Topic: BaseCamper Opinions?

[Ken (OP)]

@ our BaseCampers; as you may know our FF is set for a major software upgrade after the Trek has finished and so it's only natural that we would be interested in your point of view about forums.

BaseCampers are travelers (of course) and as such undoubtedly see lots of different sites and forums and must therefore have opinions on what a 'good' site/forum should look like.
So... this topic is a solicitation for your opinion on how the FF ranks and what you would like to see changed or added to the site. Keep in mind that we are basically a family forum and are focused on a rather narrow group as possible members.

Please note that we are not looking for a pat on the back or an atta-boy, rather we want to know about stuff that you feel would improve your experience as you navigate the site, the way themes look or the way things work in general.

When we do this upgrade I want to make the site as friendly and easy to use as possible and your opinion will surely be helpful.  

[Sport]

I didn't vote....the real test is what your contingency is comfortable with...we @ BaseCamp have to get used to every forum we visit . Most modern forums all have the same features...some are easier to find than others and they rotate....only thing that throws me off on this forum is the Tab layout as opposed to a NavBar ....but again ...whatever your people are used to using

[TLD]

I like a nav bar top & bottom myself..

[Dataman]

OK BF, I'm old, senile and easily confused.  :innocent: I'm not sure what I would be voting on in the poll or how it would help you.

Is it "sites" I've visited? Well, comparing you to Amazon, newegg, tigerdirect ... well ... it sucks.  :rofl: :belly: :rofl: But then I suppose your web staff is bit smaller than Amazon's. 
If it's forums/boards, it's better than most run by a single person but it would be difficult to compare to EVGA's, BOINC's or nVidia's boards. It's one heck of the lot better than "vanilla forums" for the BOINC science projects. riteon
Again ... not sure what I would be voting on or how it would help you.

 :ff:

[mike047]

Nice clean layout.

[LoneWolf_53]

Nice clean layout.

Yep that's been my take from the first time I came here.

I'm a firm believer in "less is more".     Make it simple and easy to use for all skill levels.

[mousie]

Not an answer to the thread question but...the part of me that dabbles with forum software was curious to see what sort of upgrades you were planning, and started lurking about where I found your thread on the blank pages.  We used to get that on an SMF forum I admin as well....reloading the forum software and rebooting server did nothing in our case.  The blank pages went away after recompiling php and mysql.  Just thought I'd mention it in case it's something you're still looking for answers on.


In response to the original question though...I tend to favor SMF, from both an admin standpoint and from a user standpoint.  The new RC out seems to work pretty well, and their converter did a pretty good job when I played with it, though I didn't have as many mods as here.  From a user standpoint, this forum/smf does a pretty good job at keeping your unread posts straight, which is a biggie for me.

Everyone has their preferences...one thing that throws me off is the first breadcrumb(included screenshot if you're unsure what I'm referring to) takes you to the portal home page instead of the forum index, but it may be that you guys intended that.

I imagine the "members online" on the front page, with all the avatars, doesn't look so full usually - right now it takes up a lot (relatively) of screenspace, but I could see for when it's just your smaller group it may be nice.


And just because....atta boy!  :disted:

[Ken (OP)]

Thanks mousie & all.

One of my test forums is set up with the new SMF2 RC2 and TinyPortal v1.0 beta5, you can see it HERE.
That's what we'll be going to soon here on the live site and the reason I'm not doing the change now is the fear of risking a downtime running into at least several hours while the BC is still going on. Once we do the upgrade the look and feel changes won't be overly dramatic to a user, but to the admins it will make a tremendous difference what controls are available for manipulating to site.

TBH, I've never worked on the names of the breadcrumbs links but that's a good point and it will certainly be looked at now.

The members on line w/avatars is getting kind of cluttered because of so many members being on and I've already adjusted the time span to limit the number of avatars displayed, but maybe it's time to turn it off for a while.

Thanks for the input... this is what me is looking for.  :bigteeth:

[vaio]

I like the invisionfree boards myself.
They are clean and simple but there are plenty of modification add-ons available for those that want them.

I find them easier to navigate than many.

[mousie]

link not link link not link link not link link not link


^^^maybe a different color for the links^^^  :disted:  they kinda blend in with unlinked text