Board re-design

mhhh, I don’t know if I like the re-design of the boards…
There seems to be very little contrast.

but maybe I just have to get used to it.

oh and also, what happend to the updated list of posts on the front page??
I really liked that…

stay tuned… it’s “in progress…”

R

Is there any way to move the poster’s name/information/avatar back over to the left?

Doesn’t seem to make any sense being on the right.

Like having a conversation with someone and then getting introduced to them after the fact.

My eye starts at the left for a brief moment, then darts right to see who wrote it, then back to the left to read their message.

This will be particularly difficult, as I know personally (and assuming others) monitor post activity by who posted last, it makes it much easier.

It also makes following discussions much easier. Especially if it is between 2 or 3 people. Jump to the right, ah ok, thats who I was waiting for my response from, and now back to the left to view it, as I’m scrolling down through.

In an all text thread, if I know “User X” commented last, and they have a big red truck for their avatar, I will scroll down until I see their avatar, and see if someone commented after them.

It will be much more difficult to try scroll through oceans of text, darting right, and back to left, while searching for the first word of the post, if you can even remember it.

Looks good so far, looking forward to seeing all of the polishing.

Changes are in progress, sit tight. We appreciate the feedback, keep it coming.

Not to keep badgering but in addition to moving the names to the left I have one small request. On the main page, the link to “mark all forums read” is now on the upper right. It used to be lower left below the list of categories, and I think that was a perfect placement. Right after you look at your last post you’re right there to mark them all read. With it at the top it seems weird. At first I thought it was removed completely it’s kind of in the middle of nowhere in the upper right, doesn’t connect with how you’d use it .

I know it’s being updated so this will probably get fixed, but thought I’d mention it.

Can’t seem to search on the index page (overall forum search).

I agree with Avatar/user info on left as well.

We’ve taken a lot of your feedback and Richard assimilated it into an awesome refresh. We are just waiting for final aproval and then Will will have to fine tune and program it. Thanks for all the feedback, keep it coming.

something I have been frustrated with is that when you are searching for an old post in a thread, and you run the search, then get the results - I never have any idea which link in the results to click to go directly to that entry on the thread. I think I remember trying all the links and nothing went straight there… an usually end up just just going through each page until I find it or just give up.

in the appearance, I like the improvements so far, but have a suggestion - there are lots of little bits of text all over that are the same on almost every page ( “FAQ”, “Members”,“BBCode is ON”, etc) that look a little dull in the browser font. Maybe they could be jazzed up like the quote button, or at least made a little less blockly than the default font, which makes this look a little like a boring usergroup rather than a kicka$$ design chat area… who knows though, maybe that isn’t even an option in the discussion software you’re using

This last one is asking for a whole lot, but would be really great and maybe you guys are already planning it. Is it possible to somehow make an Iphone/mobile friendly version of the discussions area where it would be more usable in the browser of say… an iphone… maybe not even a standalone app, just a web view version.

when you search there is a choice to have the results displayed by post or by thread. if you choose post then the actual post is given in the search results and clicking it will take you right there.

R

Hmm… I’ll probably be searching for this thread next time I search :wink: Thanks for the clarification, R

I have to say, after a few days here… I’m really digging the new look! Yes, its a bit different but change is good now and then. Hats off to all who had their hand in it.

Thanks for all the input folks. There are a few steps in the upgrade process. We had to upgrade our hosting account, and then perform the backups, installation and data migration to go from one version to the next. There were some other technical details involved in that switch also. So the first step was that migration, which took place last weekend.

The next step is to update the default presentation with a custom style designed by our own R Kuchinsky (thanks for your work on that!). We’ll also be putting the ‘latest threads’ back on the home page with a few updates to that feed also, based on your input.

The last step will be final tweaks to customize the software to our own needs, integrating features from our other sites and customizing the performance of the forum package as much as possible. The whole thing is a work-in-progress which will take place over the next several weeks. Please post any thoughts or suggestions for features and customizations here and we’ll compile everything into one wish-list.

Stay tuned, and thanks for your participation.

  • C77 Admin

New redesign is starting to grow on me. I’m still not used to having the names and avatars on the right, it was nice to see who’s post I was going to read before I read it, now it’s sort of an after the fact thing, no biggie I guess it’s just different.

Is there a key explaining the icons for the posts? Seems like there 5 or 6 different combinations, not sure what each one stands for?
logos.jpg

actually, we’re planning some new icons and less of them hopefully to avoid that exact confusion…

R

Is there a key explaining the icons for the posts? Seems like there 5 or 6 different combinations, not sure what each one stands for?

The same question … previously posted in different “Topic” >>> Board Updates

Have you posted a user-guide/legend for these new icons?

Or have I missed it?

An icon “marker” indicating a thread the one previously posted in would be helpful (I think one of these already does that, just haven’t decided which one it is.)

A “User Guide” with “How To” information would also be very helpful; to old and new members.

Ok all,

here’s the layout mockup I’ve made that we are working away to implement. more changes and tweaks also coming soon as Yo and Stu mentioned.

it’s just a start and a lot of the small details and other screens still need to looked at.

in general, i tried to follow the core front page layout/design, though even there (as I posted a while ago) there is lots of inconsistency (in fonts, all caps, no caps, etc.) so had to kind of fudge it. the basic premise is that all UI elements are the serif font (bembo i think) and all user written text is sans serif (arial?). plus the search boxes are the same, date formats the same, new, similar graphics for the the buttons to the existing graphics, etc., same background colors, headline placements, patterns, etc.

I tried to keep the amount of info to a minimum. I don’t think too many of our users are power PHP users, so a lot of functions while maybe nice are uncessary and clutter the UI. for example, I can’t at all understand all the different icons beside the post. I’ve made only 3: very busy/recent posts, recent posts, no recent posts. I’d imagine this would perhaps be a combo of the “unread” posts flags.

all links are the same red/brown color as on the core front page

avatars and poster info are on the L for the reasons Yo mentioned and to have a more clear transition from the last version

the boards are now always called “discussions” (if we like that) instead of before where it was sometimes referred to as Boards, forums, discussions, etc.

In thinking ahead about some of the other stuff, I would also perhaps recommend a greater tie in for the users to the coroflot user pages. not sure if this is possible as I believe they are different systems, but if you clicked on the avatar would be aweome to have an “enhanced” user page with some mini corefolio work displayed, maybe automatically display the coroflot profile (if they are a coroflot user) and maybe the last 3 posts made… might also help generate more users to sign up for coroflot!

at the top, there are 3 of the latest posts made, similar to the work shown on the core front page. The idea here is that it is actually refreshed in realtime (somewhat) as opposed to those ones on the core sidebar which show really old and inactive topics. this would be almost like a twitter feed in that you see that latest that’s going on…

also as previously mentioned, when you click on a link from the front page it SHOULD take you to the last page of a thread…!




R

R,

Looks awesome man. Dare I say… beautiful?

I enjoy those arrow icons under the name (WWW, Reply, etc). I can see your aesthetic influence there, and thats not a bad thing.

Very clean. The last discussion forum setup looked like we were forced to use old technology (anyone remember mIRC?) and the layout that came along with it. Now it looks like the discussion forum’s technology/engine is bent to our visual and UI discretion.

The names on the left look great, makes perfect sense to me. I imagine that the names on the right was a default in the coding, just a guess though. “Avatars and poster info are on the L for the reasons Yo mentioned”. Don’t you mean “Taylor” by the way? Just giving you a hard time.

Could you tell me which serif font that is? Looks beautiful. I’m currently working on redesigning my website / buz cards / all documents, and I’m working on a Helvetica + serif font, this particular font looks great. I’m better at spotting sans serif fonts, not so good with the fancy stuff.

The black border at the top and bottom frames it well with a balanced amount of contrast.

I can see you all have put some time into the coding and the visual design, looks great.


Found it… Garamond serif font

Glad you like. Actually put hardly anytime at all into it, but did so with a lot of love:)

The comment about Yo, was actually directed at him. I copied and pasted this from a moderators thread and Yo explained (as you also did here) the idea that you should have the avatar info on the L as you read from L to R you are essentially introduced to the person first, then read their comments.

The font I used was Bembo. I just did a whathefont.com lookup from a part of the core page. It’s not the most awesome serif font, but was trying to keep the core look. I have no idea if that was the actual font. Garramond is close to. I use Georgia on my pages when mixing serif and sans.

R

If I’m reading the CSS right, the front page uses a mix of Helvetica Neue, Arial, Georgia, and Times

I was going to write the same thing after noticing them and not being able to make any sense of it.

How about “hover” textplanation on the icons?