Changes to the Competitions Time Section

MSE_Stephen

Hi everyone,

You’ll notice some changes to the Competitions Time Section

Section Reorganised

Some of the changes were suggested earlier on this thread and are designed to improve the navigation of Competitions. These changes also prepare for new features in the future.

The main change is are -

• “Competitions Time” is now the title of the section that holds all competition boards. 
• The main competition board has been renamed ‘Standard Competitions’ - similar to a suggestion on the thread above.
• We've created a Search Widget just for Comps!

But now we’d like to hear from you. Do the names, and descriptions of the boards still work?

Could they be improved?

Search Widget

We’ve built a new Search widget in the sidebar of the Main Competitions Section.

It currently defaults to searching just the boards with active competitions and sorting by Best Match, but this can be changed if there’s consensus

We’d love your feedback on this widget.

• Should it open in same or new tab?
• Should it put the search term in the ‘Title’ field instead of main search field

…or are there any other tweaks we could make.

amsquared

I like the Search Widget I'd also like the search widget to search "Game Over" competitions as well. On the odd occasions that I win something I hunt through the "Game Over" thread so that I can thank the original poster by DM in addition to posting on "I Won".

It would also be useful to have the Search widget on all of the sub-pages of Competitions Time eg the Standard Competitions Page. I find the existing "Search the Forum" a bit confusing especially as it will still appear on all the sub-pages without the much better Search Widget.

Blulu

Well, it's finally happened! MSE has made changes to the competitions board that I like. I've only noticed the change to the board layout, so far, so I reserve the right to come back and moan about other stuff later. However, the layout looks loads better, to me. It means we can avoid having to scroll through lots of stuff, to find what we're looking for. It's a clear and simple design. I think it will be good for new users too.

Now can we talk about being able to increase the number of posts per page and being able to hover over a thread link to see a snippet of that thread? No? Oh well, I thought I'd try, while we're on a roll.


Blu XXX

MSE_Stephen

amsquared said:

I like the Search Widget I'd also like the search widget to search "Game Over" competitions as well. On the odd occasions that I win something I hunt through the "Game Over" thread so that I can thank the original poster by DM in addition to posting on "I Won".

It would also be useful to have the Search widget on all of the sub-pages of Competitions Time eg the Standard Competitions Page. I find the existing "Search the Forum" a bit confusing especially as it will still appear on all the sub-pages without the much better Search Widget.

Hi

The intentions of the Search widget is to provide a very simple starting point for Comps searches. From where you can adapt to your needs. E.g. Then adding Game Over to the filter at the side (or from the filter section on mobile)

The problem with adding it to all Competition boards is that things get complicated quickly -

• Some will argue that it’s confusing if it isn’t searching just the board you are viewing 
• Some will prefer to search the whole section.
• There may be a need to search sub-categories

…Before long it needs drop-down, checkboxes, logic so that it knows which board it’s being shown on, and multiple formats so it looks good on many different devices. 

I’m not ruling out some of those improvements in the future, but for now the intention is a simple search though we can make some tweaks to what it does by default. 

MSE_Stephen

Blulu said:

Well, it's finally happened! MSE has made changes to the competitions board that I like. I've only noticed the change to the board layout, so far...

We’re glad you like the new format  

It’s mostly a bit of a rearrangement we hope works better, and in preparation for new features in the future.

Now can we talk about being able to increase the number of posts per page and being able to hover over a thread link to see a snippet of that thread? No? Oh well, I thought I'd try, while we're on a roll.

You can actually get a sneak peak of what the Competitions boards may look like in the future by looking at Latests Threads, which is the first to use the new format -

• New filters at the top of the page 
• Up to 100 threads listed per page
• No hover-snippet, but can show an excerpt of each post (IF that’s the format Compers prefer)
• ...All can be set separately for the Comps Board even if the rest of the forum is different.

What’s preventing us from moving to these new layouts right now - with loads of options for how a board is displayed - is actually Competition Time! The New Layouts can’t show Entered/Skipped and we have to wait until that feature is compatible before we can switch over

pebblebeach8

I have not explored the new thread properly yet, but one thing that is really off putting for me is the background.  Is there anywhere in my settings I can change it back to a plain background?  Thanks

One-Eye

Search Widget

(I am using a PC, so my observations don't relate to how the forum appears on tablets & phones)

1) The location above the right hand sidebar Quick Links is fine, and the feature works well. (The lack of "Create New" on the top-level is welcome - a possible problem raised in the earlier proposals)

2) It only appears on the top-level "Competitions Time". I think users will spend less time there, but much more time in the sub-categories, especially "Standard Competitions". It really really needs to appear in the sub-categories (above Quick Links and below the Create New button?). It can be exactly the same as it is in the top-level - it doesn't need to appear or work any differently. The point made above - "Some will argue that it’s confusing if it isn’t searching just the board you are viewing" is false, as Search currently searches the whole forum, and not your current category.

3) Game Over MUST appear as a default Category ie:

Clicking on the "X" to remove a category works very well and it is much easier to do this and remove a category than it is to add another category. It is probably OK that "I won" and "chat" are excluded.

4) Sort Order - the current sort order is "Best Match". PLEASE can "Newest" be the default sort order
&sort=-dateInserted

5) It should not be changed to search in the title, and it currently opens in a new tab - which is ideal.

One-Eye

Category Names & Straplines

Some of the historic category names & straplines are now wrong for the way the forum is used, especially the "Regular Competitions". A few changes would help users, especially newbies, find the correct area in which to post or find what they are looking for, and alongside the new "Standard Competitions" this would massively cut down on the number of comps posted in the wrong part of the forum.
___________________________________________________________________________________

Standard Competitions

Share and find new competitions you’d like to enter to win here.

I suggest:

Standard Competitions

FREE competitions you enter online, by email or through social media.

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Post, phone & text comps

Spending to enter competitions is NOT MoneySaving. Always include the free entry route if there is one and never post a pay-to-enter competition costing more than £2.10

I suggest

Post, phone & text comps

Competitions with no free online entry. NEVER post a pay-to-enter competition costing more than £2.10

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Regular competitions

This is the place for ongoing and recurring competitions which regularly produce winners - weekly, monthly etc.

(this strapline is totally wrong - weekly and monthly comps are not posted here.)
I suggest

Regular competitions - Lists & Indexes

Regularly updated lists of magazine puzzles, daily entry comps etc

(I have deliberately retained the "Regular Competitions" at the start of the title as this wording appears in other places in the forum)

___________________________________________________________________________________

MSE_Stephen

Thanks for all the feedback so far! 

We don't plan on making any more changes until the end of the week / next week - just so that there's a chance for a range of opinions here.

So please keep letting us know over the next few days, or comp-liment posts you agree with.

For the Search widget, we can certainly sort by Newest if there's consensus. 

We can also look at adding Game Over (Game Over Archive?) - but in considering whether that's a good idea, we would want to make sure we're making it especially easy for a new member looking for Comps since they will find it the the hardest to find their way around, whereas our regular Compers will know how navigate the quirks of Search even if it means a few extra clicks - would be very interested in hearing opinions on this. 

If the Search widget is to appear on all Comps pages, it would have to be immediately under the Quick Links - So the one on the new main page would probably also have to be moved down just so that it's consistent on every page.

One-Eye

MSE_Stephen said:

For the Search widget, we can certainly sort by Newest if there's consensus. 

There has been no consensus to have it as "Best Match" and will be no consensus to have it as "Newest". I suggest change it immediately and see if anyone objects.

gdmoney

PLEASE can "Newest" be the default sort order for the search widget.