[WEBSITE v2] MusicBee website and forum redesign

[AvikB]

Forum takes too much space ?(width and height of every post), on my 1366x768 monitor it looks weird, on 1920x1080 it looks OK...

looks fine on 1366x768. I tested it.

[Xenatier]

Looks really good Love the dark theme.

[AvikB]

Looks really good Love the dark theme.

[redwing]

Is uploading a thumbnail, in addition to screenshots, really necessary when submitting a skin?
If you look at skins already submitted, all are using one of the screenshots as a thumbnail.
If it's really needed for some reason, why not just use the first screenshot (in a lower resolution or whatever)?

[AvikB]

Is uploading a thumbnail, in addition to screenshots, really necessary when submitting a skin? If you look at skins already submitted, all are using one of the screenshots as a thumbnail. If it's really needed for some reason, why not just use the first screenshot (in a lower resolution or whatever)?

It is necessary. I can't use the first screenshot, because screenshots are large in size and takes time to load. Thumbnails are smaller and is used for recognize add-ons in a glance. And since images are not hosted in the server, it is not possible to resize them.

Ofcourse if someone uses the imgur submission provided by default, we get a smaller resized image back, so no problem. The only problem is if someone use dropbox or other third party providers, they don't provide smaller thubmnail size images.

If you look at skins already submitted, all are using one of the screenshots as a thumbnail.

That is true. a screenshot can be used as thumbnail but a thumbnail can't be used as screenshots, due to their size. I have no problem with someone using a Imgur screenshot as thumbnail, but it is not ok to have a dropbox hosted screenshot as a thumbnail. As i said earlier imgur images can be resized automatically, unlike other hosting services, that's why i want people to use imgur for uploading screenshots or anything.

[BeeBeeKing]

Forum takes too much space ?(width and height of every post), on my 1366x768 monitor it looks weird, on 1920x1080 it looks OK...

Agreed, too much wasted white space, I am finding it much harder to read than the old forum.

[redwing]

Is uploading a thumbnail, in addition to screenshots, really necessary when submitting a skin? If you look at skins already submitted, all are using one of the screenshots as a thumbnail. If it's really needed for some reason, why not just use the first screenshot (in a lower resolution or whatever)?

It is necessary. I can't use the first screenshot, because screenshots are large in size and takes time to load. Thumbnails are smaller and is used for recognize add-ons in a glance. And since images are not hosted in the server, it is not possible to resize them.

Ofcourse if someone uses the imgur submission provided by default, we get a smaller resized image back, so no problem. The only problem is if someone use dropbox or other third party providers, they don't provide smaller thubmnail size images.

If you look at skins already submitted, all are using one of the screenshots as a thumbnail.

That is true. a screenshot can be used as thumbnail but a thumbnail can't be used as screenshots, due to their size. I have no problem with someone using a Imgur screenshot as thumbnail, but it is not ok to have a dropbox hosted screenshot as a thumbnail. As i said earlier imgur images can be resized automatically, unlike other hosting services, that's why i want people to use imgur for uploading screenshots or anything.

OK. Thanks for replying.
Other skinners might be wondering the same thing. I'd suggest you add this post to the submission guide thread or clarify the point on the guide as the thread is locked.

[jackuars]

Hi avik, great job! Also am interested in website development. Can you recommend some good online tutorials including videos? And what languages/scripting should be studied?

[AvikB]

Forum takes too much space ?(width and height of every post), on my 1366x768 monitor it looks weird, on 1920x1080 it looks OK...

Agreed, too much wasted white space, I am finding it much harder to read than the old forum.

We had a test site running over 3-4 month and i went over ALL the feedback over the forum, but everyone was ok with the layout. So i am not going to change it unless a lots of people demand it.

OK. Thanks for replying.
Other skinners might be wondering the same thing. I'd suggest you add this post to the submission guide thread or clarify the point on the guide as the thread is locked.

Yeah i locked the thread to prevent any discussion or so.i will update it.

Hi avik, great job! Also am interested in website development. Can you recommend some good online tutorials including videos? And what languages/scripting should be studied?

Just follow along the video and choose a language you like:   https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sBzRwzY7G-k
You should definitely start with HTML5, CSS 3 (choose SCSS as precompiler), Javascript(Jquery for making life easy) and for backend or server side you can try Node.JS, PHP(i used PHP to make this site).
To be fair it will take years to master all these. So good luck.

[redwing]

Among the three menus below each add-on, "Download", "Support Forum" and "Like", "Support Forum" is not clear. I'd suggest "Go to Forum Thread" instead.

[hiccup]

Forum takes too much space ?(width and height of every post), on my 1366x768 monitor it looks weird, on 1920x1080 it looks OK...

Agreed, too much wasted white space, I am finding it much harder to read than the old forum.

We had a test site running over 3-4 month and i went over ALL the feedback over the forum, but everyone was ok with the layout. So i am not going to change it unless a lots of people demand it.

Of course you are absolutely right AvikB.

But let's not forget that the test site had a very limited number of users, and very little daily activity.
Now that the forum is live, and there is a lot of activity, I myself also find that I am still adapting to some changes, and finding reading it slightly more difficult at the moment. This was not that obvious to me when using the test forum, where we of course were focusing on other things too.

I wish I had a screenshot of the old forum (anybody?) to compare, so I might see if it is mostly imaginary, or that I could put the finger on what specifically might possibly be improved, without the need for you to make too rigorous changes.

One thing coming to mind that I think I need to adapt to is the much more graphic and colored (green) displays of 'Quotes'. Graphically it's very nice, but it's drawing a lot of attention and taking up quite some screen space.
Also the headers of the posts are partly in bold type. Might be o.k., but together with the large quote fields, it makes the actual text of the postings themselves almost getting the least attention compared to the quotes and the header.

Indeed there also is more 'white' in the postings. But that might be due to the request of many to have avatars, which might also need some reserved vertical space, even when not present?

[hiccup]

We had a test site running over 3-4 month and i went over ALL the feedback over the forum, but everyone was ok with the layout.

Please don't shoot me ;-) but I am sure in that period I have mentioned once or twice that I would prefer some thinner bars and fields at some locations.

For now, I noticed that the alignment for the sticky posts is not yet adjusted to be similar to the other posts.

Is it intentional that the area in the green rectangular is white instead of having the same color as the rest of the bars?

Also here I find that the vertical space for each topic could be decreased a little bit.
And I notice that some are even higher than others, while they hardly have content that justifies that.

[AvikB]

Of course you are absolutely right AvikB. But let's not forget that the test site had a very limited number of users, and very little daily activity. Now that the forum is live, and there is a lot of activity, I myself also find that I am still adapting to some changes, and finding reading it slightly more difficult at the moment. This was not that obvious to me when using the test forum, where we of course were focusing on other things too. I wish I had a screenshot of the old forum (anybody?) to compare, so I might see if it is mostly imaginary, or that I could put the finger on what specifically might possibly be improved, without the need for you to make too rigorous changes. One thing coming to mind that I think I need to adapt to is the much more graphic and colored (green) displays of 'Quotes'. Graphically it's very nice, but it's drawing a lot of attention and taking up quite some screen space. Also the headers of the posts are partly in bold type. Might be o.k., but together with the large quote fields, it makes the actual text of the postings themselves almost getting the least attention compared to the quotes and the header. Indeed there also is more 'white' in the postings. But that might be due to the request of many to have avatars, which might also need some reserved vertical space, even when not present?

I am still reluctant to change the layout of the forum. As i said no more major changes, only bug fix. Changing layout at this point will only include more bug.

Please don't shoot me ;-) but I am sure in that period I have mentioned once or twice that I would prefer some thinner bars and fields at some locations.

For now, I noticed that the alignment for the sticky posts is not yet adjusted to be similar to the other posts.

yeah i forgot   , i will fix it..... i promise.

Is it intentional that the area in the green rectangular is white instead of having the same color as the rest of the bars?

It is intentional. Does it look bad?

Also here I find that the vertical space for each topic could be decreased a little bit.
And I notice that some are even higher than others, while they hardly have content that justifies that.

Unfortunately i will leave it as it is since it is minor. The forum uses html table which is not good for styling and causes issues(like this). Fixing it would be a huge risk as it will always break something else. sorry about that.

[hiccup]

Unfortunately i will leave it as it is since it is minor. The forum uses html table which is not good for styling and causes issues(like this). Fixing it would be a huge risk as it will always break something else. sorry about that.

Ok, no problem. That's all clear and appreciated.

Yeah, the white area to my eyes is a bit ugly. Could well just be a matter of taste though.

[redwing]

I don't understand why every add-on I submit has to get approved by admin/mod. I'm waiting hours for a TM I submitted. Also I made a slight edit for a skin, and it's on the waiting list again. I'd suggest only first add-on requires approval and once a user gets approved with the first add-on, then all restrictions should be removed for the user from that moment. We had no issues at all on the previous website without any approval involved.