I think it is ok.

Just wish it had an edit function for posts. I type my thoughts, I proof read quick, looks good, post and then all of a sudden see my typo's, which I suppose drives me crazy for some reason to spell a word wrong but really is a typo because I am not a typist with my 2 finger poking at the keyboard.

There are things I like and things I don't.  Mostly I think it's just a process of adjustment.

I like the new forum a lot, now that the threads with the most recent posts appear at the top of the index list. But I'd like it even better if I could get the most recent post in each thread to appear at the top of the page instead of the bottom. Is there a way we can do this?

 Mark

It's OK byt I wish it hsd spelkcheck. SEEYA Jack

I have to agree inthat I had finally gotten comfortable with the old format and visited first thing every morning.

I see that the new version is much faster - but not the same.  I'll visit maybe once a week, if that often.

I found it much easier to find NEW posts on the old forum.

 HT4K

Jon T

Can you search on the new forum?  I cant seem to find it...and ummm yep mumble mumble I am one of those computer types by trade.....SHHHH dont tell...

~gober

Gober,

 I have mentioned the lack of a search functio already and got no response that I've seen that I was wrong about that.  Perhaps if enough of us grumble about it, they'll add one.

It may be just me, but it certainly seems like there are less posts with the new system, even accounting for the seasonal nature of the posts (this being "low" season).

FrankP 

The new forum is quicker to read all the posts in a thread, but I liked how it was easy to find new messages on the old forum.

<SIGH>  How well I recall the howls of disapprobation directed at the OLD forum.  We're listening and eager to make it better.  Please be patient---it will take some time.  It's a sprawling site and we're scurrying about fixing things everywhere. 

Dang, am I the only one here who doesn't mind the new format? Seems like everybody's getting their questions answered just like on the old one! And my belief is that's what this thing is here for. As a whole the entire site is light years ahead of the old one and they're not through "fixing" everything yet!

George K

Those who want spell check, and those who NEED spell check, should go to IEspell.com.  IE users only.  I have been using it for years and like it better than any forum spell check.  It will work with any web text box at all sites.

One shortfall tho is that it won't tell me wheat a 'disapprobation' is.  :o)

 Kim

Firefox supports text box spell checking right out of the box.  Right click in the text box and select "Spell check this field".

 -Steve

I also preferred the old forum. I liked seeing what was new, and being able to see the "flow" of the thread. There are some folks that you just have to see what they have to say, regardless of your relative interest in the topic; not to suggest that Kurt Mauer might be one of them. I now find myself going to the Guillimot forum for my morning fix. I guess I just find this forum somewhat uninteresting by comparison.

Jim L 

I'm a bit puzzled. The threads which have appeared or have had something added since one's last visit are plainly highlighted in blue, the date & time of the last post, as well as the last poster's name are displayed up front, so what else is needed to find the new posts? Or are people really just asking for an ordered display of the thread stucture like the old forum had (which is something different)?

I agree that an edit function would be good eventually. It'd be a help in self-moderation. Search will be nice, too, when it comes completely alive.

I'd like to suggest that the display order should be user selectable, maybe remembered in a cookie, because whichever one is selected by default, half the people are going to hate it.

The ability to preview the embedded images is very nice. There are a lot fewer of the "Oops, no picture, let's trry again" postings now. It's also nice to have bold & underlined options for the text. Font size would be nice to have, too, when the webmaster gets around to it.

I also wouldn't mind a larger text area. Right now the vertical letterbox format has 55% of my screen wasted on a blue background. It seems really silly to have a 19-inch flat screen and still have to squint through a 6-inch porthole. For those of us in the bifocal demographic, and judging by the crowd pictures at the O-fest shop demos there's a bunch of us, having the text area expanded to fill the screen would definitely help with the eyestrain.

 But as GeorgeK says, the questions are being answered. 

Laszlo

PS - I just remembered another feature I'd like to see. On the picture galleries, it'd be nice to be able start at the back, too. I was trying to show a picture to a friend and I had to cycle through 35 images to get to the one I wanted to show him.

>>The threads which have appeared or have had something added since one's last visit are plainly highlighted in blue, the date & time of the last post, as well as the last poster's name are displayed up front, so what else is needed to find the new posts? Or are people really just asking for an ordered display of the thread stucture like the old forum had (which is something different)? <<

Ok, this does work if you log in.  Since the login isn't automatic, I hadn't been taking the time to do so.  Now if only the posts were highlighted too.

 Jon T

>>>>It may be just me, but it certainly seems like there are less posts with the new system, even accounting for the seasonal nature of the posts (this being "low" season). >>>>

By the numbers, the new forum is more active than the old one;  168 posts in the last week versus 89  in the last week of the old forum.  It's also getting more "hits."  That's not to suggest there isn't room for improvement, and we'll get to it in time.

The speed is very good, and I'm optimistic that the loss of usability, compared to the old forum, will be gradually addressed over time. These things don't happen overnight, and "user experience" is not necessarily the highest priority--if the old system was getting unmaintainable, then in effect, fixing that was the top priority for all of us, even though it was invisible to us. In the meantime, I have to admit that I read the forum only a small fraction as much as I used to. It is too much work. To be more specific, it would take a lot of time and tedious work to see what is new, from whom. In contrast, with the old forum, I could easily scan the thread "trees" in a matter of seconds, just by letting the screen scroll slowly down. I would see what was new on which thread, who wrote it, and determine which posts I was interested in. For example there are some writers whom I will always read if I see a new post from them, even if the thread itself is not that interesting. For example, one writer might be always hilarious, but keep us all worried that he was eaten by a Canadian grizzly during his long absences. Another may disappear for months, only to turn up in a pop-up camper in a far-off Eastern lands, full of stories of misadventure, reviews of exotic dishes such as crabcakes, and reminders to stop worrying so much. A third might combine wit, scores of building tips, and the Chemistry knowledge that we all missed because in college we were off doing some other experiments, etc.

Having zero control of the text size makes me skip longer posts.  The above post is probably a good one but when I have to put on my glasses and lean over to slowly read I tend to skip it. 

Camper's comments reflect my opinion much better than my inarticulate post above. But the fact that I had to say "above" is another reason I don't care for this format. With the "tree" format, one could post a reply to a particular post. Now it's just a list in chronological order. The last post might add some important point to a previous post somewhere up the list, or just to throw a good-natured zinger on somebody, but you might not recall that, and you may not care to re-read the previous posts to find the thread. (BTW, I think Camper might be talking about Kurt also, along with some other of my favorites.)

Jim L

Jim L: Yes, Maurer was one of them. But don't tell him. He's already somewhat vain about his 11 lb. kayak. If he thinks he can write, too, he'll become unbearable. Good point about the need for the "tree view" to know who was responding to what. I hope the tree view can be restored, eventually. But apparently others don't miss it as much as a couple of us do, so that's good.

I think the new Forum is an improvement however...still way behind in the world of online forums. One of the best is vBulletin.

http://www.vbulletin.com/

Not very difficult to manage either.  It also has ablog feature allwoing registered users to feature build logs and such.  Here is an example of the forum in use.

www.rcgroups.com 

Has everything and then some.

 -Rocko

I agree that the new Forum isn't "state of the art".  However, having been a webmaster for a sail club, I think I know why off-the-shelf forum/bulletin-board software isn't being used.

The free or commercially available software that I've looked at tends to want to run the whole show.  It takes work to integrate it into a larger web site.  It takes an even larger amount of work if your overall web site wants to do it's own authentication.  Since CLC wants to manage accounts to keep track of things like order history, builder's club, etc.., it's quite hard to get the forum software to "play nice" with this.  It can be done, but it means modifying the forum software. With some software, this would be a violation of it's license. Even if allowed, it would mean manually merging edits in every time a newer version of the forum software became available.  The only viable way to use 3rd party forum software here is to fork off a free software forum package and then forevermore maintain it.  This works great for a while, but then it slowly becomes obsolete and no longer "state of the art".  Eventually your users complain about it and you have to go through the whole process again.

Sorry for the spewage.  This was a sore point during my time as a volunteer web developer.

-Steve

Mr. Kim, as far as text size, if you use FireFox instead of Internet explorer, you can do control + to make the text larger. I use it all the time for my poor eyes. Just a thought.

by the way...............hitting ctrl+  works in internet explorer too....

Do you know  how many boatbuilders it takes to change a light bulb?

Seven.  One to change the bulb, and six to talk about how they liked the old bulb better.    (<g>...........and ducking and running.)

Julie K.  

 >>>>>>The free or commercially available software that I've looked at tends to want to run the whole show.  It takes work to integrate it into a larger web site.  It takes an even larger amount of work if your overall web site wants to do it's own authentication.  Since CLC wants to manage accounts to keep track of things like order history, builder's club, etc.., it's quite hard to get the forum software to "play nice" with this. >>>>>>

Well, all that, yes.  Plus:  Matt, CLC's webmaster, VP, ShopCam operator, and indispensable jack-of-all-trades, just added another title:  proud father.  Congrats from all of us, Matt, and the CLC Forum can wait just a little until Madeline settles in... 

Nice job Matt.  You might want to loosen your bungees a tad.  You gotta be careful on how hard you squeeze babies.

 Kim

Congrats Matt....now the fun begins..

http://www.bluegary.com/Dory1.htm

...maybe a similar product for CLC to consider in the near future in honour of the new addition.

 Take care

Chris 

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