Boards News - June 2017

Hello everyone! I hope June is treating you well so far; the weather hasn't quite been what many of us would have hoped for considering the exams have started (and I hope they're going well for you if you're sitting them). But let's not let that dampen our spirits.

We've another competition running over in the What's On forum. If you'd like to be in with a chance of winning a Huawei Honor Pad 2, all you have to do is tell us in this thread which event from the forum you're most looking forward to. And if it's not already there, why not share the event that you're excited about?

One of the major developments this month is the relaunch of the Feedback forum, new and improved we hope! It's fair to say that Feedback wasn't working in its former guise, so it's been revamped. Feedback from the community is important for Boards, but we needed to find a way to ensure that suggestions, constructive criticism, and yes, even complaints, could rise above the noise. If you have an account that's at least 3 months old and 100 posts to your name, you can start a thread in the Feedback forum. But please remember that anyone, even those excluded by the above post and membership limitations, can email any site feedback to us directly on hello@boards.ie or via the Contact Us form.

On the subject of technical issues, we have sorted out the scroll bar not appearing when dropdown menus get too large. We've also (finally, I know) found an automatic solution for PayPal subscriptions, which basically required ripping everything up and starting again. Still keeping an eye on it to be sure, but it's looking good. Sorry it took so long and for any inconvenience caused in the meanwhile.

Something that has cropped up, and it's a weird one, is that one particular thread (the Argos Chat Thread under Bargain Alerts) doesn't seem to load the latest post when requested. It seems to be coming back to normal, slowly but surely, but some issues remain for some users. If you spot this happening in other threads, please let us know in Site Development.

In other site related news, the Social Media & Blogging forum was recently opened. At the moment, the community and mods are working on a charter, but soon we'll be able to chat about the influence of social media, ethics, and much more.

Time to highlight some things that are happening in various forums around Boards. Over in the Sailing & Boating forum, fergal.b launched his restored cruiser and it is a beauty. I've mentioned the project in the past, but you can see the progress here.



And he's not the only one undertaking a restoration. FirstIn is working on restoring a 17 foot clinker boat and you can follow their work here.

Some forums are all about making yourself better. Over in the Nutrition & Diet forum, there's an interesting discussion on sugar, something that many of us could do with eating less of. Meanwhile, an oldie but goodie, the Sleeping & Dreaming forum has some tips for getting a good night's sleep.

In saying that, Werewolves have no need for sleep; the Forum Games forum will be kickstarting another game of online Werewolf (smooth!) on June 25th. This game will be Superhero themed, featuring characters from the worlds of DC and Marvel.

This forum also has a representative taking part in the Mafia/Werewolf Championship, an online tournament that pits representatives from various online forums and communities against one another. You can follow Tigger's progress here and there will be chatter in the Boards.ie thread, I'm sure.



Meanwhile, for the watchers of TV, the Television Awards forum has opened nominations for a variety of categories. So if you feel there's someone worthy of being acknowledged for their performance in a single episode; a show that looks promising for the coming year; or a show that's outstayed its welcome, for example, you can nominate them here.

Finally, to end on a high note, the Santa Strike Force raised a good amount of money at the end of last year, and it's currently being put to good use. You can see how some funds have been used so far here and hopefully much more to be soon over the rest of the year.