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Website Revision - Potential New Home Page

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Gary Lewis

Re: Website Revision - Potential New Home Page

Administrator

I've made a change to reduce the real estate the poem and picture take by placing them side-by-side. See what you think up top.

And now to address another thing: It was suggested that we have the forum-specific things actually in the forum instead of available via the menu above. And I think these are those things: Forum FAQ's; Member's Map; Forum & Website Issues, although this one is debatable.

But, it has also been suggested that we have fewer stickies. So here's a proposal:

FORUM Folder: Create a new, pinned folder which houses the FAQ's folder; Member's Map folder; Forum & Website Issues thread; Adminstrative Area folder; Website & Forum Suggestion Box thread

MARKETPLACE Folder: Create a new, pinned folder that houses the eBay & Craigslist Finds folder; For Sale, Trade, or Free To A Good Home folder; Want To Buy folder

By my calculation that would reduce the # of pinned folders on the main page by three. And, it would probably let us eliminate the Bullnose Forum entry in the menu if I find homes for the other bits.

I'm open to other or additional suggestions. Please tell me your thoughts.

Gary, AKA "Gary fellow": Profile

Dad's: '81 F150 Ranger XLT 4x4: Down for restomod: Full-roller "stroked 351M" w/Trick Flow heads & intake, EEC-V SEFI/E4OD/3.50 gears w/Kevlar clutches
Blue: 2015 F150 Platinum 4x4 SuperCrew wearing Blue Jeans & sporting a 3.5L EB & Max Tow
Big Blue: 1985 F250HD 4x4: 460/ZF5/3.55's, D60 w/Ox locker & 10.25 Sterling/Trutrac, Blue Top & Borgeson, & EEC-V MAF/SEFI

FoxFord33

Re: Website Revision - Potential New Home Page

Suggestion:

Have a "landing page" style homepage, where there are two options: "New to the site?" and "Proceed to site." "New..." would take a new person to those 'once but not often again' features like username creation, general how-to's for the site, etc. "Proceed" would take you to the site pretty much as-is, with the other suggested changes.

Ford Grand Wagoneer - 1990 Jeep Grand Wagoneer preparing to receive a Ford drivetrain...

A Keeper - 1993 F-150 XLT Super-Cab 5.0 EFI 2WD E4OD 8.8" with 3.55 gear Sold it for my Grand Wagoneer project!

Gary Lewis

Re: Website Revision - Potential New Home Page

Administrator

FoxFord33 wrote

Suggestion:

Have a "landing page" style homepage, where there are two options: "New to the site?" and "Proceed to site." "New..." would take a new person to those 'once but not often again' features like username creation, general how-to's for the site, etc. "Proceed" would take you to the site pretty much as-is, with the other suggested changes.

Thanks for the suggestion, Steve. I thought about something like that. But then I realized that there are two functions of the "site": the forum and the documentation on the rest of the site. So "New..." would have to be qualified as to forum or documentation. And "Proceed" takes you to the forum? Or the documentation?

So we would be placing a barrier between the 50% of the site's traffic which is headed to the forum, only to capture the roughly 10/week that are newbies to the forum. I don't have a good feeling about that.

And, remember that this whole thing was from a suggestion by a friend, part of which was an effort to free up real estate on the forum as well as to reduce the # of bits transfered. Well, I helped it some yesterday by reducing the bits w/in the picture by a factor of 4, from 1Mb to 256Kb. And today I helped the real estate issue by making the picture smaller and placing it in parallel with the prayer.

So, back to my question about that - did it help?

Gary, AKA "Gary fellow": Profile

Steve83

Re: Website Revision - Potential New Home Page

Banned User

Gary Lewis wrote

...an effort to free up real estate...by making the picture smaller and placing it in parallel with the prayer.

So, back to my question about that - did it help?

Since the page auto-jumps down past them anyway, I don't see it as a substantial improvement. There's just less space at the top of the page to jump past when the page finishes loading. But I also don't see much need for improvement - it was working before, and it still works now. Tempest in a teacup.

Gary Lewis wrote

So here's a proposal...

All of that sounds good to me.

Consider pulling the Admin Area (including suggestions, feedback, & quarantine) into a semi-hidden area NOT easily accessible or noticeable. Maybe only available via the pulldown. It's not something everyone needs to see every visit.

grumpin

Re: Website Revision - Potential New Home Page

I noticed a little faster load time with the picture and prayer next to each other.

Dane
1986 F250HD SC XLT Lariat 4x4 460 C6-Sold
1992 Bronco XLT 4x4 351W E4OD
1998 GMC Sierra SLE K1500 350 4L60E
Arizona

Gary Lewis

Re: Website Revision - Potential New Home Page

Administrator

Ok guys, thanks for the input. I hope to get more input before I start making changes, especially from those with slower connections. But the fact that it is loading more quickly is good news.

Gary, AKA "Gary fellow": Profile

85lebaront2

Re: Website Revision - Potential New Home Page

Administrator

Ok, I finally saw the change this morning, looks good and does make the top more compact. Since I only visit on my computer it really didn't matter one way or the other to me.

Bill AKA "LOBO" Profile

"Getting old is inevitable, growing up is optional" Darth Vader 1986 F350 460 converted to MAF/SEFI, E4OD 12X3 1/2 rear brakes, traction loc 3:55 gear, 160 amp 3G alternator Wife's 2011 Flex Limited Daily Driver 2009 Flex Limited with factory tow package Project car 1986 Chrysler LeBaron convertible 2.2L Turbo II, modified A413

1986F150Six

Re: Website Revision - Potential New Home Page

Administrator

In reply to this post by Gary Lewis

Gary Lewis wrote

I hope to get more input before I start making changes, especially from those with slower connections.

Hey, you talking about us older guys?

Gary Lewis

Re: Website Revision - Potential New Home Page

Administrator

Thanks, Bill.

David - I was thinking more about Jim's limited connectivity to the internet, not my connection to my memory. But, as I said from the pulpit on Sunday, if this is what 72 is like, can you imagine what problems Methuselah had?

Gary, AKA "Gary fellow": Profile

1986F150Six

Re: Website Revision - Potential New Home Page

Administrator

969 years?

Gary Lewis

Re: Website Revision - Potential New Home Page

Administrator

Yep! I have problems when I go into another room remembering why I went there. Sometimes back out of the room to figure it out. Or sit down for a mo to think about it. So by 969 I'm not sure I'll recognize me in the mirror!

Gary, AKA "Gary fellow": Profile

81f100custom

Re: Website Revision - Potential New Home Page

Not sure if this would be of any help but just another site/forum I am a member on. Just maybe some ideas or thoughts on how someone else out there is doing it. When there home page loads it list the 20 most recent post no matter what they are. You can go under the forums tab where it is broken down into the individual subjects or topics. Anyway just thought it may be worth a look.

https://www.elcaminocentral.com/

Eddie,
81 F100 Custom SWB, 5.0L, 4x2, Single Rail Four-Speed Overdrive, 3.00 Non-Limited Slip Rear Axle, Non A/C truck to complete 85 F150 factory A/C conversion, Nutmeg interior color.

Gary Lewis

Re: Website Revision - Potential New Home Page

Administrator

Thanks. It is always interesting to see how others do it. But our forum provider, Nabble, doesn't provide the ability to do what they are doing on that site. At least not when you first go to our forum. However, you can then click one link, Topics View, and that will take you to a chronological list of all posts, starting with the latest one.

Anyway, thanks again.

Gary, AKA "Gary fellow": Profile

Steve83

Re: Website Revision - Potential New Home Page

Banned User

In reply to this post by Gary Lewis

Gary Lewis wrote

...can you imagine what problems Methuselah had?

He died young, compared to Noah.

grumpin

Re: Website Revision - Potential New Home Page

Noah was 950.

Dane
1986 F250HD SC XLT Lariat 4x4 460 C6-Sold
1992 Bronco XLT 4x4 351W E4OD
1998 GMC Sierra SLE K1500 350 4L60E
Arizona

Ford F834

Re: Website Revision - Potential New Home Page

Administrator

In reply to this post by Gary Lewis

Hello Gary, sorry I am quite late for the party on this one. It seems you have achieved your goals regarding bit transfer and page loading speed but I thought I’d weigh in anyway...

I agree that things work fine the way they are, but I will go against the grain and say that I like the idea of a homepage and here is why... there is only a passing mention of the website in the bolded site description above the forum topics. Even if people realize it’s there, I think it is understated. Maybe it is a hold over from the caveman days where the larger something was drawn on the cave wall the more important it was. I know it is only an optical illusion, but the website now seems more like a hidden feature or a background reference and in my opinion it deserves more than that. Making the forum the homepage was a good way to get the word out, but the website seems under-represented.

I concur with the comments that the sample home page has too much text. It is good text, but I know from my teaching years that overloaded presentation slides can cause readers to shut down. If you do consider a homepage I would keep it very simple. More or less a door #1 and door #2 approach. I know it’s not very “useful” but is analogous to the title page of a book or foyer of a building. You don’t spend a lot of time there, but it is aesthetically pleasing and psychologically significant to feel “there” when you get there. If you had a side by side “documentation” entrance and “discussion” entrance I think it would better represent what the site has to offer. I appear to be the odd one out as far liking the homepage idea, but such is the nature of asking opinions 😉

SHORT BED 4-DOOR DIESEL: 1986 F350 4x4 under construction-- 7.3 IDIT ZF5+GVOD

STRAIGHT SIX 4X4: 1981 F150 2wd to 4x4-- 300 I6 close ratio diesel T19, hydroboost brakes, Saginaw steering

BIG F: 1995 F-Superduty under construction— converting to 6.9L IDI diesel ZF5+DNE2

Gary Lewis

Re: Website Revision - Potential New Home Page

Administrator

Jonathan - You aren't alone as Steve/FoxFord33 suggested something that's similar to your suggestion.

I, too, think the "documentation" (let's call the pieces "forum" and "documentation") gets short shrift. And I'd love to make it more obvious to the casual observer. So, we need to think about how to do that.

But, I'm not sure a new homepage does that. I say that because I'm not sure how many people would come in that way. However, let's kick that around a bit. As I see it there are these ways of coming to the website:

Searches: We get traffic due to searches for a specific term. As of right now we are getting about 200 - 250 clicks from Google searches to the documentation and 25 - 30 clicks to the forum per day. But those go directly to the specific page on which the search topic resides. (And, by the way, the # of clicks/day is increasing nicely.) So they'd never go to the home page.

Shared Links: I frequently provide links directly to a specific post or page of documentation to people on Facebook. And I know that others do as well - in fact I've had nice surprises lately when I thought "Oh, I have that info" and see that someone else has already provided the link. But, again, those go directly to the page or post and would't go to the home page.

Emailed Links: I don't know 'bout y'all, but I'm subscribed at the top level of the forum and get an email for each and every post. (The forum is odd compared to others and you have to overtly subscribe to get an email for posts.) And the way I come to the forum 99.999999% of the time is via one of those links. But if we had a home page the links would still take me directly to the post, not the home page.

Saved Links: Some of you have saved links directly to the forum, and even if we had a home page there'd still be the ability to save a link to the forum, thereby bypassing the home page.

So the only people that would ever see the home page would be few and far between that Googled something that was on the home page. But we are saying there should be very little on the home page, so there'd be nothing to find.

Don't know 'bout you, but I've just

myself out of wanting a home page.

But, that does not mean we shouldn't have a way to tell people about the documentation if they find the forum, or vice versa.

Toward that end I've had some thoughts, but want yours as well. One of mine is a popup for first time visitors. (I don't know if that's possible, but humor me.) If the visit is to the forum it could tell them how to register. And/or it could tell them about the documentation. If to the documentation it could tell them about the forum and the menu to other documentation.

Thoughts? HELP! I'm going crazy thinking about this!

Gary, AKA "Gary fellow": Profile

Steve83

Re: Website Revision - Potential New Home Page

Banned User

Lighten up, Francis.

The only link I use or share is http://www.garysgaragemahal.com/ . From there, I find what I want. I assume most other users can, too. The only change that has occurred to me is the naming of the Resources folder. To this day, I couldn't tell you what's in it because it's not intuitive to remember (although I'm pretty sure I've browsed it at least once). I assume it wouldn't be apparent to new visitors, either.

Gary Lewis

Re: Website Revision - Potential New Home Page

Administrator

Steve83 wrote

Lighten up, Francis.

LOL! I had to look that one up!

I didn't mean to come across so ....... adamant. But, unless there are lots of people going to garysgaragemahal.com then a home page won't help us much.

However, I have found a way to create a pop up for the first visit to the site. It isn't cheap but at least I know it can be done. So, if we decide that a pop up to explain what we are about and how to use the site is needed then that is a possibility.

Gary, AKA "Gary fellow": Profile

grumpin

Re: Website Revision - Potential New Home Page

He also said “I’m getting too old for this

”!

Dane
1986 F250HD SC XLT Lariat 4x4 460 C6-Sold
1992 Bronco XLT 4x4 351W E4OD
1998 GMC Sierra SLE K1500 350 4L60E
Arizona

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