Site Updates

[athanasios]

Change the black background to gray and the posts will increase for sure. If not at least make the font color brighter.

-

Συν Αθηνά και χείρα κίνει.

Edric do not complain about members not posting in the time you fail to do so regularly. Even posts of Communist interest don't seem to make you respond anymore.

[Dragoon Knight]

[colour=#005FFF]Have to say that I agree wholeheartedly with Edric, here. The new design is the primary reason I've stopped posting as much as I did. Granted, I was never exactly prolific in the first place, but there was real progress being made in Fan Fiction just before the software changed. There was heated discussion, with moderation required, in PRP. I believe even Technical Issues was chugging along nicely. I can't be the only one who's noticed that this very discussion - that of the unsuitability of the new IP.Board implementation - has been the fastest moving in a long time? It's just not working.

For me, the new interface and background software was immediately distasteful. Some of the issues I had were legitimate bugs, but others were more esoteric; I just didn't like the way things looked or felt anymore. I've given it time to settle; I still visit FED2k every day, still read all new posts that I find interesting... but I rarely feel engaged. It's almost as if the posts aren't real to me. They're there, but I don't feel a part of things. It feels like a completely different forum, one that I haven't been a member of for 7 years. Trust me when I say that my decline in posting has nothing to do with growing up and moving on - it's all down to the changes brought on by IP.Board.

Please, Gob, don't take this as an affront to the work you're doing. I know I speak for everyone when I say that we appreciate everything you've done for FED2k over the years. You've kept a community alive, inspired more than a few Fan Fics of your own, moderated and conversed with us members and assigned a great team of staff. But this change is something that I think was probably forced upon you, so to speak. With the spambots and the overheads of running older software, I fully understand your reasons for making the switch. It's just having the unforseen consequence of alienating people. You've done just about all you can to cater to us, making the site as similar to the old design as possible, but it's just not working out.

I'm not saying that I'll stop posting because of this change, but my drive to do so has waned considerably. Perhaps I just need more time, and even more likely is that my opinion isn't going to change your decision. But I know I would be the happiest person in Scotland if tomorrow I woke up, fired up FED2k and things were back to the way they used to be. :)[/colour]

[MrFlibble]

[colour=#005FFF]For me, the new interface and background software was immediately distasteful. Some of the issues I had were legitimate bugs, but others were more esoteric; I just didn't like the way things looked or felt anymore. I've given it time to settle; I still visit FED2k every day, still read all new posts that I find interesting... but I rarely feel engaged. It's almost as if the posts aren't real to me. They're there, but I don't feel a part of things. It feels like a completely different forum, one that I haven't been a member of for 7 years.[/colour]

Dragoon Knight, this is almost exactly what I feel, too. I must say, however, that personally I wasn't exactly discouraged from posting after the change - rather, the decline in activity resulted in much less conversations I could take part in, and the conversations themselves have become erratic as it seems to take ages for people to reply.

In spite of everything said, I think we should hold to a more optimistic view, and continue on in the new forum. After all, the appearance can be altered (I hope that sooner or later, the option to use the "nostalgia" FED2k skin will be introduced), and it is the active participation of the members that matters in the first place. So yeah - let's do it! Hopefully the bugs, glitches and other performance issues with the new software will be sorted out soon :)

[gryphon]

Guy's, I just have to get this out of my system but grow up and learn to live with it.

You change wardrobes every 3 / 4 years, computers every year, a new car in 3 or 4 years for a new bike. Everything evolves and like the style or not, you have a text-box, reply button and a forum full of friends.

If you have time to worry about all the rest you frankly just have to much time on your hands.... Now can we all get along and start posting again.... :)

[veK]

@ gryphon: I'm not against changes but if the newest version doesn't work as well as the old one did, then why change it in the first place?

While I do not like the new style very much I might live with it. But what I can't ignore are a lot of minor technical issues that make browsing/reading/posting on the forums less enjoyable than before. Like e.g. what I posted last time: no option to sort the posts the other way around so the newest one is on top of page 1. Or that all those threads are flagged as "new posts" like described earlier by... humm I think it was Andrew. Anyways... combine those technical aspects with an "acceptable but still not as much appreciated as the old one"-design and the result is just me being around less and not being active on the forums.

[Dante]

Posting is needlessly frustrating. Little things like having to redo colour tags for quotes, jumping to the top of a message every time I paste something, that irritating little pause that makes everything slower. Not saying we should go back, because technology marches on and all that, just stating that there are grievances which could maybe be ironed out, when there's time.

And that it's quiet. Very quiet.

[ErasOmnius]

There are probably less posts not because of anything that can be done with the Software, or the like.

It probably has more to do with waning interest of DUNE overall. There will not be a movie coming out anytime soon. That was a draw for new members. There hasn't been a new Brian Herbert Dune book in almost a year and a half. So there is no spillage from people who are reading his books.

No new games in almost a decade. Mini-series has been 7+ years ago. It is a permanent affliction -- and from a Marketing stand-point, may be irreversible.

I think the software change is okay.

[Dragoon Knight]

[colour=#005FFF]While the lack of Dune media in any respectable form has no doubt contributed to the lack of posting, it cannot explain the overwhelming downturn that appeared at the same time as the software change.[/colour]

[Wolf]

Re. new forum software: it takes some getting used to, but I've pretty much completely adjusted. As far as I'm concerned, it's virtually the same as the old forum software. However, I think Edric has a point that the change to the new skin put off a lot of people who didn't want to bother learning the ins and outs of a new architecture all over again. At the same time, I don't think we should change it back. First of all, Gob put in a lot of work and I'd feel bad making him undo it. Second, the people who left simply because they couldn't be bothered to learn the new forum scheme probably wouldn't come back if we changed back, and even if they did, they probably weren't serious posters. I stopped posting for the last few months mainly for the same reasons Chigger did, and also because I'm absurdly busy in life.

[MrFlibble]

At the same time, I don't think we should change it back.

Actually, I think going back is probably either not possible at all, or is bound to end up with even more screw-ups so it's not worth the effort in the first place. What is possible, and even desirable I suppose, is to make a(n optional) forum skin that will be as close to the old forum look as possible. And fixing the existing bugs, errors and suchlike stuff (see Dante's notes above) is a definite must-do.

[Gruntlord6]

[c=#00dd00]We have a crisis on our hands. In just a couple of months, the forum went from holding steady with the same level of activity that we've had for years, to being almost dead. Obviously, the new software is to blame. People don't like it, so they stopped posting. Presumably most people are still reading the forum, though, so we have to act quickly to restore activity before they stop doing even that and FED2k dies.

I will petition Gob to restore the old software. Clearly the IP.Board experiment is a failure. If restoring the old software doesn't work, either because Gob disagrees or because it's not technically possible, then those of us who are still here must make a commitment to increase our posting drastically for at least a month, like during the Great Dune Revolution of Dunenewt.

I love FED2k. We cannot let it die.[/c]

I like the IPB Board. Its more modern.

[Edric O]

[c=#00dd00]I have deleted 29 posts that made this topic descend into a flame war, and I've edited out the offending lines from the posts that originally sparked the flame war. Also, the people involved received a warn point each. The warn point will be removed after one week - unless you continue to make personal attacks, in which case you will get a second warn point (and so on; at 10 points you get a temporary ban).

The age of lax moderation is over. From now on, you will receive a warn point every time you make a personal attack on another forum member, and such attacks will be deleted. Defending yourself from an insult is no excuse to insult back.

Now, let's get back on topic and discuss site updates.[/c]

[Wolf]

Thanks.

A separate issue: on my profile it says (under "Active Posts") that I have 2,097 posts (I suppose now 2,098). However, when I post messages, it records a different number (in this case, 2,024, though, I suppose now 2,025). What's an "active post"? Furthermore, what accounts for the discrepency? My apologies if this has been addressed already--I'm not the most active board user.

[MrFlibble]

[c=#00dd00]The age of lax moderation is over. From now on, you will receive a warn point every time you make a personal attack on another forum member, and such attacks will be deleted. Defending yourself from an insult is no excuse to insult back.[/c]

Yay! All hail the moderators' dictatorship!

[c=#00dd00]Now, let's get back on topic and discuss site updates.[/c]

Allrighty. First off, the scrolling lags I've complained somewhere above are either less noticeable now, or I got used to them. The broad margins are still an issue though (once again, somewhere above I posted a screenie), since so much screen space gets wasted. When I switch to the IP.Board skin, the forum body occupies the entire width of the screen.

BTW, what are the prospects of making an old-style FED2k skin for the forum? I remember Gob saying something about the number of available skins being limited (with the need to pay for extra additions) or something of that kind. Is that true?

[Dante]

Ok, so, are these warn points recorded somewhere or is it a case of a handwritten note on your desk? I ask simply to clarify "people involved," I'm not sure all the posts deleted were point-worthy. Honestly not trying to start anything, but if this is a new regime then it would be useful to know things like this as a point of reference.

(This is on topic, sort of, right?)

[Gobalopper]

In regards to the warning stuff. I'm not sure if you guys see it but moderators/admins see a bar below your profile pic and can also go to a page to view what the warning was about.

btw, if someone can create a list or point me to one of the top requested fixes that would be handy. I have two weeks off starting on the 20th and while I won't be able to dedicate all that time to working on the site I should be able to get some things done. If no such list exists than maybe a poll on the topic would be useful.

[Andrew]

I click on wiki link at top of forum, brings me back to forum.

I don't see quick link to Rules/FAQ

I let gurneyman know about posting to really old threads in duniverse board. Not going to remove the lengthy one with questions.

[Andrew]

Sorry guys, I just checked my inbox first time since software change, so I didn't read any messages sent to me.

Let me know if any are still needed to reply to.

[Dante]

We don't see the warning points, no. Or at least, I don't. There are little grey dots, but they seem to be related to post count.

The issue I have is that a lot of old posts, some of them in locked threads or by people who have long since left, just aren't showing up. Granted we don't reference old discussions very often, but when we do it's handy when they're complete. Besides that, it's the extraneous features that bother me. The Digg button, the ratings buttons for posts, and what does the 'promote to article' button do anyway?

Hey Gob, good to see you.

[MrFlibble]

btw, if someone can create a list or point me to one of the top requested fixes that would be handy. I have two weeks off starting on the 20th and while I won't be able to dedicate all that time to working on the site I should be able to get some things done. If no such list exists than maybe a poll on the topic would be useful.

Okay, since no one else did anything bout it here goes:

1) Some old posts' content isn't being shown, presumable because of "bad characters" in them. These posts can still be quoted or edited, but are not displayed in the forum body.

2) There are huge (107 pixel wide) gaps between the forum body margins and the vertical edges of the screen. I've attached a screenshot of what it looks like on my PC here. It's certainly not because of forum software, as the default IP.Board skin does not have this problem.

3) Loading times for pages are still somewhat slow.

4) You've fixed the old links to forum threads, but old links to individual posts within threads still redirect you to the main page. I'm not pressing this issue, as it is not very important, but would be nice if that was fixed too.

5) PM system is a mess. Messages that I have deleted years ago are suddenly back, and everything is reorganized in a GMail manner (messages are linked into "conversations"), making it difficult to keep track of everything. Also, new PM notification doesn't seem to work properly.

[athanasios]

Same problem here: Receive notification for wrong PM.

[SandChigger]

What'd I miss? (Was I involved? Pooh... I always miss all the fun. :( )

About the "invisible posts": I've just edited a couple of mine and fixed some things...

- One post had a couple of long dashes (—) in it and they were showing up as the little diamond-with-a-question-mark-inside "character not in this font" symbol. Once I retyped in the dashes and saved, the comment became visible.

- Another comment was visible but I'd used HTML-style angular brackets instead of the BBcode square brackets so the part I wanted in boldface wasn't displaying correctly.

- Some of the old smilies aren't displaying correctly. (Not a biggie unless you're a smiley/emoticon junkie like me. :) )

It seems this sort of glitch would be easy enough to fix by running a few find/replace searches over the database. Gobalopper, do you command-line it or use something like phpMyAdmin to manipulate the database? (Or just use the stuff I presume is built into the boardware?)

[MrFlibble]

- Some of the old smilies aren't displaying correctly. (Not a biggie unless you're a smiley/emoticon junkie like me. :) )

Right, I forgot to list that one :)

[Edric O]

Ok, so, are these warn points recorded somewhere or is it a case of a handwritten note on your desk? I ask simply to clarify "people involved," I'm not sure all the posts deleted were point-worthy. Honestly not trying to start anything, but if this is a new regime then it would be useful to know things like this as a point of reference.

[c=#00dd00]Hm, that's odd. Making warnings invisible kinda defeats the point of warnings... Gob, is there anything you can do to let people see their own warn levels?

For the record, the people who received a warning point for the now-deleted flaming in this thread were ErasOmnius, Dante, Wolf, and SandChigger. But all of those points have been removed since then, because a week passed without incident.[/c]

[SandChigger]

For the record, the people who received a warning point for the now-deleted flaming in this thread were ErasOmnius, Dante, Wolf, and SandChigger. But all of those points have been removed since then, because a week passed without incident.[/c]

Yippee!

So, how many have I racked up now, Big Boy?