UBB.Developers Forums General Discussion Suggestions and Feedback Need some feedback

Within the next couple of versions I'd like to make a bit of a change to the icon's displayed on the postlist.php, showflat.php and showthreaded.php pages.

Basically right now you need 2 icons, one for read and one for unread. This is somewhat limiting as well since they pretty much have to be the same color in order for everyone to know when a thread has new posts or not. So you can't just upload icons with varying colors.

What I'm thinking of is adding a new column to the very left and in here we display some sort of icon when a thread is new, then the current icons could be whatever color you want them to be. And you'd only need 1 icon since this wouldn't be used to track read/unread status.

Basically, what I'm looking for is if everyone thinks this would be a good idea. And if so, what kind of icon should we use as the default icon to designate a thread with new posts.

I recall something being requested about this same idea. (maybe in the hacks area)

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I think it's a good idea. Personally I would keep using the light bulbs for the read/unread status so not to break the theme of it all.
</2cents>

Good point. I think maybe if we use the lightbulbs actually we'd just need the lit one to designate unread. Otherwise the column could remain empty or be used for other requested things like hot topics, etc.

But this would cripple the forums, wouldn't it? Or would the unread icon be there for all unread posts when viewing in expanded mode or in a thread?

I don't like the idea anyway, but I don't even use multiple icons today. I think it just looks ugly and way too cluttered with so many different icons, it takes away the focus from what is important (if it is a new post or not and what the thread/post is about, which is found in the topic text).

The idea of having just a few thread icons showing information that you don't get today is a way better idea as far as I'm concerned. That is, the post icon shows if it is a normal thread/poll/sticky/attachment.

But I won't complain much if you add this change (as long as you would still show all new posts when in expanded mode), since I'd just remove it from the template.

At this point it's just an idea in my head. I wouldn't want this to be a step backward but yes the expanded/threaded views is one thing that's kept me from doing this in the past because I'm just not sure how to pull it off visually.

I never minded the two tone message icons, it's part of what makes threads unique. But, I never had to make icons either. If you want to change that part my suggestion is (you're proably going to call this Blasphemy) that you use the UBB.classic/OpenTopic model where you have the message icons still, but to the left is the colored folders that indicate a topic with a read or unread message in it. The top level should still use the lightbulbs I think.

My reasons for the suggestion are:
1)It's not so different that people are unused to how it works. Not just UBB.classic but every UBB clone out there uses it. I'd wager that most people who are familiar with the internet are familiar with this design and behaviour. Another stong reason to keep threads as is by the way.

2)Because every UBB clone out there uses it there are a gabillion and 3 places to get customized icons to replace the stock folders.


3)We already have stock folders to add to the .zips

As a Product Manager I'm all for making threads feel more like the UBB feel so that people can go from one to the other seamlessly. As a UBB.threads owner I'm all about keeping my .threads board a .threads board.

I do think though that IF a change is made, that it should be made to bring it closer to our other products. That's IF a change needs to be made.


[edited in] I have to think about how it would work in threaded.

ok, my asbestos is on. fire away.

Maybe have one set of icon and change the background of the post icon table cell when the post is new. Thus skipping the extras icon completely.

Speaking of expanded view, isn't there still a bug which makes some replies not show up when viewing in expanded mode? I'm almost positive of this, I think I saw it here on td just recently.

I'm totally aware of the fact that it would be bettor for infopop that their products are similar. Especially since threads is considered as the next step for classic owners, and they don't want to loose functionality either.

I'm also aware of the fact that probably most people like having their sites cluttered with small icons, scrolling text, bouncing images and whatnot. But I for one hate it. It is actually one of the reasons that I've always liked threads as both a user and an admin. To me, it feels like all this abundance of extra meaningless things are used to hide the fact that the real content isn't good.

The thing is, that not many other forums have the threaded view, so they can use simpler forms of showing information. More features means more possibilites of problems. But as I said, as long as no functionality is removed it doesn't really matter to me. Not now when we have the wonderful templates.

Another way to do it would be to keep the options open, let the admins decide what they think is best. If they want two icons per post, let them have it, but those who just wants one can have it also.

As far as the yellow/orange icons go (even the book) I don't like them either even though they are very threads-specific. We used our own images before, but now we use the folder icon from an old version, which is changed to bright red for unread posts.

That's an option as well. One icon set would definitely be great to achieve as it will make it easier for users to upload new post icons, but how it's achieved is open for discussion

I think expanded should be working ok. The only time I've seen this recently is when the placeholder user wasn't setup properly.

Yeah, it would be easier for people to add icons if they only have to make one.

Maybe the background of the whole row could be a different color. That would make new posts very easy to spot. But then there would have to be two lighttable and two darktable styles. Not too bad though.

I'll check up on the expanded view and post a bug report if I find anything.

Instead of two lighttable and darktables just add another table inside to add a 'ring' around the image to indicate 'new' then you could use one image. This would let us use the same templates too.

The two extra styles were for having the whole row with a different background color. That is, another color behind the post icon, the subject, the date etc. This would make it very clear that it is a new post.

I suppose you could get away with just one color to mark a whole row as new. All the new threads would have the same background color so it would be very easy to see what's new It would break the altering colors but not sure if that would be a bad thing in this case. Choices, choices.

I don't like the idea of a seperate column. The way it works now is just fine. But the suggestion with another css-class for new posts sounds good!

Erm, by the way. We are just talking about new posts, are there still bugs in the new-post tracking? On my forums I encounter problems:
- (always) Going over the link "Last post" makes ALL posts in that board read -> huge bug.
- (sporadic) The main page shows several new posts (correct), after going to postlist, none is marked as new (wrong) -> bug

Going to be fixed in 6.1? Cool

Hmmm...

First, I have to agree with Navaho: If you're going to do it then shift the look towards Classic since that's what most peeps are use to.

*Dal puts on his flame retardant clothing...*

Second, I like the way Threads looks and the fact that it's not Classic. My users, on the other hand, are use to Classic. So why not create a "Classic skin" that incorporates the new icon ideas. With the template approach to Threads, and all the existing Classic templates that have been created already, it wouldn't be that difficult to pull it off. You could also add an admin option to select "UBB Threads or UBB Classic" view.

Of course all of this is easy for me to say cause I don't have to write the script

One of the things I'm wrestling with from a design perspective is the amount of horizontal room to give Threads. I've removed a menu that I use to use with my Classic forum; it was causing problems before the move to Threads and I like the way a forum looks when it has all of the horizontal space on the screen. If you start adding more columns then there is less room to display the existing ones, and even less room for someone to add a side bar to their page.

Last but not least: I think you are a genius Scream because of the way you've used basic html templates to control the layout of Threads. I like the fact that I don't have to be a script guru to change the look and feel of my forum. Whatever you do please do not deviate from the use of templates! Dare I say it: Being an administrator of a Threads forum is actually enjoyable cause it's so easy!

Actually I haven't been able to duplicate any problems with the post tracking so I don't know what to fix If I can get it to not work correctly then I can probably fix it.

I really like the idea of a different color for the row when something is new as well. The question I have now is should this be one color for all new or should it alternate as well like the lighttable/darktable does.

And thanks for the feedback on the templates. I was hoping people would find them somewhat easy to work with as that was the whole point

I think alternating would be the ticket. If they user want's all the same color they could change the style sheet so that both styles matched.

And what happens if old stylesheets are used then? No color change on the row since the new classes are not listed?

I would prefer to just make a slight change to the image cell where the lightbulb is now.

Or better yet, just leave it alone! I like it how it is now Maybe put this change in as an option that can be turned on?

Definitely nothing is set in stone right now that this will be done. Just talk at this point. Basically just thinking of ways to make the post icons more flexible.

From time to time things do need to get added into the existing sytlesheets with an upgrade. Like when we added the graphs onto the pull results. That required adding a .pollcolor class to all existing stylesheets.

Can always add the new style classes to the old style sheets to make them work.

Thanks for doing the templates! I was hacking my own board within days of setting up Threads

...so the postlist will have colored rows for new posts. What happens to showflat and showthreaded? Will the header of the new posts display in the "new"-color as well?

Scream, if you make the changes, is there a posibility to mark the first post of a thread new as well? At the moment showflat and showthreaded show the very first post always as "read".

[]Actually I haven't been able to duplicate any problems with the post tracking so I don't know what to fix If I can get it to not work correctly then I can probably fix it.

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ok, the second one is sporadic and I'm not able to find a pattern. But the first point is permanent. On the Main Index you got all the "Last post"-links. Using these links always makes all posts in that board marked as read... Even here on threadsdev.

Ah ok. Yes, using these last post by links bypasses the postlist screen which actually does the newpost checking. I've tried to put in a fix for this but unforunately there isn't a real solution that I can find without adding a bunch of queries to the showthreaded/showflat scripts that the postlist script does normally.

I think that would be best to keep things consistent. The header should display in the same color that is used on the postlist screen. And yes, I should be able to make the changes so the first post is marked correctly.

So far I think this is probably one of the better ways to handle this. It doesn't require adding a new column and eliminates the need for the 2 sets of icons, already this was a problem for 6.1 as I didn't have orange versions of several images available, also it would allow for post icons to be of any color.

Yes, I think this is the best way too, and it will definitely be very easy to see which posts that are new.

Sounds good to me.

I'd like to have only one set of icons, and would also prefer that another column not be added.

The single set of icons would also help if the icons were made stylesheet-specific. I think this was talked about as a future change.

You probably could create directories in your images directory with the same name as the style sheets that each contained a complete set of graphics to be used with that style sheet. Then when the send_header function is called in your ubbt.inc.php script you could set the $config['images'] variable to include the name of the style sheet's directory... $config['images'] = "{$config['images']/$StyleSheet"; so that from there out all calls to images went to that style sheet's directory.

I did something like this somewhere... actually think it was a few site revamps ago at my main site.


Edit note: Now that templates are used it would be kinda neat to use different templates based on the style sheet too... wooo just think of the number of combinations... billions and billions and billions... wait that's Carl Sagan... ok at least a half dozen or more... lol

posted by JustDave:

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Edit note: Now that templates are used it would be kinda neat to use different templates based on the style sheet too... wooo just think of the number of combinations... billions and billions and billions... wait that's Carl Sagan... ok at least a half dozen or more... lol

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I was thinking the same thing yesterday in a post to Conrad over at the Info Pop site (he gave me the idea). What about having a "Threads style" and a "Classic style" for the templates...

Dalar has done a mod for this, which can be found here.

At my site we usually theme the site during christmas (and sometimes on Halloween and such) and having a set of christmas templates is going to save me some time on themeing the forum.

I'd say that the images should be based on the template rather than stylesheet, and that each template could have a different set of stylesheets. Don't know how stylesheet selection would work for users if the template is changed though.