Forum Redesign Announcement

LadyMorticia

Will the Competitions board be getting the ability to only view competitions you've "crossed" or only competitions you've "ticked"? (and maybe even the option to only view ones you haven't crossed or ticked!)

It's something many compers really would like to see implemented.

Wywth

MSE_Forum_Manager wrote: »

...We’re looking at making our archaic registration process easier, quicker and more efficient...

Easier & quicker? :eek:

The trolls & spammers will love that, not that they seem to have any issues today creating multiple new user accounts :cool:

jamesd

MSE_Forum_Manager wrote: »

Our main focus here is the effect the forum has when people arrive at the site for the first time. If you look at, say, our landing page (main forum board list), there sheer amount of things going on there can be overwhelming for someone who just wants to ask a question about PPI. Do we really need a group of orange men on every page? Is it obvious how you join the forum? Maybe/maybe not.

Easy for me to answer that. I just took a look in a different browser.

What did I see? For many common screen resolutions I doubt that the first board name or join text is even above the fold (visible without scrolling). So where will people think they are and how can they do what they are there to do?

Cookie alert, main menu, site banner, cards loans/ etc ribbon, main site > forum breadcrumb, IMPORTANT! etc, downtime alert (but invisible in my normal old view), another menu ribbon, at last join, but do I have to join just to read? Then a pure money section break and finally the start of the forum contents list.

Easy to accept an argument that there is room for improvement in that presentation and the associated newcomer workflow.

So I'll pretend I'm at work. What are the most common questions? Can offer sticky thread lists of possible solutions for topics, using them as a knowledge base. Can take a question in an easy to dismiss, and persistently dismissed, overlay frame and do a search of stickies and last week of moneysaving sections, or less if required to keep a suitable working set size. Can present the results as a list of possible quick solutions and offer an option to just go ahead and submit the question via a question-driven workflow. This sort of thinking because:

1. You know the common questions.
2. The search can reduce duplicate posts and leverage existing content to get quick answers. That also helps the repliers here who wouldn't want to be flooded with lots of duplicates.
3. The established workflow in an overlaid window can greatly smooth the process for a newcomer with a question and you can even consider things like having a sticky floating frame for additional navigation options as they proceed and explore.

But that's my thought process and at work, among other things, I'm a team champion for a knowledge base system that does this sort of thing with the objective of giving fast answers and avoiding the need for humans to answer the common questions.

That'll be more than enough from me for now, though, you'll already have your own ideas.

MSE_Forum_Manager wrote: »

These are the type of questions we're asking and the metrics we have are that we could do this better. It's not bad by any means, but every user who bounces is a lost money saver we could help.

And also a lost opportunity to make money, which is not evil. Someone has to pay the bills, somehow.

Former_MSE_Forum_Manager

LadyMorticia wrote: »

Will the Competitions board be getting the ability to only view competitions you've "crossed" or only competitions you've "ticked"? (and maybe even the option to only view ones you haven't crossed or ticked!)

It's something many compers really would like to see implemented.

This is a bit too specific for this first stage - plan is to get the verticals of the forum right (i.e. the templates that are common across all boards, and then we'll start to look at specific boards as a stage 2.

Wywth wrote: »

Easier & quicker? :eek:

The trolls & spammers will love that, not that they seem to have any issues today creating multiple new user accounts :cool:

Plan is to make the process better for genuine users so they don't drop out along the way, but to review captcha alternatives to find the right fit of stopping spammers as much as possible whilst making the process easier for real people. We have someone in house who is better qualified than I to answer more than this, but that's the headline as it were.

Former_MSE_Forum_Manager

jamesd wrote: »

For many common screen resolutions I doubt that the first board name or join text is even above the fold (visible without scrolling). So where will people think they are and how can they do what they are there to do?

Nail > head.

fermi

MSE_Forum_Manager wrote: »

Acute accented letters : Sorry just remind me what this is - I've spent quite a long time building this redesign project up, this has slipped under my radar.

Some letters like are in the forum word filter from quite a few years ago, as users and some spammers were using them to circumvent the word filter.

While some users seem to be incensed by that, I can't see why it matters much. If someone has to write fiancee or similar without the accented e, then it's no big deal and everyone understands what is being posted.

Former_MSE_Forum_Manager

fermi wrote: »

Some letters like are in the forum word filter from quite a few years ago, as users and some spammers were using them to circumvent the word filter.

While some users seem to be incensed by that, I can't see why it matters much. If someone has to write fiancee or similar without the accented e, then it's no big deal and everyone understands what is being posted.

Thanks fermi,

I'll have to check with the devs what the pros and cons are. My inkling is that if putting it back opens the spam channels wider, we'd keep it in the filter and people would have to live with it.

This seems like the reason we did it in the first place.

However if it can go back in without causing a problem, we'll look at that.

fermi

jamesd wrote: »

What did I see? For many common screen resolutions I doubt that the first board name or join text is even above the fold (visible without scrolling). So where will people think they are and how can they do what they are there to do?

MSE_Forum_Manager wrote: »

Nail > head.

Which is why, regretfully, I have been using userstyles to modify the forum display for a few years now.

Such as these: http://userstyles.org/styles/browse/all/moneysavingexpert

marleyboy

So relieved to hear this is not moving to moneysupermarket via the backdoor . All I ask is can we keep our stars\status's as they are? Will skip over to new look MSE if that is the case.

dtaylor84

MSE_Forum_Manager wrote: »

We’re looking at making our archaic registration process easier, quicker and more efficient.

Our overall remit is a cleaner, lighter, tighter look that removes a lot of the clutter and makes the content king.

We’re finally looking at mobile viewing for the forum [...]

Well, this all sounds great (in theory at least).

However, we have long term plans for the forum to allow it to compete at the highest level as a social media site to help people save money (it was the 8th biggest UK social network in 2011 according to hitwise, but we are competing against more and more of them in 2013), without losing the fantastic community spirit, ethos and organic growth of the last decade, and that requires us to move with the times.

This, OTOH, sounds terrifying. It's a forum, not facebook or twitter. Please just bear that in mind...

If you choose, you can stay on the current version (though we hope you don’t!)
So how about we don’t force you over? Our intention is to give this new look to new forum users and all non-logged in site users. Current users will not be forced across when it’s launched. We will provide clear links so you can try the new forum on for size and we truly hope we’ll have done the right work to make you want to stay. Don’t like it though? Just hop back to the old version - we’ll still be friends

I hope "current version" includes the "previous version" that I'm still using after your last redesign!