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Forum Update

Posted: Tue Dec 12, 2017 2:50 am
by valis
The forums are now updated to the latest version of phpBB. Please provide your feedback in this post, and here is a list of current known issues:

I am still tweaking the styles, the posting page is where I'm focusing currently, so no need to report that just yet. There are other pages I haven't yet checked. However the main forum page and viewing forums and posts are a fair way along, so feel free to give feedback on those.

Smileys are UGLY at the edges...

There are no longer borders on many pages, I like this actually but it means that some of the old color choices don't quite have the same impact. So comment there.

Things to look out for: GREEN colors, report these. grey on grey, report this as well. Anything you don't like or feel is 'off' somehow that hasn't been mentioned.

Thanks!

Re: Forum Update

Posted: Tue Dec 12, 2017 3:25 am
by roy thinnes
thanks valis, brilliant forum update!
and sorry, nothing to complain here-
except :) ugly smileys edges :) (?)

Re: Forum Update

Posted: Tue Dec 12, 2017 3:31 am
by next to nothing
Hey, nice job!

A couple of observtions, just small things:
- You have probably noticed, but maybe the alignment of the Planet Z logo should be revised to align it with left side of layout
- On a more general note, maybe something should be done with scaling? i mean, it scales totally fine when making resizing the browser window to be smaller ( i like how the username changes to go on top of post at very small window size), but on full screen on a 1920x1080 monitor i just find something a bit "odd" about the margins introduced by a large user name surface/table, maybe it could be made a bit narrower on max size?
- Oh and and HTTPS is gone, but you are probably working on that :)

Re: Forum Update

Posted: Tue Dec 12, 2017 3:33 am
by next to nothing
Deleted, irrelevant.

Re: Forum Update

Posted: Tue Dec 12, 2017 3:40 am
by valis
Yes, the upper logo needs to be redone. Wanted to make sure we wanted to keep the name "PlanetZ" still, and then I need time to remake it. Once that's done it will fit :wink:

Re: Margins (Padding), I will look at tweaking things a bit. This style is just inhereiting subsilver/default for 3,2, a lot of the changes you see with the post title for the latest post on far right of main forums, names being moved around and so on are from the changes to the overall phpBB codebase and features...but I will see what I can do to accommodate longtime users and the way we're used to things looking.

HTTPS is still working, though inserting external images and such will throw up a warning on your 'lock' icon portion of the browser's menubar.

Lastly, I can insert images:
Image
Use the upper icon for the editing window and just encapsulate your link in the img tags.

Re: Forum Update

Posted: Tue Dec 12, 2017 4:00 am
by next to nothing
Regarding images, i used the "insert image" button and used pasted my image url https://imgur.com/a/xZ2Lf between the brackets, so i am not sure why it doesn't work. the link itself appears to work.

Regarding the padding, I have no problems with new layouts, i just wanted to highlight this as it is pretty noticable (but its probably just me) especially on longer posts. Now show stopper though :)

EDIT:
and regarding HTTPS, the site is still "not secure" (as Chrome reports) for me, no lock.

Re: Forum Update

Posted: Tue Dec 12, 2017 4:11 am
by Rebu
Cool, super readable now with smartphone^^

Great work!!

Re: Forum Update

Posted: Tue Dec 12, 2017 4:15 am
by faxinadu
so we went ableton with the users on the right hand side i see :D :D 8)


thanks for the work valis! <3

Re: Forum Update

Posted: Tue Dec 12, 2017 4:30 am
by GordonGekko
Rebu wrote: Tue Dec 12, 2017 4:11 am Cool, super readable now with smartphone^^

Great work!!
This :D
And thx for all the work valis

Re: Forum Update

Posted: Tue Dec 12, 2017 4:36 am
by next to nothing
Jsut a little update on the HTTPS bit; when i use the url https://forums.... it works. If i go directly to forums.planetz.com it doesn't activate HTTPS. I seem to remember HTTPS:// to be activated even if i didn't use it in my url, but my memory might serve me wrong.

Re: Forum Update

Posted: Tue Dec 12, 2017 4:44 am
by JoPo
:o :o Excellent !! :o :o

Can't believe PlanetZ has a new face ! The most ancient forum and the more I follow forum ! It's like living in a new room with new decoration ! :)

Very nice ! I just miss the 'read latest posts' direct button... :D

Re: Forum Update

Posted: Tue Dec 12, 2017 4:55 am
by Nestor
First of all, thank you for taking care of the forum Valis, it is great! :)

To me, it feels refreshing and looking pretty good in general, except for the logo, as stated by Next (just now when I am posting, I see a new one and to the far left, so that's it, I call it FAST FIXING :lol )

Me too, I can see no HTTPS available, perhaps the module you added recently is not connected to this new version, I don’t know. (Again, it has been fixed right now, while I'm writing. Man I will hire you :) )

I use f.lux in my screens, a little program that adapts the brightness and color of your screen to match your needs as the day goes by and night comes with its darkness, so I have about half of the brightness most people use in their screens, even like this, I can see everything very clear in Planet Z, no problems at all in this regard, I did not find any color problems.

It seems that some extremely large pictures that some of us have posted long ago, have auto-sized to a proper measure, but 100% sure though, even like this, you can still expand to original size, so both things are cool.

Still talking about graphics, I can see that avatars have different sizes, it would be cooler if they were of the same size, but nothing important there really.

I have tried many topics where there are pictures attached that are important to understand such or such particular topic, especially in the solving problems section, but no broken links that I can report exist.

Animated gifs also work fine.

I did not find any broken link to other pages either so far, something that may sometimes occur when updating.

Yes, smiles are screwed, but they have not lost their sense of humor, which is important! :lol: You can always load a different set of them, and try.

The whole page loads faster than before, in general. I guess it is due to a better code in this version, which I believe is 3.5?

Here, in a Ken post, I found an attachment that is no longer there, I don’t know if it is naturally gone, or it is a problem in the page, here you have the link just in case (it is in the first post, down):
http://forums.scopeusers.com/viewtopic.php?f=17&t=35136

I’ve downloaded files too, no problems with it.

I see that topics texts are at the left and member’s details at the right. I would strongly prefer them to be the opposite, I don’t know what you thing about this. That would be the only thing it would really change, but this is only me, let see what others have to say too, of course :wink:

Again, thank you very much! :)

Re: Forum Update

Posted: Tue Dec 12, 2017 4:57 am
by valis
next to nothing wrote: Tue Dec 12, 2017 4:36 am Jsut a little update on the HTTPS bit; when i use the url https://forums.... it works. If i go directly to forums.planetz.com it doesn't activate HTTPS. I seem to remember HTTPS:// to be activated even if i didn't use it in my url, but my memory might serve me wrong.
SSL has never been forced, but I will look around and see if that's do-able without breaking things for those who for whatever reason can't do SSL. I did have a redirect on the frontend of the site, but I'm installing a CMS now so that we can have some user-friendly content on the front of the site before new users reach the forums. More on that soon!
GordonGekko wrote: Tue Dec 12, 2017 4:30 am This :D
And thx for all the work valis
No problem, still not done!
JoPo wrote: Tue Dec 12, 2017 4:44 am Very nice ! I just miss the 'read latest posts' direct button... :D
Check 'quick links' top left...

Re: Forum Update

Posted: Tue Dec 12, 2017 4:58 am
by Sounddesigner
Glad to see it looks very similar to the old forum colors, and lay-out. I remember when KVR changed their forum the colors were so dramatically different and unfriendly to my eyes that I can barely read it now with my poor vision, wish they would've kept it similar to the old forum as well.

Good job!

Re: Forum Update

Posted: Tue Dec 12, 2017 5:04 am
by next to nothing
ignore my problems inserting images. my bad.

Re: Forum Update

Posted: Tue Dec 12, 2017 5:05 am
by valis
Nestor wrote: Tue Dec 12, 2017 4:55 am First of all, thank you for taking care of the forum Valis, it is great! :)
The donations hit and FAR exceeded what I had said on these forums would give me the time to work (about 2 days) to handle all of this. And so, I am a man of my word! :D
Nestor wrote: Tue Dec 12, 2017 4:55 am To me, it feels refreshing and looking pretty good in general, except for the logo, as stated by Next (just now when I am posting, I see a new one and to the far left, so that's it, I call it FAST FIXING :lol )
So, people will hopefully let me know how they like the logo please!
Nestor wrote: Tue Dec 12, 2017 4:55 am Here, in a Ken post, I found an attachment that is no longer there, I don’t know if it is naturally gone, or it is a problem in the page, here you have the link just in case (it is in the first post, down):
http://forums.scopeusers.com/viewtopic.php?f=17&t=35136
Mentioned in my first post is the fact that mp3's are broken for now, that whole table was causing the upgrade to break (the filetypes have EXPANDED a lot and so it's now a subtable, and doing splits/merges/etc were not working. I was facing a manual update of every post by hand to fix this....until I can find a faster way I've removed the mp3 table). I'm open to solutions on this...
Nestor wrote: Tue Dec 12, 2017 4:55 am I see that topics texts are at the left and member’s details at the right. I would strongly prefer them to be the opposite, I don’t know what you thing about this. That would be the only thing it would really change, but this is only me, let see what others have to say too, of course :wink:

Again, thank you very much! :)
I did do the fix I see here: https://www.phpbb.com/support/docs/en/3 ... s-on-left/

But it had some issues on both mobile and when resizing the web browser, so rolled it back for now. Unfortunately I think the designer of the parent theme put this on the right so that it is now consistent with the main forum view (where you see users who posted last on right). If it's annoying to enough people I can dig into that fix again...

Lastly, we are currently on phpbb 3.2.1, in case anyone is poking around for fixes themselves.

Please let me know if you see any GREEN anywhere, or light gray background and so on! I do see the attachments themselves need fixing from that post you linked so doing it now...

Re: Forum Update

Posted: Tue Dec 12, 2017 5:11 am
by next to nothing
i see there is some kind of time out when it comes to deleting posts; i can delete a post i just made, but i cant delete a post made further up in this thread? It might always have been this way, and it might be the best solution, I'll just edit the post.

Re: Forum Update

Posted: Tue Dec 12, 2017 5:18 am
by valis
Specific features and functionality like that require 'extensions' (no more mods! so they don't break on updates!) to address these days. If you have suggestions like that, pm me. I will probably not add a ton as they can impact the security of the forums, but will consider each and review code as needed.

Re: Forum Update

Posted: Tue Dec 12, 2017 5:49 am
by John Cooper
Nice work Valis. Great to see the latest phpBB bringing a responsive and more modern design. I know this transition wasn't a trivial undertaking, and I appreciate you keeping the forums alive and kicking.
-John

Re: Forum Update

Posted: Tue Dec 12, 2017 5:57 am
by jksuperstar
Looks great on the mobile platform. Each post does have a "Re: Subject" in fairly large font, which separates the member's name from the post a bit much. A small thing, really.