Here is where everyone can post their thoughts on how to make the forum look.

joeb

Well, first thing I think of, is a good background colour in combination with an easy to use colour for hidden hints. One of the problems now, is that there are 2 backgrounds, so neither textcolour give good results for both of them.

And of course it would be nice to get rid of that standard YaBB etc. logo in the left upper corner. In a matter of fact they are "our" boards. Isn't it?

Right !! The YABB thing looks kinda cheap.... we don't really need it !

The point with the 2 colors is very important ....however, I'd like to point out, that having 2 colors does help too, things are somewhat easier to see (as opposed to if they all had the same background). So maybe we could find a way to deal with the "hidden text issue" without being forced to have only 1 background color....!!

Maybe there is another solution....even if I can't think of any now.... but I'm sure somebody might have an idea....

The color/spoiler situation is easy enough to solve. Just pick two colors that are fairly close together, but far enough apart to give a reasonable contrast on alternating table cells. Then pick the color that is exactly halfway between the two, and it's near-impossible to detect. I've attached an example below. The spoiler text is right below the regular text. Can you see it? :)

The colors used in the example are:
Backgrounds: rgb(233,232,224) and rgb(224,223,215)
Spoiler Text: rgb(228,227,219)
Regular text: rgb(65,77,86)

Other ways to do it would require adding a "spoiler" tag to the software. This tag could either just set the background color on the paragraph to be the same as the text color, or get fancy and provide a button that expands to the spoiler text when clicked.

None of them are particularly hard to implement (the last two are more difficult, but not by much. Depending, of course, on how well-written the board is in the first place).

If I knew perl, I'd go diving into the code myself...unfortunately, both ruby and python are higher up on my list of scripting languages to learn. :P

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Very good, ryos... I can't see anything of the spoiler text at all !!!

Something else. The size of the text vs. the size of the smilies. Example:


Anthony wrote on 20.04.2007 at 19:31:48:

Ooo a first timer... here's a hint: When I made my first mansion, it was alright. (Wingy's small mansion) Don't make bricks be alone*. ... That's ok, but Jacob didn't like it. You used alone bricks in your picture up there. I kinda liked that, but it needs more,, bricks!  ;) It will get your score up abit... maybe you have a gift for designing which I might have, if I win 1st, but if you do, that's going to be a problem for me. :P

Well, I don't like that smilies change the distance between the textlines. Maybe there is something you can do about that, Joe?

You can set the CSS line-height property to the height of a smily. I'm not sure if the resulting spaced lines would be pleasing, though.

Oh wait, my name's not Joe. Sorry. ;D :D ;)

Hello ryos-Joe!  ;D I KNOW it is also possible to change the size of the smilies.

Freddy wrote on 22.04.2007 at 03:04:45:

Hello ryos-Joe!  ;D I KNOW it is also possible to change the size of the smilies.

No, I mean change the spacing of the lines so that all of them are spaced like they would be if they all had smilies in them. That way, the smilies don't change the spacing.

Aha! Except "toppie", "bath" and a few others. ;D

WOW. All this fun.....

I am currently muddling through the documents on setting up templates which is where I believe I need to do the work. I'm also going to need to figure out the file structure so I can put the graphics where the YaBB engine can find them.

Ruby and Python? haven't used Ruby but Python is highly integrated into the Poser environment. Just about all of the 3rd party tools for Poser are done in Python.
Perl. Most of the ETL for extracting COBOL data and putting it into the IBM DB2 server is in a tool called DataStage which is fired off from Unix and Perl scripts.

Personally I wish the server was done in php. Boy could we have some fun with that because then more then likely we could have a MySQL database running and put libraries up with just about anything in them.

Fun, fun, fun.......


Joe B

The YaBB Admin tool for setting up the CSS sheets is WAY less than intuitive. I got frustrated by it and have started putting the Templates together by hand so there has been a little delay in getting this project started but I am moving along now. I have four basic templates I'll be putting in place.


Joe B

Quote:

Well, first thing I think of, is a good background colour in combination with an easy to use colour for hidden hints. One of the problems now, is that there are 2 backgrounds, so neither textcolour give good results for both of them.

First on the list!!! I just need to find out HOW to get the new graphic into a spot where the forum software will be able to locate it. Normally I'd just use some FTP tool (Fetch, etc) to put the graphic in place or work on the site in Dreamweaver, Go Live, etc. but I need to know where it's at and probably the password in.

Vern, admins???????


joe B

:'( I really can't help you with this. And I wonder if Vern is able to. Maybe you need to jump on the YaBB-forums with your question?!  :-/

Yeah, Vern got me access and as you can probably see I've put up the picture with Jack sitting at the table. I'd be VERY interested on your thoughts by the way. I've also found a bunch of  useful information out on the YaBB boards. I don't think I've munged up anything on the forum so I guess I'm doing alright.

Thanks for the support!!!!

Joe B

@ Joe: Nice work! Thx. It was a very good feeling to see that after restarting the boards, all YaBB-stuff was gone and a nice picture of Sir Jack (designing his next mansion?) replaced it.

Because I was away for a while, a few things, while using Firefox btw.

1° The change of the top of our boards is now always there. But changing the colours is (still?) to be done in "profile". Is the target that sooner or later a final choise is made, so that the backgrounds will be the same for everyone? Or is it supposed that, after logging in, everybody always find his own choise?

2° I like to test ALL your suggestions by using them long enough. So far:
- in MMT 8 I notice an unnecessary horizontal scrollbar at the bottom of my screen;
- in MMT 5 I think that something of the layout is still unfinished ---> above AND below the complete window should be shown in which forum one is working; the characters are partly in the former unlogical blue AND partly invisible till approaching the mouse-arrow make them ... red!

EDIT. MMT 9 has the same scrollbar as MMT 8.

Thanks for the input Freddy. At least SOMEBODY notices! I'm working diligently on 2 COMPLETE templates using what feedback I've gotten. Once I get everything cleaned up I am going to have voting (only fair way I think) on which should be the DEFAULT. The other will remain so individuals can have at least one other choice. Then I'll get the new icons in and see feedback on those. I'd kind of like to release the "COMPLETED" new look when Vern does the official XP inclusive release of MM.
Then back to being a lurker, no more RED name.

BTW, Welcome back, we've missed you!

Joe B

It is nice to be back, Joe.

Unless I am wrong, I see 2 generations of MMTs you created.

The MMTs with the lower numbers all have the "problem" with blue and invisible parts of the name of the forum-in-use.

The MMTs with the higher numbers have the senseless horizontal scrollbar. I think it may have to do with a lack of margins around. The first generation MMTs DO have margins.

After reading this I went back into profile to test the new "skins" you have done, Joe....(I hadn't done so since you created the first couple of versions).

But I'm sorry to report that none of them really worked for me, they are all on the dark side.... and everytime I end up returning to the blue & white standard color scheme, which remains the one with the best legibility and "clearness".

Why don't you try one with opaque, warm colors....say very light beige and light orange or something (as I suggested before), some "pastell-type" colors (as we call them in Germany) ?  
The colors should be not more "dominant" than the standard blue and white ones....

PS:  To be honest, it wouldn't bother me at all if we stayed with the standard blue/white scheme, should nothing else be found.
Luckily you have already removed that awfull YABB logo and replaced it with a nice MM graphic, which was probably the most important thing.

aquaMat wrote on 27.06.2007 at 05:06:25:

Luckily you have already removed that awfull YABB logo and replaced it with a nice MM graphic, which was probably the most important thing.

Indeed. But try MMT4. Doesn't feel bad at all. But I am still wondering how to place hints, because there are two different backgrounds.