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  1. New Site Help; Suggestions and Bug Reports

    http://brog.zeonfederated.com/post/13736396787/why-the-new-colorless-is-better
    #153 • 2011-12-25 11:13:54 * • Admin said:

    Yes hello, this is your lover and friend, acostoss momo poodle. I am here to explain some of the changes, how they affect the site, how everyone is to conduct themselves, and collect bug reports and suggestions.

    Changes

    Boards and Tags, Bags and Toards

    First off, you may notice that boards are gone. Copied from the linked blog post:

    A more refined tag system built from the ground up. Tags replace boards, or boards replace tags, or maybe they simply merge: thing is, a thread can belong to many tags, and each tag has a special page which is customizable by the tag creator: You can specify a description and a better name for the tag, special text shown in the sidebar (great place for rules, or notices!), and a thumbnail.

    Basically, everyone makes tags, the most popular ones go to the top bar. Remember to make sure they follow the tag guidelines, though!

    Gravatars and Emails

    There has been a bit of confusion surrounding these. As it stands, when we ported the user db, all accounts were sent a confirmation email to the email account they used when signing up for the old site. To get your Gravatar working on this site, you need to confirm your email address by clicking the link that was sent to it. After doing that, you can go to your settings page and "Defaultize" it. Whichever email is set to Default becomes the email to which all mention emails are sent, and the one that decides what Gravatar you use. This makes it easy to manage many emails and shift between Gravatars on-the-fly.

    Likes and Helpful Posts;Uses

    Another new feature is the addition of a Rep system, via Likes and Helpful Posts. By liking a thread, or marking a post as helpful, you provide the poster with Rep. This rep is not shown, but you can see how they stack up to others on their profile. This allows for a couple things, some planned, and some already implemented. You can sort threads by their popularity, and, later one, we will be offering badges and possibly even features to highly-repped users.

    Thread Sorting

    Probably one of my favorites, we can all sort the forum as we'd like. You can sort by Popularity, which takes the age of the thread, how many replies it has, and how liked it is into account when stacking it up against other thread. This ensures we have the best-of-the-best on the front page.

    If you don't like this, we still have the old, standard thread sorting available, where the last bumped thread is at the top.

    The third style of sorting just takes the newest threads andputs them at the top. It doesn't factor in posts, popularity, or anything. Think of it as being akin to a Tumblr, Twitter or Facebook Timeline.

    Notifications, Notification Emails, and Replies

    Another feature I will be using often has do do with Notifications. A little notification message pops up when you are PM'd or mentioned. If you have it enabled in your settings, an email will also be set to your "Default" email address. The nifty thing is, if you reply to that email, it will automatically post that to the thread in which you were mentioned. If it is from a PM, it will automatically reply to that PM with the text in the email. When doing this, though, be sure to remove all other reply text in the email box. It will be sent with your post, if you do not.

    Posts and Ownership

    All threads are independent of their child posts. That is to say, if I remove this thread, all replies to it are still possible to link to and view.

    Thread makers can lock and unlock their own threads.

    Polls

    Polls are also independant of threads. You can shift between many polls, or remove them from a thread altogether, all while still retaining the same poll. This also means you can have the same poll in 5 threads at once!

    Attachments and ALL THE THINGS

    You can now upload images to the site, again. You can also view an overview of everything you have uploaded or made, including threads, posts, badges(if your userClass permits it), pages (again, userClass permitting), and polls.

    Other

    There is actually much more, much that isn't really worth saying. Little optimizations, tiny bugs fixed, and a ton of decisions made during the development of the site. If there is anything you are unsure or confused about, ask about it in this thread.

    AND IF YOU FIND A BUG PLEASE EMAIL IT TO hello@thecolorless.net INSTEAD OF MAKING A NEW THREAD ABOUT IT.

    -- added by Trev

  3. #154 • 2011-12-25 11:14:11 * • Admin said:

    Even though we are always taking bug reports and suggestions at hello@thecolorless.net, not everyone sends them in. This holds true, even now. Thus, feel free to post them here, and we'll get right on it.

    Current To-do:

    • Fix Bugs
    • Autoembed videos and images like in the old site
    • change chat channel urls to mimic the old ones
    • implement a bug/feature report system
    • NSFW tags, 18+ hiding until opt-out
    • Simpler poll and badge use
    • Tag hiding from frontpage
    • More homepage sortings, such as "Friends' Posts" or "Favorite tags"
    • Moderator Control Panel
    • Swearword filter until opt-out
    • Pagination buttons at the top and bottom of the thread
    • Expand/collapse button for the first thread on pages > 1
    • Reply button in PMs
    • Export Chatlog Feature

    Current Bugs:

    • Chat doesn't work in iOS or Android mobile.
    • Modal windows on small screens are terribad.
    • Any message beginning with "/" or "\" is not passed.

    Finished:

    • Back To Top button
    • Fixed Global Users online bug
    • Mud Green
    • Kick/Mute is in chat

    Ideas:

    • Site-style changing functionality
    • Button Consolidation
    • Social Media Links
    • Notifications in Chat
    • Notifications When Friend Makes a Thread
    • Private Chat Messaging
    • User-controlled Account Deletion
  4. #182 • 2011-12-25 12:27:21 * • break said:

    ookay so, uhm.. thanks for oyur hard work, though i kinda really hate the new design. a lot. i didnt really minfd the former design changs, btu this thing now, i really hate it. anyways there is another problem, beeign taht, well uhm, all my PM's are gone without a trace.

    also the "back to top" button on the bottom of the page is missing, sadly. also it seems liek the stickied threads arent stickied anymore.

  8. #188 • 2011-12-25 12:47:14 • break said:

    also threads that get posted in apparently stay where they were, too.. i hoope youl fix this stuff soon? (actually, why didnt you actually finish the new design before releasing it or making it? the way it is now, its like a buggy game that was released half-finished because the developers wnated to meet the deadline.. yeah, this is like gothic 3!

  9. #189 • 2011-12-25 12:49:56 * • Admin said:

    @break

    First, we are working off of a new threads database. The old one was incompatible with the new site software. Thus, all threads are gone. We will have a read-only archive of the old site, users and threads included, soon.

    Second, if you are going to say you "hate the design", please tell me what you hate, and what you'd change.

    Third, new database also means all PMs are gone.

    Fourth, threads will no longer be stickied.

    Fifth, I'll add the "Back to Top" button to the suggested features list.

    @Dante_Butler

    We are using the same chat with only a couple tweaks, one of which broke compatibility on mobile devices. This same thing may have also broken chat for you. I haven't gotten any other reports on Firefox not working,and I know we definitely tested Firefox. What version number are you using?

    As for badges, we will be adding them in soon, when our designer finishes them. We're going for a different design on them, and thus need them remade. Please excuse the wait.

  10. #192 • 2011-12-25 13:02:55 • break said:

    @Admin so you wont be restoring the threads? what with the old sticky threads, especially the currently ongoing Art Coliseum competition? id say a read-oly archive is a very.. unsatisfieng method. i still dotn get why you even did this in the first palce when it juts doesnt work... coudltn you have tried it with dev first? dev didnt have a smch cntent as the original site after all.

    well its hard to explain; its just that the moment i saaw the new design, it immediately stuck me as "extremely ugly"... well, first, it kinda lost the charme the old version had; and i was always fond of the colorscheme, design, and the "speechbubble* deisgn of the posts.. personnaly, a si see no benefits in the new design, i#d actualy just change it all back so taht may not be a big help XD

    you wont be able to fix taht either huh?

    even if they arent stickied anymore (why not, anyways?) they shoudl at least go up to the head of the list when someone posts in them, like it was before.

    i used the "back to top" button alot before...

  12. #194 • 2011-12-25 13:10:33 • Raizeil said:

    On the home page, the top topic buttons, "Anime" "Colorless" etc. look messy with the rest of the css idk maybe you guys want help with buttons? if you send me specifications i can graphically design some...

  13. #201 • 2011-12-25 13:22:07 * • Admin said:

    @break Shirosuke knew of this beforehand, and will be remaking her Art Coliseum thread.

    The posts are still speech bubbles, and point to the username.

    The new design is to make it easier to use the new site software. We aren't running the same software we were using before. It is recoded from the ground up, while this isn't apparent to the end user. That is why we suddenly have so many new threads.

    We moved to a new way of sorting threads, in that popular threads are shown first. I'll talk to Gargron on the idea of having stickied threads, but they ought to be obsolete with the popularity indexing.

    As I said before, the button will be added back.

    @OneDollar

    We'll have one in soon, one custom coded for the site. as we haven't many threads yet, I ask that you bear with us and click through a page or two.

    I'll add in Mud Green later tonight.

    @Raizeil

    They are generated from the tag pages, actually. Whatever image is chosen for the tag page is then cropped and used for the background of the little tag buttons. The buttons themselves are pure CSS.

    If you have any design ideas for them, I'd love to hear them.

  14. #204 • 2011-12-25 13:30:48 • break said:

    weeell but what with all the other threads...

    eh? ah now i see the pointer, but.. it just points upward, not to the username. at least on chrome.

    hm i see... so wt the new softwae, the old designwas impossible? so, once oyu et the hang of it, will you improve the design again?

    hmmm i think the "popular threads up" system is only necessary when there are really many posters, and well, its kidna moderate here on colorless.

  15. #205 • 2011-12-25 13:31:35 • Admin said:

    Also, taken from the blog post, a little bit on the site design:

    The new design is more organized, and adapts to your capabilities: equally usable on small mobile phone screens and large LCD monitors. A natural color scheme is no longer monochromatic - it’s boring without any colors! And you don’t have to take the site name literally ;)

  16. #207 • 2011-12-25 13:34:34 • Admin said:

    @Break

    As it is, now, the system is already working great. We see great threads at the top, with many likes and replies, and less great ones at the bottom, with fewer likes and replies.

    It is not the design that was impossible, but the database. The design was quite nearly possible in it's form, it was just not a good one. It was static, never changed size, making it hard for small screens to use it. It had no rhyme or reason, things were just tacked in to be there, like the boards at the top. There was not real evolution to the "design", in such a way it detracted from usability.

    Hmm, I'll see if I can fix that.

  17. #214 • 2011-12-25 13:47:00 • break said:

    hmm okay if you say so...

    hmm i sill liked the old design.. i liked how it was monochromatic and minimalistic, too. no way to have a button to switch designs in cas eoyu dtn use a cellphone? many sites with designchanges have buttons to switch between them..

    okay^^

  18. #244 • 2011-12-25 14:42:42 * • MyogiWarrior34 said:

    Do you think it would be best to have the automatic Markdown for images and youtube links like before? It's kinda hard to do the markdowns by yourself, especially if a certain member may not be so familiar with the system even. This would ease the post stress that may harm our members.

    I am typing this experiencing said markdown stress at the moment

    And another suggestion, rechanging the post time from 24-hour to 12-hour... example is Break's post above mine.

    Instead of... 214 • 2011-12-25 13:47:00 • break said: It would best be 214 • 2011-12-25 1:47 pm • break said:

    Other suggestions: 1. Return the Search bar? 2. Member Search link? 3. Have a count of the current number of members we have shown somewhere on the front page to know of our growth? 4. Ability of the Thread starter to edit their post INCLUDING any link they added. 5. Include links to user's FB, YT, DA, Skype, & Twitter on their profile, like before if that's alright?

    Other than these little things, I am quite fond of the new look although experience me flipping tables along the way as changes such as these are things I'm not used to on the first minute.

  22. #315 • 2011-12-25 17:59:11 * • break said:

    @Gargron that doesnt really help.. not much,at least.. and like @MyogiWarrior34 said, most people would delete those after some time.. plus, i dunno how it is for others, but in the days before the designchange, i didnt receive any emails with the notificaions anymore. so the most recent PM's, the oens that are important, are foever lost.

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