XenForo 2.0 Upgrade: Announcement and Feedback Thread

[Zapetu]

Also just noticed - do we really need 17x different dislike / like "emotions". From what I've seen on other forums in the past, whereas "likes" can make a helpful post stand out, when you introducing "dislikes, sad dislike, angry dislike, boring dislike, nitpicking over spelling dislike", etc, that's when forums really start to go downhill. The last thing I want to see is this place trying too hard to end up like Twitter...

Couldn't agree more. There's no need for all those emotions and especially the negative ones might even be harmful to the whole community. There used to be a 'report post option' and that should be enough. Also it would be really useful if you could port all the previous likes for individual posts from the old forums. Those really helped to point out the most informative posts as BSim500 wrote. I don't really care how many likes I have as a user but would like that all informative posts, mine or especially someone else's, would stand out.

I also absolutely need my edit button and I don't feel like there should be any restrictions to that. Delete is also fine as an addition. If I later find out that I've written something that isn't really true, I like to make corrections to it. Also, as a non-native speaker, I make a lot of typos and spelling mistakes and like the ability to correct them later.

 

[purbeast0]

This is so bad. You all lost probably 50% or more of the userbase at the last UI overhaul that wasn't needed and turned this forum into a ghost town. Now I'm pretty confident you will lose even more for making yet again, another change that wasn't needed.

 

[daveybrat]

Visual problems aside, the forums are extremely slow and laggy for me. Something i've never experienced before on here. Maybe it's still being worked on but it's borderline unusable for now.

 

[mxnerd]

The font looks like it's printing on a laser printer that's running out of toner, it's so thin that's really hard to read! Really terrible!

And I still can't edit any of my own posting!

 

[Iron Woode]

other than the orange text (dark theme) it looks pretty good. There is still the superfluous emoji food header, though.

There are other custom themes out there that look interesting:

https://www.themehouse.com/xenforo/2/themes

 

[mxnerd]

This particular thread always took several seconds to load, it's so slow!
https://forums.anandtech.com/threads/freenas-questions.2556269/unread

 

[daveybrat]

This particular thread always took several seconds to load, it's so slow!
https://forums.anandtech.com/threads/freenas-questions.2556269/unread

Yup, i clicked that link and just like many others it took several seconds to open.

 

[sourceninja]

I love that the dark theme uses a color I associate with a clicked link for unclicked links and a color I associate with unclicked for clicked links.

 

[nurturedhate]

This may well work wonders on mobile but it fails on desktop. The font and size make it hard to read. Seeing new posts in a general forum is less intuitive. The default style is nearly blinding. My primary usage for this site is the Hardware & Technology section that one would assume would skew towards a desktop and it's now hard to read. If it's annoying to use and consume there's a strong likelihood people will find somewhere else to browse. The dark theme is definitely better but still not functional.

On top of that we have massive dead space at the top where I assume ads are going to be placed making things worse.
A random reply button in the top right corner.
No navigation between forums on the left side.
Have trending links and search features on the left and right side.
The ask the community box on the right seems more like a suggestion/drop-a-line/info box than a thread starter.

The orange is ok. I like it except for on the usernames.
The red at the bottom of the page for links/topics/follow really clashes (dark theme)

 

[coercitiv]

There's no need for all those emotions and especially the negative ones might even be harmful to the whole community. There used to be a 'report post option' and that should be enough.

I partially disagree: some of the new options are welcome, as they help people express their opinion without necessarily diluting the conversation. The problem I'm seeing right now is they're way too many, list should be trimmed to remain relevant. I especially like the following: Agree, Disagree, Informative, Old. The ones pertaining pure emotions are a bit too much for a tech centered forum.

Whether we end up with Like/Dislike or Agree/Disagree I don't care as much, but there were numerous times I felt the need for such an option.

[Later Edit] can we get the edit option sorted out please? Thank You!

 

[zebrax2]

1. For the the dark theme make the light grey - grey stripe background in the thread view a little darker. The orange text on the lighter stripe is slightly hard to read.
2. A forum directory on the left side panel to make navigation between forums easier. Right now as far as i can see i need to go to the forum front page each time i want to go to another section
3. Like button takes too much space. Make the icon smaller and move it to the quote reply line instead of it having its own line
4. The gap between each post could be smaller
5. An option to change the color of the letter avatars so that they only have a single color scheme instead of the Christmas color scheme we have now
*edit
6. Truncated page list of each thread not showing requiring the users to open the thread first before having access to the last page
7. For dark theme again - The background color for pinned threads are not immediately visible. Also the red pin icon on the current reddish grey background for pinned threads is also hard to see.

 

[DrMrLordX]

Would like to see the classic theme restored. I used that extensively since I wanted my AT forum experience to look pretty much like it did over a decade ago. Now it's gone, and I am quite unhappy with the result.

edit: but hey, at least I am getting an Edit button. In orange. Um, go Vols?

edit edit: The Alerts menu used to have asterisks next to new items. Now there's nothing to indicate that I've already seen a particular alert.

 

[amenx]

Almost seems like one of the most vital aspects of any forum - easy readability - was not a consideration in the new layout.

Compare how eye friendly this text is in another forum: https://www.techpowerup.com/forums/forums/general-hardware.14/
To the default one over here. The dark (pale gray) theme is only slightly better, but that orange text is still not easy on the eyes.

 

[jpishgar]

Awesome feedback - thank you all for the excellent input, it is greatly appreciated and will be synthesized as notes for the theme critters to provide edits and options.

Of note, this morning we're still bumping into some unusual stability issues with the database post-upgrade with long load times on some threads, but we're digging into why and hope to have that resolved soon.

 

[purbeast0]

One example of terrible UX.

 

[DigDog]

Uh ...

I noticed on the main forum page, you use well known symbols to indicate the content of the subforum - Windows 10, javascript, linux, apple, etc.

IANAL but i suspect you cannot use another company's logo.
Intellectual Property n' all that.

 

[mxnerd]

Edit button finally appeared for my posts. Most threads still took over 15 seconds to load, however.

 

[mxnerd]

Edit button finally appeared for my posts. Most threads still took over 15 seconds to load, however.

=

Now posting took over a minute and timed out!

 

[purbeast0]

Uh ...

I noticed on the main forum page, you use well known symbols to indicate the content of the subforum - Windows 10, javascript, linux, apple, etc.

IANAL but i suspect you cannot use another company's logo.
Intellectual Property n' all that.

That's not true at all. There are tons of free libraries that will give you these too. I've used Font Awesome for years and many people have without issue.

https://fontawesome.com/icons?d=gallery

 

[mxnerd]

Seems web page loading issues fixed. Threads load much faster now.

Hope font issue can also be fixed at the least.

 

[jsimenhoff]

Sorry for the downtime. There was an errant add on causing load due to too many queries. We've disabled this add on for the time being, which should help resolve the loading and connection errors.

 

[Carson Dyle]

I'd like to suggest losing the ability for users to Delete their posts. Potential to cause issues, IMO. As long as someone can Edit a post for a reasonable amount of time, or indefinitely, it's unnecessary.

Also: Would it be possible (desirable?) to modify all three skins to always show user join date, number of posts and likes? It was good to be able to see these at a glance when participating in conversations. Now, it's an unnecessary amount of extra work just to see this basic info.

 

[coercitiv]

One example of terrible UX.

That was my doing, part joke, part signaling meant to attract attention.

But yeah, as a graphical and interface designer I would definitely agree that using such a strong main emphasis color in both themes (light & dark) escalates contrast so quickly that there's hardly any higher level to go to. The Anandtech site may use both orange and blue for links and buttons, but proportions strongly favor blue over orange, which makes the interface easier to browse and also helps orange links and buttons stand out where they should. As it stands right now, on the forum this ratio is reversed, leading to some unfortunate side-effects.

Hopefully, after things settle down with the migration and more important issues are solved, a color balance for links / buttons will be considered as well. As long as performance and functionality issues are ironed out I can live with it as is anyway.

 

[WelshBloke]

For people complaining about white space on the right, if you hit the three blue dots next to the reply box it collapses the right side bar.

If you hit the three white bars next to the Anandtech logo in the top left it collapses the left side bar.

 

[DigDog]

That's not true at all. There are tons of free libraries that will give you these too. I've used Font Awesome for years and many people have without issue.

https://fontawesome.com/icons?d=gallery

I am not a lawyer.

I think the free library is a case of did not know copyright i fringment was happening, but .. AT has a wee bit more exposure than some font pack.
And truly, you cant just up n use Steam's logo.

Or do, i dont care.

NEF NEF NEF NEF NEF BEF NEF (BEF)