New Features on Tacoma World

Is there a button that says "Stop making all my websites look like Windows 8 shit meant for a hipster with a tablet"?

Maybe a button that says "Make it go back"?

I know some folks like this kind of look, and I'll either get over it or ...well, that's about it really. I don't see a whole lot of options. Wish I could have voted no beforehand.

 

Last May. That Bison was causing a traffic jam, but I wasn't going to give him any lip!

 

It wasn't up for vote. The old software wasn't being supported any longer, so it was time to upgrade.

Maybe we need a thread for complainers, where they can donate money instead of bitching about many hours of hard work and lots of money spent for them to have a place to hang out online is not good enough.

 

Wow, this place got really different! Going to take some getting used to.

 

Is this anything like passing a kidney stone?

 

Well, thank you, but now I don't know how to do it myself! What did you do?

 

@tcBob I just liked this it was a centralized place to see subscribed threads, new pm's, access to your account settings. Seems like it just takes more clicking to get to where you want to go.

 

I wish the 'sticky' threads still had a different background shade than the other threads in a forum

 

Exploring the new layout. Lost my signature pic?

 

Take this as constructive criticism, not just complaining. The new update to the forum software looks pretty, rounded edges on boxes etc., but it still basically the same forum software from 10 year ago. 80% of the screen is wasted space, either empty or redundant (the same signature I've seen 8 times in the last 15 minutes). We are about to see the Gen-3 Tacoma. There is are Gen-3 concepts in web-based forums, but TW is still Gen-1.

I'm on a 13" mac, and here is a small screen snapshot of my entire screen. There are two lines of information. 22 words total of new information. The rest is blank, or details about the poster, which I rarely read. If I wanted to read the poster's details, couldn't I just click on their name? Yes, I can also view page on a bigger monitor, but the ratio or wasted space remains the same. If the info for Up2NoGood was on a single horizontal line, you would have 70% less wasted space. And to repeat myself, sometimes the screen doesn't look so empty, because I'm seeing the same signature over and over and over and over and over...



In the computer science world where I live, they solved this problem. Some smart guys created a new forum format that is 100% focused on information exchange. More specifically, focused on asking questions and getting answers. I admit they more tightly focused on question/answer. But computer science and engineering forums are night and day different from using TW and thousands of other old-school forums. It will look slightly confusing and you may not understand the topics, but stackexchange.com paradigm is 100% more efficient.

Here is The Straight Dope from 2003 and 2013. It follows the exact same paradigm over 10 years of "change", and has the same issues with signal-to-noise (and signal-to-blank) ratio. Nothing really changed between 2003 and 2013. Just slight user interface improvements.



Compare 2003 Straight Dope to today's TW:



Pretty much the same layout. And as you dive in, same wasted and redundant screen layout. Just like most forums, TW and others are all based one one or two purchased forum packages. The "stack exchange" (as in 'exchange information' rather than cutesy signatures) has become the defacto standard for engineering.




Here is a typical screen shot of a answer to a question at a modern forum. I'm keeping these images small because the details don't matter, the signal/noise ratio is what matters. I just grabbed a random screen from stackoverflow. I can click on the poster and responder to see their info if I want to. I don't see the same picture, the same US flag, the same 'I support the troops" (and I do support the troop!), the same quippy quote that was funny the first 72 times, but now has lost its humor. I see the question, I see answer, I see comments on the answers, I see related posts. I don't see a full screen to show 22 words of new information.




I like TW, I enjoy visiting here. But I was really disappointed to see a forum "upgrade" that pretty much has us at a Gen-1 forum with rounded boxes and drag&drop images (ooh!).

 

Looks good to me, Bob#1 . I realize now what an ordeal it must of been to transfer the "old" to the "new". Thank You for your hard work, sir!

 

Ya, we finally got past that Big Dude, then drove about 100 yards and a Grizzly bear was going up the hillside causing another major jam!

 

New update looks amazing! I thought I went to the wrong site at first. Nice work!

 

If that was this forum I'd bounce tomorrow. I like my wasted space, and my stupid signature quotes.

 

Follow my comments. tcBob just inserted mine. I uploaded my pics to My Media (had never done that before), and then you're supposed to just be able to copy the URL for the pic and insert it. I dunno, I couldn't make it work.

 

Drag & Drop works. I like that.

Back when they were clean...

 

Looking at the first page, don't see it, gonna search around a bit, but...

When you're at the main page, seeing the list of recently updated topics....am I blind, or is there no longer a way to click once and get to the last page of a 500 page foodie thread, for instance?