- Apr 21, 2009
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It's our third major visual change to the site since Android Central has been around. Still a lot more great updates coming, but we just couldn't wait longer and wanted to push live with what we had. Think of us like Google ... always in Beta and improving, so expect to see changes and improvements continue to pour in. We can't wait to hear the feedback from the community - our ongoing goal is to continue to be the No. 1 Community and Resource for All Things Android, so you need to keep telling us what you want to see.
Redesign Highlights:
In addition to updating the site with a cleaner look that helps put the focus on the content, we focused on three main things in the user experience: Speed of Use, Ease of Use and More Integration between our editorial and community forum content.
Site-wide
The blog
Android Central Forums
Working on this forums revamp we already have our to do list for our next forums upgrade. There's so much more to come. So join today and get posting and enjoy all the good times ahead.
From myself, Cory Streater, all the mods and advisers (and let's face it, they work harder than we do) and everyone else at Android Central, thanks for making this the best, most helpful and friendliest Android site around. Cheers, everybody.
Redesign Highlights:
In addition to updating the site with a cleaner look that helps put the focus on the content, we focused on three main things in the user experience: Speed of Use, Ease of Use and More Integration between our editorial and community forum content.
Site-wide
- Header: The site header scraps the heavy images for a faster loading and cleaner look. Notice the link to Android Central's updated FREE Wallpaper Gallery and the additional links to the forums. Be sure to put the From the forums: Newest Post link to use!
- Sidebar: We also narrowed down the side bar, giving more room for article content on the blogs and even more room for viewing posts in the forums for logged out users (remember, if you register with Android Central you get full width browsing in the forums!). The new sidebar also shows the latest articles and forum threads on the site, helping you to stay up to date no matter where you are.
The blog
- Featured Stories: The homepage gets a big update! At the top of the site are our featured stories. These are important stories you won't want to miss, so we put them up there so you'll never miss them. Going down the page, we now have a variety of article teaser formats that help differentiate the content.
- Dashboard: We've updated our recently introduced "dashboard". All stories now appear by default on the homepage. Be sure to click the little icon for List View - if you're a power user and don't want to miss any content on the site, this gives you Google Reader-like functionality. You can pull in tons of headlines and once and instantly expand headlines to get the image and full teaser. And don't forget, tabbing over to Discussions gives you a window to the latest posts from our forum community.
- Comments / User Pages: We've cleaned up comments to articles and we're now pulling in member avatars! Also new, if you click on the avatar or username for a member you'll go to their profile page which shows the latest article comments and forum posts by that member. We have a lot more planned for this area of the site, but this a great step forward.
- Wallpaper Gallery: Re-skinned and widened out to match the new look of the site!
Android Central Forums
- A New, Clean Look: Perhaps the biggest change with this relaunch are the revamped forums. Based on the feedback our community gave us, we really cleaned up the look and the user experience. We took some inspiration from our friends at Google (and Google +) here to come up with a clean look that highlights the most important content and forum functions on the page and still keep less-frequently used features and content easily accessible and discoverable.
- Forum Super Navigation: At the top of the forums we've added a new layer of "super navigation" which includes both a dedicated forums search and also a search for finding any forum on the site. Just start typing and a list of all forums will appear. We also have links to popular forums here and the trending block which only appeared on the forums homepage previously is now on every page of the forums. For logged in users, we've also added buttons so you can easily get to your latest posts and threads.
Working on this forums revamp we already have our to do list for our next forums upgrade. There's so much more to come. So join today and get posting and enjoy all the good times ahead.
From myself, Cory Streater, all the mods and advisers (and let's face it, they work harder than we do) and everyone else at Android Central, thanks for making this the best, most helpful and friendliest Android site around. Cheers, everybody.
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