Board needs color / contrast

[Dave B]

A quick look at the old board tells you that color and contrast directed you where you wanted to go or what you wanted to look at. Learning colors for frequently used functions becomes quick and automatic without having to "read" everything. There is very little contrast between light blue and black which makes this layout very "busy" and confusing while learning the layout. Yes,  eventually it will become automatic with time but color would speed the learning curve considerably. Dave B

[Chuck]

    OK, I've been looking at the new board a bit and after my initial "#@$#!~!! it's not as easy as the old one" reaction I started looking at it closer. It certainly has more power in some ways, so to give it it's due, a lot looks good. Kind of slashdotish in many ways. (slashdot.org)

    The one thing I haven't figured out on it, and what makes the old format so valuable to me, is on one page I can see all the posted messages for a given time period, threaded so I can see who has commented on my (or your) last comment. This allows us to keep conversations going and answer questions that crop up later without a huge investment in searching for things.

    I do like being able to read all comments on one page, but the tree form of this board has become habit forming.

    I do agree with the color codeing comments. Get some "navigate with color" stuff going.

I'm playing a bit here to see if html tagging comes through in the reader... It's confusing to have the option to view it in plain text.

[ADMIN]

As with most complicated software that dynamically generates HTML -- some things are easy to change, and others are hard. In this case, changing colors is EASY. I can have the whole thing a blaze of purple, red, pink and orange for ya in 2 minutes!

However -- before I go crazy, do you (or anyone else) have some specific suggestions for where the colors should be put, what needs to contrast with what, etc.? We'll sure listen to 'em!

Scoop is rather slashdot-ish -- it's intended to be -- but the software is much better written and easier to customize than slashdot. I looked at getting slashdot initially, and all the Linux nerds said "no way - it works, but it sucks to install and customize."

Cheers

ADMIN

[ADMIN]

I've been using the old OP board with nested threads turned off to save load time --- what I've been doing on this board is using HOTLIST to keep track of comments and replies on stuff I'm following...
DANF

[Dave B]

I think the toughest thing for me is that there is very little difference between the light blue, blue and black text. It's not obvious when something has been previously highlighted after being selected or when active. An example is  "number of new responses" I think this could stand out more. I think like many I'm more used to the ease of "discussion" on the old discussion board which was very simple but yet limited. It's getting easier with time as it always will. I just think from what I've read and myself included that most all the options (which are a great improvement) seem to blend into and confuse the main idea of the board, ease of discussion. Maybe a seperate color for all the text of the discussion board section like before (bold black and red for "new" would help to isolate it some. Usually more than 3 distinct colors can get too busy also. Any comments or ideas are appreciated. Dave B.

[kurt]

aka 2 coments 1 new change 1 new to red would help. now were did i put that cheese

[Dave B]

Things are looking different already and for me the contrast really helps isolate the discussion board from the options, much easier to read and know where you're at. More friendly for sure, thanks.  Dave B