I rather like the new layout, though the blue on blue mentioned above would not have been my first choice, but I was horrified to find that all the bookmarks I’d carefully stored in a howto folder for my own reference no longer worked. But, good news, the problem must have been fixed in the past few hours, because all those links are now being redirected to the new URLs.
Thanks!!
My opinion doesn’t count, but I am giving it anyway - I would have preferred it not to be changed.
How about the sidebar referring to Howtos for New Users? I would have thought advanced users would already know where to find the advanced Howtos.
It’s there but since there are no recent posts in that forum, it’s not showing up. The way the blocks in the sidebar work is that they show up IF there is new content that matches their criteria definition. Consider the HowTos in the sidebar as a “What’s New”.
On Tue, 04 Jan 2011 12:06:01 +0000, brucecadieux wrote:
> Take it any way you want, with a grain of salt or with the same attitude
> as before, the Oh well and a shrug.
Just remember that if you complain without providing any alternatives,
then we can’t take anything so you shouldn’t expect a change. If you
want to be a part of change, suggestions are a much better way to get
attention than just a complaint.
We do realise that we’re not going to please everyone (that would be
quite impossible), but we do consider suggestions that are made. That
doesn’t mean we’ll make them, but we do consider them.
Giving us nothing to consider, though, means that the complaints will
likely not be addressed.
Your choice. 
Jim Henderson
openSUSE Forums Administrator
Forum Use Terms & Conditions at http://tinyurl.com/openSUSE-T-C
On Tue, 04 Jan 2011 12:06:01 +0000, brucecadieux wrote:
> swerdna;2273479 Wrote:
>> Just click the link “get technical help” or the link “other forums”,
>> depending whether you want the tech forums or the non-tech forums, and
>> you’ll see a broad expanse similar to how it was 18 months ago, in the
>> beginning. You’ll probably be happy about that because we made them
>> just for you Bruce (OK and also for the other English speakers lol).
>
> Exactly the kind of respsonse and attitude I expected here. And is
> exactly why I don’t bother making suggestions. It really is a sad state
> that one of my favorite forums has become I place I choose not to visit
> as much as I used to, and not just because of forum “layout”. 
Well now, hang on a second - swerdna was telling you how to get a view
that looks like what it used to look like, since you seemed to prefer
that rather than what the view looks like now - and you’re not happy with
that either?
What exactly would make you happy?
Or do you just want to complain for the sake of complaining?
What exactly is your goal here? Seriously, I want to know.
Jim
–
Jim Henderson
openSUSE Forums Administrator
Forum Use Terms & Conditions at http://tinyurl.com/openSUSE-T-C
Swernda was being a smart ass.
I don’t wish to see any change other than the original forum layout. In other words I didn’t like any of the changes that have been made since that last major destruction 
That is my suggestion, use a “simple” forum layout, like the old and original one. It worked well, it wasn’t broken…old saying, if it ain’t broke don’t fix it.
Consider it, for the 3 seconds that you will. Then carry on as you planned.
The thing I find most amusing is when opinions are asked for, someone gives an opinion and that is somehow a terrible thing if it isn’t the same as your own.
Simple solution…don’t ask for “opinions” about changes that are already a done deal.
It’s kind of like taking the time, labor and effort to paint a car, then asking people for ways to improve it after the paint job is done rotfl!
brucecadieux wrote:
> Forum has been getting more difficult to navigate, it has gotten to
> where I even dread seeing what changes will be made with each visit, I
> visit less and less often. Shame to see what was a simple and straight
> forward easy to navigate forum turn into what it has. A mish mash page
> that just looks terrible and is not contrary to what some may think, is
> not easier to navigate. :’(
give nntp a try: clean, crisp, fast…
and, unchanging (unless you wanna fiddle with it)…
–
DenverD
CAVEAT: http://is.gd/bpoMD [posted via NNTP w/openSUSE 10.3]
Programming: a race between software engineers building bigger/better
idiot-proof programs, and the universe building bigger/better idiots.
So far, the universe is winning. Rick Cook
I have an idea that might work for what most want.
Have this layout be with the default theme. Then do other layouts with other themes. This way users can control what layout and theme they want.
Just my 2cents.
By the way, I like it just fine, and thanks for the hard work Kim.
On Tue, 04 Jan 2011 19:32:03 +0000, brucecadieux wrote:
> Swernda was being a smart ass.
I didn’t read it that way, or at least not mostly that way. It was, to
my read, a mostly serious answer with a little bit of humour applied to
it.
> I don’t wish to see any change other than the original forum layout. In
> other words I didn’t like any of the changes that have been made since
> that last major destruction
>
> That is my suggestion, use a “simple” forum layout, like the old and
> original one. It worked well, it wasn’t broken…old
> saying, if it ain’t broke don’t fix it.
>
> Consider it, for the 3 seconds that you will. Then carry on as you
> planned.
>
> The thing I find most amusing is when opinions are asked for, someone
> gives an opinion and that is somehow a terrible thing if it isn’t the
> same as your own.
That’s actually not the case. The thing I find amusing is that people
make suggestions and when they’re rejected, they assume it’s because we
didn’t agree. I actually agree with you, but there are more suggestions
that are given and all cannot possibly be implemented.
So we do the best we can with what suggestions we do get. Some people
(such as you) make suggestions that end up not being implemented. That
doesn’t mean we’re not listening - but we can’t satisfy every
possible set of suggestions. Sometimes due to coding constraints,
sometimes due to software constraints, sometimes due to management
constraints.
But just because your specific changes weren’t implemented doesn’t mean
that they weren’t considered or that we didn’t look at it in a serious
way. It just means that on balance, your suggestions were not amongst
those that floated to the top of the suggestions that were made.
It happens.
I mean, really, if we get a suggestion “don’t change anything” and
another suggestion that implies a change (such as adding links to popular
How Tos), how exactly do we reconcile that to make everyone happy?
Answer: It’s not actually possible to integrate both suggestions. So we
evaluate the options, make a decision, and one or the other people who
made suggestions are going to claim that “you guys didn’t listen to me!!!
@!@”.
> Simple solution…don’t ask for “opinions” about changes
> that are already a done deal.
>
> It’s kind of like taking the time, labor and effort to paint a car, then
> asking people for ways to improve it after the paint job is done rotfl!
Except that we are continually making changes in order to try to come to
something that most of the users find usable and good. Again, we can’t
possibly please everyone, so in the end, someone’s going to be unhappy.
This time around, you’re the one who’s not happy. That doesn’t mean you
haven’t been heard or that we don’t care about your opinion: We do. But
we also are in a position where anything we do is going to result in
someone being unhappy.
Jim Henderson
openSUSE Forums Administrator
Forum Use Terms & Conditions at http://tinyurl.com/openSUSE-T-C
On Tue, 04 Jan 2011 20:06:01 +0000, Jonathan R wrote:
> I have an idea that might work for what most want.
>
> Have this layout be with the default theme. Then do other layouts with
> other themes. This way users can control what layout and theme they
> want.
>
> Just my 2cents.
>
> By the way, I like it just fine, and thanks for the hard work Kim.
I’d support that as an option, absolutely.
Jim
–
Jim Henderson
openSUSE Forums Administrator
Forum Use Terms & Conditions at http://tinyurl.com/openSUSE-T-C
On 2011-01-04 05:06, mmarif4u wrote:
> But wait, they are broken now, WHY?..because the URL pattern
> changes now, a simple example:
> OLD one,
> http://forums.opensuse.org/english/get-help-here/pre-release-beta/
> New one,
> ‘Pre-Release/Beta’ (http://tinyurl.com/2du7r4s)
> followed by many more…
I have to expand that tinyurl to see what you mean - I hate tinyurls:
> http://forums.opensuse.org/english/get-technical-help-here/pre-release-beta/
> I am not saying, to keep it just because i am linking to it. How many
> other users will link to this forum topics?
That will be the reason why some links I see in the nntp side do not work
any more and I can’t find the forum thread it relates to. I get to a page
that says “wrong link, inform an administrator”.
–
Cheers / Saludos,
Carlos E. R.
(from 11.2 x86_64 “Emerald” at Telcontar)
The one thing I want is a fast way to see new posts. Didn’t MS have a 3-click philosophy (more than 3 clicks to get anywhere was too much?) I visit often and to get to new posts I must:
I think getting logged in is too much of a pain when you have to do it multiple times per day. In one incarnation of the forums, I could log in by merely clicking on a bookmark and click on the search button that remembered my preferences and begin reading: 2 clicks!
On Tue, 04 Jan 2011 21:36:02 +0000, Prexy wrote:
> The one thing I want is a fast way to see new posts. Didn’t MS have a
> 3-click philosophy (more than 3 clicks to get anywhere was too much?) I
> visit often and to get to new posts I must:
>
> 1. click my bookmark to forums.opensuse.org 2. click on the login link
> 3. fill in login info (I have this done automatically) and click on
> “login”
> 4. get back to the forums main page and click on “advanced search” 5.
> click on “search single content type” so I can get to 6. click on
> “subscribed forums” in the box (I previously had to subscribe to every
> English forum to not see non-English postings. It would be much easier
> to be able to subscribe to 1 language only.) 7. click on “search now”
> Begin reading posts.
>
> I think getting logged in is too much of a pain when you have to do it
> multiple times per day. In one incarnation of the forums, I could log
> in by merely clicking on a bookmark and click on the search button that
> remembered my preferences and begin reading: 2 clicks!
You could skip step 1 and bookmark the login page instead - that should
work without a problem.
Then navigate to the top menu bar item “What’s New”, mouse over it and
select “New Posts”. That saves you having to go into the search page.
I just did that myself and got 5 pages of new posts since the last time I
logged into the web interface.
So if I assume I bookmarked my login link, it’s 3 clicks to get to the
new posts.
The login process has been discussed a few times already, so I’ll not go
over why it times out again (there are plenty of threads that discuss
this already).
–
Jim Henderson
openSUSE Forums Administrator
Forum Use Terms & Conditions at http://tinyurl.com/openSUSE-T-C
On 2011-01-04 19:49, DenverD wrote:
> give nntp a try: clean, crisp, fast…
> and, unchanging (unless you wanna fiddle with it)…
Indeed >:-)
Seeing this thread I just went to see the forum side to see for myself what
you people are talking about. It must be interesting all that forum things!
>:-)
I fail to see why the main page lists all languages in so much detail (even
though I’m bilingual). But when I click on the English forums link, I get a
smallish page, with the subforums listed in a small box, darkish blue text
on blue background, almost unreadable.
Only when I click on “Forum: Get Technical Help Here”, then I get to a
readable place.
–
Cheers / Saludos,
Carlos E. R.
(from 11.2 x86_64 “Emerald” at Telcontar)
Thanks for that. Someone else mentioned problems with that too. We should “mend” it.
I have an idea that might work for what most want.
Have this layout be with the default theme. Then do other layouts with other themes. This way users can control what layout and theme they want.
Just my 2cents.
By the way, I like it just fine, and thanks for the hard work Kim.
+1 to what Jonathan suggested.
+1 from me as well.
Hmm, I wonder what most of the other global websites do to solve the language problem for country home pages? For starters, the language selector menu is a simple dropdown at the top of the global page (mostly in US English). Selection leads to a country/language (as appropriate) home page. That seems to have worked for those websites for many years.
That’s true, and that works well with translation, but we’re not doing translation/internationalization as such.
In some cases, communities that are established but are foreign in nature get externally linked to preserve that community. When one does not exist, then a team of mods specific to that language to handle that forum needs to be developed, in which case we then offer the forum in that language. That is why you see things the way you do. You’ll notice we don’t offer all the languages, and some are in fact externally linked.
So if it was just a matter of internationalization, sure, we could do that. Trust me, we don’t go looking for extra work to make for ourselves.
That I can believe. Although in my global example, where “selection leads to a country/language (as appropriate) home page”, that local home page often has very different content to the global home page (not just straight translation), and in some cases appeared to switch or externally link to a local website.
Anyway, you can only make use of the tools installed, so I go with whatever best/easiest way the admins can come up with to provide some local choice of layout.