I think this is a bit ironic: http://www.thisandagain.com/pollpic.gif
(Screen shot from my Mac)
Two things:
1. On the registration page, keep the form fields white. Keeping them the same color as the background with a thin outline only a few shades lighter isn’t very user-friendly. Keep the boxes white or alternately, make the outlines black.
2. Don’t hide the page name for the RSS (as it stands now it’s just typophile.com/rss/INSERT_PAGENAME_HERE.rdf/xml). This way, people with RSS browsers can copy the URL into their respective program. It would also be helpful if you offered the RSS on your main page such that my little orange RSS icon will show up in my Firefox browser.
I love how integrated all the features are — I just assumed I could reference my wiki entry for sans serif from my blog, and it just worked! Awesome! I also can’t wait to see how the wiki and the forums tie together in practice; my hope is that the number of rehashed threads will drop precipitously as more FAQ-type material migrates to the wiki.
I could use a little less flash to the interface and a little more functionality, though. The wiki’s still a little flaky in some respects and the UI could stand to be streamlined a bit. That said, this is a huge improvement and the new architecture seems ready to grow in ways that the old just never would have. Good work!
I was very impressed when I first saw the redesign, generally still am, it is beautiful. But looking at this forum, after actually using it, wish to share these opinions.
1. Lack of visual contrast and cues
I think the old layout may be more visually clear. Now, because all posts share the same gray background and especially the username/posting date line’s close proximity along with its lack of strong visual contrast with the actual post, it makes the page harder to scan, when scrolled the page seem to gel into one gray mass with less visual cue to differentiate between posts. The old alternating gray / white rows, avatar together with the user’s post length seems clearer and might help users remember post positions on a page better.
2. Text color, size and contrast
Also the text is dark grey, small and on a gray background, I think it hampers prolonged reading a little because of lesser overall contrast.
3. Why so grey?
The whole grey color scheme makes this forum seem a little solemn maybe, somehow less fun then the old one.
4. Smilies are fun, would be nice to have back …
Just my 0.02 cents.
Hrant,
Try FeedReader for Win XP. It’s nice, simple and free.
I tried out a few different RSS readers for PC and this one was the best one I found…
I have a very fast internet connection, but the website is slow… I hope this will be improved when the site leaves the Beta stage.
Other then that I have to get used to the new layout and search a bit, but I’m very sure I will love this in some days. It looks at least great, and that’s all we graphic designers want. :D
Regards,
®ené
*** C H A R A C T E R S { Typography to express yourself } ***
Just a note for Hrant:
Even with the RSS reader you will only get notification of new threads.
Meanwhile you can use the “tracker”:
http://typophile.com/tracker/
I’ve been using computers since friggin’ 1977, and you guys still manage to make me feel retarded! On Tuesday I finished catching up with (nevermind actually reacting to…) all the pre-relaunch posts that I’d missed; so now I guess I need to:
1) Get that RSS thing working. I hope it’s versatile… Like I really don’t want to fall into the fast & furious world of type-IDs again.
2) Use the Tracker to get at the posts that were made after the relaunch but before my RSS hookup.
Please correct me if I’m missing something…
hhp
Do you use Thunderbird?
It reads RSS feeds too.
You can subscribe to specific areas of the forum; receiving feeds only from the areas you are interested in. See here: http://typophile.com/feeds
Yeah, I’ve been using Thunderbird (and Firefox) for a few months now. I just found a nice page about it*, and it’s looking promising! My favorite part is “Thunderbird lets you view RSS content in a way that is very similar to reading email”! You young guns who eat and sleep technology don’t get what it means to be a lethargic, content-focused old fart who’s “been there, done that, can’t remember”… :-/
* http://kb.mozillazine.org/Thunderbird_:_FAQs_:_RSS_Basics
hhp
OK, I don’t want this to become a tech support thread or anything, but I need help! I installed the RSS thing into Thunderbird, and fired it up. Problem #1: I only got 15 messages, the first from 4/17, 7:20AM (“Troubleman”) and the last from 5/12, 12:11PM (“Information Design, information architecture”). Problem #2: It doesn’t look like it wants to load up new posts. Yes, I’ve set it to download new messages: every 1 minute; and upon startup. Problem #3: The busy bar (at the bottom-right) is acting funny now - sometimes it gets stuck in the middle, sometimes it won’t stop churning.
If anybody is willing/able to help me in private [instead]:
hrant_thatsymbol_inverselogic_dot_com
Thanks. Type is my blood.
hhp
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