Quote from @Taylor L.:
Quote from @Joe Splitrock:
Quote from @Taylor L.:
Quote from @Joe Splitrock:
Quote from @Bruce Woodruff:
Admins - Note that the only people who like the new forum look are people with very few posts. They've never really used/seen the old forums. Just sayin'.....
I will take a few daggers for saying this, but I like the new forum look and I have more than a few posts;)
To be fair, I have used the new forums for three months now. I was on the beta testing team. It took me some time to get used to it, so I encourage you to hang in there. Nobody wants to lose you or any other top contributors. You will get used to it and forget what the old forums even looked like. The BP team is very open to making tweaks and addressing concerns, so your feedback is being heard. That is why this thread is open for comments.
The biggest, biggest problem I see is the arrangement of each post's window. The arrangement should draw the eye to the post's content (blue box). Quoted content (yellow box) should be collapsed by default, with the ability to expand for context.
Green box items should be on the left, separated from the post's content but still identifying the person who made the post.
This poor arrangement of posts makes the forums far more mentally taxing and confusing to read. Ultimately this will just send people off the site, because the extra mental effort is tiring and confusing at a subconscious level.
The exact number of posts and points is just unnecessary information. The previous method of rounding was great.
If I could change
one thing, I would put green box items on the left. That is where that information should be. Its current placement makes using the forums far more difficult than it needs to be.
This comes down to how people use the forums and how they interpret information. Of course we are all different. The grey box behind the text visually tells me what people are responding to. My eyes move to the response immediately and I just scroll past the grey box, unless I need to read it for context. In that way I find the grey box very helpful compared to before.
The text you boxed in green is basically a header bar separating posts. I think it helps to break up responses and it keeps the side bar from being too wide. If you put too much text in the side bar, it makes the center text more narrow, meaning more scrolling to read. It also creates a problem for the mobile web version, because a phone is not wide enough to have that much text on the side. You could have two different formatting methods for phone and desktop, but maybe that is harder to manage. I wouldn't be opposed to any of the changes you proposed, but I don't find either option mentally taxing.
Your logic counters itself in this response. At first, scroll length doesn't matter, you'll just keep scrolling. Then later on it does (examples bolded and underlined above). I am certain that this particular post I'm about to make will be enormously long, and the forum software fails to compensate for that.
It is two different types of scrolling. One is jumping between responses. You scroll past the grey and stop. The other is scrolling as you read. Think of it like skipping commercials. If you had to fast forward through 5 minutes of commercials every 30 minutes, it is easier than skipping 10 seconds of commercials every minute.
The grey boxes are normally pretty small, but in cases where people have long responses, they do get big. I agree in that case, having it collapse would be useful.
I would say collapsing the grey box makes more sense than moving the two line text "green" header. Just my opinion. Maybe on your screen size/resolution it is worse than on mine. I also have the benefit of using the new interface for several months, so I am adjusted to it.
It is good feedback you provided. I am not a decision maker in any of this;) Let the BP overlords discuss and do as they wish.
