New phpBB upgrade

Aydun · 09 Nov 2014, 1:10 pm

Hi all,

You may notice a few changes since your last visit, that's because we have updated to the latest and greatest version of the phpBB forum software!

The main improvement is the alert system (next to messages) You can now easily see when someone quotes/comments/thanks you etc.
You can configure what types of messages notify you if you wish.

Confirmation pages are mostly gone. no more 'Thank you for logging in' etc. You are now redirected straight to the forums.
Similarly for marking forums read and subscribing.

The layout's mostly the same, however a few links are now in menus.

Plus many other things...

Let me know if you have any questions or issues.

Dynamite · 09 Nov 2014, 1:53 pm

Man this is looking real good! I tried to move this for you but it seems I don't have the right permissions to put it in official announcements - maybe that's an admin only thing? If that's not the case I can send a screenshot of what it's doing for your debugging purposes

The notification icon is a very welcome addition. (First thing I noticed!)

Aydun · 09 Nov 2014, 2:08 pm

Fixed! Maybe..

Dynamite · 09 Nov 2014, 4:49 pm

Hats off to you sir. She's running like greased owl sh** now

Interface couldn't be easier.

Aydun · 09 Nov 2014, 5:09 pm

Thank you sir

No+Pro · 09 Nov 2014, 7:41 pm

nice
may just be me but when i delete a msg from within the msg, if that makes sense, it stays in my inbox. can still delete from inbox ok

Aydun · 09 Nov 2014, 7:54 pm

No+Pro wrote:nice
may just be me but when i delete a msg from within the msg, if that makes sense, it stays in my inbox. can still delete from inbox ok

Right you are. Same thing on the official phpbb website actually..

I'll try find out about it when I'm on a computer.

Mambo · 10 Nov 2014, 1:33 pm

Where's the option to change the theme gone?

Aydun · 10 Nov 2014, 2:02 pm

Mambo wrote:Where's the option to change the theme gone?

The old theme is incompatible with phpBB 3.1 ..

Aydun · 12 Nov 2014, 11:58 am

No+Pro wrote:nice
may just be me but when i delete a msg from within the msg, if that makes sense, it stays in my inbox. can still delete from inbox ok

Fixed as.

Aydun · 12 Nov 2014, 8:11 pm

Mambo wrote:Where's the option to change the theme gone?

Was this for compatibility btw?

I did some testing, it should work perfectly IE9 onwards and should work on practically any recent version of FF and Chrome.

IE7 and 8, unfortunately it looks a bit wacky on those, but I added a hack so those browsers will at least show the menu items now, so control panel and logout button are at least accessible, whereas before they weren't.

Mambo · 14 Nov 2014, 2:05 pm

aydun wrote:
Mambo wrote:Where's the option to change the theme gone?
Was this for compatibility btw?

I did some testing, it should work perfectly IE9 onwards and should work on practically any recent version of FF and Chrome.

IE7 and 8, unfortunately it looks a bit wacky on those, but I added a hack so those browsers will at least show the menu items now, so control panel and logout button are at least accessible, whereas before they weren't.

I don't like the look and layout of the current theme. The old one was a lot easier to navigate and looked better.

theedge · 14 Nov 2014, 9:11 pm

Mambo wrote: I don't like the look and layout of the current theme. The old one was a lot easier to navigate and looked better.

+1

It seems harder to navigate with everything buried under one menu while in the old interface all the links were in front of you as you now need an extra click to get to where you want to go. So I quite liked having all those links laid out in front of me. And it still looked fine on my cellphone even though I know it is not html5.

If we are going with this menu layout, we probably should name "Links" to Menu.

Aydun · 15 Nov 2014, 2:28 am

Mambo wrote:I don't like the look and layout of the current theme. The old one was a lot easier to navigate and looked better.

That's fair. According to phpbb stats, only 2 people were using the old theme, so unfortunately I can't justify the time to convert it, sorry. However, if the author does, I will definitely reinstall it for you! As for ease of use, mind if I ask what you preferred? Perhaps I can incorporate it.

theedge wrote:It seems harder to navigate with everything buried under one menu while in the old interface all the links were in front of you as you now need an extra click to get to where you want to go. So I quite liked having all those links laid out in front of me. And it still looked fine on my cellphone even though I know it is not html5.

If we are going with this menu layout, we probably should name "Links" to Menu.

That's kind of what menus are for, to contain similar items in the one place

Previously everything was scattered around the header, which by any UX standards, is pretty poor practice. Plus, two clicks is much faster than zooming and trying to click the button, especially for a new user.. Imagine the mess if web browsers didn't have menus!

Also, by UX practices, 'links' makes more sense. Links is a menu, yes. But you name an element after what it contains, not what it is. Otherwise every drop-down element would be named menu. I understand changes may be difficult to get used to, and of course suggestions are more than welcome, but in this case, I'll follow how phpBB does it.

theedge · 16 Nov 2014, 10:05 pm

aydun wrote:That's kind of what menus are for, to contain similar items in the one place Previously everything was scattered around the header, which by any UX standards, is pretty poor practice. Plus, two clicks is much faster than zooming and trying to click the button, especially for a new user.. Imagine the mess if web browsers didn't have menus!

Also, by UX practices, 'links' makes more sense. Links is a menu, yes. But you name an element after what it contains, not what it is. Otherwise every drop-down element would be named menu. I understand changes may be difficult to get used to, and of course suggestions are more than welcome, but in this case, I'll follow how phpBB does it.

Programmers...

.

"Forum Actions", "Actions", "Go to..." are a few suggestions from looking at a few other forums in the web.

"Active topics" or "new posts" could be taken out of the menu and put by itself as that would be what users go for catch up on updates..

Hope this clarifies a few things. Don't take the feedback personal. As users we are trying to offer help. And in the real world it is a bad idea lecturing users especially when it gets technical. Take this from someone who has been in the trenches and been in the firing line also.

I admit the menu works fine on the cellphone

Aydun · 24 Nov 2014, 1:38 pm

theedge wrote:"Forum Actions", "Actions"

They're not really actions. The title, 'Actions', would be appropriate for 'mark read', 'subscribe forum', etc.
Reference forum for '(Quick) links': https://area51.phpbb.com/phpBB/

theedge wrote:"Active topics" or "new posts" could be taken out of the menu and put by itself as that would be what users go for catch up on updates..

I may try this next update. The only thing is that it depends which link people use the most... I personally use 'unread posts'. Although it literally takes me less than a second to click it (or any of the other links) now, anyway.

theedge wrote:And in the real world it is a bad idea lecturing users especially when it gets technical.

In the real world you probably also shouldn't work on things while drinking

Fortunately, helping out with a forum in one's free time isn't really the 'real world'.