon apparently goes back all the way to SMF 1.

...if there is a theme that could exist to make it more like the old version when enabled on a user's account, would earn a huge "yesss" from me.

If your problem is with the backgrounds, I can work with that. If you want icons in the drop-down menus up top, I can add those in. But I can't do much with criticism like "It's not how it was".

...these are just typical and condense everything into fewer buttons, which leaves more blank space, which looks worse.

Well, the purpose of the design is to be more conducive to smaller window sizes, instead of breaking altogether, which was a distinct possibility before. Something of a first step towards mobile design -- not exactly 'responsive', but rather 'pre-shrunk'.

If you think adding icons in the same style as the old ones would help, that's a possibility. I'd thought about it earlier on, but they didn't make it into the final product. No reason that has to remain the case, though.

The lack of borders in the default theme makes the forum look cluttered and unorganised and the alternating colours for the rows seems tacky.

Well, something I think you're overlooking here is that the alternating colors themselves are a substitute for the borders. The borders were meant to partition and separate space -- so does having large spaces of different-colored backgrounds.

Borders are something I spent weeks agonizing over, as anyone who is in my development circle can tell you. At length, I decided that it wasn't worth the time to implement for the main theme, if I couldn't do them right in the amount of time I had to work on it. The Classic and Minimal themes can get away with the borders they have because they're modeled on an appearance that is, shall we say, less than perfect. For the default theme, though, if it wasn't perfect, I wasn't inclined to do it. As it is, there's still a lot of rough edges in Default in spite of my time investment, but hacking together ugly borders are unlikely to have helped those much.

The classic theme is way too wide.

If by "too wide" you mean it's "wider than it was on SMF 1.1 RAF", that's possible, I suppose. The purpose this time around was not to have perfect fidelity, but to make something in the same style and general look of that, which it is.

That said, I've seen a *lot* of SMF 1.1, both back in the day and quite recently. I know what it looks like if anybody here does. Given the difference in font sizes, buttons and other foundational interface elements which I wasn't going to change, I don't think it is dramatically different in effect from the Classic style. If you want to go to Archive.org and look it up and compare them, feel free -- I've done it myself, for hours.

And the minimalist theme is just dull.

Of course it is.

Making the top of the forum wider is not a good idea. It looks cluttered.

I'm not entirely sure at this point whether you're referring to width, or height. The lookbox shrinks and grows with the width of the window, like the rest of the interface. But I'm willing to make it smaller again, as it was for quite a while during the LAF testing process.

The only problem I see is in usernames with posts. When names are two lines long, the text overlaps.

Yeah, I found that problem out pretty quickly. I want to make the big titles smaller in general, and probably do something with line-height. I read a lot of jazz about the "Golden Ratio" in typography but didn't get to applying it in the pressure to get something out the door. Perhaps that's something that can work its way into the design more.

Overall I feel that when implementing aesthetic and functional changes you should always consult the community first. It basically just feels like you're editing things to suit what you want without any thought to what the users of the forum think.

Throughout the time I've been working on the forum, I've always kept a number of people around to ask about the theme and similar decisions. True, I didn't ask you or a number of other people on the forum, but that doesn't imply a total lack of seeking feedback. If they would, Chipster, Kitsune, Banya, Tumbler, and others can all attest that I've bounced things off of them at some point or another in time. And frankly, that is the most practical way of doing things: as I'm sure you've found out if you've ever worked on any large project, if you base all of your decisions on the response you get from a committee, you're never going to get anything done.

More to it, though, my working process has always been fairly transparent, as far as developers go. This work wasn't all done in a secret room somewhere. The LAF has been up all this time, usually demonstrating the effects of various changes I made, and I'm available to answer questions by PM, email, instant messaging, or even on the forum itself, in the Suggestions board. If someone didn't ever keep up with any of my work or get in contact with me, I don't think it's unreasonable to assume that they weren't all that invested in it. And even after releasing these projects, it is not uncommon -- I would dare say, more often than not, in fact -- for me to change or add something in response to some piece of input.

So, the opportunities here to get involved in the development process were pretty numerous. I'm inclined to guess they're much more so than you're likely to find in many other projects, paid or unpaid. If the webmaster of the site made these changes, everyone would just have to live with it. In fact, they have before, and I don't remember him ever asking anyone for feedback, when the RAF was originally made or afterwards. The fact that I've been as available as I have all this time for the community doesn't mean that now I am obligated to go above and beyond to keep everyone happy (as if that was ever possible, which, as I have found out, it is not).

[Chipster of Noonvale]

For what it's worth, this icon apparently goes back all the way to SMF 1.

Interesting.  I don't remember seeing it before.  It might be useful for the Front Lawns though, so I can easily see if the new posts are right there or in the subsections.

Overall I feel that when implementing aesthetic and functional changes you should always consult the community first.

About this, I think both Jet and James make valid points.  It is true that getting majority approval for every single detail is really inefficient.  It is also true that the LAF has been up, allowing anyone to "preview" upcoming changes before they happened.

However, I think that making a massive change that cannot be reversed (such as removing the thanking feature, since the data was lost), should be more widely discussed.  I've been through a few similar situations, and the results were rarely positive.

That said, we will probably all get used to the new thank-less forum in a while.  The forum survived for five (?) years without it, we'll be fine.