Forum updated

[Ian.H]

Hi all..

I've updated the forum to a new version. This I hope will help to combat some of the spam registrations that have been around of late.

There have been some other changes made and you'll now find that you will need to log in again initially due to a couple of cookie changes (hopefully for better security).

Some of the custom template changes I made previously are also not implemented in this version (such as extra data in the "postbit" area and not being able to select whether the postbit info is above or to the left of posts. These are things I need to work out what to change within this new version, but it'll be done. If you leave your postbit setting as-is.. once I find out what code needs amending, it'll automagically pick up your existing choice.



Regards,

Ian

[Ian.H]

Finally found the bits to update to get the selectable postbit working and have added the extra info (LFS details, such as team name etc) to the relevant postbit area



Regards,

Ian

[Kryten]

Nice, although I have to say the "unread" icons are a bit unclear.

The speech bubble icons are grey for read forums and a slightly bluer grey for forums with newer posts, maybe the icon for a forum with new posts should be red or something to make it clearer at a glance?

Also when in a forum, read threads have a red envelope icon and unread threads have a blue or grey envelope icon (can't remember now). Perhaps this should be reversed?

Otherwise, it looks nice!

[Ian.H]

Hi Kryten..

Nice, although I have to say the "unread" icons are a bit unclear.

The speech bubble icons are grey for read forums and a slightly bluer grey for forums with newer posts, maybe the icon for a forum with new posts should be red or something to make it clearer at a glance?

Agreed! At the time I posted this thread, obviously I'd already seen the post, so didn't know what the new post graphic was like.. but as you say, it's not that easy to distinguish. I'll have a play with some things for the images for that as it would be nicer to make it more obvious.

Also when in a forum, read threads have a red envelope icon and unread threads have a blue or grey envelope icon (can't remember now). Perhaps this should be reversed?

Otherwise, it looks nice!

I can't get this to show. I either get a little blue circular icon that I can click on to take me to the latest post, or no icon at all.. I don't see any envelopes with this version. Is there any chance you can grab a screenshot?



Cheers..

Ian


EDIT: Hmm, I just saw the littler envelope icons in the bottom of the page when viewing a thread list. The red ones for 'hot topic' and blue ones for 'non-hot topic'.. but again, neither are very clear when new posts are available or not. I'll have a look at updating these icons too

[Kryten]

See attached for big envelopes

Yes I see the icon legend down the bottom now which says that red icons are for hot topics, however almost every thread in this particular forum is considered "hot" even though some have only 1 or 2 replies. They all have a large number of views though so maybe that's why they're considered "hot". Most forums use the number of replies rather than views to mark a thread has "hot" though.

The pink speech bubble icon on the main forum is much better.

[Ian.H]

Hi Kryten..

See attached for big envelopes

Yes I see the icon legend down the bottom now which says that red icons are for hot topics, however almost every thread in this particular forum is considered "hot" even though some have only 1 or 2 replies. They all have a large number of views though so maybe that's why they're considered "hot". Most forums use the number of replies rather than views to mark a thread has "hot" though.

I see now! For some reason, Firefox was being weird and wasn't displaying those icons at all, hot or not. Ultimately disabled all add-ons enabling them one-by-one to try and find something that was causing it, only to now have enabled them all again and the icons are showing.. so god knows what happened there

I've updated the numbers required now. There's 2 figures, one for views and one for posts. They were at 150 and 15 respectively.. but have now changed them to 500 and 20.. seems to be more what's expected looking at them now.

The pink speech bubble icon on the main forum is much better.

Cool. No idea why they chose such a subtle difference to begin with.



Cheers,

Ian

[Bladerunner]

Looks good at first sight..will have a scout around and see what it's like in depth!