A few forum suggestions

[HolyK]

Hello, i would like to suggest a few things to make this forum a bit more "comfortable/Interesting". Also i can help with the realization, because lot of these things i already did on the another forum which i'm administrating, so feel free to ask :)

1] Missing "Forum" button in Navbar on some pages.
- I know that the "FreeNAS" logo is hyperlinked to forum index, but the button can/should be also on the place, so the rest of the buttons will not jump left and right like crazy.

2] FreeNAS home page link in NavBar.
- There is no way how to get back from forum to the FreeNAS page, so a nice button will be usefull :]

3] Exclude Forums from What's New/FORUMHOME
- This is a nice hack for excluding some subforums from the What's new feature and also from the forum index page. So for example, i can see some posts from Italian section in What's New, but i rly don't care, because i don't speak Italian. With that hack, user can easily hide section to which are not interested.
Link: http://www.vbulletin.org/forum/showthread.php?t=256264

4] vB version is still visible in page source
- Version of the vB was removed from the page footer, i assume for the security reasons. Anyway, the version can be found in the source code of the page.

Code:

<meta name="generator" content="vBulletin 4.1.3" />
var SIMPLEVERSION = "413";

By the way i strongly suggest to update the forum. There are many cool features (like "autosave", "CK editor" with TABLES, ... etc.)

5] Some mobile style will be pretty cool.
- I think a lot of people browsing web from their phones, me included. So some tiny and low data skin will be fine. I'm not talking about Tapatalk (i don't like this app), i mean only the skin. For example thisone is really fine.

6] Fix the "THANKS" hack
- The "thanks" hack is fine, but the counters are a bit weird. And also the position of the second line is wrong.

For example (sorry proto :D)
Thanks: 46 // This is probably how many times the user thanked.
Thanked 28 Times in 22 Posts // This counting how many times the user received "thanks"

I think, it is a bit confusing what is what, so i suggest to simplify these two lines
THX gived
THX received

Easy and obvious :]

7] Advanced quick reply.
- Right now, the quick reply function giving only the basic text formatting. Having a full formatting bar will be pretty useful. Check this for the old version of vB, or this for the vB with CK editor (4.1.4+)

8] Thread TAGging
- "Force" people a bit to put some TAGs when new thread is created. It will help a lot when someone searching something.

X] Enough for now i think, but i have more ;)


Again, i can help you if you want, just send me a PM, we can discuss about it :)

Holy

 

[ProtoSD]

No Apology needed Holy,

I agree with almost all of what you suggested, but I wanted to add more of an explanation. I'm in a hurry, but I'll update this post later.

I think if several of us can agree on what we would like to see, the admins would be glad to help.

Thanks for the feedback.



UPDATE: Ok, I'm back and can respond in more detail.

1] Missing "Forum" button in Navbar on some pages.
- I know that the "FreeNAS" logo is hyperlinked to forum index, but the button can/should be also on the place, so the rest of the buttons will not jump left and right like crazy.

I'm not completely clear what your mean here. Can you make a screenshot?

2] FreeNAS home page link in NavBar.
- There is no way how to get back from forum to the FreeNAS page, so a nice button will be usefull :]

Good suggestion. Just so I'm clear, you mean a link back to
http://www.freenas.org/
Which by the way, my browser (Chrome) just said had been reported as a Phishing site.....

4] vB version is still visible in page source
- Version of the vB was removed from the page footer, i assume for the security reasons. Anyway, the version can be found in the source code of the page.

Not sure why this is a problem, but can you elaborate?

By the way i strongly suggest to update the forum. There are many cool features (like "autosave", "CK editor" with TABLES, ... etc.)

What's involved in upgrading, how much time would it involve?

5] Some mobile style will be pretty cool.
- I think a lot of people browsing web from their phones, me included. So some tiny and low data skin will be fine. I'm not talking about Tapatalk (i don't like this app), i mean only the skin. For example thisone is really fine.

I don't use mobile for web, but I can see how this would be helpful. I would also like to see some other color scheme for the site in general because the WHITE background is really hard on my eyes. Something like a light Grey would be better.

6] Fix the "THANKS" hack
- The "thanks" hack is fine, but the counters are a bit weird. And also the position of the second line is wrong.

For example (sorry proto )
Thanks: 46 // This is probably how many times the user thanked.
Thanked 28 Times in 22 Posts // This counting how many times the user received "thanks"

I don't find this a problem, I like the extra details, but if other people here prefer it a different way, please add your input. My problem was that I thought that the "Search for Thanked Posts" was part of the "Thank You" button feature and I find it very useful, so if that could be added it would be great. Holy, do you know which plug-in provides that feature?

7] Advanced quick reply.
- Right now, the quick reply function giving only the basic text formatting. Having a full formatting bar will be pretty useful. Check this for the old version of vB, or this for the vB with CK editor (4.1.4+)

I completely agree, I use Advanced editing mode here more than anything and it's a pain after you start to reply to have to switch modes.

8] Thread TAGging
- "Force" people a bit to put some TAGs when new thread is created. It will help a lot when someone searching something.

I agree this would be helpful, but some of the tags I've seen people use are completely useless, misspelled, multiple words, etc. Sometimes if I'm bored, I'll go through posts and add tags to ones that don't have them and fix them or add to them on others.

Holy, your help and suggestions for improving this site have been great. The Spam filter was helpful as well as the tip for fixing the button in the titlebar for the FreeNAS 7 forums.

What does everyone else think? Please post what you would like changed/fixed and after we get some agreement on stuff we can ask the Admins to help.

 

[HolyK]

1] Missing "Forum" button in Navbar on some pages.
- I know that the "FreeNAS" logo is hyperlinked to forum index, but the button can/should be also on the place, so the rest of the buttons will not jump left and right like crazy.

I'm not completely clear what your mean here. Can you make a screenshot?

Here you go:

Like i said. The FreeNAS logo in the left corner do the trick, but i don't know if all users know this.
Ignore that "jumping like a crazy". 2 days ago, the "Forum tab" was there on some pages, now its gone on all pages, so the rest of the tabs does not moving anymore.

2] FreeNAS home page link in NavBar.
- There is no way how to get back from forum to the FreeNAS page, so a nice button will be usefull :]

Good suggestion. Just so I'm clear, you mean a link back to
http://www.freenas.org/
Which by the way, my browser (Chrome) just said had been reported as a Phishing site.....

Yes, correct. Just like the tab for FreeNAS.7, so the another one to jump to the home page.

4] vB version is still visible in page source
- Version of the vB was removed from the page footer, i assume for the security reasons. Anyway, the version can be found in the source code of the page.

Code:

<meta name="generator" content="vBulletin 4.1.3" />
var SIMPLEVERSION = "413";

Not sure why this is a problem, but can you elaborate?

Usually the footer is like this:


On this forum, the version is missing. I thought it was removed for security purpose, so i just point on the remaining thing in the source code. If the reason was not the security, just ignore this point.

Explanation: Sometimes (not all the time, but can happen), some security hole can be found in vB and usually it is fixed in few hours by vB devs, anyway these problems are usually connected with one (or more) versions of the vB platform. So, if some kiddie would like (would try) to hack this, the base information is the version of the vB. Then, googling "step-by-step howto" is the hardest part to do it. If he cannot get the vB version, he need to investigate what is the real version of the vB. It is not so hard and there are another way how to get the real version, but it can help a bit.

Anyway, this is totally different segment of the interest than the one which i'm administrating, so i don't think some noob will try to hack this. So, you can ignore this whole point, i just want to make it clear :)

By the way i strongly suggest to update the forum. There are many cool features (like "autosave", "CK editor" with TABLES, ... etc.)

What's involved in upgrading, how much time would it involve?

It depends how hard is the forum modified and how many changes will the patch do. Anyway, since this forum have only small modifications, it should not take much time. The update process of the vB is pretty easy. Also template system will try to merge the new code with the customization. The plugin system is sophisticated, do if something gets wrong, you can easily disable anything. Basically custom modifications aren't "hardway", anything can be reverted.

Update procedure is very simple:
0] Download new version of vB
1] BACKUP DB !!!
2] Close forum via control panel
3] DISABLE all plugins (put a "define('DISABLE_HOOKS', true);" at the start of your config file)
4] Upload new files
5] Execute the update (http://******/install/upgrade.php)
6] Enable plugins, check if all is ok, open forum
7] Profit

It should not take more than 10min (i'm not counting the time for the backup and time for set up new features, or fixes)

5] Some mobile style will be pretty cool.
- I think a lot of people browsing web from their phones, me included. So some tiny and low data skin will be fine. I'm not talking about Tapatalk (i don't like this app), i mean only the skin. For example thisone is really fine.

I don't use mobile for web, but I can see how this would be helpful. I would also like to see some other color scheme for the site in general because the WHITE background is really hard on my eyes. Something like a light Grey would be better.

In the control pannel there is a tool to create another color variation of the default skin. You just need to play a bit with it, but it is easy. You are right, some dark/grey skin will be nice.

6] Fix the "THANKS" hack
- The "thanks" hack is fine, but the counters are a bit weird. And also the position of the second line is wrong.

I don't find this a problem, I like the extra details, but if other people here prefer it a different way, please add your input. My problem was that I thought that the "Search for Thanked Posts" was part of the "Thank You" button feature and I find it very useful, so if that could be added it would be great. Holy, do you know which plug-in provides that feature?

I'll take a look and let you know.

8] Thread TAGging
- "Force" people a bit to put some TAGs when new thread is created. It will help a lot when someone searching something.

I agree this would be helpful, but some of the tags I've seen people use are completely useless, misspelled, multiple words, etc. Sometimes if I'm bored, I'll go through posts and add tags to ones that don't have them and fix them or add to them on others.

I got you and you are right. I suggest to not allow standard user to create a new TAGs, but you can predefine some TAGs and then let the users to choose one (or more) of them.

Holy, your help and suggestions for improving this site have been great. The Spam filter was helpful as well as the tip for fixing the button in the titlebar for the FreeNAS 7 forums.

I'd like to help somehow to this nice project

 

[James]

I'm swamped with work and travel for the next few weeks, but will take a closer look at implementing these changes mid-Novemberish.

 

[ProtoSD]

I just wanted stress again how much some alternate color themes would be extremely nice to have. The white'ish background is hell on my eyes after awhile (in combination with all the other white color screens I need to use). Some darkish grey with some other color text, orange/yellow/maybe black, or light blue? Maybe similar to my profile page, but maybe a darker grey?

I actually like the color scheme the Serviio website uses A LOT: http://forum.serviio.org/

 

[HolyK]

Since vBulletin 4.0.4, part of the admin control panel is nice Style Generator, so admin can create a lot of color variations of the default skin by few clicks. Rest of the colors can be modifed in the "Style Variable Editor" for each style.

 

[ProtoSD]

I'm swamped with work and travel for the next few weeks, but will take a closer look at implementing these changes mid-Novemberish.

Any update on when you can work on this? I realize Thanksgiving is just around the corner. If you want to temporarily elevate me to admin I could make some color templates, which is high priority for me right now since I spend so much time here and the white background it killing my eyes!

I also think HolyKiller would be a valuable addition as moderator.

 

[HolyK]

Thanks protosd, but right now i'm a bit overloaded by work and another project, deadline is comming :/ So, thank you for the trust, but maybe in next year :)

 

[James]

I gave a crack at it last week and couldn't figure it out. James is also looking into it.

 

[ProtoSD]

I know some PM's were sent asking for assistance from the Admins that seem to have gone unanswered. I really don't mind contributing to the forums and helping moderate, but I have to agree with the PM that Milhouse sent. We're volunteers and are limited to how much we can help if we can't get help from one of the Admins and/or at least some communication/acknowledgment. I'm perfectly willing to keep helping, but am also going to take a break from spam/janitor duty until someone can help us address the issue mentioned above and by PM.

Here are some suggestions sent by PM to me:

Don't we have the 1 minute minimum wait time between postings set? If not then maybe that would be a good idea. If we do have it set, maybe a 2 minute setting would be handy? I hate to bog down posters but we must get a handle on this.

I like the idea of a 5 minute limit between posting for anyone who hasn't either been a member for 1 month & posted at least 20 times, once both conditions have been met then reduce the posting time to 1 minute. I don't know if that is possible.

The SPAM filter we have is better than the one we didn't have before, but there must be some settings that can be adjusted.

It also appears that hundreds of bogus accounts are being created and their profiles being used (filled out) with SPAM to promote/elevate search ratings. Even when they're banned, those profiles are still being indexed and creating unnecessary traffic. Most of these accounts never post spam, but only exist to advertise crap in their profiles.

Admins, please help those of us that are trying to help you!

 

[James]

I've bumped up the default of 30 seconds to 2 minutes.

 

[Milhouse]

I've bumped up the default of 30 seconds to 2 minutes.

Can you reply to your PMs, emails... etc. Thanks.

 

[James]

Sorry, didn't notice the admin notifications (why it is a teeny link hiding at the top of the page is beyond me).

James is making progress on the forum suggestions and I suspect they should all be implemented within a few days. Some are head scratchers on how to implement so your continued patience is appreciated.

 

[HolyK]

2 admin: If you need sometnig, maybe i will be able to help. Just PM me what is it about :]

 

[James]

Sorry for the delay! I added the navbar links and removed the version number from the template source. More to come, thanks for waiting. :)

 

[Milhouse]

Sorry for the delay! I added the navbar links and removed the version number from the template source. More to come, thanks for waiting. :)

You might want to check the version numbers again, as (at the time of writing) they're back in the source (4.1.8) and also "vBulletin" is being advertised at the foot of each page. Has there been a site upgrade/update in the last 24 hours, as I've also noticed some minor layout changes (spam management forms are now full width when previously they were horizontally centered).

 

[James]

You might want to check the version numbers again, as (at the time of writing) they're back in the source (4.1.8) and also "vBulletin" is being advertised at the foot of each page.

This is okay, the big bad bots will only get us if we're not running the most current version. Editing the template (in this manner) breaks things.

Has there been a site upgrade/update in the last 24 hours, as I've also noticed some minor layout changes (spam management forms are now full width when previously they were horizontally centered).

Yea, we updated with only minor hiccups. I installed the advanced reply mod, but aside from links for 'Marco Mamdouh' in our footer, nothing appears to have changed. We'll probably need to wait for them to update for 4.1.8 in order to use this. Also, the 'thanks hack' received enough complaints for it to be removed and replaced - unfortunately the (better) version is not available for 4.1.8, yet. Lastly, the mobile style does not install correctly for anything above 4.1.2.

I'll keep looking and would love to try out some alternatives if they should appear in this thread, ;-).

 

[ProtoSD]

Thanks for the help James. I didn't realize there were complaints about the Thanks button other than the features I thought it was missing.

I'm a little confused about the advanced edit mode, there doesn't seem to be any more Bold, Quotes, Fonts, URL, IMG, or CODE tag features anymore, what's up with that? It's going to make editing HowTos / FAQs a little tricky, am I missing something?

 

[Milhouse]

Confirming comment from protosd, the "advanced reply" seems less advanced than the previous version - no bold, italic, underline etc., or smilies.

Hopefully the "Thanks" button will return in full rather than the partial version we had before, so that you can actually find the posts for which you have received thanks, and also those where you have given it.

Oh and it would be nice to replace the default vBulletin favicon.ico with something more befitting FreeNAS.

 

[HolyK]

As i can see, something is wrong. I suggest to disable problematic modifications until solution will be found.

I should upgrade my forum (4.1.7) to last vB (4.1.8) during next week, after that, i will let you know.

About the mobile style ... it works flawlessly on my site

Holy