Navigating the new forum

 I am sure I am like many  of the members in that I often keep up to date on this and other sources of information by using my cell phone.  In fact, last week I was at SEMA and my cell phone was my only viewing choice. 

 I have been playing with this new layout for the last few days and find it far from being intuitive to this non-digital native. Usually I do quite well with my online experiences but this new look is  just not working for me. 

 I just now found this experience to be additionally frustrating when I find multiple features are now visible in landscape mode that I never could view in portrait mode?????

 I am thinking I will put this forum  on a back burner for a week or three in hopes that some of the concerns and suggestions made by the members can be implemented and perhaps allow a more user-friendly layout to be established.   

Best wishes, but other than the frustration of picture size limitations with the old forum, I had no complaints with the old lay out.

As is often said-

If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it.

Larry 

even on a laptop, running firefox, I have felt lost.

the top thing that maybe is the confussion for me is the author of a post is not in the message block.  The author's location also helps me remember who is who.

and the current visitors being little circles instead of words

Julian, Steve, and Chuck

Thanks for the additional input, it is of course the type of input we need it we're to resolve the issues. The goal of course is for the forums to work trouble free.

Joe I plan to work on the "look" of the posts, specifically the transparent background where the poster's name is located. I think it should be solid.

I like having the poster's location too, I haven't run across anyway to change that, I'll ask at the appropriate time. I don't want to distract Dave while he works on the iPhone "responsiveness" issue.

jfb05177 posted:

… and the current visitors being little circles instead of words

if you hover the cursor over the round avatar their name appears

What do you think of this change in the art work (grey background)? I just figured-out how to do this this evening.

Please express your likes & dislikes, yeahs and nays, thumbs up or thumbs down.

If you like it in general, we can work from here.

There is currently some text that is DARK BLUE, they are links. I thought the color may help some folks find links, navigate, etc. Unfortunately this made the links in the header & footer blue as well. I'm hoping there is HTML code I can insert into the header & footer to make the links white again. But I'm waiting to see what the overall reception from you folks is like before I go further.

Julian, the pagination is now visible at the bottom of the pages.

I like your new color scheme better, and I like / appreciate the blue for the links. 

Personally, I would like:

1.  Less Line spacing in the posts.  One carriage return moves the next line down really far.  Note my numbering here.

2.  Smaller text

3.  Use the inch of margin on the left to put the username & info.  Expand the inch of margin on the right.

Less gap between posts.

4.  Something like this site (https://www.jaguarforum.com) IMHO maximizes space, and is pleasing on the eye...  You can't read it as well here, because the picture is compressed, (It's showing the entire width of my monitor in about 66% of the space here).

anything to throw a little more light on my keyboard is welcome, the old platform was so dark i couldn't find the keys w/o a light on in the room ... since you asked

is there a 'mark forum read' function?

Yes, near the top of the right hand (widget) column.

On the forum directory page
on the "all topics" page
on all 6 forum category pages
on all 29 individual forum pages
but not on the page for an individual topic (thread)

-G

Update

I'm not done adjusting the artwork. Just giving it a rest. There's some text colors and box borders I still need to work-out. I need to check in with Dave too.

my next question...

I can't find a box to check that will send an email when a new PM

The notifications you receive are dependent upon what you check or uncheck in two sections: in your "personal settings" and in your "notifications". 

It is not intuitive, I tried to eliminate getting an email every time someone posts to a thread I posted on and also need to uncheck the little 'follow' button to the lower left of the reply box!

OK, I think I found the pages with the boxes.    now to see how it works now.

joules posted:

It is not intuitive, I tried to eliminate getting an email every time someone posts to a thread I posted on and also need to uncheck the little 'follow' button to the lower left of the reply box!

Under personal settings are two boxes:

(1) Follow content when you create new content
(2) Follow content when you comment/reply.

Those are obviously global settings that shall be applied to everything you post. You are correct that the "posting" box also has a box you can check which gives you a choice to follow or "un-follow" a specific thread or post. That box is not "automatically" checked unless one or both of the global boxes have been checked.

In your case it seems it would be best for you to "uncheck" the global settings, allowing yourself to follow only those posts you decide to follow, which you can then select to follow on an individual basis.

The software of the new platform is neither easier nor more difficult to learn to use than the software of the old platform was. Its not even all that different, there's just many more features, and many more choices. And with those features and choices comes the necessity to learn to manage them, which is as simple as checking a box or two, or clicking a link.  Julian I have confidence you'll learn to use the new software quickly, just as you learned to use the old software, and once you do the exasperation you feel now will disappear.

Thanks George and yes it is me learning my way around, albeit I unchecked those boxes a some days ago and still get email notification of each post on a thread I have posted on.

First post in a long time. Wow how things have changed. I've visited and read the most recent posts but have otherwise been lost. I received a PM a few days ago and I'll just throw this out there in case it may be helpful to someone else. It appears the new forum software doesn't support (very well) Internet Explorer or at least not any version except the latest release which I don't own.

The big problem with IE, even when logged on, there are virtually no navigation bars/menus  displayed making it almost impossible to navigate. Online status indicators are missing etc. It finally dawned on me to have a look from another browser (MS Edge, Chrome, my mobile) and now the nav bars, menus and status icons display....so if you are trying to view from IE, forget it.

Having said that, even when viewing from the other browsers, and as a moderator & administrator of other forums and having built my own websites, I must say I still find the various navigation options on the main nav menus and the general forum structure to be quite different than most web forums and consequently quite unintuitive and difficult to use.

Is there anything equivalent to saved "favorite threads" in the previous forum? Or are those lost?

Sorry, don't mean to be negative, just keepin it real.

Best,

Kelly

from someone that hates change,

https://www.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/new/

and don't look back. IE is the Pong of browsers

Have used them all....it's really just a matter of personal preference other than the fact the IE is targeted and exploited many, many, more times than the others.

I see there is a grey menu bar and Icon now at the top of the landing page so maybe this was addressed. Certain it wasn't there b4.

Best,

K

panterror posted:

I see there is a grey menu bar and Icon now at the top of the landing page so maybe this was addressed. Certain it wasn't there b4.

Best,

K

Hi Kelly glad your back, hope you stay.

The Nav-bar design has been there all along, since the new forums went on-line.

In terms of changes to the look or lay-out … I have not made changes to the forums in about a month. Perhaps more. My sense of passing time is not as good as it once was. Safe to say no changes since your next to last visit.

The forums look the same on IE, Chrome & Firefox on the PC & laptop I use at home, plus Debbie's phone, which is an iPhone. That's the only stuff I have to test with. I use IE on a daily basis & Debbie uses Chrome. That way we are constantly testing with the two most common search engines.

HOOP.LA has been around since 2014, it is a professionally designed and mature platform. I'm sure it looks the same on all screens of the same dimensions & orientation, regardless of the navigation software, so long as that software is compliant with all current standards. If anyone is using software that is out of date, that's a problem on THEIR end, not Social Strata's.

I must disagree that the new forum platform is odd or unintuitive, or the navigation features lacking,  in comparison to any internet venue featuring responsive programming.

I am working on a progress report.