Welcome to the NEW Forum
SiCo
EnglandPosts: 1,371M
Good morning everyone, it's been a long weekend and I'm still nowhere near finished!
However welcome to the new forum software, this is a MAJOR update and replaces everything the site ran on before.
For this reason, the initial iteration is not complete, there is a lot I don't like and I am continuing to work on fixing the issues. Please post questions or issues here and I will try to address all of them.
However, there are a lot of new features and you should have all your Private Messages! I will address all this in a future update but the highlights are:
- New Editor (Ignore the grey font for the moment I've only just noticed that!)
- I have just realised how to use it! If you want to format either highlight the text you want to change and a little popup appears with otpions. Or highlight a chunk and click the little mark in the left hand side. This then gives you full editing options such as lists.
- You can embed Youtube etc. much easier
- You can subscribe to lots of different things.
- You can unsubscribe to lots of different things!
- You can set your home page to either categories (forums) or the recent discussions view.
- It's also mobile friendly at last!
Things I don't like:
- Editor font colour.
- Default avatars. - I will work on restoring your old ones, however, if you have the original please upload it again as this software uses bigger avatars by default so the old ones won't be as clear when used in their larger size. I am working on changing the default avatars to a more subdued set of images!
- The main categories (forums) layout is very crowded and unclear.
- Some of the code from the previous site doesn't currently work in posts.
- The general design needs a lot of work.
- There seem to be a lot of "edited November -1" showing up on posts - no idea?!!?!
Some Links
How to use the Rich Text Editor:
https://success.vanillaforums.com/kb/articles/13-rich-editor
Simon
Comments
I've not been on much recently but this is all looking rather modern and fresh, it also loads much quicker which is one of the reasons I've not been on as much. Top work Simon it's very much appreciated.
Testing
Hmm, I can't see what I'm typing
I'm sure it's one of the many things on your list(!) but just to mention that the security certificate isn't working for me at the moment: I'm getting a 'not secure' notice in Chrome.
Top work though! This new software should be much easier to use.
Just as a tip to other users: the 'discussions' button at the top will show you all of the latest posts, but all threads marked as 'announcements' will stay at the top of the results list unless you go to the little cog on the right hand side of them and select 'dismiss'.
Should have gone to Specsavers 😂
There is a lot to like about New AJB, but I have a couple of questions/chritisisms.
- when I type it's grey and that's inconvenient.
-What's the difference between General JB Chat and General JB Discussion? Do we need to move the Chat if we discover we have different opinions?
-It also seems redundant have both a Non-Bond Discussion and Off-topic.
As far as I can tell, 'General James Bond Discussion' and 'Non-Bond Discussion' are both categories, with several sub-forums underneath them. It is confusing though when you look at the home page because everything just appears as one list, unlike the old AJB's layout. Perhaps this will be refined as the new site takes shape.
If you click on 'Categories' at the top you can see all of the different areas of the forum. Click 'Discussions' to see the threads with the most recent discussions (although you will have to dismiss the threads marked 'announcement' if you do this as they will stick to the top of the list if you don't).
Indeed, but I seem to be typing in white on a white background.
@Barbel I only noticed this issue this morning and ran out of time to fix it. I hope to remedy it this afternoon. I’m not sure even Specsavers do glasses strong enough to see this!
Good job on the upgrade, @SiCo! I see we're using Vanilla Forums software which is the same as they use over at MI6 Community. It's a good layout and I'm familiar with it as I'm a member over there too.
I'm sure that any teething problems will swiftly be ironed out. Thanks for all the hard work you've put in behind the scenes to make it happen, @SiCo. It's very much appreciated!
You’ve redecorated! I don’t like it...
Grey font is too light for my eyes to register, doesn’t seem to be any last post dates on the threads either to differentiate new posts?
sure it will work out fine in time
Can you check now, as far as I can see the security is working fine. I have forced the site to run on the secure version (although I could not get it to load the unsecured version!). If not can you email me a screenshot of the little drop down (click the padlock next to the address bar) so I can try and find out what's going on.
That's a good tip I didn't know that! I am going to look at how announcements work on here as we do have a lot of them!
1) The grey is changing as soon as I can sort it, hopefully 5 mins, as I mentioned this was an oversight on my part and I ran out of time.
2) The headings are something I need to look into, it appears that the way the forum imported into the new software it creates sub categories within categories. This in turn allows you to visit one narrowed down category view. However, it is very confusing on the main page and I will look into fixing this. Basically, these are not actual forums and they should be headings.
3) Relates to the above, they are simply the old category titles
Thanks, and yes Vanilla seems like the best of some bad choices in the forum world! So far I'm impressed with the underlying software.
Hopefully, I will have fixed the grey font by the time you get back! The dates is something I need to look into, I have noticed a few odd date issues.
As for the redecorating, it was a necessity as the old software died! It is very much a work in progress.
Although I have just realised you can post in these groups so that is confusing!
thanks mysterious unseen SiCo for all you work to reinvent the forum, hopefully this new version will be more stable and quicker to load!
if you're still able to tweak things, it'd be good to...
...see the date (and time) of the latest post in the threads listed in each subforum section,
...and have a link directly to the last page of a thread from the subforum section (instead of going to the first page and having to find the way to the last page from there ... if the first post is very long, one must scroll a long way)
also, can we no longer preview posts before committing to Post Comment?
Ok, the editor should now have black text on a white background. If you do not see this please hold down the CTRL key and refresh the page. This should force a reload of the styles.
I am not against change, but already missing the two mechanics I have used by far the most: Showing all new or "unread" posts since my last visit, and the ability to jump directly to the last "new" post / or at least the last page of a topic from the list of topics. 😥
"- That is something to be afraid of."
...see the date (and time) of the latest post in the threads listed in each subforum section,
@caractacus potts Yes I don't know what's going on here.
...and have a link directly to the last page of a thread from the subforum section (instead of going to the first page and having to find the way to the last page from there ... if the first post is very long, one must scroll a long way)
@caractacus potts I thought this was the default, however in the short term you can append #latest to the end of the URL (which granted isn't any easier than going in and clicking to the last page!).
also, can we no longer preview posts before committing to Post Comment?
@caractacus potts Good question, I guess the thought is that with the new editor you don't need a separate preview. I will see if there are any plugins for it.
I just posted in the "re-cast a classic Bond movie" thread and it shoes up in two topics. Is this ment to be that way?
And where are the emojis? I'm secretly a teenage girl and I can't exist without them.
Will our past subscriptions and favorites be transferred over?
Is there a time limit for editing a comment? That will have some implications for some threads like the Tom Ford projects.
@SiCo Sure, the 'not secure' warning has gone now, all looks good 😊
The edit button actually has a countdown of 15mins written next to it.
I've had a brief look around the new-look site. It hasn't changed much and I'm sure I'll get used to it fairly sharpish.
Just want to say thanks to Si for ensuring AJB has retained everything and not archived or closed threads etc as some site forums do when they need to relaunch. I appreciate life and technology has to move on and I'll miss the old site for a while. This is probably about as similar as I expect we can get.
It does certainly load faster and I'm okay with the navigation. Most of the points above are going to be dealt with I'm sure. Congrats, Si. A great job done well.
Just gotta fix my avatar now - I didn't have it saved. 😪
My next question is regarding the search function. Will an advanced search function be installed? As it exists it doesn't allow us to narrow results by topics, forums, or users.
I think advanced search is needed to prevent duplicate topics.
Edited to add: I'd have added this to my previous post but I was past the 15 minute editing limit.
That's a good question I hadn't even considered those, I will take a look later and see what I can come up with.
As for the time limit, I had always thought there was a limit on the last software too but obviously not. I will take a look. Is it really important? I guess the point is to stop people from deleting posts or changing the context of the conversation.