Board Software Update - Update

Netko · Post by **Netko** » 2007-10-24 02:43am

The more I think about it, the more I agree - nice widget thingy got to me when I was making the previous post. It's certainly worthwhile in the profile next to the posts per day information, but on every post... maybe not so much.

Temjin · Post by **Temjin** » 2007-10-24 03:17am

Stark wrote:I know it's lame, but I want them to remove the fucking giant cannon one.

Fuck yeah. I haven't come across one use of it that didn't come off as annoying and stupid.

Starglider · Post by **Starglider** » 2007-10-24 11:34am

Stark wrote:I know it's lame, but I want them to remove the fucking giant cannon one.

Ok, but only if it is replaced with these;

General Zod · Post by **General Zod** » 2007-10-24 11:41am

Darth Wong wrote:One objection that occurs to me about the activity chart is that I kind of doubt anyone really cares how consistent another person's posting has been. It's a neat widget, and we all know how tempting neat widgets are, but there doesn't seem to be any particular demand for it. I think most people would prefer simply having a slightly improved stars system.

Or no stars at all.

rhoenix · Post by **rhoenix** » 2007-10-24 02:20pm

In thinking about this more, having a graph of posting rate and history, perhaps along with custom images for usergroups, would fit just fine in the user's profile. Along with this, it would allow for more room for stars/rebel symbols/etc. for length of membership.

In this, I agree with Stark (holy shit!) in that having most of those images and such as part of the avatar section per post is a bit much. Keeping it clean and concise for posting seems best to me; have the extra stuff be in the profile.

Ubiquitous · Post by **Ubiquitous** » 2007-10-24 02:51pm

A graph showing users posting history might be a nice add on inside someones profile. But it should not be included in every post a user makes. It is just clutter.

Personally, I think the stars system worked fine. If it ain't broke...

Zadius · Post by **Zadius** » 2007-10-24 03:40pm

My opinion is that an improved star system is a good idea, but anything else added to the avatar area would just clutter it up. I wouldn't mind a posting history tool or widget in the profile pages though, as others have suggested.

I second the notion that we get rid of the cannon emoticon and keep only the basic ones. Keep it simple.

Stark · Post by **Stark** » 2007-10-24 05:32pm

My attitude toward stars is that they're both irrelevant and require constant patching. What are they used for? To identify noobs visually, and to give feedback to longterm members. This would very easily be done by a combination of the current join date, and having five-ish stars (ideally, a single image area that stacks or arranges stars, instead of an ever-wider string of them) then changing to a similarly sized badge or badges representing fixed peroids of time or slices of board lifetime. If people are really going to flop their dicks out over senority, the join date is right there: but the 10 stars thing was just getting insane. Let 'veteran' users hold a badge for four years (or whatever other time period) instead of a line of stars. Stars didn't provide instant feedback anyway, as they kept getting resynced.

Yes, I like this idea because it reduces clutter AND frees up av space for things like usergroup or 'reward/punishment' badges. Either allow users to choose which to display or have a simple hierarchy, but keep all the badges anyone ever earned on their profile. Starglider could even link it to a timestamp on the activity graph, so you'd know that someone got a 'post reset' badge at x date, or someone was recognised for debating or whatever.

EDIT - I'd also like to suggest that the current titles become badges too, to give a more uniform appearance.