New Menu

Ross

Revision 2:

Revision 2 is mostly a feature update, but contains some javascript optimizations which should further improve render and load times on older browsers/computers.

• Preferences - We've added user definable preferences for the menu to allow for some customization.
  • Lock Navigation - This has the same functionality as the lock icon, we've just moved it into the preferences menu.
  • Zero Delay - This allows you to enable/disable the artificial delay on hovering. Useful for slower machines and nimbler mouse jockeys.
  • Netbook Mode - The *automagical* way of resizing the menu for netbooks wasn't working well, so we've modified the code slightly and made it something that people can choose to enable or disable.
  • Find a Forum - Lets you enable/disable the "Find a Forum" predictive menu. If you're having trouble with the Subbed menu showing occasionally on Firefox, you may wish to disable this as it's the result of a Firefox Javascript bug we haven't fixed yet.
• Notifications - These are quite new, and are designed to effectively reproduce the major functionality of Hobbes' Firefox plugin. We're starting off with two, the idea being that we can plug more of these in as we go along. Warning: may be buggy / not work correctly. Feedback appreciated.
  • PM Notifier - This will periodically check for new PMs without you needing to refresh the page, so even if you're reading a really long thread you'll get a little icon flashing in the top right telling you there's a PM waiting for you.
  • Thread Notifier - same as the PM notifier, but for subscribed threads.

This is going to be rolled out within the next 15 minutes or so. Live now.

PS: all of these settings are cookie-based, so will be different depending on what computer you use. This was a deliberate choice; a) users may wish to have different settings on different computers (netbook vs main pc, for example), and b) it reduces the amount of database interaction required by the menu (will load faster).

Ross

Ok, update is done, if you're seeing problems, try hitting Ctrl+F5.

Thread notifications may be a bit flakey, will need to test for a while.

AlmightyCushion

This

Ross wrote: »

Netbook Mode - The *automagical* way of resizing the menu for netbooks wasn't working well, so we've modified the code slightly and made it something that people can choose to enable or disable.

and this

PS: all of these settings are cookie-based, so will be different depending on what computer you use. This was a deliberate choice; a) users may wish to have different settings on different computers (netbook vs main pc, for example), and b) it reduces the amount of database interaction required by the menu (will load faster).

are pretty sweet features. I regularly switch between the netbook and my pc so I'll be using this. Thanks Ross.

Boston

I have to say, whatever about the menu itself, I like the two way feedback in this thread.

copacetic

woot! zero delay and find a forum off ftw. stunning work guys, the direct link to CP/subbed thread are handy, although a little bit of duplication on the left with the icons on the right, maybe an icon for ctrl panel to the right also?

Either way, its really worth all your efforts.

AlmightyCushion

Is it just me or is the text a little bit too small when on netbook mode? Would making it a bit bigger increase the size much?

Ross

Boston wrote: »

I have to say, whatever about the menu itself, I like the two way feedback in this thread.

Appreciated.

copacetic wrote: »

woot! zero delay and find a forum off ftw. stunning work guys, the direct link to CP/subbed thread are handy, although a little bit of duplication on the left with the icons on the right, maybe an icon for ctrl panel to the right also?

Either way, its really worth all your efforts.

Yeah, I'm not terribly gone on those links either myself, they were suggested at some point though so I figured I'd give it a shot, will see if I can make it more functional and - as is becoming more important in this endeavour - optional

AlmightyCushion wrote: »

Is it just me or is the text a little bit too small when on netbook mode? Would making it a bit bigger increase the size much?

It may be that the text is too small, it was the easiest way to resize the menus, anything larger and the edges start to disappear in 800x600 resolutions. Will see if I can come up with some more creative squishing.

Captain Darling

Ross wrote: »

It may be that the text is too small, it was the easiest way to resize the menus, anything larger and the edges start to disappear in 800x600 resolutions. Will see if I can come up with some more creative squishing.

I have that too, I'm squinting when i select netbook mode, the normal menu fits fine though. (using Chrome as my browser, it doesnt fit right when i use IE)

turgon

I dont mean to sound sickish, and for that reason I delayed this post waiting for someone else to say it, but this "menu 2" is absolutely fantastic. I dont do that much journeying through the net but from what Ive seen this is the best navigation system in terms of usability that I can imagine. A "system," because this is not just a "bar", the whole perspective is excellent, it seems that the whole of boards.ie is available with just a few moves of the mouse. And being able to customise it in such a friendly way (AJAX ftw!) is just real great. Originally I just liked it because of the layout, but the improvements towards being more than just a nav bar since version 1 are just fantastic.

And despite all the things that are in it it remains very petit and completely unobtrusive. The latter being a problem with ambitious navigation systems in that they a lot of the time work against the user. Since a few days ago I stopped seeing this improvement simply within the context of boards, but rather within the context of Web nav as a whole.

Generic addendum: keep up the good work!!

AlmightyCushion

I've noticed a bit of a bug here, Ross. I'm using firefox 3.0.11 on windows 7 RC. In the menu I have the following enabled - Lock Navigation, Zero Delay and Netbook mode. I have the following disabled - Find a Forum, PM notifier and Thread notifier.

When I hover over search, the menu drops down. If I then move the mouse cursor to the right over the scroll bar and move down, the menu drop down doesn't dissapear. It's a fairly small think. I imagine that when you move over the scroll bar the menu doesn't think you've left the drop down.

PogMoThoin

Sex and Sexuality doesn't show in the menu.

copacetic

PogMoThoin wrote: »

Sex and Sexuality doesn't show in the menu.

I don't think any private forums do (or did in the old styles). See earlier discussion.
If you add it to your subscribed forums it will appear under subbed.

eVeNtInE

This post has been deleted.

AlmightyCushion

When I go to the home page with the same configuration except for having the lock removed, the ajax fanciness doesn't seem to load. It just shows all the links at the top of the page.

Ross

eVeNtInE wrote: »

This post has been deleted.

copacetic wrote: »

I don't think any private forums do (or did in the old styles). See earlier discussion.
If you add it to your subscribed forums it will appear under subbed.

Yeah, they're private forums so don't show up in the new menu as a result. Might make exceptions or I might see if I can find a creative way of having private forums optionally show up in the "subbed" list.

AlmightyCushion wrote: »

I've noticed a bit of a bug here, Ross. I'm using firefox 3.0.11 on windows 7 RC. In the menu I have the following enabled - Lock Navigation, Zero Delay and Netbook mode. I have the following disabled - Find a Forum, PM notifier and Thread notifier.

When I hover over search, the menu drops down. If I then move the mouse cursor to the right over the scroll bar and move down, the menu drop down doesn't dissapear. It's a fairly small think. I imagine that when you move over the scroll bar the menu doesn't think you've left the drop down.

Nice spot, it's a problem with Firefox and jQuery (possibly just javascript) where a transition from a mousover event to a chrome event fails to trigger a mouseout event. Seems like a browser bug as it does the same (again, only in Firefox) when moving from a mousover to an input or textarea field (which I fixed by forcing a mouseout event on a textfield/input hover). Interesting one anyway, will see if I can work around it or even submit a bug report to Mozilla for it.

AlmightyCushion wrote: »

When I go to the home page with the same configuration except for having the lock removed, the ajax fanciness doesn't seem to load. It just shows all the links at the top of the page.

Do you get any Javascript errors on the page? Maybe try giving it a Ctrl+F5 on the homepage if you haven't already, shouldn't be any problems apart from a mysterious Location.toString error which has been around for a while.

AlmightyCushion

Ross wrote: »

Nice spot, it's a problem with Firefox and jQuery (possibly just javascript) where a transition from a mousover event to a chrome event fails to trigger a mouseout event. Seems like a browser bug as it does the same (again, only in Firefox) when moving from a mousover to an input or textarea field (which I fixed by forcing a mouseout event on a textfield/input hover). Interesting one anyway, will see if I can work around it or even submit a bug report to Mozilla for it.

I was thinking it might be a browser thing all right. Thankfully it's not that big a deal.

Ross wrote: »

Do you get any Javascript errors on the page? Maybe try giving it a Ctrl+F5 on the homepage if you haven't already, shouldn't be any problems apart from a mysterious Location.toString error which has been around for a while.

No javascript error. Tried hard refresh and clearing all cookies, cache etc. Still getting it. It's only happens on the homepage for me. Happens in chrome as well. At the bottom of the part where all the links I see:

Loading..

Bit of a weird one.

cherryghost

I was showing this to a few people, the possible layouts on the boards site, 4 of the 5 never used boards, and dont intend on signing up primarily on the fact that either the Beta nor the current version is easy to navigate around.

'Its a total maze' if i am correct in saying

Ross

cherryghost wrote: »

I was showing this to a few people, the possible layouts on the boards site, 4 of the 5 never used boards, and dont intend on signing up primarily on the fact that either the Beta nor the current version is easy to navigate around.

'Its a total maze' if i am correct in saying

Um, noted I guess!

If we can find more novel ( or if you do, please don't keep it a secret ) ways of navigating the thousands of forums on Boards.ie in the future we'll be on it. Navigation and better ways of finding the appropriate information (read: searching) are always going to be a top priority, but they're not easy problems and will take time to solve.

For now I'd say I'm disappointed that some people are completely turned away from Boards.ie purely because they find it difficult to navigate, but I completely understand why if they haven't actually come to it organically. The information is the drive behind Boards.ie, without advanced knowledge of the value contained within, the design and and navigation are certainly not attractors by themselves. I feel it's a strong first step in the right direction, though obviously I have some bias

Eoin

Ross wrote: »

For now I'd say I'm disappointed that some people are completely turned away from Boards.ie purely because they find it difficult to navigate, but I completely understand why if they haven't actually come to it organically. .

I'd take it with a pinch of salt Ross, there will always be nay-sayers. I can't think of a more intuitive way to navigate a site of this scale. The "find a forum" feature should make it a snap for newcomers to find their way around.

copacetic

eoin wrote: »

I'd take it with a pinch of salt Ross, there will always be nay-sayers. I can't think of a more intuitive way to navigate a site of this scale. The "find a forum" feature should make it a snap for newcomers to find their way around.

agreed. what kind of person doesn't sign up to something because it's not simple? i.e if there was one forum it'd be simple but be of little use. Generally sign up seems to be driven by google searches, people find something they are interested in and sign up to talk about it.

Showing people the new menu and saying is this menu enough for you to sign up to a site to enjoy doesn't make any sense. It's window dressing, amazing window dressing, but thats all. It's a window to the content, not the content, the content is what brings people in.

Generally other vbulletin forums are now harder to navigate than we are, so these people aren't going anywhere else either.

cherryghost

I'm not saying that a minority of people wont sign up because of the navigation, but they saw it as a major headache were they to sign up. The forums map has grown more and more and I wouldnt hestitate not to believe that for newcomers it would take quite some time to grow accustomed to the menus.

I do however think the beta layout is a step in the right direction, it makes things easier to see. I'm not trying to get anyone down over this, its not my personal opinion, rather an opinion of others. I work in an internet cafe so I do take note of certain things, and as a regular boards user, I tend to take more interest in cases that arise like these in the shop.

Keep up the great work lads

Ross

cherryghost wrote: »

I'm not saying that a minority of people wont sign up because of the navigation, but they saw it as a major headache were they to sign up. The forums map has grown more and more and I wouldnt hestitate not to believe that for newcomers it would take quite some time to grow accustomed to the menus.

I do however think the beta layout is a step in the right direction, it makes things easier to see. I'm not trying to get anyone down over this, its not my personal opinion, rather an opinion of others. I work in an internet cafe so I do take note of certain things, and as a regular boards user, I tend to take more interest in cases that arise like these in the shop.

Keep up the great work lads

Thanks for the expanded feedback, as a developer it's definitely possible to lose user perspective when doing something like this and I'm not offended in the slightest (I was initially a bit puzzled, but your second post has given new perspective).

Conor

cherryghost wrote: »

I'm not saying that a minority of people wont sign up because of the navigation, but they saw it as a major headache were they to sign up. The forums map has grown more and more and I wouldnt hestitate not to believe that for newcomers it would take quite some time to grow accustomed to the menus.

I do however think the beta layout is a step in the right direction, it makes things easier to see. I'm not trying to get anyone down over this, its not my personal opinion, rather an opinion of others. I work in an internet cafe so I do take note of certain things, and as a regular boards user, I tend to take more interest in cases that arise like these in the shop.

Feedback like this is always useful. Keep it up! If you spot anything that you reckon is obviously wrong, please bring it up.

cherryghost wrote: »

Keep up the great work lads

99% of the work done on the new menu has been due to Ross. He's worked very hard on it, so it's nice to see him get recognition for it.

cherryghost

Ross wrote: »

Thanks for the expanded feedback, as a developer it's definitely possible to lose user perspective when doing something like this and I'm not offended in the slightest (I was initially a bit puzzled, but your second post has given new perspective).

Sorry about the confusion, I was on my way out of work when I was posting that :rolleyes:

AlmightyCushion

Ross wrote: »

Um, noted I guess!

If we can find more novel ( or if you do, please don't keep it a secret ) ways of navigating the thousands of forums on Boards.ie in the future we'll be on it. Navigation and better ways of finding the appropriate information (read: searching) are always going to be a top priority, but they're not easy problems and will take time to solve.

For now I'd say I'm disappointed that some people are completely turned away from Boards.ie purely because they find it difficult to navigate, but I completely understand why if they haven't actually come to it organically. The information is the drive behind Boards.ie, without advanced knowledge of the value contained within, the design and and navigation are certainly not attractors by themselves. I feel it's a strong first step in the right direction, though obviously I have some bias

In fairness compared to most forums boards has about 50 or so times the amount of forums (might be a slight exageration but you get the idea). Trying to navigate a site with 1000 is never gonna be easy as navigating a site with 20 - 50 forums no matter what you fancy menu and navigation thingeys you make. Obviously having a lot more forums has it's advantages (a forum for more or less everything) but the bigger you go the harder it will be to navigate. The old menu did a decent job at it but it really did suffer in some areas. The Tech category was a big example of this. You'd hover over tech and then have to figure out which sub heading you should go to. Even then there could be more sub headings. Complete pain in the balls and a little daunting if you're not used to it. New menu really improves on it. Hover over tech and all the sub headings and forums are there.

It's a hell of a lot easier than before even for someone who knows the structure.

Dunder Mifflin

A bit of a bug this morning when I opened the homepage - see image attached. As soon as I clicked on to a different forum the menu was fixed. I tried refreshing and CTRL+F5 to refresh also but neither seemed to work.

edit: Actually it happens each time I open the homepage. I changed the lock menu setting yesterday and this seems to be causing it. When the menu is locked in place it's fine, when it's not it displays all the forums on the homepage.

Sully

The New Post indicator is flashing even though I have read all my subscribed threads and there are no new posts. Any ideas why that would be?

Also, out of all the drop down menus I find that "Search" sticks the most. The only way to remove it is by hovering over another menu.

Other then that, great work lads. Very handy new features

Ross

Dunder Mifflin wrote: »

A bit of a bug this morning when I opened the homepage - see image attached. As soon as I clicked on to a different forum the menu was fixed. I tried refreshing and CTRL+F5 to refresh also but neither seemed to work.

edit: Actually it happens each time I open the homepage. I changed the lock menu setting yesterday and this seems to be causing it. When the menu is locked in place it's fine, when it's not it displays all the forums on the homepage.

Thanks, this is fixed now!

AlmightyCushion

For the record that was the problem I was having. I really should have posted a screen shot.

Sharpshooter

Hi guys, I wonder if you could fix something for me?
I like the Boards.ie beta skin but it keeps reverting to white skin.
Thanks.