Is this the final design?

[Geraint]

         Widescreen :  I'm not sure it's a good solution, unless your screen is actually wide. 

         I'm on a 14 inch at 1366 x 768, and widescreen makes everything feel a little small.  You can change the browser zoom settings, but that makes some of the overall format feel distorted then too.  It's all better for actually, potentially seeing more of the site per click again, but I feel like the quality is still myeh.

That depends on one's perspective.  I work on a 24" 1920x1200 monitor  The wide screen works nicely on it at full screen, but I rarely ever work full screen.  Rather I uses two half screen windows side by side. roughly 1000x1200 (since they can slightly overlap).  The wide screen version of the top will scale down to that width, along with the rest of the forum (other than the new button bar).  The normal version of the top part will not scale down to anywhere near that width and, even though the forum itself will do so easily, and I have to scroll over to use the search function or anything else on the right side.

[kylie]

         Going to be blunt again, but trying to be clear and get it done with:  I am really not liking this on the face of it.

          Between the Shoutbox, ad bar, and oversized buttons...  A huge chunk of the page is taken up, even if you go widescreen --- which I'm really not sure works well for me anyway.  And at present, you have the orange (that is a naggingly bright, persistently distracting orange imo) notice bar flashing up brightly left and right in the middle of working through everything, too.

           On top of that the Messages link is frequently used and it should not be narrow and buried at the very top of the page over all this stuff that's not central to the site.  Or at least, you used to say it wasn't obviously central and roleplaying was.  We should not feel pressed to resort to pop-ups for something so frequent, if we don't want to.

            There may be some other new details here I would rather like, but right now all this stuff is just nagging me so much I'm hardly noticing.  I hardly want to look around beyond growling at constantly scrolling and blinking at persistent distractions more.

            I feel a bit like just now the site is trying to emulate Facebook, and I have been using Facebook less lately because it's been doing more stuff like this.  It's a lot more fuss and scrolling to keep the stuff you really came for in view.  Maybe some are used to this as the trend in so many sites these days and maybe it would make the site great as an advertising platform.  But so far, in the proportions and function I see right now -- I just don't enjoy it so much.  It looks a little "slicker" sure and stuff like the button shape is fine (maybe they don't need to be quite that big??).... 

             But what I keep noticing right now?  This is just getting in my way a lot.

[Orange Marmalade]

I like the "No shoutbox" variant but it never sticks. The moment I click any link it poofs. Is there a way to make it permanent or set it via cookie or something? :)

[Geraint]

I like the "No shoutbox" variant but it never sticks. The moment I click any link it poofs. Is there a way to make it permanent or set it via cookie or something? :)

Try holding down your shift button on the keyboard and pushing the refresh button on your browser while you're in the no shoutbox version?

[Orange Marmalade]

Try holding down your shift button on the keyboard and pushing the refresh button on your browser while you're in the no shoutbox version?

That works on the refresh, still doesn't update any of the links on the page. The problem is the variant=noshoutbox doesn't propagate to the other links. So once you click, say, Bookmarks it takes you to https://elliquiy.com/forums/index.php?action=bookmarks, rather than https://elliquiy.com/forums/index.php?action=bookmarks;variant=noshoutbox  :-(

I guess it doesn't matter too much, the buttons are only a couple pixels. Might matter more when I'm on one of my old laptops or a tablet where screen real estate is more important though.

[Geraint]

That works on the refresh, still doesn't update any of the links on the page. The problem is the variant=noshoutbox doesn't propagate to the other links. So once you click, say, Bookmarks it takes you to https://elliquiy.com/forums/index.php?action=bookmarks, rather than https://elliquiy.com/forums/index.php?action=bookmarks;variant=noshoutbox  :-(

I guess it doesn't matter too much, the buttons are only a couple pixels. Might matter more when I'm on one of my old laptops or a tablet where screen real estate is more important though.

Just in case ... Have you tried the reloading (shift refresh) once you got to the new page?

[Chrystal]

It works just fine for me. I select no shoutbox, and I stay with no shoutbox. I have to select it again when I open Elliquiy, but that's just one click.

I think this  might be a browser issue? What browser and version are you using? I'm using Firefox 30.0

[Vekseid]

It works just fine for me. I select no shoutbox, and I stay with no shoutbox. I have to select it again when I open Elliquiy, but that's just one click.

I think this  might be a browser issue? What browser and version are you using? I'm using Firefox 30.0

He's using the bluegray theme, so he can certainly select different variants...

[Kitsunetsuki]

For the record, "No shoutbox" works fine for me as well. The only times I have to select it again are when I either log out of the forum, or when I've closed my browser completely. Even if I close the tab with E up and load E on a new tab, it stays selected. I'm on Windows 7, using Google Chrome.

[Orange Marmalade]

Just in case ... Have you tried the reloading (shift refresh) once you got to the new page?

I did try that and no dice.. but it still seems to have been cache related somehow - cleared things out and now its all good. Maybe the shift reload was working on the current page but when I was going to any other page it was still using some of the cached formatting there? I donno, but all good now :D

[Bloodied Porcelain]

Just incase it hasn't been brought up before... if I use code to determine how big my spoiler tag is going to be... none of the code inside that spoiler works. See below.

Hello There

this is some bold text

[Vekseid]

Just incase it hasn't been brought up before... if I use code to determine how big my spoiler tag is going to be... none of the code inside that spoiler works. See below.

Hello There

this is some bold text

Gah, may as well just remove and rename that. Erf : / Sorry. Will try to come up with something. *kicks parser*

[Chrystal]

Just incase it hasn't been brought up before... if I use code to determine how big my spoiler tag is going to be... none of the code inside that spoiler works. See below.

Hello There

this is some bold text

YIKES!

I had already raised the point in respect of nested spoilers, but I didn't notice that it killed all code off! Well spotted, BeeP.

That is going to basically mean those spoilers with the parameters are effectively (and defectively which my spell-check wanted to put in) useless, because there's no poing in a spoiler that you can't put code in!

Gah, may as well just remove and rename that. Erf : / Sorry. Will try to come up with something. *kicks parser*

Is there a reason you can't put it back the way it was?

[Bloodied Porcelain]

YIKES!

I had already raised the point in respect of nested spoilers, but I didn't notice that it killed all code off! Well spotted, BeeP.

That is going to basically mean those spoilers with the parameters are effectively (and defectively which my spell-check wanted to put in) useless, because there's no poing in a spoiler that you can't put code in!

Is there a reason you can't put it back the way it was?

You can nest spoilers inside of one another, but only if you're not using the code to change the spoiler's size.

[Vekseid]

YIKES!

I had already raised the point in respect of nested spoilers, but I didn't notice that it killed all code off! Well spotted, BeeP.

That is going to basically mean those spoilers with the parameters are effectively (and defectively which my spell-check wanted to put in) useless, because there's no poing in a spoiler that you can't put code in!

Is there a reason you can't put it back the way it was?

It's a matter of "Fix your code by pressing enter, and adding spaces to the title for now" versus "Use this hack with floats to make it not devour the screen."

The former annoys people, the latter is not a particularly stable sort of affairs, if that makes sense. It's also not given to be accessible (in the sense of how things appear in your post versus how a screen reader organizes them) depending on the nature of the hack used.

You can nest spoilers inside of one another, but only if you're not using the code to change the spoiler's size.

I've temporarily disabled that version. It will probably be back with something that works, I just need to be kindof careful.

EDIT: is now wurking.

[Chrystal]

You can nest spoilers inside of one another, but only if you're not using the code to change the spoiler's size.

I know...

It's a matter of "Fix your code by pressing enter, and adding spaces to the title for now" versus "Use this hack with floats to make it not devour the screen."

The former annoys people, the latter is not a particularly stable sort of affairs, if that makes sense. It's also not given to be accessible (in the sense of how things appear in your post versus how a screen reader organizes them) depending on the nature of the hack used.

I've temporarily disabled that version. It will probably be back with something that works, I just need to be kindof careful.

EDIT: is now wurking.

EEP?

I use nested spoilers a lot... Seem to be okay now, and I didn't notice them not working.

[Vekseid]

I know...

EEP?

I use nested spoilers a lot... Seem to be okay now, and I didn't notice them not working.

Each format is actually parsed as a separate tag.

So I disabled the parameterized version for a short bit, but the others remained.

[Chrystal]

Ah, okay. It wasn't clear which one you disabled... Had me panicing for a moment!

[Chrystal]

Um, Sorry to be a pain, but embedded spoilers don't work with the parameters?

Hello There

Hello There

Hello There

world

AND YAY, this works now too :D

[Geraint]

I'd like to thank Veks for all of his efforts to deal with people's issues with the new design, especially since I was one of those having the most severe problems.

I'm really happy to report that as of my signing on this afternoon, several of my problems are either solved or at least reduced to trivial nature.

Disabling the shoutbox is now easy and unintrusive.  And using the wide screen version I can actually see the search button and other things on the right without scrolling ... both at full screen and half screen.  And I can have both of those adjustments at the same time.

The intrusive button bar is much less intrusive now, and doesn't automatically distract my eyes when writing or navigating the forum, so I can actually go back to writing without headaches.

Really, all of that that makes a huge difference.  Thank you!


We still have a set of three matching new blues, and another matching set three old blues, with the two sets not matching each other, but at this point it's an esthetic quibble for me, and may perhaps be solved by additional templates..


I do have one other issue, though:
I'd like to present a somewhat different perspective on the spoilers than the one that is currently being addressed.

I think it's wonderful that Veks is being so responsive to people who want to do complicated things with spoilers.   I think that's part of what makes this forum special

But I'd also like to remind about those of us (I would guess a large majority) for whom the old default case button-generated spoiler was quite sufficient (perhaps with an "=Title" that we added) and easily and happily used ... because it is no longer anything like it used to be. 

I have three years worth of carefully titled and placed spoilers that now look nothing remotely like they did when I made them.  I find that very frustrating, because it entirely changes the look of pages for which I had carefully considered how they would look.

Even more frustrating, however, is that if I want to go back and restore something like the former appearance I'll have to go find complicated code (which I probably won't use often enough to remember, and whose location I likely won't be able to find when I do need it), then take the time to insert it within what used to be a simple uniform base case button generated function.  And I will have to do that in the future unless I am willing to settle for what the current default spoiler looks like.

In other words, I'd really like the default spoiler to go back to looking (in size and position) like the old default spoiler, and leave the complicated additional coding for additional functionality to those for whom the net effect is worth the additional effort.       

[AmberStarfire]

There might not be much point at this stage, but it would be possible to do up an alternate spoiler tag.

Create a class called .alternatespoiler, then put in the specifics of the spoiler tag from the previous themes that showed the spoiler up differently (provided there aren't any other major differences). Then anyone still using the old spoiler tag would have the option of changing it to 'alternatespoiler' instead of 'spoiler' so it shows up the old way it did before, and it wouldn't affect the current usage of the spoiler tag as it shows up now.

If you put it on index.css, it should affect all themes in current use.