A SharperIron Design Update this Weekend
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If my notes are correct, SI’s last design update was about three years ago. That would make us way overdue for a face lift! It turns out one has been in the making behind the scenes for several months, and the site will go offline for much of the weekend to transition.
The underlying framework, for those interested, is still Drupal 7, but theming for Drupal — and for websites in general — has improved a good bit in the last couple of years. There are some powerful tools available now for themers … and I don’t how to use any of them!
But the good folks at More Than (Just) Themes provided a great starting design and excellent support along the way so, Lord willing, an updated look will be operational and about 90% actually “finished” before Monday morning October 30. Most of you probably won’t notice the 10% that will still be under construction.
As some of you have probably noticed, I’m a lousy cheerleader. So, with that as context, my assessment is that the update is looking mostly pretty good.
A few improvements to look for along with a fresh, more colorful look:
- Improved overall fit to varying screen sizes
- More eyeball-friendly fonts
- Easy return to top of page
- Text editor (comments, etc.) in rich text mode on most phone browsers (rather than plain text)
- Logging in via the Log In link returns you to the page you logged in from (with a few exceptions) rather than always taking you to your profile
- New Posts tabs display data without reloading the entire New Posts page
- Jump to Filings from the menu (saves some scrolling on small screens)
- Logged in users: “Discuss” takes you to the bottom of the thread (a shortcut that works regardless of logged-in state is on the do-list)
- Multi-page threads: paging links (next, 1, 2, 3, etc.) are visible at the top of the thread as well as the bottom
- Containers on the Forums page are just headings rather than links to a redundant and potentially confusing additional list page
- Larger ads for our advertisers
- Miscellaneous other tuning and tweaking
- A continued total absence of: automatically playing videos, instant or time delayed overlay ads, popups insisting that you turn your adblocker off.
There are a number of options that are in the “undecided” category, so your feedback after the transition will be welcome. And this thread is the perfect place to post issues/bugs/whatever.
We’re not moving to a different server, so there shouldn’t be any weird half-old-half-new syncing issues … but if you see anomalies of any kind, flush your browser cache (usually ctrl+shift+delete; select images and files) and see if that helps.
Just one other detail: The plan is to go offline today, 10/27/17 around 4 PM Central.
Aaron Blumer 2016 Bio
Aaron Blumer is a Michigan native and graduate of Bob Jones University and Central Baptist Theological Seminary (Plymouth, MN). He and his family live in small-town western Wisconsin, not far from where he pastored for thirteen years. In his full time job, he is content manager for a law-enforcement digital library service. (Views expressed are the author's own and not his employer's, church's, etc.)
- 10 views
Yeah, that one is OK now too, I think. :-D *lol* *confused* *DASH*
And just because…
*meh* *eek* *crazy* 8-) @@ *blush* =-O
Views expressed are always my own and not my employer's, my church's, my family's, my neighbors', or my pets'. The house plants have authorized me to speak for them, however, and they always agree with me.
I’d like to see the ability (in no particular order of importance):
- to choose fonts and sizes. I prefer serif fonts.
- to navigate from the bottom of a thread instead of having to page up to the top.
- to navigate from section to section in without going back to the top of the main page.
Hoping to shed more light than heat..
There was a problem with the Blogroll “blocks” being too narrow on small screens. This has been fixed also now.
Rob: Some good suggestions there. I’m not sure about font switching, but I’ve seen some themes with a side-swipe menu that makes the main navigation available from anywhere on the page without scrolling up. Kind of like that. (Another option is to put main navigation where we currently have “Profile - Messages - Log Out/LogIn,” but then we lose those three options as a separate set of links. Not out of the question at all.)
I think the one-click scroll to bottom can happen sooner rather than later, possibly. Have a theory about how to do that, but it needs a little research.
Views expressed are always my own and not my employer's, my church's, my family's, my neighbors', or my pets'. The house plants have authorized me to speak for them, however, and they always agree with me.
A board I frequent has the various choices of font and their sizes as options next to the B for bold and I for italic buttons.
Hoping to shed more light than heat..
Discussion