Subject:
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Re: 2 Things...
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Newsgroups:
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lugnet.admin.general
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Date:
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Wed, 23 Jun 1999 12:57:47 GMT
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Viewed:
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206 times
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On Tue, 22 Jun 1999 21:22:22 GMT, "Todd Lehman" <lehman@javanet.com> wrote:
> In lugnet.admin.general, Steve Bliss writes:
> > The new view is somewhat busy for my taste. But I typically use a
> > newsreader, not the web interface.
>
> Could you be more specific about the word "busy"? (Don't worry, I can take
> any/all criticism, constructive or not.) Do you mean that there is too much
> stuff visually going on, or some of the elements are too "loud," or . . . ?
Basically, it's the brown headings *after* the message (they make me feel
like I missed something *before* the message, because there weren't any
headers up there). And the "Message was in Reply To", and "This Message
has X Replies" sections.
The layout of the 'brief' display, with the click-box and the contrasting
background adds to the feeling of 'busy-ness'.
> > - The 'brief' display format is somewhat confusing. I think I would have
> > swapped the location of the newsgroup and the author.
>
> That would be kind of nice, except the newsgroup list can be arbitrarily
> lengthy, while names generally only run about 10-20 characters.
That makes sense. No, wait: names can be arbitrarily long, can't they?
> > Also, I find myself
> > clicking the newsgroup link (when I'm trying to access the message),
> > because it's the only visible (ie, underlined) link.
>
> I had that same problem the first couple of days. I'd forgotten that,
> thanks.
Thanks for making the subject-line clickable.
> > I like the fact that it is consistent from page to page.
>
> (that what is consistent?)
The format of the 'brief' display.
> > - On the message pages, having options at both the top and bottom of the
> > page is confusing. They should be all in one place, or maybe repeated
> > (that would not be my preference).
>
> I'm not sure I know what you mean. What options are at the top? Do you
> mean the search box and the post-new icon? Would it help if the post-reply
> icon were back up at the top?
New and Reply, mostly. Thanks for moving the Reply icon, although the new
location is somewhat unexpected. At least people won't mistake 'New' for
'Reply' quite as easily, eh?
> > - The actual message should go from margin to margin, instead of having a
> > limited width. The limited width is both irritating (more scrolling) and
> > inconsistent (other elements on the page go from margin to margin).
>
> It's not actually limiting the width; it's not not expanding it. That is
> to say, the brief-mode view takes the article body and munges it up into a
> single long string for quick context scanning. That can't really be done on
> the full-article display because of the infinite variety of columnar ASCII
> text that can be written.
I finally realized what was going on with the message-page layout, that the
messages are being displayed in their actual layout.
You might consider doing a table-base (or even *gasp* frames-based) layout,
with some information placed side-by-side with the message body. It sounds
like that would be a good use of screen real estate, at least for some
people (but probably really bad for other people).
> > - Using the 'brief' format for the "message is in reply to" information is
> > consistent, but it is also distracting, because it looks like a divider
> > bar. Actually, the "message is in reply to" part isn't really necessary --
> > that info is available through the thread-tree.
>
> I don't disagree 100%, but what if the thread tree has 200 messages and
> the little blinking star is three screens down? What if a new user has
> absolutely no idea about what a thread is but understands the concept of
> "message is in reply to"? That's really why it's there, ...
I can't argue with that, except to wonder how often that situation comes
up.
> ... plus a bit of
> text-context to help out when some ignoramus posts a reply without quoting
> any of the content from the previous article.
Again, this doesn't happen *all* that often. With one current exception.
> (Which thread-view page do you mean, BTW? There are three indented versions,
> and the larger the content, less funny the bars feel, I think.)
I see what you mean (I hadn't checked the "All" layout before). I agree
with you. The bars look the most odd when they are the same height as the
content, in the compact view. The brief view looks somewhat better, and
the All view is just fine.
> > - Where's the link to the power-search page? ;) Seriously, throw up (errr,
> > place) two links next to the search box: one for the Pause-search, one for
> > the newsgroup-search.
>
> You mean, give a link to
>
> http://www.lugnet.com/pause/search/
> or
> http://www.lugnet.com/pause/
>
> at the top of the homepage in the blue band?
Actually, linking to the /pause/ homepage would be more useful, just
because the pause/search/ page is so bare. Which means it would be a
duplicate link from the menu. But people would look by the search box for
search links, and having a link the set db would be a Good Thing.
Ditto for the newsgroup search page.
> > - It would be appropriate to have a link to the Traffic page on the
> > navbar.
>
> Hmm, what might be the icon/graphic for such a link?
Traffic jam. ;)
By the way, *THANK YOU VERY MUCH* for all of this! One point I especially
appreciate: there aren't little links all other the place, screaming "click
here to discuss this!" Not that there's much reason for those, yet. But
if they never appear on lugnet, I won't miss them. They give such
disjointed feeling to the whole newsgroup/discussion board thing.
Steve
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Message is in Reply To:
 | | Re: 2 Things...
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| (...) Great idea! (...) Could you be more specific about the word "busy"? (Don't worry, I can take any/all criticism, constructive or not.) Do you mean that there is too much stuff visually going on, or some of the elements are too "loud," or . . . (...) (25 years ago, 22-Jun-99, to lugnet.admin.general)
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