Home Page Redesign

Tar.Aldarion

Spear wrote: »

I'd suggest using this to avoid the homepage:

http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/index.php

How about http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/usercp.php

I am pie

bluewolf wrote: »

Where are you getting that from
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v660/blueywolf/homepageview_zps3a08570c.jpg

Even with that screenshot there is a lump of grey doing nothing under that curiously prominent Announcements box.

Announcements which that great % of users probably pay scant attention to.

Boards.ie: Nicola

I am pie wrote: »

Even with that screenshot there is a lump of grey doing nothing under that curiously prominent Announcements box.

That would be because bluewolf has ads turned off and the Talk To block is an MPU so won't show up if ads are disabled.

AlmightyCushion

The old version was much better and even it wasn't great. There is way too much white space and padding. It's like the front page of a really small forum some guy set up that only has a handful of users, not the front page of a site as large as boards. Even increasing the amount of threads it shows won't really fix that, the page will still look sparse and empty. The big thing that makes the front page look empty is all that white space in the very middle of the screen.



That big box is about 400 pixels wide. My screen is 1600x900 so slap, bang in the middle of the page there is a big area that makes up 25% of the total screen width just empty. I imagine the percentages get higher the bigger the screen. It would look a lot better if there was more padding on the left and right of the main area as opposed to in the middle of the page. The Twitter home page is a good example of this. It has feck all text and content on it but there is so much padding on the left and right you don't notice it as much. The problem with doing this though is that the width is inconsistent with the showthread page. Saying that the whole site is a mess with consistency given the different times different parts have been developed.

The post and thanks count are too far over. On the old home screen you could tell a big thread from a small or new one very easily as you could see the post count beside the thread titles. In the new version they are so far over that you can't tell at a glance and end up playing eye tennis with the screen as your eyes dart over and back between thread title and post count. This didn't really happen on the old version as there was more columns so less white space and your eyes moved slower and more naturally across the page. You should really move the thanks and post count to the left of the thread title. It would give more information at a glance and get rid of the exhausting game of eye tennis we currently have.

You should also look at moving the tabs to the left of the thread title. This will move the thread title part more into the centre of the page removing some of the white space there. It will also allow you to fit in another thread row on a page minimising scrolling. It also means you can keep the width consistent with the showthread page while removing some of the white space in the middle.

Clicking the thread title should bring you to the last viewed post. It's more obvious than clicking the post count (who would ever guess that doing that would perform that function especially when doing the same action in the forum view shows you a list of people who posted in the thread). I imagine most people don't want to view a thread from the first post every time they click it so it makes no sense why it should even do that.

Titles staying bolded is (I assume) a bug so I'll leave that but that's another thing that needs sorted.

I'm honestly surprised this made it out of the design phase like this. It really shouldn't have got out the door like this. How did nobody not notice all that empty space and how terrible it looked? I'd understand if it was a developer (us developers can be pretty poor at design at the best of times) but that it was done by an actual designer makes it even worse. It makes me worry for the future look of the site if this is something that goes live.

TLDR: Have the tabs arranged vertically to the left of the thread title part. Then put the thanks and post count (maybe not in that order) to the right of that and then have the thread title part. This will make the site look less empty which I think is the most jarring thing about the new design. Make these changes and it will look and work much better. Make the thread title bring you to the last unread post.

username123

Boards.ie: Nicola wrote: »

That would be because bluewolf has ads turned off and the Talk To block is an MPU so won't show up if ads are disabled.

Dont most internet users these days have ads turned off? Certainly people who are savvy enough to use a site like boards.ie.

I disabled my Adblock for a minute there and now I see that the homepage has been redesigned to give more space to commercial ventures.

Boards.ie: Nicola

Ok folks, I just want to say we are taking all feedback on board.

We've explained the design and development logic behind this and while it is fair to say we expected a reaction to the new homepage, we didn't expect this level.

I myself can't make any promises regarding what will be changed, the old homepage will not be returning.

As Dav said in an earlier post in this thread, we do have a really good track record in responding to feedback and adjusting features accordingly.

Boards.ie: Nicola

username123 wrote: »

Dont most internet users these days have ads turned off? Certainly people who are savvy enough to use a site like boards.ie.

I disabled my Adblock for a minute there and now I see that the homepage has been redesigned to give more space to commercial ventures.

We've never been shy about saying that revenue from ads pays most of our bills, in future we are hoping that the Talk To forums will be a primary source of revenue and this is why they now have prominence-as well as being useful channels for members to communicate with service providers.

The fact is that it is that a site of this magnitude needs money to run, and to run in a decent fashion. I don't know about you but I would rather see Talk To's take up more space than God forbid a homepage takeover skins, which are becoming more and more common on other sites.

Tar.Aldarion

username123 wrote: »

Dont most internet users these days have ads turned off? Certainly people who are savvy enough to use a site like boards.ie.

I disabled my Adblock for a minute there and now I see that the homepage has been redesigned to give more space to commercial ventures.

Well not only adblock, I wouldn't adblock boards, subscribers/mods etc can turn them off and it now affects them adversely.



Here's a bug guys:

BNMC

Fuck this.

Boards.ie: Nicola

Tar.Aldarion wrote: »

Here's a bug guys:

I think that has been flagged but if you can post it in Site Dev it would be much appreciated.

keith16

Now I have a "were hiring" banner across the top. Surely a candidate to go in the announcement box?

Boards.ie: Nicola

keith16 wrote: »

Now I have a "were hiring" banner across the top. Surely a candidate to go in the announcement box?

We've used those a good few times before, you can dismiss it by clicking the red x. It will probably be added to the Announcements tomorrow.

FutureGuy

Honestly, I really couldn't care less about trending but I can understand why you would place it there. I'm not sure what demographic you want to hit with this feature. When you consider that topics such as "how many times do you wipe your bum" and other After Hours gems are going to light up this feed, I'm not sure it's going to attract the type of person I think you are looking to attract.

I'm not a big fan of the new look tbh. I like the old page more because I can see more of the latest posts and I can easily see what forum it's posted on. EDIT : Looking at it again, there is like a voild down the centre of the page on my laptop where there is nothing but space. Doesn't look good at all.

Given the choice, it's the old page for me.

EDIT: Actually I learned a valuable lesson today about not being frank when it's required. OK. I actually hate the new look. I hate the fact that I cannot have a speed read down through the latest posts and find something interesting to view. It's unlikely to happen now that we are restricted to the last 10-ish posts.

I can actually see myself visiting Boards a lot less for "quick random fun checks". That cannot be good for DM?

Skid X

Boards.ie: Rónán wrote: »

The thread links on the homepage never functioned as described above. If you click on the postcount it'll take you to the last unread post of the thread, just like before.

Could you put this in an announcement at some stage?, I never knew about that.
Maybe with a few other 'tips to make your Boards life better', something like that.

I always used the little arrow to take me to the first unread post, I think a lot of people did too.

I'm not crazy about the redesign, the biggest issues being the small number of threads on the frontpage and the huge amount of grey space in the centre of the screen.

Fanny Biscuit

Not liking the new home page but i supose like everything it will take a while to get use to. I spend more timing reading thead titles from the home page and clicking them from there like most. I can't see the new redesign having the same effect, more the opposite imo.

Why not just create another tab/drop down for trending threads or move the tabs to side?

padma

What was good about the old home page was the long list of threads you could breeze down through, now with the handful of threads it isn't as user friendly as before.

For example today I went in to Boards.ie, looked at the home page threads, scrolled down, nothing of interest and then logged off.

maximoose

Not a fan at all. PLEASE let us have the option of the old one!

MadsL

partyatmygaff wrote: »

Why is the density lower than the touch site then? If you can fit 15 threads on a phone, surely you can do the same (and then some) on a desktop?

Agggh!! Is my response to the redesign; I was using 28064212's extension to allow for a much much denser homepage = 40-50 threads on a page, this new page is like the Fisher Price version of that. Hate it.

If you want to fix something, fix the fact that you cannot refresh the touch app from the bottom of a page - terrible to have to scroll back to the top of the touch app just to hit the browser refresh.

danjo-xx

I prefer the main forum index to be the home page I think it shows the extent of subjects covered by the site especially to new visitors. Maybe Todays Posts could be put back on the sub menu bar.

just my 2c worth but I have my own workarounds.:)

P_1

Tar.Aldarion wrote: »

Here's a bug guys:

I don't think that's actually a bug, its a fairly massive thread with most posts generating massive thanks.

As others have said, I'm not sure why the ammount of thanks a thread has generated needs to be listed. It's a bit too Facebookish for me

GreenWolfe

First off, well done to the site developers for making it this far.

Unfortunately, to echo some of the comments on the thread I'm not having a good experience with the new homepage. It's difficult to get a quick look at what's going on, I find there's too much wasted space (was this tested on a 1366x768 laptop screen?) and it's much more awkward to get to the last post of a thread.

I'd see myself opening boards.ie much less often if this redesign stays in its current form. Would it have been possible to keep the good, working elements of the older homepage design?

iora_rua

Sorry, have had a look around this new style 'front' page and hate the fact that I now have to trawl through FIVE PAGES to approximate what used to be on the one opening page. And, all that 'Trending' crap can go jump ...

I always enjoyed quickly whizzing down through the various threads on the opening page - and maybe finding a few items of interest that I could click in and out of, before heading off to my usual topics.

Please leave the original there for those who want it - if it ain't broke, don't fix it!

Thank you for reading ...

Tar.Aldarion

P_1 wrote: »

I don't think that's actually a bug, its a fairly massive thread with most posts generating massive thanks.

As others have said, I'm not sure why the ammount of thanks a thread has generated needs to be listed. It's a bit too Facebookish for me

You think there are 4 billion thanks on that thread?!
Ever person that ever registered on boards (600000) would have to have thanked it 7200 times each

The issue is also that even if there was the page does not accommodate it correctly.

P_1

Tar.Aldarion wrote: »

You think there are 4 billion thanks on that thread?!
Ever person that ever registered on boards (600000) would have to have thanked it 7200 times each

The issue is also that even if there was the page does not accommodate it correctly.

Actually you're right, tis a bug.

Now if you'll excuse me, I'm off to Specsavers :P

Professey Chin

Gotta agree with everything said so far.
The massive amount of whitespace right in the middle of the screen is really jarring and genuinely makes browsing a bit uncomfortable.
Forums not having their own section makes browsing more difficult.
Only being able to view 12 per page is a ridiculously small number
The thanks post per thread is pointless overall.

Also is there any way to change what tab it defaults to? Id usually keep it to my subscribed forums the hobbing back & forth is annoying

Robdoo

What's the point of "My Forums" being 5 pages instead of 1?

Doylers

Lots of wasted space, I miss when I could read all the most recent threads in one go on a single page. BOOOOOOOO boards

mad turnip

Doylers wrote: »

Lots of wasted space, I miss when I could read all the most recent threads in one go on a single page. BOOOOOOOO boards

For anyone that has a big grey bar above where the threads are listed thats because of adblock. BOOM!

alchemist33

Sorry to add to the boo-urns, but one of my main issues is being unable to go to the last page of a thread so easily. I can't remember what I had to do before (yes, I know it was a day ago) but I've got to go to the actual thread now before finding the last page.

Edit: re the lack of a last post button, click on the number of posts and it'll take you to the next unread post.

GoodBridge

Boo to unnecessary paging:

a) I'd actually prefer the opposite: that scrolling down would just load more of the previous posts.
b) The next page appears instantly so I assume it's already on the client or has been pre-fetched.

Can I ask what the motivation is behind the change?

You've abandoned the simplest of navigation methods and replaced it with the requirement that user must click a 10px by 14px arrow to paginate. We ain't all on the airsoft forum you know!!