Comments (constructive) on the New Forum Software

[JasonB]

On JasonB Said:

….. as the main backroom boffin is on holiday.

 

Smart chap/chapess

 

[Colin BishopModerator @colinbishop34627]

Model Boats Moderator here. The MB site is now showing the correct upcoming issue cover following my exchanges with Mortons and the Editor yesterday.

We seem to be getting an easier ride than on here, mainly due I think to the MB membership being much smaller with less data (so faster response times) and lower expectations (we don’t use the forum so intensively as you people so don’t hit so many bugs or strange happenings!).

General reaction to the new site has been distinctly lukewarm but there is acceptance that it is a work in prgress so there is cautious optimism. This topic is on page 18, our corresponding one is on page 3! This topic is overwhelmingly negative, ours is more neutral. Activity has definitely fallen off since the new site went live, a small group of regulars are on board but are generating all the limited activity.

Everyone wants a proper Latest Posts list which most of us consider essential to using the forum.

Everyone also feels strongly that Mortons have gone totally overboard with the adverts and repetitive banners to subscribe etc. We understand that adverts are necessary, no issues there, but this ‘in your face’ approach is totally counter productive and simply puts viewers off which just defeats the object.

I will be posting some of this as feedback on the system Mortons have set up do deal with ongoing issues.

 

[JasonB]

On JasonB Said

Am I expecting too much?

…

If I had negotiated the development contract … the answer would be emphatically NO

… but it rather depends who did.

MichaelG.

[Peter GreeneParticipant @petergreene36336]

Found it!

I knew there was an earlier topic – in pre Morton days – about upgrading the site software – and I’d been digging around try to find it.

It’s here and makes interesting – not to say amusing – reading in light of some of the comments in this thread. (Warning: it’s a very long thread).

Be careful what you wish for 🙂

 

[JasonBModerator @jasonb]

The fact that Model Boats is on a different server means that it is running a lot faster than here which will save some comments.

Also the amount of activity here can easily see 30 or so topics active in a 24hr period, MB seems to be less than 10 so easier to keep track of on the short “Latest Activity “list though that is down again at the moment.

[Craig BrownParticipant @craigbrown60096]

I can only assume this has already been brought up, but prompted by comments from Jason in another thread, regarding the lack of new members. This I would imagine is largely to do with an issue I have just noticed with redirects to the forum from Google giving an error message.

For example if you Google search “Warco VMC forum”, the model engineer forum is the top hit but clicking on any of the threads gives a page not found error. Now if I were a non member then chances are I just press back and move on to the next website

[JasonBModerator @jasonb]

I’m not techie enough to know why but if Google does manage to find something then the link it finds is the old url and not what it has become on this site so the page is not found.

The other thing is Google is simply not finding things that used to be here. I tried several options including typing as the old front page search did which should get Google looking in model-engineer.co.uk for “Jason’s Firefly” which was a popular thread and previously turned up lots of my images. Results now zero.

[Michael GilliganParticipant @michaelgilligan61133]

Picking-up on Jason’s point …

This is what Google returned when I searched [as one reasonably might] for model engineer forum
.

.

and here’s what ‘Learn why’ tells us

https://support.google.com/webmasters/answer/7489871?hl=en

If we want it to work … someone needs to flick that switch !!

MichaelG.

[JasonB]

On JasonB Said:

The other thing is Google is simply not finding things that used to be here. I tried several options including typing as the old front page search did which should get Google looking in model-engineer.co.uk for “Jason’s Firefly” which was a popular thread and previously turned up lots of my images. Results now zero.

I found that when experimenting also. Things I would have searched for previously would have had this forum right at the top in the results, now it’s either way down the list or not there at all

[Benedict WhiteParticipant @benedictwhite51126]

Yesterday at 20:11 I made a note (In a spreadsheet) of the Forum stats.

 

Today I made a note of the same, then got the spreadsheet to work out the difference.

 

There are now (compared to yesterday)

6   more users

10  more topics

120 more replies

Just thought I would let people know.

Also the “Latest Activity” is now working again.

[peak4Participant @peak4]

What would appear to be another hyperlink bug.

I was commenting on the thread about re-sizing images, and wanted to provide a link back to a post of mine on a different thread.

We know that just inserting a URL of that post seems to be resolved by the forum as a link to the fist page and not the individual post

Screenshot of entered text

Test Thread for inserting images

Due to that bug I thought I’d try embedding the post number as a shortcut in the text, as in this example

I was commenting on the thread about re-sizing images, and wanted to provide a link back to a post of mine on a different thread.

Unfortunately, that doesn’t seem to work correctly either

That actually takes you to the the top of this page of this topic, not the one I was hoping to point towards on the image thread.

If however, you post the whole of the URL as a link into the same text, then it seems to work OK

I was commenting onthe thread about re-sizing images and wanted to provide a link back to a post of mine on a different thread.

Then that seems to work out OK

I see the spellcucker is still disabled 🙂

Bill

 

 

[peak4]

On peak4 Said:

What would appear to be another hyperlink bug.

I was commenting on the thread about re-sizing images, and wanted to provide a link back to a post of mine on a different thread.

We know that just inserting a URL of that post seems to be resolved by the forum as a link to the fist page and not the individual post

Screenshot of entered text

… <etc. >

 

.

That’s very odd, Bill

I have just put that URL into a new tab, and it worked fine

… let’s see what it does here:

Test Thread for inserting images

https://www.model-engineer.co.uk/forums/topic/test-thread-for-inserting-images/page/2/#post-683367

MichaelG.

.

Note: __ the first of those two links was created by the system … I had simply pasted the URL into my post.

… for the second one, I used the ‘chain-link’ icon in the menu bar.

… and they are displaying differently whilst I am editing this post.

MichaelG.

[peak4Participant @peak4]

Michael, thats similar to me.

Putting the whole URL into a new tab works fine.

Allowing the forum to redirect by clicking on the link, sends youu elsewhere.
That’s the problem I’m trying to highlight; putting the destination post number #xxxxx in a forum reply sends you somewhere completely different again.

Must go tea’s ready 🙂

Bill

[Michael GilliganParticipant @michaelgilligan61133]

O.K. __ I give up

My previous post is now morphing as I watch it

… I have no idea what you will see !

MichaelG.

.

Here’s a screenshot of my post having just refreshed the page

… either it’s going mad or I am:

[ChrisH]

On ChrisH Said:

There seems to be a lot of negative comments re the new site – to which I mostly agree, although I have not read through every comment.

So I don’t know if it has been mentioned before, but to those like me who suffer with some degree of colour blindness there are some colour issues here, for example pale blue text on a white background, whilst readable to me, is a strain to read.  The outline of the text box around this comment box I can hardly see – what is wrong with a black outline on a white backround instead of what appears to be very pale grey?

And there is an awful lot of white everywhere, plus I’m not struck on the text font!

There is an expression of “if it ain’t broke don’t fix it”; I appreciate this is a new forum but a lot of the old furum was not broke!

Chris

 

 

[peak4Participant @peak4]

Michael G; Unfortunalely, your screenshot doesn’t display, however, your first link takes me here.
i.e. the head of the topic about posting images
Although the link you posted was complete with the actual page and post number, the forum resolves it to a truntated URL.

 

Your second link, where the text of the address is visible, takes me here; i.e. directly to the correct post

This is obviously where it should go, and worked OK for me when I inserted that same link into the actual wording of a sentence.

However, when I inserted the #xxxxx into a section of text like this, using the same chain link icon>

It went here; Note that the post number is correct of 683367,

The #xxxxx doesn’t seem to have been resolved correctly as it’s actually sent you to the very top of Page 19 on this topic, rather than page 2 of where I should have been heading

Bill

[Michael GilliganParticipant @michaelgilligan61133]

I have just sent you an eMail, Bill

MichaelG.

[Michael Gilligan]

On Michael Gilligan Said:

I have just sent you an eMail, Bill

MichaelG.

Cheers, got it; the image came through as a .png which doesn’t seem to resolve as an image on this forum.
(or maybe it does sometimes??)

Sleep well, we keep different hours over here since we retired, hence the late tea/dinner/evening meal. 🙂

Bill

[peak4Participant @peak4]

This isnt dissimilar to the Gallery problem I replied to on the relevant thread, where the buttons send you to a page which isn’t there, but that reverts you to the initial URL, with a P404 error

Bill

[peak4]

On peak4 Said:

On Michael Gilligan Said:

I have just sent you an eMail, Bill

MichaelG.

Cheers, got it; the image came through as a .png which doesn’t seem to

resolve as an image on this forum.
(or maybe it does sometimes??)

 

…

.

We were promised the earth, in view of file-types, and [allegedly] got a few crumbs … one of which was the ability to inset .png files

I have no idea what is going on, but I am now getting towards not caring any more.

The system has let me insert .png images … and on my screen [except for last nights weird behaviour] they are visible

Whether anyone else can see them is now open to question !

My next post will be a very simple expression of that question.

MichaelG.

[Michael GilliganParticipant @michaelgilligan61133]

Two images posted … how many can you see ?

First a .png screenshot [drastically cropped to 874×865]
.

.

Now, that same cropped image, saved as a 99% jpeg file:

.

[Michael GilliganParticipant @michaelgilligan61133]

Just as an aside … the whole performance of posting large images in the tiny composition pane is beyond a joke.

MichaelG.

[Michael GilliganParticipant @michaelgilligan61133]

Another constructive comment
[unrelated to the ongoing discussion about posting pictures]

I mentioned recently that Sucuri is not permitted to fully scan this site

… it does, however, provide some useful comments on Hardening

https://sitecheck.sucuri.net/results/www.model-engineer.co.uk

I would suggest looking at those sooner-rather-than-later.

MichaelG.

[JasonBModerator @jasonb]

Michael I see both

Not sure about the small pane it may be an ipad thing (phone as well?) and probably not as significant as the general pain of using the site.

[Nicholas FarrParticipant @nicholasfarr14254]

Hi MichaelG, I can see two texted images, both of which are the same size, and are cropped to the word “through” third line up from the bottom, on the right hand side.

The link you have posted says scan failed 403 Forbidden, but there is a green tick saying site is not blacklisted.

Regards Nick.

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