New beta site up for testing

ben

ben

Administrator
Ukraine
Hello,

Season's Greetings to all our members.

We've started testing the new forum system, and would welcome feedback from the community. You can access the beta site here:

http://www.a2oc.net/forum-beta/

Currently there are some parts that haven't been migrated, including:

  • Media Gallery
  • Previous post 'likes'
  • Donation system
  • GoogleMaps system

We're working on updating the beta site with changes over the next few days.

In the meantime, feel free to try out the new software from your desktop PC or mobile phones. You can use your usual login credentials. Please post questions and issues you encounter in our existing feedback forum:

http://www.a2oc.net/forum/forumdisplay.php?45-Feedback

The new site supports two-factor authentication (which allows you to further secure your account). This system is optional however.

Note that any data you add to the test site will be deleted, so don't add any new content that you want to keep.

Thanks,

Ben
 
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Looks good Ben. Just uploaded a photo with ease. I like that the marketplace is divided from the recent activity.
 
Looking good (Have you got nothing better to do on Xmas day ;) )

Anyway, a few points for a start...
  • Could you change the menu text on the start screen from Red to Yellow or green please? I'm partially colourblind and it is difficult to read red against black, especially on small fonts. Or can you set customisable themes?
  • I seem to be having issues uploading photos. I have tried several different formats now (biggest file was 740kb), and both dragging the file into the box, and "Click Here" method. Both came up with same error.
  • The new site either uses different formatting tools, or do you need to turn formatting on for signatures, as my .sig is all over the place :)

Apart from that, it looks great and I'm sure once the problems are ironed out it will be much better to use than this current format.

Now - go and eat your Christmas dinner :)
 
Hi Ben
Some quick initial feedback. Generally looking good. As a PC user I was worried that a site built for mobiles would end up with very long pages. It's good to see that at the top the Home / Forums / What's New links remain visible for quick navigation to these common functions. Also good to see "Jump to new" which I use a lot.

I clicked on my ID top right and then on Your Content and then the page of all the threads I had started or responded to. In the old system it was possible to have started or responded to as separate lists. Not a deal breaker, but would be nice to have.

Just posted on the Merry Christmas thread and got a "This message is awaiting moderator approval, and is invisible to normal visitors. ". Maybe that's because it's a test system.

That's all for now. Good work :)
 
Good work Ben and the teram.

I did spot that the "£" sign is showing special characters (Internet explorer) on the sales adverts I looked at.

Steve B
 
Also I can't seem to load any image over 1meg? It is up to 2 meg surely?

I have also lost my signature picture.

Steve B
 
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Hi. Happy New Year.
The £ sign issue will be fixed in the final import. Mismatched character set.

I’ll also up the image limit to 2Mb.

Re: images in signatures, users may need to update these, depending on where they currently host the images.
 
Ben, as most pictures are taken on mobile phones these days and the image size from the phones as increased over time to what is now averaging 2.5 to 3mb per image, is there are practical reason why the image size is being set at 2mb, if not then would say 3.5mb be better as it would remove the faffing about needed to reduce the size of an image.
Its not a major issue just something that would remove what appears to currently be a point of frustration for members in uploading images

All the best for the new year
Cheers,
Paul
 
If using a mobile for photos it's also then quite easy to run the photo through a free editor and takes seconds before uploading it to the site.

It's also good practice to do so as it removes any geotags attached to the photo.
 
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Ben,

One thing I've noticed on the beta site is that when logged in I'm unable to view member's profiles. The message suggests a permission issue.

Steve
 
Happy New Year everyone! I'm sure that the comments made to date make sense to a lot of the members but, please bear in mind that some of us - well me for one - aren't entirely au fait with technology and I don't understand half of what's been said! Writing this reply using my phone will take at least five minutes so, please make things as simple as possible so that I can continue to enjoy the site.
 
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depronman said:
Ben, as most pictures are taken on mobile phones these days and the image size from the phones as increased over time to what is now averaging 2.5 to 3mb per image, is there are practical reason why the image size is being set at 2mb, if not then would say 3.5mb be better as it would remove the faffing about needed to reduce the size of an image.
Its not a major issue just something that would remove what appears to currently be a point of frustration for members in uploading images

All the best for the new year
Cheers,
Paul
Click to expand...
I agree with this. The size limit has stopped me unloading many pictures of repairs I’ve done that may help others. My phone belongs to my company and I don’t want, and shouldn’t, have random apps installed to resize photos. Apart from that I don’t want the extra faf of resizing when other forums let you upload virtually any size.
 
In Ben's defence, it also worth bearing in mind the burden the site will then take on in terms of bandwidth overhead when serving those large images. You may only upload an image once, but that same image may well be viewed by tens/hundreds/thousands of users in the future and every time someone clicks on a page with five or six 8mb+ images, that will place a significant burden (and cost) on the servers. Also, I'm sure if you happen to be on a mobile device in an area with poor signal, you wouldn't thank the person that uploaded 50mb+ of images to a page as it brings your browser to a grinding halt.

Personally, I don't see the need for images of much over 2Mb on a site like this. Just because an image is 8Mb+ it doesn't guarantee it's going to be in focus and not too light/dark to see the subject. I little bit of time spent by us users to tart the photos up and resize them to something reasonable will make life easier for all further downstream.

The alternative would be for the forum software to automatically resize (downsize) uploaded images before hosting them, but I'm not sure how well that fits in with Ben's plans.

Just my 2p worth.

Matt
 
Yes I agree with all of that, but 2mb is too small for 2018, maybe try 3mb and see how it goes? And if someone quotes a picture then the software should hide the picture so we don’t see the same image multiple times.
 
TFG said:
In Ben's defence, it also worth bearing in mind the burden the site will then take on in terms of bandwidth overhead when serving those large images. You may only upload an image once, but that same image may well be viewed by tens/hundreds/thousands of users in the future and every time someone clicks on a page with five or six 8mb+ images, that will place a significant burden (and cost) on the servers. Also, I'm sure if you happen to be on a mobile device in an area with poor signal, you wouldn't thank the person that uploaded 50mb+ of images to a page as it brings your browser to a grinding halt.

Personally, I don't see the need for images of much over 2Mb on a site like this. Just because an image is 8Mb+ it doesn't guarantee it's going to be in focus and not too light/dark to see the subject. I little bit of time spent by us users to tart the photos up and resize them to something reasonable will make life easier for all further downstream.

The alternative would be for the forum software to automatically resize (downsize) uploaded images before hosting them, but I'm not sure how well that fits in with Ben's plans.
Click to expand...


Matt, you've actually come up with the solution in the last paragraph. I'm fairly certain that a decent forum software should provide the option to be "dynamic" and change it's settings between desktop and mobile browsers - I think this is one of the options for the "Media" pack which is a small extra on the site, and as mentioned previously I'd happily pay a little extra to have this facility available.
 
sciroccorrado said:
I'd happily pay a little extra to have this facility available.
Click to expand...

Yes, I’ve only been here since Aug, I payed 10 quid as I thought it was cheeky getting information for free. But the forum has saved me fortunes and I would gladly pay more to a great site.
 
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