Major upgrade coming soon: Styles/Theme will change

[Deviant Ollam]

Re: Major upgrade coming soon: Styles/Theme will change

One thing i'll say... am I the only person who feels unsettled down in their soul by the forum code now including a "Bing Search" box at the top? What's next, will there be a "download the talks to your Zune" button somewhere?

[Deviant Ollam]

Re: Major upgrade coming soon: Styles/Theme will change

Somehow "High Contrast Dark" doesn't play nice with my eyes, even on my massive monitor, etc. "High Contrast Light" isn't half bad at all, and i can see why some people like it so much. All in all, i think the "Classic" may still be my favorite... if only for consistency's sake.

[EDIT - it's not just my nostalgia and general resistance to change, it seems. I genuinely feel less eye strain on the "classic" look than with any others. But that's just my eyes, YCMV]

[TheCotMan]

Re: Major upgrade coming soon: Styles/Theme will change

I could get used to this. I note that even though I'd left my choice as high contrast light when I logged out, it still reverted to high contrast dark when I just logged in now. Hopefully this was because you were still futzing with things, and not because it doesn't stick.

and

I logged off, and then logged back on, and I'm happy to say that I still have the high contrast white.

Probably not... The reason that it may have kept your style choice between logins was more likely because of a cookie that retained that choice. The use of the "style list" at the bottom left corner of the page is only for trying out styles. None of these selections have (historically) caused the forums to change your style in a way that follows your login, not pre-set cookies.

If you want to set your style and have it persist with your login (no matter what cookies you have previously set) then please visit:
Forum: Profile: Edit options and scroll down until you get to:

Forum Skin:Forum Skin:

There is more than one skin in which you can view the forums. If you would like to switch to a different skin, select it from this list.

Please note that some forums here may override your skin choice temporarily.

In there, choose the style you want and scroll down to submit your selection. Then it should follow your login, regardless of previously set cookies.

The "auto saving" thing is VERY annoying. I don't mind that it does it, but it would be really nice to not have it tell me about it.

That is part of the new forum software, not the style. It is likely going to exist in all 3 styles. There may be an option with editorbox in choosing between "flash" and "ajax" but I'd like to hear more feedback from other users before considering a change in this. (I think I chose ajax over flash for obvious reasons.)

The font is perfect, as far as I'm concerned.

That is really good news.

I also note the new version is very touchy-feely. Ick. Similar threads? I don't think I care. S'okay, though. I'll just ignore them. Hopefully the similar thread thing doesn't lead to *more* of that resurrecting old threads that seems to show up now and then.

"Similar threads," is a feature I enabled a year ot two back. I thought it might be useful to new users looking for threads like the one they are reading. It was my hope that threads for contests, events and soaicl gathering from previous years might be listed below the thread being read, and provide the user(s) with more related information they would use before asking a question that was previously answered. if enough people do not like this feature, I can disable it.

Thanks for your work, as always.

Thanks for the feedback! In a few weeks, I plan to put up the two high contrast styles up for a vote. I don't have time to maintain two of these styles through various upgrades that risk breaking styles. I also *might* introduce a third style for mobile devices after the selection of which "High Contrast" style to keep has been made.


Thanks again,
-Cot

[shrdlu]

Re: Major upgrade coming soon: Styles/Theme will change

I logged off, and then logged back on, and I'm happy to say that I still have the high contrast white.

Thanks again, Cot.

[shrdlu]

Re: Major upgrade coming soon: Styles/Theme will change

Ok then. Finally, High-Contrast-Light should be ready for testing. Major problems have been addressed.

Feed back as constructive criticism for all 3 public styles is welcome:
* High Contrast Dark
* High Contrast Light
* Classic 1

I could get used to this. I note that even though I'd left my choice as high contrast light when I logged out, it still reverted to high contrast dark when I just logged in now. Hopefully this was because you were still futzing with things, and not because it doesn't stick.

The "auto saving" thing is VERY annoying. I don't mind that it does it, but it would be really nice to not have it tell me about it.

The font is perfect, as far as I'm concerned.

I also note the new version is very touchy-feely. Ick. Similar threads? I don't think I care. S'okay, though. I'll just ignore them. Hopefully the similar thread thing doesn't lead to *more* of that resurrecting old threads that seems to show up now and then.

Thanks for your work, as always.

[TheCotMan]

Re: Major upgrade coming soon: Styles/Theme will change

Ok then. Finally, High-Contrast-Light should be ready for testing. Major problems have been addressed.

Feed back as constructive criticism for all 3 public styles is welcome:
* High Contrast Dark
* High Contrast Light
* Classic 1

[TheCotMan]

Re: Major upgrade coming soon: Styles/Theme will change

I'm using Classic, and it's okay, but I really miss the old one. Could you please at least consider making the font a bit larger? I don't think I'm the only one with aging eyes, and it's very difficult to read.

It is possible to make the font larger, but with many modern browsers, there is an option to do this.
For example, with firefox, press control-shift-+ (plus)

Please let me know if that is sufficient or not for larger font. if not, then I can look at specifying larger fonts.

Sorry that the original "legacy" is no longer available. The old version of software and style is not forward compatible to the present version of forums, and the previous version of forums is soon to be "obsolete" and no longer supported. With more time and feedback, hopefully we can better approximate "legacy" with the new "classic1." We will never get a 100% match, because the vendors of the forum software have changed far too much for us to make a style with the new system that would be supportable through future minor upgrades.

It's never easy, is it.

[Edit] I just switched to High Contrast light, and it's a bit easier to look at. I could live with this one.

[Edit again] Whoa. I see that this one's still pretty borked. At least I managed to figure out where the logout and other currently hidden commands are (for others, just drag the mouse over the area, and they'll highlight).

Yes, yes. I did not finish with "High Contrast Light" but you are the second person to see that it was incomplete but not read that it was not yet ready for normal use unless you wanted broken styles. :-P~~~ (rasberries)

I've applied around 80 updates/edited to High-Contrast-Light, but I am still not finished with making it into something that can actually be used. Another 40+ edits are needed, and I probably won't finish tonight, but it is getting closer to something that can be used. Once High-Contrast-Light is "finished" (major problems appear to be fixed) I'll be looking for comments on how it can be improved.

I am planning to support "Classic1" and either the "High Contrast Light" or the "High Contrast Dark". Constructive criticism will be welcome for High-Contrast-Light when i am ready. You can provide constructive criticism for "Classic1" and "High Contrast Dark" right now.

The only improvements for either "High Contrast" options that I'll consider are improvements that make them easier to read; they can be as ugly as a 2-for-1 $0.50 whore on social security, missing teeth and dentures, but if they are easy to read, then they are winners.

Improvement for "Classic1" that are desired are those that will let us better approximate "legacy" from the previous version of software.

Lastly, I don't have enough time to support both high contrast styles. Once both are working and feedback is closed, I'll create a poll to see which one people plan to use as default styles for their profiles. The winner will remain and the loser will be disabled and I will stop supporting it through future upgrades.

[shrdlu]

Re: Major upgrade coming soon: Styles/Theme will change

I'm using Classic, and it's okay, but I really miss the old one. Could you please at least consider making the font a bit larger? I don't think I'm the only one with aging eyes, and it's very difficult to read.

It's never easy, is it.

[Edit] I just switched to High Contrast light, and it's a bit easier to look at. I could live with this one.

[Edit again] Whoa. I see that this one's still pretty borked. At least I managed to figure out where the logout and other currently hidden commands are (for others, just drag the mouse over the area, and they'll highlight).

Back later, maybe.

[TheCotMan]

Re: Major upgrade coming soon: Styles/Theme will change

....
A third style is not yet complete, but you can choose to use it if you don't mind an unusable style, so far. (Many text-links are presently light font colors on light backgrounds and you may not even know they are there unless you know they are supposed to be there or happen to highlight them.

I am accepting feedback as constructive criticism on the 'Classic1" and "High Contrast Dark" to make them better.
Once I finish with a base for "High Contrast Light" I'll post a followup here again, asking for constructive criticism for it.
...

My high contrast light theme has a reply to thread button that appears to be white on white, if I mouse over it appears to be white text on black background, also previous thread/next thread appear to be white text on light background (navigation at the bottom of this thread)

Using fedora 16 and ff9. I can screen shot this if you'd like

edit-also user names on this theme are white on light back ground, very hard to make out

No need for feedback on High-Contrast-Light : It has many, many problems that need to be addressed. The only two styles that are mostly working right now are "Classic1" and "High-Contrast-Dark."

Once I get time to go back and work on "High-Contrast-Light" and make it work as well as "High-Contrast-Dark" , I'll again ask for feedback on it.
(It is not that feedback is not desired, but that I already know there are at least 50 things broken in High-Contrast-Lightm and want to fix those before asking people for what they see as broken.)

Thanks!
-Cot

[bjaming]

Re: Major upgrade coming soon: Styles/Theme will change

My high contrast light theme has a reply to thread button that appears to be white on white, if I mouse over it appears to be white text on black background, also previous thread/next thread appear to be white text on light background (navigation at the bottom of this thread)

Using fedora 16 and ff9. I can screen shot this if you'd like

edit-also user names on this theme are white on light back ground, very hard to make out

[TheCotMan]

Re: Major upgrade coming soon: Styles/Theme will change

Blog font issues with light text on light background in classic1 and high-contrast-dark fixed.

Blog calendar issues for "today" date being unreadable could not be resolved with variable edits; I had to edit a template: fixed.

UserCP/Settings/Profile issues with unreadable sections so users could not tell what settings were being changed in classic1 and high-contrast-dark fixed.

Link color was inconsistent in classic1 and High-Contrast-Dark. Now links for both are mostly limited to 2 colors: blue/white (classic1), and yellow/white (high-contrast-dark.)

General cleanup of UserCP colors for readability in both styles.

What else?

[TheCotMan]

Re: Major upgrade coming soon: Styles/Theme will change

Page number nag in thread view dark on dark fixed in, "High Contrast Dark."
Forum links on-hover low contrast light on light fixed in, "high-contrast-dark."

Any other style problems in either of these?

[TheCotMan]

Re: Major upgrade coming soon: Styles/Theme will change

In, "High Contrast Dark," the, "Reply to Thread," was black text on black background. Changed to yellow text on black background and hover to extreme inverse (black text on white background.)

Any other problems with, "High Contrast Dark," or, "Classic1" ?

[TheCotMan]

Re: Major upgrade coming soon: Styles/Theme will change

Known problem in "classic1": image icons for posts are the 48x48 sized icons, not the 16x17 or whatever they were. This is on my list as something to address.

Small icons in view of threads in a forum are now the smaller icons.

Any other problems?

[TheCotMan]

Re: Major upgrade coming soon: Styles/Theme will change

Known problem in "classic1": image icons for posts are the 48x48 sized icons, not the 16x17 or whatever they were. This is on my list as something to address.