I don’t like it. Looks buttoned-up and stripped down to me. Makes me question the motivation for the change. Is this supposed to be a forum upgrade or was the change made for other reasons (cost, resources, security, etc.)?
If the goal truly is to improve the forum, then (and I’ve said this many, many times over the years, but I’ll say it again anyway) you need to require more standardized input from the user such as the vehicle’s year, make, and model, engine size, mileage etc. Then, the forum should be sortable by any of these criteria…
This is a variation of Wondir’s search engine. When someone sends in a query I’ve seen a hundred times (like, "SHE WON’T START!), I can have my little tutorial sent to them with a touch of a button, say, response #5. The canned responses could be stored anywhere. I’m not particular. I could, of course, add or subtract to the canned response as I thought appropriate.
There are so many thing missing from the new format, that it is hardly worthwhile bothering to visit.
It seemed like on the old forum, 90-95% of the questions were posted by newbies, but there was a core of veteran members who answered those questions and debated each others’ answers.
I think the new format will drive away the veteran members… then the newbies will get tired of posting questions that never get satisfactory answers, and then the whole thing will just gradually fade away.
Too bad, because with the Car Talk brand, there is no reason why this couldn’t have been expanded into something very useful.
Is there anyway to provide a cookie so that users don’t have to log in every time they visit? I found it convenient to just go to the old board and be automatically logged on. Minor quibble, but still.
Also, reduce the empty space present on every thread. I’d like to be able to read maybe 2 or 3 or more posts without having to scroll down. Oh, and the thread titles are way too big, makes it look like a child’s colouring book, not an informative car forum. It just looks too, I guess, unprofessional. The old forum was all business, no fancy fonts or anything, and it was great.
Overall, I’d say this new forum is just barely okay. At this point, I’d say it’s a step (or three) in the wrong direction. Take a look at www.crownvic.net That site has an awesome forum format.
WIRING DIAGRAMS are indispensable in troubleshooting automotive electrical/electronic problems. The only place I’ve found free wiring diagram, consistently is at www.autozone.com (I can go through my local public library; but, others can’t.). Could wiring diagrams be imported to these boards from autozone.com, or, someone else?
I use a little program called, AS-U-Type It does a nice job of spell checking on any program offers a lot of configuration choices and can do things like pasting standard text. For example when I type CELX it will replace that with:
That CEL (check engine light) is just a kid in class waving her hand trying to get you attention because she has the answer. You need to have the codes read. Some places will read them for FREE. Try Autozone or Advanced Auto Parts. Get the exact code not just their translation into English and post it back here.
Which is a regular.
I would like to add a few emotions as it often helps convey the true message.
Most of the rest of my comments have already been suggested.
How about the ability to add additional comments with an edit note like:
Edited today …
Like this would be additional information. Admittedly there are times I would like to be able to delete or do actual edits, like when my spell chuck does not catch an error.
I think I have found out what the problems is with staying logged on. If I log on and back up to a prior screen where I was not logged on, I loose my logon.
I would guess if I logon at the first screen of the session, it would stick. I have a habit of logging on the first time I submit a reply.
Auto logon seems to be a little flaky and I suspect that is due to the change over and I may need to dump my cookies and start over to clear things up.
I liked how on the old system, when you logged on to the site, you could instantly see which posts you had read or were considered “new” by the color…now all the posts are the same looking and there is way too much space between each post…wasting a lot of real estate on the screen.
Also, join date, # of posts, signatures, an interface closer to the old system…and no anonymous posting…better/safer that way.
Heck while we’re at it, just grab phpBB. It’s free, it takes minutes to set up unless you do custom graphics in which case it might take a whole afternoon, and it’s good. I use it on my car forum. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again. This new format is awful. You guys might think flashy graphics and popup windows that black out the thread look really, REALLY cool, but they’re useless.
In fact, they’re worse than useless - instead of just not doing anything which would be bad enough, these “features” actually block us from being able to view the thread as we type. We can’t even quote without jumping through a bunch of hoops! It’s very, VERY difficult to give accurate answers to a question when we can’t look at the question while we’re answering.
I’d like to have the option to select different background colors like on the old board. Also, it’d be nice to see the screen names a bit bigger for those of us who can’t see the small text too well(granted I can see it alright at 1920x1200 res, but some might not be so lucky)
MOVING a post every time someone responds to it was the second most irritating feature about the cars.com board. Now it’s HERE!! wondir.com did it better. They didn’t move. IF you MUST move the posts, at least give us the ability to use a post number to bring up the desired post. ANY improvement would be welcomed.
sigh So much for this suggestion. Doesn’t seem to be part of the new format. Oh well. Not all change is progress and sometimes it just means we have to go with the flow and try not to be tooooooo negative.
You always must reply to the last poster to keep the post in the order in which they are posted even if thats not the person your replying to. Is that fixable?
You always must reply to the last poster to keep the post in the order in which they are posted even if thats not the person your replying to. Is that fixable? Can post be sorted in order of post
What if I tell someone that he doesn’t need to change his timing belt, when I meant to say that he does? It is foolish not to allow edits. Most forums allow them, with a timestamp if it’s been more than a few minutes since the original posting. That way nobody can go back and rewrite history, since the timestamp would show an edit from the original.
I’d like to see a button that will allow you to revert to the ‘classic’ or a less stylistic board.
Even if there is a need to update the backend of the site, the interface can be any way you want it to look. Many sites have the ability to toggle between different views and CarTalk could benefit from this.
The bottom-line is that information should be presented in a simple, easy to read format so you can get the most information with the fewest actions. I don’t think it helps to make rounded, soft looking large buttons that appear to pop-out inside of boxes that float and are only connected to minimalist arrows. Further, using shades of grey instead of bordered lines confuses the boundary. These are just stylistic changes that are quite distracting and unnecessary.
I like the flat, linear view that shows the different postings in easy-to-identify blocks. I want to be able to scan the most postings as quickly as possible, preview the messages without clicking, and navigate between pages with the fewest actions. If it looks like an Excel spreadsheet, fine - at least spreadsheets continue to be easy to read and have stood the test of time for being able to present lots of data easily.
Seriously, don’t try to make a website appear to be something it’s not, or can ever be. Unless you can radically change the way bulletin boards are used and turn our thinking upside-down - don’t waste my time.
As others have said, this forum is a huge step backwards. To start with, I can only see 10 subject lines for posts on the screen. I’d like to see a user-selectable number, say, 100, posts per page. I’m simply not going to take the time to scroll through pages of 10 posts per page; I’ll leave the forum instead.
And where is the text of the message one is replying to?
Get with it, guys! You really messed things up here!
