"So, for those of you who definitely do not like the new system, what suggestions would you have for improvement?"

I think the best improvement possible would be to give me my hard earned 11000 points!!

 

I am taking brads advice and just learn the new system, it is faster.

LOL, see my latest response to your blog   

We also have http://oldforums.joeuser.com

Also note that the arrow seperators in the forum are clickable:

Home -> Blogging -> YOu can click on those arrows to quickly navigate.

Also note that the arrow seperators in the forum are clickable: Home -> Blogging -> YOu can click on those arrows to quickly navigate.

Learning this little tidbit does make things a bit easier, but I do miss the at a glance view.

We also have http://oldforums.joeuser.com

This makes me very happy.

The oldforums site (once the word gets out) will silence a lot of the old regulars who'd rather not change, but then you're supporting two forum types... it's still more constructive to try to improve your new format to the point where most of their specific complaints are addressed.

I shot over to the oldforums version and the comfort of familiarity was immediate. I was unable to post a comment on a thread that I found, however.

As for what I liked about the older version, you could see multiple articles (and their authors) under each general category. This still was never optimal in the most used categories (and rarely mattered in the underused ones), but it was good to see if anyone worth reading (in my opinion) had written anything lately (what I use the Recent Articles sidebar for) or had been responded to (what I would use the old forums for).

Honestly, for me, if I had the ability to set up a "favorite bloggers" page that showed all the recent articles by just those authors, toggling order by publication or last posted to in the forums, that would alleviate the majority of my want for checking the forums anyway. However, this doesn't address the people who want to go into the forums just to see the most recently commented on articles regardless of author.

Good luck in pleasing all of the people all of the time!

Put Zoomba in Charge!  He will kick arse and take names!  Even if he is a liberal!

Maybe make the forums look less "busy" if that makes any sense...I found myself so overwhelmed with all the various categories and sections.

I do like that the old forums are available...but I do want to give this layout a chance.

Somehow the subcategories don't really work for JoeUser the way they worked for Wincustomize. I've never really wished I could keep all the 'war on terror' posts out of my 'us domestic' posts in the politics section. Browsing JU isn't really an act of targeting specific information as much as it is browsing for new insights in the same way one would read a newspaper.

I think regulars will either bookmark the g=recent page or produce a lot of needless click-through. At the very least some subcategories need to be tuned. Right now 'Environment" in "Politics" hasn't seen a post since the 24th of August, so that slot is wasted for the frequent visitors.

Also, right now there is only one category, "General" showing for Current Events. Headings with only one subindex don't really need subindexes, do they? Granted, I can't think of many subcategories for Current Events that aren't duplicated elsewhere, thus my questioning the real need for subcategories at all.

If subcategories aren't negotiable, I would absorb 'Politics' into Current events. I think 'war on terror' and 'environment' for instance could sit alongside 'politics' at the same level beneath the current events section. I would look at all the sections that way, and see if maybe less-used topics couldn't be merged or divided between other sections. Anything that isn't bringing something new to the top is wasted space.

In terms of page real estate I wish that the articles got as much impact as the headings. People don't come here to read the category titles, but that is what the focus seems to be on. I think I would de-emphasize the category titles and give more attention to the article title. Perhaps maybe like a table of contents style, like: "This is the name of the article. (whitespace) _b_in Politics_/b_ (date).

I don't mean to be cranky about it, I just think sometimes what is good for one site doesn't really meet the needs of another. JU isn't really informational the way a lot of the content on wincustomize is. Therefore wincustomize benefits from a strongly-categorized format that gets specific information in front of the person with ease. JU, at least from my perspective, is for people who are coming here to find stuff they WOULDN'T normally be looking for.

Truth be told, when the "old" forums came out, I wasn't crazy about them. But as I became accustomed to them, I didn't mind so much. The main strength of the new forums is that their format is more similar to the more popular message board site, so it's a more familiar indexing system to those new to JU. But I like the way the old format showed four or five recent articles under each category.

P.S. I realize also on a database driven site, which shares its DB with another site, the suggestions above could be hell to implement, and often a lot more work than coming up with a few new queries. I'm looking at it simply from a usability perspective, but I also understand 100% that form sometimes has to follow the shape of the underlying function.

My Watch List :-
List my most recent articles, I would prefer to use this entirely for articles I choose to watch, so I can have quick reference to them. instead what is happening, everytime I write and post one of my watch list items is bumped off the list.

Please keep the list just to what we choose to watch and we remove as we wnat to remove etc.

My Blog Pages:-

I cannot find a way to get to my blog pages without having to click create blog, this then takes me to the sign up page which I then have to find my own blog.

Please have a button to click on to take me straight to my blog, (it may already be there and I just do not know where it is, if this is the case please point me in the right direction)


Favorites:-

Honestly, for me, if I had the ability to set up a "favorite bloggers" page that showed all the recent articles by just those authors, toggling order by publication or last posted to in the forums, that would alleviate the majority of my want for checking the forums anyway.

ditto psuedo


writing and editing:-

A spell check would not be a bad addition to make.
[color="#FF0000">

Font Coloring:-

I wrote this above suggestions, then went and hi-lited each sub heading and picked red from the font colours, so that each sub heading will stand out in red.

It did not work. Is the problem with me or the font colour box thingmajiggy?

But I like the way the old format showed four or five recent articles under each category.

Ditto what Gid says

My Posts:-

Please make it so..... when you open my posts, a post thathas a new comment on is hilited in bold or has a tick in the box so it stands out and brings itself to your attention.

thanks