Forum Indicies

[WaltP]

I like the new format for each forum index. Compact is good! Thank you, Dani

[happygeek]

The long nights of code tweaking are really paying off I think. It's amazing how Dani manages to improve the look all the time, even when you think it has hit pretty much the best it is going to get :)

A big thank you from me as well, Dani.

[Dani]

Wow, what a relief! I was so afraid I would get lots of criticism about the missing forum descriptions and last thread info. Thank you for the positive comments and encouragement!

[John A]

I especially like the way the hyperlinks are now without an underline; it makes the whole design look cleaner.

The blogs look especially good. :)

Wow, what a relief! I was so afraid I would get lots of criticism about the missing forum descriptions and last thread info.

What would ever make you say a thing like that?!!? We're always so optimistic and encouraging about whatever you implement! :cheesy:

[mattyd]

Hi. Yes, looks great and "cleaner" (which I always like).

Over the last week or so I come to Daniweb and I think: "What has changed? The colors? Something has changed." What I mean is, this is before I read of the new changes going on. I thought I was possibly imagining this. :lol: I am color-blind so I was not\ am not sure if color changes were\ are actually being made. Are there colors being modified also?

Good work.
Matty D

[Dani]

Regarding the colors, the listing of threads has been changed from white/pale yellow to white/pale grey ... with the hope that less orange on the page makes things easier to read.

[mattyd]

Ok, cool-- I thought this had changed. I like the white\ grey with the orange in certain areas. Grey is one of my favorite colors and white and orange, IMO, is a great color combination.

Your site not only looks very nice, it contains such a wealth of knowledge that is priceless for people like us. Thank-you for all your work.

Matty D.

[~s.o.s~]

Wow, what a relief! I was so afraid I would get lots of criticism about the missing forum descriptions and last thread info. Thank you for the positive comments and encouragement!

Not so fast..... (there has to be a villian in the movie you know...)

With this new format I really don't get the point of keeping "Subcribe to a forum" feature. Previously it showed the last thread posted in that forum, but now it shows nothing, just the time last post was made ?

Smaller fonts and excessive use of gray colors make some things difficult to be seen.

[Dani]

Firstly, no font sizes have been changed at all :)
Secondly ... hover over the little arrow button in the last post area.
Thirdly, forum subscriptions are useful if you want to receive an email notification.

[iamthwee]

I also have to question why are you spending time on making things look prettier and neater when you should be spending time addressing things that actually are a problem.

Like newbies never, ever, ever using code tags? Cheers.

[edit] Also when you hover over the button there is no actual content about the post itself. That might be useful to have.

Also I didn't know about the hover part until to told sos. That makes it rather unintuitive [/edit]

[Ravalon]

I also have to question why are you spending time on making things look prettier and neater when you should be spending time addressing things that actually are a problem.

Like newbies never, ever, ever using code tags? Cheers.

That's a hard problem. Forcing good behaviour without needlessly restricting people is very tough. That's why behaviour changes are best done at the management level and not the application level. :)

[Dani]

Absolutely no information at all has been removed from the page. The ONLY difference is that instead of the last post information appearing within the table all the time, it only appears in a hover bubble when the last post button is hovered over.

To answer your second question, the primary reason for these changes is not to pretty up the design. It's usability. For example, the blogs feature is now more prominent with effort to attract a more tech saavy audience. That means that there will be a higher level audience finding and reading the blog entries. That increases the audience level coming into the forums. More tech saavy people means fewer newbies forgetting code tags and posting homework problems. See, I *am* addressing the issue.

When things look "prettier and neater" they have a greater amount of credibility attached to them. Just looking like we have more credibility makes us more worthwhile in the eyes of the more saavy folks.

Something else to note is that 95% of the world finds us via search results. They come in and read the landing page, and then move on to something else. But by condensing and reorganizing the page, it can be a huge step towards demonstrating in those precious first 10 seconds exactly what DaniWeb has and does.

[mattyd]

excessive use of gray colors make some things difficult to be seen.

Difficult to see? I see it just fine. Maybe you should adjust your monitor. ;)

Also, so many people on this site complain about colors that "make my eyes bleed!!" when used in posts-- I have never quite understood this; The format options offer standard font color choice, bolding, italicizing, etc, but when people (God forbid!) use colors all the "professionals" supposedly in the "know" complain. :lol::confused: I am a painter-- I like color! to highlight and expound upon the text.

My recommendation; perhaps Dani can:

• remove all extraneous thread formatting (font color change) :rolleyes:
• Make an all black-and-white site for those with color issues. :p

Matty D

[iamthwee]

That's a hard problem. Forcing good behaviour without needlessly restricting people is very tough. That's why behaviour changes are best done at the management level and not the application level.

I would agree but the same problem was raised over a year ago, and we left it to management. Still over a year nothing has changed. I'm sure the moderators who have to keep editing posts without code tags will agree. I'm not asking for a complete foolproof solution, but surely a something, even if it is beta testing is a good thing.

Absolutely no information at all has been removed from the page. The ONLY difference is that instead of the last post information appearing within the table all the time, it only appears in a hover bubble when the last post button is hovered over.

Ok maybe I just need getting used to it. But first impressions... I didn't know what to hover over, or that the actual descriptions of the posts were on the right hand side. Shouldn't it be intuitive?

When things look "prettier and neater" they have a greater amount of credibility attached to them. Just looking like we have more credibility makes us more worthwhile in the eyes of the more saavy folks.

Okay now I understand where you're coming from. Daniweb is partly a business afterall. It's just that without you explaining this many wouldn't have known. Cheers.

[Dani]

Regarding color changes, threads used to look like this:

www.daniweb.com/techtalkforums/getdaily.html

And now threads look like this:

www.daniweb.com/techtalkforums/forum8.html

Which do yo like better? I think the grey makes the bright yellow less overwhelming so you're more apt to spend more time studying the page. But I do like the yellow too ... which is why I'm so undecided that I'm keeping the old color scheme on the search pages and such until I make up my mind.

[Dani]

> I didn't know what to hover over, or that the actual descriptions of the posts were on the right hand side. Shouldn't it be intuitive?
For me it's intuitive because to actually GO to that last post, you click on the little button ... and as soon as you hover over it, its details show up. But I am also the one who designed it.

[mattyd]

Regarding color changes, threads used to look like this:

www.daniweb.com/techtalkforums/getdaily.html

And now threads look like this:

www.daniweb.com/techtalkforums/forum8.html

Which do yo like better? I think the grey makes the bright yellow less overwhelming so you're more apt to spend more time studying the page. But I do like the yellow too ... which is why I'm so undecided that I'm keeping the old color scheme on the search pages and such until I make up my mind.

The second one is better, definately (the white and grey). The other with the pale peachy\cream tone... no.

Regards,
Matty D

[Dani]

I think I like the white/grey better too, but I don't yet feel comfortable enough to totally ditch the yellow version since we've had it for sooooo long.

[Ravalon]

I would agree but the same problem was raised over a year ago, and we left it to management. Still over a year nothing has changed.

The time a problem is known doesn't change its difficulty. ;)

I'd guess that the problem stems from so many new people coming in and not knowing about the tags. The only way management can handle that is by catching the posts early and fixing them. So many people just come in for one problem and then leave again, it's hard and endless work.

An ideal solution preserves formatting in posts without code tags, but that opens up other problems. ;)

[iamthwee]

@Ravalon

Not saying it's a trivial fix. But nothing in terms of scripting has been done or tested.

The impression I'm getting is this:

If a script was to be implemented (to help the code tag problem) it would have to be a server side one. Now all this depends on whether the software development forum attracts enough people (and revenue) for dani to justify having another server to cope with the parsing.

Will it be 100% fool proof? Of course not.

That's the long and short of it. Anyway this is getting dragged off-topic. I'm just going to have to accept that's how it is.

[WaltP]

Regarding color changes, threads used to look like this:

www.daniweb.com/techtalkforums/getdaily.html

And now threads look like this:

www.daniweb.com/techtalkforums/forum8.html

Which do yo like better?

I am mildly (very mildly) partial to the yellow format. Not enough to complain, just noting preference.

I've personally never understood the need to have the "last post" information. The only info I'm interested is whether or not there have been posts since my last visit -- which we've got. For me, the last post information is meaningless.

Like newbies never, ever, ever using code tags? Cheers.

The only thing I've ever been able to come up with is, based on post count after SUBMIT is clicked, display a short form of the rules, something like
Have you explained what you need fully?
Have you posted code with code tags?
etc
I can also see why this is not a good solution, too, but it does get the info to the poster that hasn't read any rules.

[Ancient Dragon]

Regarding color changes, threads used to look like this:

www.daniweb.com/techtalkforums/getdaily.html

And now threads look like this:

www.daniweb.com/techtalkforums/forum8.html

I like the new color scheme better than the old one. But I don't like this change because it doesn't give me as much information as the older version.

[John A]

Like Dani said, no information has been removed. Do you see under the "Last Post" collumn, "Today 2:13 pm" (for example)? Then there's that little '>' triangle. Hover your mouse over that, and you can see the information that you speak of.

[John A]

I have to protest against this super-small Quick Reply box. What is the point of having it small? I know it's supposed to be a "quick" reply, but this seems a little too "quick" for me.

[mattyd]

I have to protest against this super-small Quick Reply box. What is the point of having it small? I know it's supposed to be a "quick" reply, but this seems a little too "quick" for me.

I think this is a positive change in a design sense. It does not have to be larger (it could even be a bit smaller). The placement of the box along with the other element(s) gives it a more 'boxy" and geometric look. I really like that. This is just my opinion.

Regards,
Matty D

[~s.o.s~]

Agreed with Joey, can't even get to type my responses properly there. Making technical posts which include pasting snippets would force me to switch to the advanced reply view. The previous one was good to go....

[Dani]

As sharky said, there is no reason for it to be anything more than enough room to post a quick reply (which it certainly is as I'm having no problem typing this out here). Remember, if you're going to do anything fancy such as quoting someone else or using code tags, you'd use the advanced reply anyways.

As for the reason for the change ... if you recall, before there was a Google AdSense unit next to a rectangle ad, and below that the Quick Reply. I simply replaced the AdSense ad with the Quick Reply box. The advantage being that we got rid of one of the ads (yay!) and the quick reply box was able to be moved up to be directly below the thread listing. The idea is that by eliminating the need to scroll past two big rectangle ads to get to the quick reply box will promote more impulse posting among the community. You know, those times when you think about chiming in with some input but just don't feel like bothering. ;) A smaller quick reply box very close to the thread listing page will hopefully make that more enticing.

[Ancient Dragon]

Like Dani said, no information has been removed.

That page used to contain links to the most recent post, which I could click on to quickly see what was posted. Those links are no longer there. Its not a real big deal for me that they are gone, but it was pretty convenient.

[Dani]

Like I said, now just hover over the button with the arrow on it (next to the last post time) to see the last post title and author.

[mattyd]

The idea is that by eliminating the need to scroll past two big rectangle ads to get to the quick reply box will promote more impulse posting among the community.

Yes, this is so true. I rarely used Quick Reply until the last few days actually-- it seemed a long drop to get to it easily and really I would always forget about it when it would of been and the best option for a simple reply. This makes it more convenient and therefore offers better, overall site function.

All these "small" changes (improvements) will really make a usability difference for everyone. I really like what I see. :)

Matty D