Forum design

[lukepaz]

(first of all, sorry for my english :p)

Hey people, well, this forum has a pretty basic php design (actually, the standard php design), so, I'm offering myself to make a template to it.

I'm no master of design n photoshopping, but I've already made two good foruns. They're in a brazilian host, but they're php:
http://thedaoraloles.forumeiros.com/
http://freeblast.forumeiros.com/

Well, none of them worked in the end and they're not even close from something professional, but they're way easier to find stuff and read messages, for example, than this basic design.

In fact, I've not already done the template yet cause I just want a "we'll think about it" from the mods, so I'm not taking the risk of making a template and in the end receive a "we're not taking templates from users" or something like that and have waste a couple hours of my life for absolutely nothing

Be happy, think about it and don't do drugs

[seckle]

" pretty basic php design " as opposed to what?

busy? fancy theme's means more coding, which means slower response time...which means larger delivery....which means more bandwidth...more money.

the simplicity of theme on this site is for a reason, and that is we wanted the most minimal amount of code involved, and the most amount of flexibility in the ease of usage. busy & complicated php themes are full of bugs, and don't deliver properly on multiple devices that have different size screens ( mostly mobile ones these days). what might look great on a PC, often looks crap on an iphone, etc. on a global site like DSF, with international traffic, a bug free experience is priority one, over any design.

[lukepaz]

Yeah, make sense...

It's just that this design looks a bit difficult to you to "locate yourself", because you can confuse, for example, the area from user1's post, user1's signature and user2's post, because there are almost no difference between these three things, and that's something that really annoys me.

I'm used to this forum, wich is a heavily edited php forum, and you're right: it's not as soft as this forum (although there's no bugs as you said), but it's not a matter of being a "beautiful forum", but easier to use and locate stuff, wich is a deficiency of this standard design.

That would make a small difference anyway, and what you said makes sense

[syrup]

that looks like a mess tbh

[Phase Down]

this design works for a reason, clean, to the point, there are millions of phpbb templates u can download that would be well above the standard of your coded templates.. really no reason to change from the phpbb main template unless you are looking for something real specific or in line with your main website

[sigbowls]

i kinda wish we could have wide avatars and wide screen youtube embeds but no biggie

[ineffable]

Yeah current one looks better than what you linked tbh

[DRTY]

make sure you've got it on subsilver2. Used quite a few forums, and this is the best one I have functionally and visually, it's simple and it works, those examples are messy and cluttered.

[syrup]

make sure you've got it on subsilver2. Used quite a few forums, and this is the best one I have functionally and visually, it's simple and it works, those examples are messy and cluttered.

prosilver>>>>

imo. a lot easier on the eye and sleeker

[chekov]

jesus i just changed mine to subsilver2 for a second

fuck that

[test_recordings]

Yeah, make sense...

It's just that this design looks a bit difficult to you to "locate yourself", because you can confuse, for example, the area from user1's post, user1's signature and user2's post, because there are almost no difference between these three things, and that's something that really annoys me.

I'm used to this forum, wich is a heavily edited php forum, and you're right: it's not as soft as this forum (although there's no bugs as you said), but it's not a matter of being a "beautiful forum", but easier to use and locate stuff, wich is a deficiency of this standard design.

That would make a small difference anyway, and what you said makes sense

There's no clear differentiation between types of info on that site you linked, how are you supposed to work out what's what ?

[Mason]

fuck subsilver and fuck this wasteman

[__________]

" pretty basic php design " as opposed to what?

busy? fancy theme's means more coding, which means slower response time...which means larger delivery....which means more bandwidth...more money.

the simplicity of theme on this site is for a reason, and that is we wanted the most minimal amount of code involved, and the most amount of flexibility in the ease of usage. busy & complicated php themes are full of bugs, and don't deliver properly on multiple devices that have different size screens ( mostly mobile ones these days). what might look great on a PC, often looks crap on an iphone, etc. on a global site like DSF, with international traffic, a bug free experience is priority one, over any design.

You make it sound like this design is perfect and responsive, but it's not. Looks OK on an iPad and an iPhone but there's more mobile devices out there.

"themes" aren't done in PHP. You're thinking about CSS. If you really want to save bandwidth like you say, minifying your CSS files would be a good place to start - http://www.dubstepforum.com/styles/subs ... esheet.css - look at that shit. You could save at least 20% bandwidth on that CSS if you minify it. Only takes about 5 seconds.

[AxeD]

Don't mind it myself, but yeah looks pretty weak. Especially top left with the 'logo'

[Figment]

i think this forum is fine as it is tbh, probably one of the most easy to navigate and use, a massive change is not we want, this is pretty much the only forum of this size dedicated to this music, there is no need to need for a super pretty forum (for brothers dubstep tbh)

[EliteLennon117]

minimal music = minimal message board

[seckle]

" pretty basic php design " as opposed to what?

busy? fancy theme's means more coding, which means slower response time...which means larger delivery....which means more bandwidth...more money.

the simplicity of theme on this site is for a reason, and that is we wanted the most minimal amount of code involved, and the most amount of flexibility in the ease of usage. busy & complicated php themes are full of bugs, and don't deliver properly on multiple devices that have different size screens ( mostly mobile ones these days). what might look great on a PC, often looks crap on an iphone, etc. on a global site like DSF, with international traffic, a bug free experience is priority one, over any design.

You make it sound like this design is perfect and responsive, but it's not. Looks OK on an iPad and an iPhone but there's more mobile devices out there.

"themes" aren't done in PHP. You're thinking about CSS. If you really want to save bandwidth like you say, minifying your CSS files would be a good place to start - http://www.dubstepforum.com/styles/subs ... esheet.css - look at that shit. You could save at least 20% bandwidth on that CSS if you minify it. Only takes about 5 seconds.

i never siad it was perfect. minifying the css on something like this, means that you're reducing this theme down to nothing. its fine the way it is, and it works on all devices, and isn't expensive to deliver. there's nothing perfect about phpbb. it was created years before responsive design, and serves its purpose here for dsf.

[wub]

minimal music = minimal message board

See also mnml.nl - http://www.mnml.nl/phpBB3/

[DRTY]

make sure you've got it on subsilver2. Used quite a few forums, and this is the best one I have functionally and visually, it's simple and it works, those examples are messy and cluttered.

prosilver>>>>

imo. a lot easier on the eye and sleeker

NO. Everything is backwards with prosilver, and all rounded. ergh

[__________]

minifying the css on something like this, means that you're reducing this theme down to nothing.

I dunno what you mean by that. All minifying does is minimise the amount of code needed to provide the same end result. The end user would see no difference but Dubway's server bill would!