Buffistas Building a Better Board
Do you have problems, concerns or recommendations about the technical side of the Phoenix? Air them here. Compliments also welcome.
To-do list
As is, this board swings like a pendulum do!
Buffistas on bicycles, two by two...
I am Read New's bitch.
Me too. And I LOVE that at the end of Read New, it puts you right at your message center.
I love it ,too. My only quibble with read new is that I wish it would stay in a thread until you've read all the posts in the thread, rather than jumping around each time you click. But then I suppose it wouldn't actually be Read New. :)
And (not accusing anyone of suggesting this) suggesting improvements NE complaints.
I would love this board if it stayed in this exact form forever. It is already superior to the WX in all it's incarnations, including TT and PF.
But that does not mean if I see a way to make it better I won't suggest them.
And, since I'm pretty good at PHP, perhaps help implement them.
My only quibble with read new is that I wish it would stay in a thread until you've read all the posts in the thread, rather than jumping around each time you click.
Click Next.
Click Next.
But then I have to actually decide which link I want to click.
t whine
I just thought of a great metaphor to explain why no-one should be sad when someone asks for improvements.
If you are a jeweler and set a diamond, and someone ask for a change there is a certain sadness involved. You did your craft, and the person was not satisfied as with it as it was. But software development is not like diamond cutting, even though the Phoenix is a gem of a board.
Software development is more like cooking. If you serve someone a dish, and they ask for seconds, this is not sad - it is the best compliment a chef can get. If you write a novel , and someone asks for a sequel, again a great compliment. They want more.
No piece of software is ever really finished. When you comlete a dvelopment stage, and people start asking for a further stage, it is just like asking a cook for seconds. They love what you did and want more.
What would be bad at this point , what every develper fears is a bunch of people screaming "I can't get in..." . "It won't let me...".
That people are asking for improvements - not bug fixes tells you how great the board really is. It is in a way better that the other compliments, because it is unconcious, selfish, and therefore guaranteed sincere.
One other WX note -- Holli, if you're around, I just noticed that the TT TV header still points to the Contingency Plan at WX.
I just thought of a great metaphor to explain why no-one should be sad when someone asks for improvements.
Gar, not to be too Carly Simon, but my post wasn't about you. It's about my issue. It irks the shit out of me when I do something that was requested, when I asked people to try it and play with it before I am ready to let it go public and it is only after I go public with something, or the day I do it that people jump all over it with criticism and want modifications. It's my issue as acknowledged in my post, but your response to it seems as if I needed to say, ftr, it's not about you or anyone here.
That being said, of course I have things that I'd like to see different with the software to suit my personal needs. But I don't feel compelled to ask for those changes today. Or maybe even this week. Or maybe at all. As a human, I have the great capacity to modify my own behavior to suit some of the things I'd like to see changed.
explain why no-one should be sad when someone asks for improvements.
Moreover, I'm entitled to my feelings and please don't tell me how I should or should not feel.
Maybe John will have insight into that. I'm sure it's to do with font sizes in the style sheets.
Personal style sheets are on the phase two wish list. Mozilla does let me override as far as typeface goes, but I'm pretty sure Jon hardwired the font sizes in the style sheet.
Yes, as noted, the style sheet gives a specific font size for text in the posts. There's a certain amount of argument about this, but I think most usability gurus would say that it's better not to fix sizes.
Some browsers won't let you change the size if it's set as a specific number.
The policy where I work is to always use
relative
sizes, like
font-size: 150%
for big or
font-size: 60%
for small.
As the text in people's messages is governed by one line in the style sheet, it would be very very simple to just remove the size declaration entirely, which would leave it browser-default size and liable to resizing with your preferences and/or font size buttons/menus.
[edit] I could do it, but how long is Jon B away for? I don't want to touch anything if he's coming back tomorrow, you know.
Oh, and if we're doing the dance of Feature Requests, I would actually like COMM and Bureaucracy to be in my Message Centre. My brain doesn't make a distinction between Site Tools and other threads, it just want to get at its favourite threads easily.
John, I think Jon is not going to be back until the end of the month.