Standard vbulletin format

[zakelwe]

When are you going to use it and get into the 21st century?

I just did another search and it didn't turn up with the unusual phrase I just used today. It's no wonder people keep multiple posting new threads.

The content of the site is fantastic but you are doing the people visiting here a disservice by the structure being rubbish.

Check out here for the best extreme computer forum on the web, equivalent of here for cars, for what it should be like

http://www.xtremesystems.org/forums/index.php

Far better for the users than what is here to be honest.

I've been here quite a while and yet still I can't do polls or post a PM to people for some reason... that should be standard.

If you can't search properly, you can't PM and you can't so polls then something is not right.

Andy

[Andehh]

+1

Have been a member of several forums for a year years now & PH does look dated. Im guessing its a cost issue though tbh.

Edited by Andehh on Wednesday 13th January 22:59

[zakelwe]

Andehh said:

+1

Have been a member of several forums for a year years now & PH does dated. Im guessing its a cost issue though tbh.

Cost? The above mentioned forum is more or less a one man band, but with computer nerds that is what is expected. Evo forum is equally quaint and "cheap". What is it with UK car forums they all don't bother getting in sync with the rest of the worlds forums on standardised format?

Ok, I have a bee in my bonnet, but really, as this site is so huge now it should spend some money getting the format right. It will make new visitors feel more at home and willing to stick around if nothing else.

Andy

Edited by zakelwe on Wednesday 13th January 23:01

[Uhura_Fighter]

I like the easy to read format and the fact this "sytle" without sigs etc. does keep out the unwashed.


ETA: Why can't you PM, I can and you have been here longer. To do a poll, you need to ask to have the option, cuts down on all the crap.

Edited by Uhura_Fighter on Wednesday 13th January 23:52

[tank slapper]

zakelwe said:

Check out here for the best extreme computer forum on the web, equivalent of here for cars, for what it should be like

You are joking aren't you? That site is hideous - it's hard to read and cluttered. The pages are full of crappy avatars and signatures that take up half the page.

Part of the reason I like PH is that it has a very simple design that is uncluttered and hence very easy to read. I also suspect that vBulletin would struggle to cope with the number of members that PH has.

[FourWheelDrift]

vbulletin?

Do you realise the large number of concurrent users PH gets? vbulletin forums would fall over and grind to a standstill if only 1% of the traffic that PH gets is on it.

[grumbledoak]

Aargh! Bloody 'avatars' and 'sigs'! I like the fact that PH threads are mostly the content.

I could argue about the looks; I've even sent the 'web monkeys' better (IMO) style sheets to see what they thought*.

Search is pretty poor, though.

• ETA- that sounds rather arrogant. Wasn't meant to be. It was in response to a 'How could we change the looks' thread.

Edited by grumbledoak on Thursday 14th January 00:20

[Big Al.]

zakelwe said:

Ok, I have a bee in my bonnet, but really, as this site is so huge now it should spend some money getting the format right. It will make new visitors feel more at home and willing to stick around if nothing else.

Andy

The site you suggest is IMHO.

And came across this little sentence from PH T&C's again this evening.

It says

If you are dissatisfied with the website or any content or materials on it, your sole exclusive remedy is to discontinue your use of the website.

The PH techies Will & Pete, may be around to answer your question but they are at the show in Brum ATM.

[deevlash]

out of the box forum software sucks, PH looks better than them all. I like how PH doesnt have avatars and moronic signatures (although some folk do insist upon signing their own posts manually, the idiots).

[Munter]

deevlash said:

out of the box forum software sucks, PH looks better than them all. I like how PH doesnt have avatars and moronic signatures (although some folk do insist upon signing their own posts manually, the idiots).

I agree. PHs clean look is the a large part of it's appeal.

If only the search actually worked.

Regards
M Unter

[Simbu]

You might also notice that PH and vBulletin use different languages for their server script. A simple reason might be that the tech team for PH don't know php. If this is the case then why go through the hassle of using a new forum system if your skillset lies elsewhere?

I also prefer PH's forum to vBulletin. Much less cluttered with avatars and other stuff that increases page load times. And apparently it scales well!

[RacingPete]

There are numerous factors to choosing what forum software is used on a site (some mentioned above) but also they are to do with brand values, historical factors, integration with the rest of the site, opportunity to monetise etc.

vBulletin is heavily used as it is easy to implement and is feature set and for those that are used to internet forums it is familiar. I personally think that PistonHeads is easier to read than a site using vBulletin especially with the amount of site furniture (avatars, signatures etc) around each post. I also think that the vBulletin style of forum actually looks more outdated than PistonHeads in terms of UI.

We admit that there are certain features in the forum software that need improving (especially the search) and we are looking at those for this year. But the freedom of our custom built software helps PistonHeads keeps its individual identity compared to the mass of other forums on the internet. It also allows News Stories to be linked and for us to easily repopulate the content to other parts of the site or formats if we so require.

We also have different looks and feel for the forum and will be rolling out a new default design towards the end of this month, though this is already available in your preferences under the 'skins' option - choose Big Blue.

[tubbystu]

deevlash said:

out of the box forum software sucks, PH looks better than them all. I like how PH doesnt have avatars and moronic signatures

nail, head etc.

deevlash said:

(although some folk do insist upon signing their own posts manually, the idiots).

Including the OP who signs off areply with "Andy", though his profile says his name is "Clive", and as for The Moose

Big Al said:

And came across this little sentence from PH T&C's again this evening.

It says

If you are dissatisfied with the website or any content or materials on it, your sole exclusive remedy is to discontinue your use of the website.

But the search facility really does need some major time and expenditure - its been terrible for too long and is the one area that is continually disappointing. I'm not convinced those at PH towers & HM understand how useful it can be when it works properly ...... Pete says it is on this years to do list at least.

[deevlash]

I just use google to search PH, one thing I'd love in a forum search is that when searching for something you could differentiate whether you wanted the results to include keywords in thread titles, main text, or usernames.

[Paul Drawmer]

zakelwe said:

Andehh said:

+1 Have been a member of several forums for a year years now & PH does dated. Im guessing its a cost issue though tbh.

Cost? The above mentioned forum is more or less a one man band, but with computer nerds that is what is expected. Evo forum is equally quaint and "cheap". What is it with UK car forums they all don't bother getting in sync with the rest of the worlds forums on standardised format?

Ok, I have a bee in my bonnet, but really, as this site is so huge now it should spend some money getting the format right. It will make new visitors feel more at home and willing to stick around if nothing else.

Andy

Edited by zakelwe on Wednesday 13th January 23:01

I agree with others. I like the format of PH.
It looks clean and uncluttered.
I like the way the content loads before the adverts.
It's also pretty damn fast compared with many 'modern' forum engines.

[va1o]

I like this style to, I much prefer it to all the vbulletin forums etc. This is so much more clean and uncluttered, with no unesssary crap that just makes things slow.

[Meeja]

I think that a large number of PH members (particularly the longer-serving ones!) like the clean uncluttered look.

Functionality is more important than asthetics..... Now, about that Search function......

[Famous Graham]

One of the quickest improvements to Search I can think of (and I've posted it before, iirc, although it was a couple of years ago), is to have a "this forum" option, or a search box on the actual thread page. It's a bit of a ballache going into Advanced Search, then scrolling down to the right forum (and, oddly, that scroll bar doesn't behave properly - even clicking below the slider only moves it down one line at a time).

[CommanderJameson]

I like the aesthetics and the posting stuff. It's the invisible bits that need attention, like a functional search and a PM system that doesn't depend on the far end being connected to a working email address.

Having a decent CODE tag would be cool, too, for those of us who post spoddy stuff.

[FourWheelDrift]

What's wrong with thise?

10 INPUT "What is your name: ", U$
20 PRINT "Hello "; U$
30 INPUT "How many stars do you want: ", N
40 S$ = ""
50 FOR I = 1 TO N
60 S$ = S$ + "*"
70 NEXT I
80 PRINT S$
90 INPUT "Do you want more stars? ", A$
100 IF LEN(A$) = 0 THEN GOTO 90
110 A$ = LEFT$(A$, 1)
120 IF A$ = "Y" OR A$ = "y" THEN GOTO 30
130 PRINT "Goodbye "; U$
140 END

Using the 3 curly bracket coding.