GroupDIY - A fresh look and mobile/tablet friendliness (a work in progress)

[gltech]

PS: change often makes us uncomfortable, it is good to embrace change.

Yes, when it's an improvement.

 

[Slenderchap]

Everything looks like it is a continuous paragraph/post... there is no distinction between anything (on a standard 22inch screen).

Consider the text:
Drawing Board
Analog Theory & Design
82518 Posts
6046 Topics
Last post by gyraf
in Re: 6922EH UK source
on Today at 02:11:50 AM

Only the first 2 lines need to be big... the rest should be small, and maybe all on the same line... are they even required... does it really matter how many posts and topics there are ?

Colin
www.audiomaintenance.com

 

[dirtyhanfri]

I noticed it this morning with my phone, I liked it.

Now I´m posting from a 27" screen and looks confortable.

Great Job!

 

[ln76d]

I noticed today that there's no "similar topics" links under the currently viewed topic... It was really useful function...

 

[audiomixer]

I don't want to spoil the party, but the truth is I don't like it. I am mostly on my laptop and I only see a fraction of the content now.  I need to scroll to see If there are unread posts in the different topics.. color - some already covered that...  replying lets me see eight lines - all the rest is 'stuff' - not helpful if you are in a conversation with John Roberts you know... ;-)

so - I don't want to oppose progress, but please get us some options, may  be an account based thingy ?

ok, enough rant, I feel like a dinosour already.

- Michael
PS: could we at least have the searches in the top bar? opening a topic shows me the posts after 2/3 of the page....

 

[Gustav]

Love it overall - it just feels way too big here too (cmd - - )

Gustav

 

[mrclunk]

I know its a work in progress but in its current form the sites unusable on desktop and mobile (large screen android) for me.
Line and paragraph spacing is huge!
On my mobile for example, ads take up 4/5 of a screen and peoples avatars take up half.

This is probably all stuff u can change in the CCS code. Even giving users the ability to select there own stylesheet options would be cool, but that may hammer the server..
Seeing as this site is free to all I do feel a little horrid for poo pooing your hard work!
Time to DONATE mofo's!
[Edit: Where's the donate button gone?]

 

[ppa]

I liked very much the old version, but I think that this new version is cool.
I have tried it with my smartphone and it looks very good.
It is clear that it is a work in progress and it needs a bit of fixing.

Just to add my suggestions, there is no clear distinction between posts and between other elements of layout.  Advertising spaces seems to be inside posts.
Adding lines to keep well separate posts is a thing should be done here.
I don't think the new look needs many things to do over, but mainly just making clarity on look.
I would add a few of lines of different thickness of a pastel color around, is not necessary that they are in grey range.

 

[weiss]

I think the problem is the responsive css sheet. The header's font sizes stay the same on mobile and on desktop devices, this should be fixed

 

[thermionic]

Seeing as this place is the coolest audio group on the Internet and it's free to use, I feel really awkward registering any kind of criticism. However, I do have to echo what's already been said. With my FF / Win7 laptop, ctrl +/- doesn't really get any more info on the screen as there's just so much 'dead space' that isn't used. i.e. if I use ctrl - to shrink the page the text becomes small,  but the proportion of borders to text remains the same. It seems a shame to have so much unused screen area. I'd prefer less border and more text, so people on small screens can get a decent amount of info on the screen without a large proportion given over to blank borders. Just my 2 new pence.

 

[sharpeleven]

Great idea overall.

I'm hoping we'll get the 'search inside topics' function back. It'll make things difficult trying to search through hundreds of pages of GSSL threads for a particular issue. Maybe the function is still there I just can't see it.

I'm not a big fan of sans serif fonts. Sure, it'll make everything look more modern/sleek. However, Serif fonts are much easier to read 

 

[MLM]

I agree with thermionic and audiomixer - really hate to express any criticism, as it's obvious how much work goes into bringing us this place (for free!), but on a laptop (15" macbook here) it is actually almost completely unusable. Same comments as above - so much empty space and the enormous text size makes for constant scrolling around trying to find other bits related to what you're reading...

I would beg you to re-think, and come up with something that works on all platforms, not just prioritising tablets, phones etc.. I'd be interested to know the breakdown of how many people use the forum on which device - I'm sure there are a lot of us (me included) who check this place while on the move, using iPhone etc, but when i sit down to seriously study what's on here or when I'm building a project (simultaneously having several windows open with the schematic, data sheets, the forum etc open) then the computer/laptop is the only way to go - I'd imagine this is the case for almost all of the serious, non-casual users on here.  The current design renders the site practically impossible to use seriously on a laptop/computer, and makes for an extremely frustrating experience!!

 

[shot]

I hate the fact that every sub section has it's own "Unread posts" option!
It is much more convenient to have one and only "Show unread posts" to show new posts from all sections and threads.

Wasn't it possible to have beta testing phase with new forum engine for some time running in parallel with the old classic one?
This is a shock!

 

[ruairioflaherty]

Got to spend a little more time on iPhone.  In general readability is better.  Agree with a previous poster that the static logo is using way to much screen space (1/4 on my iPhone 4).

Also scrolling through avatars seems redundant to me, could do mobile version be avatar free?  Or make them much much smaller so they can go to the left side again?

I remember really disliking the last big change here and Ethan worked until it was really really great, I have no doubt that the same will happen again.

 

[joaquins]

I'm ok on chrome on my S4mini, upper logo is a bit big on landscape, not a problem in portrait.
Thanks for adding the border shades, and the withe is more comfortable now, great progress so far,  I like where this is going. I'm ok with font size now, still too much spare space at the sides, and I would like something like this shadow or any other line between one post and the other. Also some square for the quotes. Search in the top bar would help. So far I'm really happy and thankful of all this work, thanks Ethan!

JS

 

[Ethan]

Thanks for the passionate comments everyone.  You may have noticed some tweaks today, and I will continue to make adjustments in the coming days/weeks/months to improve usability.  It's a work in (incremental) progress.
In the meantime, go build/break something.

 

[shot]

It's interesting to notice that logo is too big on mobile screen when browsing through forum, but it's small enough (actually just the right size!) when you switch to Gallery section from the main menu!
This is when viewed on S3/chrome.

 

[duantro]

It's interesting to notice that logo is too big on mobile screen when browsing through forum, but it's small enough (actually just the right size!) when you switch to Gallery section from the main menu!
This is when viewed on S3/chrome.

You are correct about the logo being perfect in the gallery section while in landscape mode on iPhone!
Thanks Ethan, I'm sure this is an incredibly daunting task. I dig the new improvements. I really like the width that the text spans now. 8)

 

[ramshackles]

Liking the new colour scheme, but I think there a couple of problems with the new layout:

1. Wasted space at the top of the screen. The breadcrumb trails, two (?!) search bars and "NEWS" banner take up half the screen on my laptop.  All I can see without scrolling is the rules and technical docs. To come on a forum and not see the actual forum is a bit naff.

2. Fonts, buttons etc too big (like everyone says). It's like reading a kids' book. You could make those search bars a whole lot smaller. And perhaps put the news (or one of the search bars) on the right of the screen where there is just dead whitespace

 

[Kingston]

I didn't actually check on ipad yesterday when i posted my critique.

But holy crap the fonts are large now!  at least i don't get the very wide (wasted space) margins on the tablet but there are like two posts on the screen max, and these are short ones.