RE: Announcement Significant forum upgrade

Trihexagonal I have always found that trying to fix forum software, or other canned products, trying and difficult at best. A few years ago, I said I would look into fixing the CSS for the main FreeBSD site (not the same thing) but the HTML was so convoluted, I quickly gave up. This page alone has 69 HTML errors and warnings and 7 CSS errors with 444 warnings. I did not bother to see how concerning all that was but that they exist is troubling enough.
 
drhowarddrfine, you don't know how badly I was hoping you had looked at the mess that is the code of this index page. Never in 20 years have I seen code so far spaced between elements/lines and as hard to make out.

My code has to be valid above all else.
 
danger@ said:
I could export the current template for you, should help you much. But im travelling right now so will be able to do so in ca 8hrs from now at the soonest.
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Please provide the CSS, too. I downloaded the site and have css.php, css_002.php, normalize.css, fontawesome-webfont.woff2, font_awesome.css, font-awesome.min.css but not even my own CSS will make it format and all I get is a white page with everything aligned to the left.

The code is very widely spaced and hard to read, though I do know how to link a stylesheet.

The freebsd.org code was simple to work with compared to this.
 
I do no longer find that thing used to mark a thread as solved...
200w.gif

And the thing that used to pop up when hovering over the "Alerts" box in the upper right doesn't work any longer somehow...
(FF58 used here)
 
I haven't read this whole thread, and I suspect this has been mentioned, but one thing I miss is the first unread post thing. The old forum seemed to do this by default, now I have to, say, go to page 2 of a multi page thread and scroll down. Admittedly, First World Problem. :)
 
Mayhem30 said:
best forum software out there
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Very controversial statement, Xenforo is a proprietary forum software, it isn't bad, but there are a lot of great free forum CMS out there. Personally I like SMF, it's BSD licensed, it is a little bit "old", but it is highly customizable, and when SMF 2.1 will be released, things may change.
 
SMF is nice, and I use it myself on my of my websites. However, their greatest downfall is how long it takes them release new versions and patches. They are just so far behind the times right now. That has angered a lot of people, and many have since moved on to other forum software.

SMF 2.1 Beta 1 was released in 2014, and it's now 2018 and we still haven't even seen the first release candidate. It honestly could be 2020 before it's officially released.

Who going to wait around for that?
 
Mayhem30 said:
SMF 2.1 Beta 1 was released in 2014, and it's now 2018 and we still haven't even seen the first release candidate. It honestly could be 2020 before it's officially released.
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SMF 2.1 Beta 3 Released 01 Jun 2017 01:21:59 GMT
And personally for my needs, for now, SMF 2.0 works great, I got all features working as on any other popular forum software, because there are a lot of SMF modifications. Also I update it frequently, every few months new 2.0.* version appear, which includes bug fixes, for now the latest is 2.0.15 which was released 20 Nov 2017, also my forum is pretty popular and people like it much, because it is nice, lightweight and very usable.
 
I mentioned that I can't find a view first unread, however I do see, at times, a jump to new button. I don't find it all the time though, and I haven't yet figured out the system.

EDIT: Hrrm, it may be, at least most of the time, automatically jumping to the first unread post, so my particular _may_ be solved. (Still not seeming consistent though, so I'm not sure.)
 
After using the new forum a bit, here's what I'd like to see;

# Break the drop down out for watched threads and watched forums so the links are sitting flat on the header.

# Make the header sticky like the title bar so I don't have to scroll back up to the top of the thread to click on the watched threads link.

# Still don't like the solid bars on one side in various boxes like the quote box and reply box. Make those a much lighter color or get rid of them completely.

Other than that all as well for me and the new forum looks nice.
 
CraigHB said:
After using the new forum a bit, here's what I'd like to see;

# Break the drop down out for watched threads and watched forums so the links are sitting flat on the header.

# Make the header sticky like the title bar so I don't have to scroll back up to the top of the thread to click on the watched threads link.
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You can just click the Forums dropdown it provides those links.
 
I just noticed the little notice "Show only unread" and an X to toggl that. Wonderful! THANKYOU!
Now I can check back an read something again if I decided I missed something. As it was, finding a previously "read" post could be quite difficult unless one has an amazing memory for keeping track of peripheral details, which I don't. I always thought it was odd to associate having clicked on something with definitely having read it.

The other changes here are fine by me. Most of it doesn't make much difference and perhaps a change is good. It looks good.
 
CraigHB said:
# Still don't like the solid bars on one side in various boxes like the quote box and reply box. Make those a much lighter color or get rid of them completely.
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I think this is a debatable feature. I personaly prefer that bar than none, make those boxes more discernible.
 
I usually rant if something is broken, quite the opposite about the forum upgrade.

The 'new' forums seems better, more usable and faster then the older one, thanks for better experience.
 
ILUXA said:
Very controversial statement, Xenforo is a proprietary forum software, it isn't bad, but there are a lot of great free forum CMS out there.
Click to expand...

I agree that in the spirit of free software we should be running it.
 
Not just "in the spirit", more in terms of usability.
"Spirit" is a very abstract thing, which only exists in few religions.
 
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