SaturnFans Unveils Updated Message Board

[Charlie]

Saturnalia is pleased to announce the launch of the new SaturnFans Forums. One of the first things I think you'll notice about the new message board is the user interface. The main forum page, along with the specific forum and thread pages, have been redesigned to help enhance your SaturnFans experience.

The main page has been divided into two columns, allowing me to position important information near the top of the page. If you are not logged in to the site, a login box is now displayed so that you can quickly enter your user name and password.

Once you are logged in, critical information such as new post details and private message indicators, are displayed near the top of the page where you can check them at a glance. The left half of the page should look familiar; it displays the message forums in a new condenced format. The right half of the screen is used to display your private message indicators, a new automatic buddy list, random Saturn photo, and the new 'Question of the Week' quick poll. Additional enhancements to the page are still under development at this time, and will be rolled out when they are ready.

In addition to improving the user interface, I've alsoadded quite a few new features to the standard message board software. The list below is a hint at what you will find. I encourage you to explore the new forums to try them all out: New forum skin
New model-specific boards
'Question of the Week' quick poll
New PM indicators with flashing icon
Automatic buddy indicator
Quick search
Search log (archive of the 10 most recent forum searches)
Quick reply box
View members reading a topic
Quick link to member photo gallery via camera button
Search the member list via custom profile fields
What do you think? Post your comments here. If you find any bugs, or have any suggestions for improvements let me know! I will be tweaking the code as I get feedback from everyone.

Thanks for your help and support!
Charlie

[swoker183]

new layout looks awesome Charlie. Great job. quick reply works if u see this.

[XtremeGrandAm]

Kinda confused me for a second I like everything except the cutdown in random images. Which I started a thread about. I liked having the several photos up there. Its a way to easily see everyones car without having to go through and look through the gallery. Thats my only complaint.

[DesertPuma]

I must be missing something... I don't see anything different, except for the fact that at the top there is only 1 random image in the middle, and a whole lot of blank space on either side :dizzy: :?: :whoa:

[Charlie]

Originally posted by DesertPuma
I must be missing something... I don't see anything different, except for the fact that at the top there is only 1 random image in the middle, and a whole lot of blank space on either side :dizzy: :?: :whoa: Whoops! That's a mistake. Check it now, the front page should look different.

Charlie

[DesertPuma]

OK, works now. Thanks. I guess it just took some time to "kick in" :)

[YELO_SC2]

Charlie,

Great job on the upgrade...I like the additional info like personal messages and such on the right side.

I think I found a bug, however. On the links within the cells for the ION, L-Series, and VUE forums, they all point to the forum instead of the photos, news, and such.

Thanks for making such a great community!

(By the way...everything loads correctly in Apple's new Safari browser that is based on Konquerer's KHTML rendering engine...thank goodness for standards :p )

[Charlie]

Originally posted by DesertPuma
OK, works now. Thanks. I guess it just took some time to "kick in" :) Nah, in my haste I forgot to make one change that was preventing the correct page from being displayed. The right version was cached in my browser, so I didn't know anything was wrong.

Charlie

[Charlie]

Originally posted by YELO_SC2
I think I found a bug, however. On the links within the cells for the ION, L-Series, and VUE forums, they all point to the forum instead of the photos, news, and such.I think I'm going to have to tweak the Javascript code that highlights the forum boxes -- it may only work in IE. Let me do some testing to see what I can find (a job for tomorrow!). Thanks for pointing out the error.

I'm glad the rest of the forum displays correctly in your browser! :)

Charlie

:zzz:

[DesertPuma]

What are the chances of getting additional smileys? :D :) :yes:

[Charlie]

Originally posted by DesertPuma
What are the chances of getting additional smileys? :D :) :yes: I have a bunch of new smilies saved on my PC, let me see if I can dig them up and post them soon.

Charlie

[Xanatos]

Charlie, the forum looks awesome. Keep up the good work :)

[piney]

Nice changes - really great! Thanks for the hard work.

[Phil]

Great job. I wish all forums I browsed looked this slick.

And for the record, it works great in Mozilla 1.2.

[RustyJCNC]

yes, the upgrade looks excellent. I love the changes and all the new additions. Good work. You must have been a busy dude Charlie.

-j

[JeffN]

Charlie,

Great work on the new and improved forum!

[ducklet]

Charlie,

Thanks for a great board -- this is definitely the best-built Internet forum I've used. Everything is easy to use, and the users, of course, ROCK! :D

Thanks for all your hard work!

--ducklet

[L300Boy]

Charlie,

The new forum design looks great. Thanks again for improving our little world ;)

[Charlie]

Thanks for the comments, guys! :)

Wait until you see what's next...

Charlie

[DesertPuma]

On some other message boards very similar to this one, I have seen that if you post a reply to a thread the left most icon has a hole punched through it.

Makes it easier to find threads that you have posted to.

[Charlie]

Originally posted by DesertPuma
Makes it easier to find threads that you have posted to. Yes, I agree! Before I moved SaturnFans to this server, I used to have that feature turned on. However, it seemed to slow down the message board response times, so I turned it off. I can try to turn it on to see how much load it puts on the server. Let me know if you notice any deterioration in service.

Charlie

[DesertPuma]

Wow that was fast. :)