New Look

[Ady1Participant @ady1]

Still miles better than Yahoo

Their recent changes have been a disaster for Yahoo groups

[ZiggarParticipant @ziggar]

can i ask why you, Katy, are here sorting this mess out while the two supposed editors/moderators that should be here are nowhere to be seen and can only be assumed to be in hiding ?

Z

[Michael GilliganParticipant @michaelgilligan61133]

Katy,

I must congratulate you on the interactive approach you are taking

… It really does make a refreshing change!

The blue & black thread titles are a vast improvement, thank you.

May I also refer you to a recent thread called Messages, where it is noted that "Inbox" on the top bar might be better labelled "Messages".

MichaelG.

[Ian PParticipant @ianp]

Posted by Ziggar on 01/10/2013 15:28:32:

can i ask why you, Katy, are here sorting this mess out while the two supposed editors/moderators that should be here are nowhere to be seen and can only be assumed to be in hiding ?

Z

Please don't make waves!

Katy is doing a thankless job, brilliantly! This is the first time that anyone from the management has taken a active interest in the users and usability of this site. Not only has she taken an interest but has been helpful and most importantly honest and communicative!

I would not criticise the magazine editors, they did what they could but only had limited power in relation to the website.

There have been one or two sporadic posts on this forum from other 'techies' but their interest did not last long and I don't recall any vast improvements as a being their legacy

Ian P

[David Clark 13Participant @davidclark13]

Hi Ziggar

I am one of the Editors/moderators.

I no longer work for MyTimeMedia but am a contractor solely responsible for editing Model Engineers' Workshop.

This means I do not get paid to moderate this forum.
Anyway I don't think I should interfere with the site as it is not my responsibility.

I have retained moderator status so I can help members with the occasional subscription query and update the Model Engineers' Workshop preview and cover.

If any member wants to discuss anything with me whether related to this website or MEW they can email me at:

david.clark@mytimemedia.com

regards David

PS. I can live with the new look site but would prefer the main page limits to be defined with a background colour. While they are not defined, it looks like half the site is missing on some pages.

Edited By David Clark 1 on 01/10/2013 16:12:25

[JasonBModerator @jasonb]

Posted by Ziggar on 01/10/2013 15:28:32:

can i ask why you, Katy, are here sorting this mess out while the two supposed editors/moderators that should be here are nowhere to be seen and can only be assumed to be in hiding ?

Z

I think you answered it yourself. Diane and David are prmerily magazine editors and secondly forum moderators. Katy is part of MTM's IT department so better quallified to sort of web issues.

J

[ZiggarParticipant @ziggar]

David thanks for the explanation

now i understand, whereas before it wasnt explained by anyone or exactly clear what was happening
at least thats how i saw it

 

Edited By Ziggar on 01/10/2013 16:19:49

[Katy PurvisParticipant @katypurvis79544]

Ziggar, Michael, Mike and Ian,

It's really not like that, the editors are busy with the magazines and look after content here on the website, the moderators are here to help you in the forum, and it is my job (although very part time, and certainly not any kind of management) to look after the back end of the MTM websites. So this particular mess is mine! The editor and moderators don't have access to much of the parts involved in this layout change.

There are twenty websites, not all of them have forums, but I can't keep an eye on every thread on every website. When we make a major change, I do try to find the threads which comment on the changes and tweak things accordingly. I am limited by the time I have to do this, the structure of our code and database, and conflicting opinions about what is OK and what isn't, which vary dramatically by website, so I can't fix everything to everyone's satisfaction. We have quite a few disgruntled members here, and I am not going to be able to turn things round for everyone this week. Yesterday's changes were restricted to ME, so I have the chance to respond a bit better than usual at the moment. When it was the turn of Model Flying, or Popular Patchwork, or whoever, I did the same. If you have got a genuine problem with the changes, and it is possible to change it, then I will do my best, and for this week at least, I'll tell you what I've done about it.

For other problems, if you think I need to know about a particular thread, you can email me, katy.purvis@mytimemedia.com, or ask Diane or one of the mods to bring it to my attention, and I'll see what, if anything, can be done.

Is that fair?

Michael, it was originally called 'Messages' but at this text size, the menu didn't fit, so quite a few labels were changed. Admin's have extra menu items, so there is less space than you'd think

[ZiggarParticipant @ziggar]

Katy, thanks for the explanation.

Again,as i said in my previous answer to Davids reply, which crossed with yours timewise, it was not clear nor had anything actually been explained in plain terms.

Again, now i understand that you are the IT person, this wasnt explained before. David has his role, this wasnt exactly explained clearly previously either. But both questions have now been answered nce and clearly so that even an idiot like me can understand. The answers were clear and precise and from the horses mouths, so to speak.

Not assumptions and guesswork………..

i make no apologies for asking the question in the first place

[Martin WParticipant @martinw]

Hi

When I first saw the revamped site I thought OMG what is going on, however after using it for a couple of days I must say that I quite like it and that in many ways it is an improvement on the old one.There have been and will be suggestions on what users want and it appears that the site is being fine tuned to a greater or lesser extent to accomodate these which is great, on the whole I like it.

Martin W

Edited By Martin W on 01/10/2013 16:44:29

[SteambuffParticipant @steambuff]

I tend to agree with Martin … it is growing on me …. but …

Can we use the full screen and not leave a 2 inch white blank space on the left and right?

Can the latest sales and wanted's be moved up the screen (Just under the 'Latest Posts' maybe … its a long scroll down

 

Thanks

Dave

Edited By Steambuff on 01/10/2013 16:49:04

[Keith LongParticipant @keithlong89920]

Dave

I think that might be down to the settings on your computer, this webpage completely fills the screen on my laptop.

Keith

[modeng2000Participant @modeng2000]

Is it possible to have a 'Mark all posts read' button please?

This is available on a lot of forums and is very useful to quickly show new posts since the last visit. The latest forum posts block on the right does not fulfill this very well.

John

[Gone AwayParticipant @goneaway]

Posted by Katy Purvis on 01/10/2013 15:10:52:

Typing those key combinations in a text editor in an awful lot of websites would produce a smiley.

 

I understand (or it's what I've "heard") that the editor is a third-party application over which you have no control (other than "user feedback" . However, for the application writer it's not difficult to fix this (i.e. it's not "rocket science".

You make it mandatory to insert smilies from the drop down. The editor then precedes those smilies with a control or ("flag" character telling the editor to interpret them as smilies. Any such characters entered in the normal text flow don't have the flag and are interpreted literally.

That's what most other sites (other than those based on this same editor) do. I don't agree with you characterisation up there ("awful lot".

 

Edited By OMG on 01/10/2013 17:18:15

[Nicholas FarrParticipant @nicholasfarr14254]

Hi Katy, thanks for the blue unclicked links, makes it so much clearer, and the 10 latest forum posts.

Regards Nick.

[jason udallParticipant @jasonudall57142]

Katy..yoi asked what zoom caused the effect I was seeing?
Well can zoom to lots of extreems on my android browser..can’t get the effect.
In firefox can’t try experiment till later. .but like I said seems to be related to zoom sizes and website code ( or Firefox ) I canwork around …might be related to a ads over text thing seen here from time to time …and as such might lead to a solution to that one

[Katy PurvisParticipant @katypurvis79544]

OMG, I can configure the editor to interpret the keycodes literally, but I can't do that on a site by site basis, ie just for ME. The other forums like the smileys, and they would be equally unhappy if we removed the key combinations for them

[KWILParticipant @kwil]

Steambuff,

Hold down Ctrl and the scroll on the mouse will adjust the content to any size to suit.

[SpringbokParticipant @springbok]

how dianne doese one become a moderator as it seems that someone with only 18 posts and have this

bob

[Katy PurvisParticipant @katypurvis79544]

Springbok, I am not strictly a moderator. We used to have admin designations, but this was objected to, and anyone with any admin rights is now called a moderator. I only have 18 posts here, because I am an admin on all the MTM websites.

[Martin WParticipant @martinw]

KWIL

Thanks for the tip re Ctrl/Scroll, another one for my remaining lonely grey cell to accomodate!!

Martin W

[Gone AwayParticipant @goneaway]

Posted by Katy Purvis on 01/10/2013 17:21:49:

OMG, I can configure the editor to interpret the keycodes literally, but I can't do that on a site by site basis, ie just for ME. The other forums like the smileys, and they would be equally unhappy if we removed the key combinations for them

Does that mean if you configure the editor to interpret the typed keycodes literally you can no longer insert smileys from the drop-down?

If it does, that configuration option seems pretty dumb.

If it doesn't then I don't see the problem … other forums can still have their smileys from the drop down (surely nobody actually remembers the characters for all those smileys anyway).

As for the difficulty of accidentally getting a smiley, while I grant you that a colon or semi-colon and a closing parenthesis in sequence would be unusual in a grammatically written sentence (!), a quote character preceding a closing parenthesis is quite common. And you only have to read these forums to know that it happens.

ps: thank you for reminding me how to spell "smileys"

[John Stevenson 1Participant @johnstevenson1]

Posted by Springbok on 01/10/2013 17:43:01:

how dianne doese one become a moderator as it seems that someone with only 18 posts and have this

bob

Simple Bob, design a new website that no one bitches about and you can be moderator for a week – hows that ?

[Katy PurvisParticipant @katypurvis79544]

Thanks everyone for the positive comments

I'll try to catch up on the wants and dislikes below

Richard and ModEng2000, I agree a unread post list would be nice, but implementing this is very unlikely, as it would massively increase the load on the forum. It would mean we would have to record and access more data about which posts you had read and when. I use the latest posts page and the coloured links myself, but as I use the PP forum everyday, I know pretty much where I'm starting from each morning, so that may or may not work for you

Zigger, I have a had reply about your digital access, which is not completely resolved to my satisfaction, but I will email you about it in a minute

David, I don't think it is very likely that the 'background' area will be changed, but I'll bring it up

Steambuff, part of your question relates to David's and I will see what I can do, but I think it will probably be something to get used to. The overall width is the same as it was previously. I doubt that we will be able to move latest sales and wants up, as it was a long battle to get latest forum posts above the ads previously, but I will talk to the advertising team and see what they think

Jason, I think I need to wait and hear about your Firefox experiment, but I'll come back to you later

OMG, I can configure it so that the dropdowns work and the shortcuts don't, but on the other forums people seem to like using the shortcuts. The members here may not be big facebook users, but on the other sites, many are, and they do know all the shortcuts Before today I had never seen a complaint about the shortcuts, only complaints that there are not enough smileys. I can't usually remember how to spell Smiley either though.

I'll come back in the morning and see what I can do about all this and whatever comes next. Please be aware that I am doing this in my own time, and now I have an evening of Patchwork forum neglect to make up for.

[David Clark 13Participant @davidclark13]

Hi Katy

How about a line down each side of the page as a seperator?

At the moment most of the adverts are below the main content of the page.

Just look at the home page.

Perhaps the answer is more content on some of the pages.

Perhaps like this?

regards David

[Author]

Posts