Website Revision - Potential New Home Page

[Gary Lewis]

Never tried that - the threads appear in chrono order of most-recent posts anyway, except the folders & stickies are always at the top.

...and I can't tell a difference in the way the page is loading, but we've established before that Chrome behaves weirdly for me. I don't know that it's actually showing the new (smaller) version of the image.

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.

[FoxFord33]

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.

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.

[Gary Lewis]

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?

 

[Steve83]

...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.

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]

...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.

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.

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

[Gary Lewis]

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

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.

[85lebaront2]

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.

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.

[1986F150Six]

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]

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

Hey, you talking about us older guys?

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?

[1986F150Six]

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?

969 years?