New Skin for the forums - your feedback essential!

[Cory Streater]

The Multi-Quote feature is not going anywhere, so you guys can stop debating that. There are people that use it and there those that don't, but this is stock vBulletin functionality that's used by too many people to just take it away.

 

[dmmarck]

The Multi-Quote feature is not going anywhere, so you guys can stop debating that. There are people that use it and there those that don't, but this is stock vBulletin functionality that's used by too many people to just take it away.

Thank the Lord!

 

[primetime34]

Multi-quote is important. Tip not so much. I like the other changes. Thanks.

 

[RUSH]

I see a few issues.

There is no contrast or break between one post and another, yes you have the grey profile bar, but it's very light, and with no sides, it doesn't look like a break. Every time a chat forum has done that, they had issues with miss-quotes and people being frustrated (been doing this for many years). The other thing is that everything looks like it's just floating. It all lacks definition. Also, with no breaks or borders, once you scroll past the top, it looks extremely bland. Oh look, a white page with text, what is this, an e-reader? To me, it looks like the images didn't load properly, even though they did. It looks more appropriate for mobile device theme than a desktop theme. Which is what it looks like you guys started with.

Now compare that with the header and footer which has lots of blocky, brightly colored images images, and it looks like it all just fades off into nothing.

The thread title area (where it says Give some reasons) also looks a bit big. The same goes for the post a reply and likes indicator. They take up a lot of room for no real reason compared to how everything around them looks tiny. Look at the message box to the right, it's utterly empty because of how stretched out everything else is.

If you want to stick with the huge title, try letting the title run all the way across and put the pm area on the line with the reply and likes after you compact it a bit. I don't really need to know when I was last here, or how many total pm's I have, just that I'm logged in and have a PM. Not sure it would work, but my guess is that it would make it look a bit better organized.

Have the designers try some lower resolutions before sticking to such a huge font. That text is going to be HUGE on lower resolution screens. Not everyone runs at 1080 or more. The G on my 25in is nearly 1/2in tall. Excessive? wait till i see it on my 13in laptop at 1200x800. I get that you are trying to prioritize the text, but that goes too far I think. it takes away from the design.


To me, it looks like you upped the font size in posts to make it stand out, but you only did that because you stripped the borders and framing. Once you increased the post font, you had to up the header size. You went backwards. Put the borders back, and use something to separate the profile from the post, then you can reduce the font sizes back down. It's simply too much information without organization, and you are trying to use font sizes to correct for it all.



Also, unless you want noobs making 3 posts in a row, leave the multi-quote, it's a single, tiny button. If that throws off your entire look, you should probably reconsider the look. It's also a hassle to do multiple quotes so even those who can do it manually, won't. A better option would be to just slightly shrink all of the buttons if that is your priority.

I couldn't have said it any better. If this was to be done, wow! Android Central would be more awesome than it is already.

 

[Laineyc]

honestly, I didn't notice that much of a difference. But there was no attachment visible. I tend to do a lot of "browsing" here because I'm such a newbie.

 

[jdownloader214]

I've seen multi-quote being use by developers answerig multiple questions, sometimes 3 at a time. As for myself, I don't use multi-quote but it might be important to some people like devs.

As for News tip, I don't use it and it seems many people don't use it as well.

 

[vicw926a4]

I have never used the Multi-quote or Tip functions, so no loss there, at least for me.

Did you intentionally removed the subject line from each response? If so, I will miss that. When scrolling through many entries, and our tendency to go off topic, it's good to have a visual reminder of what the heck the topic really is, or was.

 

[FrankXS]

Thank the Lord!

You don't have to call him Lord. I don't think. I could be wrong.

-Frank.

Sent from my HTC ThunderBolt 4G/LTE using Tapatalk

 

[omie19]

i like it

 

[Lilybell2]

I would keep Multi-Quote and omit News Tip.

I've viewed the attached image, and I think the new skin looks good.

 

[sblood86]

Skin looks awesome. +1 on putting multi-quote back though; if nothing else it's useful for devs who want to respond to multiple issues easily from within a single post.

 

[jacob103]

The absolute scariest part of our site to mess with is the Forums. We have 600,000 plus members using them a LOT. You guys and girls know them inside and out, and I?m sure you have a million-and-one things you?d like to see improved.

I?m also sure you have become very comfortable with the current look and feel.

Rest assured then, that our design team is taking this very seriously and nothing will change without first giving you the opportunity to properly give us feedback.

Cory has basically been running the forums by himself up until today - and done a bang-up job too. It feels timely (we?re growing members fast!) and relevant to add our design team to the task of making them really rock.

Why are we touching the forums?

Well, there are some issues with readability that we?d like to tackle as a matter of priority. At the moment it?s difficult to quickly locate and read the thread title as well as the post content. Page elements that are not so important have very strong colors and are currently drawing attention away from the important content.

In the long term we want to change the forums more; better information hierarchy and structure, better thread layout, easier login and registration, reduce clutter and better profiles are but a few of projects coming up.

We need you!

We wont get it right every time - sometimes we?ll do a change that you won?t agree with (even hate!). That is the nature of change. Believe us when we say that every update we do we try to make it a better user experience. Even when we find it necessary to add, say, another ad space or features for new aspiring members to keep things running smoothly.

We promise to be as open and honest about these changes as we are about improving the user experience for our members.

And we hope you will not hold back on your comments and feedback.

Phase 1 changes

Ok, first the feature change - we removed the Multi-Quote and News Tip buttons on each post. Are you guys using these? Our user testing shows very little activity there.

Secondly, we just changed font sizes, colors and background colors to highlight what was important on the threads. We?d love to get your feedback on this too.

Check out the attached image for the new skin

Click to view quoted image

 

[jacob103]

It looks great make it even better next time

 

[crwallace2]

I like the new look

 

[Oathkeeper1212]

looks good, multiquote would be nice :3

 

[John Pfeiffer]

I like the current forum skin but new is always nice

 

[efojr1]

Hy everybody i'm new to the forum but in the same sentence ive been around for awhile reading the information I needed.Glad tbe here now.

 

[superstar1213]

I like it!

 

[ifellasleep]

ok, whatever is clever

 

[PvilleComp]

Just so long as the Forums don't get a "Metro UI" feel I'm good.