487 replies to this topic

[Gaiiden]

Alrighty, we are at 125% line-height right now. When I refreshed the page it did roll up a bit. Still seems readable to me, but we'll see if anyone notices or finds it worse.

you've currently got:

ipb_styles.css:2678

.post_body {
    margin-left: 235px;
    line-height: 100%;
}

    .post_block.no_sidebar .post_body {
        margin-left: 0px;
    }
    
    .post_body .post {
        margin-top: 3px;
        padding: 10px;
        line-height: 150%; /* <--- chrome says this is being matched, and it looks bloody ugly */
    }

Hey MaulingMonkey why does the CSS styling you posted list the margin-left property as 235px? We've since edited that down to 185px

[davepermen]

I'm not sure as to the origins of this sentiment that discussing problems with the new site is somehow equivalent to whining or attacking the developers, but it's patently ridiculous. When you support a software product, you don't consider users submitting feedback and bug reports as personal attacks, do you? I know for me, user feedback is ALWAYS appreciated, even if we don't always end up making the change the user wanted. So much so, in fact, that both at work as well as in my hobbyist projects I continually reach out to users to cajole them into giving feedback. Trying to put a damper on that here seems absolutely mind boggling.

it's a typical behaviour that when something changes, people start to cry omg it's all bad. seen it often enough. feedback is appreciated, of course. but overreaction is not.

As for the rating system, it's not hard to look at the new system and determine logically what the outcome of its effects will be. You don't always have to run an experiment to know the outcome of a process. Trying to dump off the role previously filled by the rating system onto the moderators, who already have enough work to do, doesn't sound like a brilliant move to me. It's not really their job to try to run posts through the constantly fluctuating filter of community standards, and even if it were I don't think they could do it with any degree of success.

well, as said, i know it works very well in .. well, about any other forum. so yes, looking at the outcome means one thing: it should work very well here, too.

Where would they draw the line? Profanity? How about if I just call you a stupid moron? What if I followed you around and after every single one of your posts, I also posted a followup "I think everything he just said is wrong."? I bet that would get me an even higher rating, since a few people might find it funny to rate those posts up, and anyone who finds it annoying won't have any recourse but to bug the moderators to censor me when the actual content of my posts isn't breaking any rules.

I think everything he just said is wrong.


sorry, had to but that's about exactly my point: always this negativity, always this "that could go wrong in so many ways!!" how about trying and see if it does? so far, in other fories, it did not go wrong. why should this be different? are we such a bad community?

[MaulingMonkey]

Alrighty, we are at 125% line-height right now. When I refreshed the page it did roll up a bit. Still seems readable to me, but we'll see if anyone notices or finds it worse.

Looks good to me.

Hey MaulingMonkey why does the CSS styling you posted list the margin-left property as 235px? We've since edited that down to 185px

Doesn't now. Must've changed while I was preparing my post? Although superpig was ranting about server-side caching in IRC earlier... clarifying right after I cleared my client-side caching testing the black theme at time

EDIT: You've got multiple copies of ipb_styles.css, and that was from the black theme.

URLS:
white theme: http://www.gamedev.net/public/style_css/css_4/ipb_styles.css
black theme: http://www.gamedev.net/public/style_css/css_8/ipb_styles.css

sorry, had to but that's about exactly my point: always this negativity, always this "that could go wrong in so many ways!!" how about trying and see if it does? so far, in other fories, it did not go wrong. why should this be different? are we such a bad community?

But did it go right in other forums? I can't think of a single forum I frequently read anymore that has rating up without rating down of any sort. Especially if we're de-emphasizing the per-user aspect of ratings in favor of the actual post contents. But I guess I'm just another negative nancy

[Wan]

All this new stuff is overwhelming. I feel lost.

In this new design, where do I go to eat fondue while sipping Gato Negro and listening to Vaya Con Dios?

[Wan]

And yes, I have zero friends. Why does everyone need to know that?

[littlekid]

Hi, just wondering is it normal for all the drop down menus to pop open while the page is loading?? I am on Chrome and every time I go to a new page, all the drop down menu will pop open until the whole page finish loading and then it pops back. The drop down menus I am referring to is like the one on the top left when you click on your nick/name and it appears the "My Profile, My Settings etc" menu.

I really love the ability to now read on mobile devices. Kudos to it. I often read GameDev website on the go. The only nitpick that I would say is to have a faster way to get to the forums especially on a mobile device, because it does take awhile to load pages on the iphone4 But it is just a small issue

regards

[davepermen]

But did it go right in other forums? I can't think of a single forum I frequently read anymore that has rating up without rating down of any sort. Especially if we're de-emphasizing the per-user aspect of ratings in favor of the actual post contents. But I guess I'm just another negative nancy

yes, sir, as i stated repeatedly, it works just fine everywhere. notebookreview.com has a forum i'm frequently on as an example. others exist.

[__sprite]

Hi, just wondering is it normal for all the drop down menus to pop open while the page is loading?? I am on Chrome and every time I go to a new page, all the drop down menu will pop open until the whole page finish loading and then it pops back. The drop down menus I am referring to is like the one on the top left when you click on your nick/name and it appears the "My Profile, My Settings etc" menu.

Yeah, happens for me too. I reported it as a bug.

[way2lazy2care]

But did it go right in other forums? I can't think of a single forum I frequently read anymore that has rating up without rating down of any sort. Especially if we're de-emphasizing the per-user aspect of ratings in favor of the actual post contents. But I guess I'm just another negative nancy

I think the reason up and down works in other forums is either that the down votes just pertain to posts and don't affect overall profile ratings (stack overflow as far as I know is like this), which I think we should have, or they tie in negative consequences with being downvoted, which we never had outside of a number. Having read Dr. Seuss's Sneetches, I really couldn't care if a number of mine was high or low unless it were related to my bank account.

As it was, it was just a really arbitrary number. Really it was. People got rated down for so many reasons that the number lost pretty much all meaning for me. At least now I can look at a rating and think, "well this guy at least was agreed with or helped X people," as opposed to before where I would think, "Well this guy must rarely post in the lounge."

I still find ratings to be pretty arbitrary in the new system and think that communities where the people in them care enough to tell people when they are being stupid and moderators are willing to back them up don't need ratings.

[d000hg]

Regarding the rating system: I've been voted down. Multiple times. A few times it fell awfully.

But what did I learn from that? I realized I was being an ass, and more importantly, unprofessional.

I often learned the hard way that I was wrong.

I'll agree when it comes to political/religion discussions, the rating system becomes unfair, but I just stay away from them. This is a technical forum after all, a few comments may go into the lounge but an actual debate isn't best handled in GD.Net

I learnt to shut my mouth when I don't know about something or my opinion isn't needed, and to only speak when I am required and I can add something of value to the topic. Surprisingly I saw how my rating went up.

GD's old rating system was fairly atypical... and most other forums I'm on don't descend into anarchy without it, even those with NO rating system. The fact most people here are not jerks is the main thing... didn't you find people telling you that you were an ass affected you?

Not to mention - the rating system caused massive complaints when it was added.

I know the personality comes from us, but I'm talking about the site. Now it looks like any other forums, but okay, it's just my opinion. I never liked forums so much because of their layout. Maybe I'll get used to this one.

GD didn't have a distinctive look because they wanted to be cool, it was because they wrote their own software and were stuck with it. It has stayed 'retro' because it was getting out-dated, not because they chose to BE retro.

The biggest problem I have with the current system is that there is no negative feedback ability to either a) make people correct their attitude

How about, you know, telling people you don't like what they've said rather than making a cowardly down-vote where they can't even see what they did wrong? PM them or write in the forum in a respectful way. If they are properly offensive, report to mods.

[Krohm]

Developer journals no longer have their own sub-forum. To access what I think you're looking for, go to the menu at the top and click on Community -> Developer Journals. This is a hub page for the journals. From there, you can see the latest updates, filter by most popular, most commented, highest rated blogs, etc.

Yes, thank you very much but I also see 'external' blogs being replicated here. Such as Leadwerk's. Was it there before? Maybe I didn't pay attention and maybe it always have been there but... perhaps there should be some sort of separation? I don't know.

[Cygnus_X]

Alrighty, we are at 125% line-height right now. When I refreshed the page it did roll up a bit. Still seems readable to me, but we'll see if anyone notices or finds it worse.

It feels better... but I can't tell if its my eyes adusting, or if its because i'm on my laptop and not my desktop.... or if its just really better.


My other thoughts:

The feedback tab on the right needs to go.... its pretty lame.
Also, I do not need to know how many post a user has (located under group). If I wanted to know this, I could look it up. I'd rather save the vertical space.
Can we move the 'vote this post up' botton to the 'footer' of the comment/post? Again, less white space in the vertical would be a good thing. Though, there is a chance if this is changed that it may not look as good as I think it would.

Overall... Good Job with the changes... especially the response to user comments you've had so far.

Edit: One more thing. With some people, the 'joined' date under their name in the forums doesn't have enough space and gets kicked down to the next line. You may need to abbreviate Months to make this fit correctly, or widen the right column/div and push everything left.

[Mike.Popoloski]

Well, whatever my quota is for upvotes, it appears I'm still maxed out, even though today is ostensibly a new day. As for how many it was, well, my best guess is around a dozen, but I'm entirely sure.

[rip-off]

You're done, Mike. You only get 10 - ever. I hope you picked wisely =]

[MaulingMonkey]

But did it go right in other forums? I can't think of a single forum I frequently read anymore that has rating up without rating down of any sort. Especially if we're de-emphasizing the per-user aspect of ratings in favor of the actual post contents. But I guess I'm just another negative nancy

yes, sir, as i stated repeatedly, it works just fine everywhere. notebookreview.com has a forum i'm frequently on as an example. others exist.

That communities manage to survive, and sometimes even thrive without downvoting doesn't surprise me - I have seen them, after all - but it doesn't work "just fine everywhere", not in my books by any stretch. More to the point: Did those communities succeed in spite of the lack of negative rating options or because of that lack? Some can get by on the quality of their moderators, others by their elaborate systems of warnings, points, suspensions and bans. We tend to forget those that fail: we don't stick around.

And we know well what gdnet was like before the ratings system. Do you seriously believe introducing only the positive ratings would've improved the quality of posting? We could have the moderators issue more suspensions and bans at the expense of their time, but how is that an improvement?

The biggest problem I have with the current system is that there is no negative feedback ability to either a) make people correct their attitude

How about, you know, telling people you don't like what they've said rather than making a cowardly down-vote where they can't even see what they did wrong?

Yeah, because that's totally effective on it's own, since everyone who even thinks about rating someone down is a coward that hasn't already voiced their distaste and gone blithely ignored.

Is there no place for a middle ground between simply ignored words and moderator action?

Being able to point out an erroneous post, at the very least, seems something worthwhile. You can hope everyone reads the thread in whole, but some threads drag long, and in my experience, not even in on the best of forums will everyone read every page. If protecting precious egos from scary negative signs is that big an issue, make it bloody opt in like help wanted.

[way2lazy2care]

Is there no place for a middle ground between simply ignored words and moderator action?

The middle ground being a simply ignored number?

[phantom]

Is there no place for a middle ground between simply ignored words and moderator action?

The middle ground being a simply ignored number?

Except that in general the number WASNT ignored and the introduction of the rating system was a POSITIVE step for the overall post content of this site.

[MaulingMonkey]

Is there no place for a middle ground between simply ignored words and moderator action?

The middle ground being a simply ignored number?

That followed you. That number was an awesome stalker, man. Did the job of 10 men!

[Oluseyi]

I find the layout cluttered. Too many boxes in too many places with too many icons and too many badges. Also, the moderation tools in forum listings cause things to move around due to changes to the size of the containing div. Nothing is worse in UI than things arbitrarily moving around.

I don't like that i have to click the drop-downs to activate them (Safari 5.0.3, OS X 10.6.6). Drop downs on the web should drop on hover, close on mouse-out.

I think the social tools were chosen a little indiscriminately (throw everything in). I think Twitter and Facebook were all that were needed; what use is a StumbleUpon badge on a GDNet forum thread?

I hate the quote boxes. They're hideous.

I dislike the new smiley tags. They complicate programmer-y stuff like enumerated lists or parenthetical expressions.

Formatting is problematic for me. Newlines in the edit box aren't properly converted into paragraphs plus vertical margin, so I have to append additional newlines.

Other than that, it's fine. It's a forum; it'll do just fine.

[Mike.Popoloski]

Is there no place for a middle ground between simply ignored words and moderator action?

The middle ground being a simply ignored number?

As said before, the number isn't really about YOU, it's about letting everyone else encode their opinion of you into some easily viewable format. If you didn't use them or even look at them, that's fine! But if someone else wants to, why stop them? In fact, if you completely ignored them, why are you even arguing about this at all? You shouldn't care one way or the other.

Obviously, you did care about the number, but since the community held you in little regard, you aren't happy with the system. Since you guys are so keen on having everything out in the open instead of the supposedly "cowardly" use of ratings, here we go: I would rate you down for this thread alone due to your increasingly sarcastic comments, posts with little content other than mild attacks on other people, and no thought or rational arguments to back up your ideas. Apparently saying this out loud in its own post is far less disruptive than doing it quickly off to the side, so I'll try to call it out more often when I see it.