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Barbelith just changed on me.

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01:38 / 29.03.04

the loss of a clear dividing line between Revolution fora and Spectacle fora

Ah, but it's still there - They both begin and end with similar shades, the purple of A,F&D referencing Head Shop's blue, forcing a break point in the 'rainbow', then progressing through to a similar finishing colour (the green Switchboard/yellow Music). Subtle bookending.

Never fond of the pictures that we had on the old design - I thought they reinforced the whole 'dull intellectualism' thing that was going on with the classical white and gold, whereas now we've got 'exciting, NEW! intellectualism'.

I don't think the loss of info on the main screen matters all that much either, really. The topic titles changing from grey to gold to show that they contained new posts since your last visit never worked properly and only three topics were visible anyway, so more often than not you still had to go into the forum index page to find out if anything had been updated. Plus, of course, you had to do that with Conversation from the start, and that was the busiest part of the board.

It also increases the feeling that Barbelith is a hub for a number of individual message boards. I think it'd be interesting to leave it as is and see if it makes each area a separate district in Barbelith Town, much as the Magick is already.

01:59 / 29.03.04

Re: The lack of 'latest threads' listed:
I took issue with it at first, but I like it upon short reflection. It's less accessible but more prowl-conducive - Might force people to inspect/observe the areas that interest them rather than just skimming a changing list of three thread titles on their way to whatever else.

STOATIE LIEKS CHOCOLATE MILK

02:11 / 29.03.04

Actually, I'm guessing that may largely be the point.

Solitaire Rose as Tom Servo

02:40 / 29.03.04

The new look is....jarring, but I'll get used to it.

But is there a way we can get the "most recent topics" part back? I enjoyed that...as well as knowing if a subforum has new messages or not.

And things were so much better in MY day.

02:49 / 29.03.04

Yeah, jarring is right! But once my eyes adjusted I liked it... nice job. It will take some getting used to.

03:07 / 29.03.04

WOW.. was this the pretty colors you were talking about Tom? Looks great.. Im a little dizzy though..

Brigade du jour

03:40 / 29.03.04

Look! Pretty!

03:53 / 29.03.04

Madness...

Radical change Tom. I had the old page up since this morning, and came back in the evening and hit refresh. If you could have seen my face.

I'll expound more on this later. Definitely interesting...

04:34 / 29.03.04

Ooh, purdy 'lith. I like it, it's going to take a lot of getting used to, and I did like the 3 little topic titles below the forum names, but this is just so pretty and colourful, that I say YAY!

04:53 / 29.03.04

The scheme is good. It's an especially impressive feat of fast-loading, low-bandwidth design. More focus on text and issues, less glam. Feels very functional. I think it's good work. Actually kind of edgy.

04:55 / 29.03.04

*stares openmouthed, porridge spoon in mid air*

Ummm... I think I like it. I think. It's all a bit pretty for my taste and I feel a bit lost (5 mins in) but I'm sure it'll grow on me.

05:15 / 29.03.04

Now, this I like. These blues and greys are lovely. Makes for a harder edged, more crystalline Barbelith, I think.

05:40 / 29.03.04

Yummilecious colors! Definitely not a boring look and lookin' forward to what this coat of many colors brings.

05:47 / 29.03.04

Just here to hand out a few answers:

1) Colour schemes - yes they are a bit different and no - not all of them are completely perfect yet. Luckily it's really easy for me to change them, so if you have better ones, then please feel free to send them to me. Remember the core issues are: a) you want to try and make the divisions between sections relatively clear from the front page (the bars on the front page are the forums dominant colour) b) Each forum has four colours - the main colour, the first (darker) row colour, the second (lighter) row colour and a colour for the pages bar when it's there.

2) New Topics on the front page - yup - they've gone and they won't be coming back in quite the same form as before. There is a possibility that I'll bring them back in some form in the next couple of weeks - it depends how much time and / or energy I have.

3) Reply screen and previews - yeah - the reply page is not as sexy as it should be, and nor is it as well thought through. It - and various other practical pages around the place will be looked at in more depth over the next couple of weeks to try and make them a little more usable.

4) Text-styles on linux. Frankly, bum - that's really annoying. Could you send me screen shots to my plasticbag.org e-mail address and I'll see if I can figure out what's going on. Be warned if you plan to look through the CSS - the formatting on the site is pretty bloody ugly at the moment and highly confusing.

05:49 / 29.03.04

Oh and re: images - there may be a possibility of me putting in some images to add some texture and life to some of the pages. I don't know how interested people would be in that kind of thing.

05:52 / 29.03.04

OOh, very pretty. Two requests: This reply page needs a couple of the previous posts to rmind you who you're replying to. I also really need topic previews. Other than that, quite lovely.

05:55 / 29.03.04

Images are nice..

05:59 / 29.03.04

Gyah!

Its all NotTheSame!

Serves me right for not visiting lately.

06:13 / 29.03.04

Blimey! Bit of a shocker. I like it though. I agree with the idea of images, also being able to scan a few replies would help. Is not being able to see the tiop threads without entering the forum part of the plan?

06:19 / 29.03.04

Oh my goodness.

Look at all the pretty colours!

06:38 / 29.03.04

Nice. Very nice.

Thanks Tom.

06:46 / 29.03.04

Ellis! where have you been? How are you?

A niggle: I find this font very hard to read, but maybe it's just a case of getting used to it.

07:02 / 29.03.04

Does anyone else see that faint line that separates your 'edit post' option from your post? It's a bit out of place...given the lack of lines as dividers in the rest of the new board.

Apart from that, this place is Rainbow-licious. Lawrence Lleweyn Bowen might not approve, but he doesn't know anything and needs a good hard slap. And I'm pleased to note that the fora I moderate are, indeed, grey.

07:06 / 29.03.04

Who fancies being really lovely by screengrabbing what they can see, and posting it here? Only I'm on a mac and I'd like to see how much of a difference it's making. For example my fonts are lovely, and so is the reply screen where I'm typing this, but my actual thread page is on a white background which is a bit weird because it's just posts floating in the random ether...

D Terminator XXXIII

07:25 / 29.03.04

This.

Is.

Simply.

Beautiful.

What a shock to the eyes though, expecting something familiar and getting something as graphically far away from the old...

I love this.

07:37 / 29.03.04

I'm absolutely stunned! I can't say any more than that right now.

07:39 / 29.03.04

You're a dark, dark horse Tom. All that talk about should I maybe, perhaps, possibly change the name of the Magick forum....and then this! You're really something, dude.

I like having different colours for each forum.

Dan Fish - @Fish1k

07:41 / 29.03.04

Can the thread titles be aligned to the left, with the other stuff to the right? This would make the threads easier to see.

Also, would it be an option to display a 'last reply' date field? This might be an easier option than the 'replies since last visit' thing.
EDIT-sorry, just noticed this is displayed.

07:42 / 29.03.04

I'd really like to be able to see what threads there are without having to go into the actual sections. This is mainly because I am only allowed a limited amount of hits at work, and having to go into the sections to just see what is new is extra hits.

Similarly, the extra colours make it less like it is work-related documents that I am looking at, so I miss the white colour. Couldn't there be a customisable type option where you can choose what colour scheme you want?

Actually, these two reasons make me think that I shouldn't be looking at it at work in the first place. Hmm.

07:46 / 29.03.04

Olulabelle, look here for an in-thread view and here for a view of the main page.

07:54 / 29.03.04

Your links don't work, grey area.

I agree with Squirmelia that it'll be harder to look at at work, being so bright.

08:10 / 29.03.04

surely it will be easier to look at at work - it looks more like a corporate website...

08:12 / 29.03.04

Actually not sure about the two grey bars at the top and the bottom. Kinda suggests, these are the boring, functional ones, the colourful ones in the middle are where the interesting stuff happens. Which makes sense for policy & help and maybe gathering, but having creation in grey seems kinda inappropriate.

08:17 / 29.03.04

The links should work now...

STOATIE LIEKS CHOCOLATE MILK

08:24 / 29.03.04

This is really growing on me. As regards the work thing... I guess it depends where you work. Hit counts aside, the colour scheme looks a LOT less like the kind of thing they expect me to be using to slack off... but then they're used to me gazing at a mustard yellow screen.

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