DRE
Well-known member
Yeah a coworker got on to me about that too. It might be a while until I can get around to it.^ joking aside
Your Xenforo + Wordpress integration looks great.
I'd try to get the toolbars to line up better.
.BlackGamer.net
- Thread starter DRE
- Start date
- Status
DRE
Well-known member
There are no links in the Stargaze Wordpress theme. Maybe that's why it's free. LOLWhere are all the black mobile game characters!
Oh...
Whatever you do, just try to keep the number of afros and bald guys to a minimum. I'm not entirely sure why, but it seems the video game industry can't render a black person without him being bald or in an afro.
You kinda have to scroll through their videos, but TRUEGAMERHEADZ put up a series of videos with the top twenty black video game characters of all times. They start right around page 13. I didn't look through them all, so I don't know how serious they were taking it (they included Sonic: The Hedghog) but maybe it will help fill in some gaps.
Oh, when I visited, there were no links to the articles in the slider. Might want to put those in if you can.
I plan on using this wordpress theme: http://xenforo.com/community/threads/xendynamic-wordpress-theme.19856/
This way I won't have to worry about making the banner match. The problem with that theme though is that the page comments are not customized like they are in other wordpress themes so I will have to do some css and html to make it look more professional.
Digital Jedi
Well-known member
I mentioned it to a few people I know. I never actually counted the number of black gamers I know, so that was interesting. Apparently, I've only ever gamed with four white guys in my entire life.
I was also going to recommend you trim down the links in the navigation area, not sure what it's called on xenForo. But if your theme has the ability to do drop downs, I'd move a lot of items to menus under categories.
I was also going to recommend you trim down the links in the navigation area, not sure what it's called on xenForo. But if your theme has the ability to do drop downs, I'd move a lot of items to menus under categories.
DRE
Well-known member
Thanks man I appreciate it! I just got Xenforo yesterday. I've had a vBulletin site for a year.
I am really, really liking XenForo over vBulletin. The only thing I don't like is that it's just as time-consuming to figure out how to add menus and sub-menus. Don't know why these two forum systems have that same problem.
Digital Jedi
Well-known member
Nice. That tells me as soon as I visit the page what the site is about. Fits better.
I noticed that Facebook registration turns up an error. Not sure if you new about this or not.
I noticed that Facebook registration turns up an error. Not sure if you new about this or not.
DRE
Well-known member
I've decided to treat my Black Gamer like my personal blog instead of a website since no one I know is interested in previewing or reviewing games for the site. I won't change the look of it. Just creating a new section for me to ramble in. I'm also going to add a ton more games in Black Gamer Arcade to keep me busy at work. Don't know wtf I was thinking by attempting to compete with IGN.
Digital Jedi
Well-known member
I would give it a lot more time. Especially if you can do more promoting. I'd wait at least a year, with active promotion to see if you can get any reviewers.
DRE
Well-known member
This is true. Hey check this out: http://www.alexa.com/siteinfo/blackgamer.net#
Site's only 2 or 3 weeks old and already in the 500,000's for the U.S. and jumped from 7 million to 5 million in 2 weeks. I expected to get those kind of results maybe 5 months down the road. I'm thinking this is a fluke or alexa has bugs or something. I haven't even designed a mascot or logo. Haven't even gotten the chance to put ads on there ye either.
Interesting.
Carlos
Well-known member
Dude, don't worry about rankings right now.
For WP: If your skin has a Analytics input box somewhere you can get traffic metrics via google login screen and if your site is upgraded via skin, that won't be needed to re-do.
xenforo has a section in the ACP to host your analytics metrics...
ACP Home > Options > Statistics and Metrics
To build your pagerank better, you need people talking about your site. You need to advertise your site. Go to other forums and make a point to brand yourself to advertise your site.
E.G. Carlos = Brand for Forums > Signature = Advertising
If people click, you get views, but if you get a person to register to your site because he LIKES the site...You have yourself a member, but to do that, you need.... CONTENT. Google crawls sites with content in them.
Now, if your member or members like the content they're being provided, they may talk about it, so this means spreading the word.
For WP: If your skin has a Analytics input box somewhere you can get traffic metrics via google login screen and if your site is upgraded via skin, that won't be needed to re-do.
xenforo has a section in the ACP to host your analytics metrics...
ACP Home > Options > Statistics and Metrics
To build your pagerank better, you need people talking about your site. You need to advertise your site. Go to other forums and make a point to brand yourself to advertise your site.
E.G. Carlos = Brand for Forums > Signature = Advertising
If people click, you get views, but if you get a person to register to your site because he LIKES the site...You have yourself a member, but to do that, you need.... CONTENT. Google crawls sites with content in them.
Now, if your member or members like the content they're being provided, they may talk about it, so this means spreading the word.
DRE
Well-known member
I'm not comfortable with advertising a site I'm not even done working on. I still haven't really advertised my first site yet. It's like you have those videogame developers who will release a game when it still has bugs and then you have those game developers that take forever on it until they think it's ready.
Carlos
Well-known member
I know, but you're worried about ranking right now. That's the wrong way to go about it. You need to build it up, little by little, slowly but surely. If they don't like the site, big woop.
The more people see your site via advertising, the more at least one or two or a bunch of them come back.
Digital Jedi
Well-known member
I don't know much about Alexa. But what little I know suggests that it's info is sometimes under question. I don't know if that's just the internet paranoids claiming another website is fradulent/evil/out-to-get-them, or if it has some merit. I'm just sayin'.
DRE
Well-known member
Update:
I had given up on this website but Google terminated my Google Adsense account for the8thlegion.com
The8thLegion Critique and Showcase: http://xenforo.com/community/threads/the8thlegion-com.22290/
Do Not Monetize Your YouTube Account: http://xenforo.com/community/threads/do-not-monetize-your-youtube-account.30594/
Conversion
I moved the8thlegion forum over to blackgamer.net and put the original blackgamer forum in another directory, closed that forum, then updated both xenforo licenses. I should be able to get another adsense account in someone else's name now. Some members don't like the name change but they still post anyway. There is currently no way to import another xenforo forum so before I moved the sites, I created everyone's account from BlackGamer over to The8thLegion, reposted some of their posts under their account (had to reset password), then sent an email to everyone about the move and that all BlackGamer members had to reset their password.
I did not have to do any changes to the database. All I did was change the board url in xenforo options and the email. Both sites are on the same server and since BlackGamer is an addon domain of the 8thlegion, all I had to do was drag the forum in FTP access over to BlackGamer subdomain forum then I went in cPanel and created a permanent redirect that matches both http:// and http://www. with a wildcard so that any previous the8thlegion thread link will go directly to the blackgamer thread equivalent.
SEO (Search Engine Optimization)
SEO had already been down since I had made the site private. I had already lost a lot of first page search results ranking so worrying about SEO wasn't even in the equation. People are still finding the website anyway. I don't think I'll have any problem going back up the rankings since this forum is in a non-existent niche. BlackGamer.net is now officially the largest black videogame forum and it's funny how it came to be that way. I started the website as an experiment to test out xenforo before moving my main board over, then when my Google Adsense account got terminated, this has become my main board.
This has been an awkward experience. I went to the other sites I'm on and took down my the8thlegion.com home page link and replaced it with BlackGamer in both signature and avatar. Some people think it's a joke. Like 'WTF is Black Gamer?' and I'll say 'Uh, Black version of IGN but we run late on the news due to Colored People Time' at which point they get offended because they have no sense of humor and assume I'm being racist. They assume the site name is racist when it's not. Complaining about racism before even reading what the site's about is prejudice in itself.
To explain the name change I created a new subforum called Black Gaming News and stickied a thread with an explanation called What is Black Gamer? This subforum basically consists of some threads I had created on the original BlackGamer forum. I will basically have to create a whole new SEO and advertising campaign due to the change. I had only did a small amount for the original Black Gamer. Did not spend much time on it at all but since my main board is now BlackGamer.net, I gotta start all over again.
Design
Anyway for the change, I originally used the same header as blackgamer forums but a member complained and ironically she's Black. She was like 'ewww I was going to ask my friends to join until you changed the header and turned it into a Black site.' So I kept the old the8thlegion.com header and just used the original blackgamer header for the main site theme (xenportal) and as a selectable fixed style. I wasn't mad cause I like the8thlegion banner anyway since it's basically a collage of the site's member proof pics. Some members ask me to put them on the header and every once-in-awhile, someone will ask me to take them off. I'm curious to see who will complain to get their pic off the header now that they're on a 'Black' site.
I kept the original the8thlegion theme since no one really posted on the original black gamer forum which gives them no right to complain. Besides the header, the only thing I really changed is the logo. While working on the main site theme I noticed that I had broken the userbar for regular members a long time ago when I had broken something else (wrong admincp link). So I fixed that. I also had to change a couple notices, I kept T8L Games site and I patted myself on the back because most of my site's links (not including thread links) used this format <a href="account">Settings</a> In other words, when the site changed domains I did not have to update the links outside of actual threads.
Modifications
XenPorta broke on me. I then found out it was BD Widget Framework that caused the problem and xfrocks told me to upgrade to the latest version, which I did. Then it worked. Unfortunately, categories were broken so I uninstalled it again and deleted categories from the database, then my XenMedio stopped working, so upgraded XenMedio and reinstalled XenPorta. Categories are still broken. I have had trouble with Categories before so I'm not surprised. I hope Jaxel does some fixes for that in his next XenPorta update. I'm going to completely uninstall XenPorta and re-upload all files to the server and reinstall it all over again.
Even though XenPorta is essentially broken, I've turned it on anyway. Most of the modules work except for the RecentSlider. Also, my Recent News block breaks any forum that you have selected so I had to put 'unspecified' in that block. Sometimes I hate XenPorta. I'm always having trouble with it but it's way better than vbCMS or having to bother with Wordpress Integration. I really want the slider to work but I don't need it now because I don't have any members who are actually willing to write articles for the Black Gaming News subforum yet. When I do, this problem should be fixed by then.
When logged-in to the main site using the original xenforo navigation link set up, the user info menu breaks because there were too many navigation menu links. To fix this issue I originally moved all of the user info menu links above to the moderator bar using a combination of both Forsaken's Moderator Bar and Floris Xen User Bar guide. Unfortunately, Forsaken's Moderator Bar looks horrid in the old version of IE, that's why I'm using the original xenforo user info menu for the main site theme. To make room for the main site theme's menu links I moved the Sportsbook subnavigation menus to the Arcade and changed the name Arcade to Games since it now reflects eBookie betting events as well. I removed the taigachat box link which was a sacrifice since now members can't select the popup. I tried putting the popup link in the taigachat subheader but I don't know how to write the code for it so I just renamed the subheader link to Chat - Click here for full view. I moved XenCarta's sub navigation links to LnBlogs so that I could remove the navigation menu tab for that. I also moved the T8L Games main tab link as a sub navigation link for the Games tab.
Uh that's about it. Gotta go do some yard work now, burn some leaves. I wrote this so that I could look back on what happened and reflect on the amount of work it took. Sh!ts ridiculous. I'd rather play Halo.
I had given up on this website but Google terminated my Google Adsense account for the8thlegion.com
The8thLegion Critique and Showcase: http://xenforo.com/community/threads/the8thlegion-com.22290/
Do Not Monetize Your YouTube Account: http://xenforo.com/community/threads/do-not-monetize-your-youtube-account.30594/
Conversion
I moved the8thlegion forum over to blackgamer.net and put the original blackgamer forum in another directory, closed that forum, then updated both xenforo licenses. I should be able to get another adsense account in someone else's name now. Some members don't like the name change but they still post anyway. There is currently no way to import another xenforo forum so before I moved the sites, I created everyone's account from BlackGamer over to The8thLegion, reposted some of their posts under their account (had to reset password), then sent an email to everyone about the move and that all BlackGamer members had to reset their password.
I did not have to do any changes to the database. All I did was change the board url in xenforo options and the email. Both sites are on the same server and since BlackGamer is an addon domain of the 8thlegion, all I had to do was drag the forum in FTP access over to BlackGamer subdomain forum then I went in cPanel and created a permanent redirect that matches both http:// and http://www. with a wildcard so that any previous the8thlegion thread link will go directly to the blackgamer thread equivalent.
SEO (Search Engine Optimization)
SEO had already been down since I had made the site private. I had already lost a lot of first page search results ranking so worrying about SEO wasn't even in the equation. People are still finding the website anyway. I don't think I'll have any problem going back up the rankings since this forum is in a non-existent niche. BlackGamer.net is now officially the largest black videogame forum and it's funny how it came to be that way. I started the website as an experiment to test out xenforo before moving my main board over, then when my Google Adsense account got terminated, this has become my main board.
This has been an awkward experience. I went to the other sites I'm on and took down my the8thlegion.com home page link and replaced it with BlackGamer in both signature and avatar. Some people think it's a joke. Like 'WTF is Black Gamer?' and I'll say 'Uh, Black version of IGN but we run late on the news due to Colored People Time' at which point they get offended because they have no sense of humor and assume I'm being racist. They assume the site name is racist when it's not. Complaining about racism before even reading what the site's about is prejudice in itself.
To explain the name change I created a new subforum called Black Gaming News and stickied a thread with an explanation called What is Black Gamer? This subforum basically consists of some threads I had created on the original BlackGamer forum. I will basically have to create a whole new SEO and advertising campaign due to the change. I had only did a small amount for the original Black Gamer. Did not spend much time on it at all but since my main board is now BlackGamer.net, I gotta start all over again.
Design
Anyway for the change, I originally used the same header as blackgamer forums but a member complained and ironically she's Black. She was like 'ewww I was going to ask my friends to join until you changed the header and turned it into a Black site.' So I kept the old the8thlegion.com header and just used the original blackgamer header for the main site theme (xenportal) and as a selectable fixed style. I wasn't mad cause I like the8thlegion banner anyway since it's basically a collage of the site's member proof pics. Some members ask me to put them on the header and every once-in-awhile, someone will ask me to take them off. I'm curious to see who will complain to get their pic off the header now that they're on a 'Black' site.
I kept the original the8thlegion theme since no one really posted on the original black gamer forum which gives them no right to complain. Besides the header, the only thing I really changed is the logo. While working on the main site theme I noticed that I had broken the userbar for regular members a long time ago when I had broken something else (wrong admincp link). So I fixed that. I also had to change a couple notices, I kept T8L Games site and I patted myself on the back because most of my site's links (not including thread links) used this format <a href="account">Settings</a> In other words, when the site changed domains I did not have to update the links outside of actual threads.
Modifications
XenPorta broke on me. I then found out it was BD Widget Framework that caused the problem and xfrocks told me to upgrade to the latest version, which I did. Then it worked. Unfortunately, categories were broken so I uninstalled it again and deleted categories from the database, then my XenMedio stopped working, so upgraded XenMedio and reinstalled XenPorta. Categories are still broken. I have had trouble with Categories before so I'm not surprised. I hope Jaxel does some fixes for that in his next XenPorta update. I'm going to completely uninstall XenPorta and re-upload all files to the server and reinstall it all over again.
Even though XenPorta is essentially broken, I've turned it on anyway. Most of the modules work except for the RecentSlider. Also, my Recent News block breaks any forum that you have selected so I had to put 'unspecified' in that block. Sometimes I hate XenPorta. I'm always having trouble with it but it's way better than vbCMS or having to bother with Wordpress Integration. I really want the slider to work but I don't need it now because I don't have any members who are actually willing to write articles for the Black Gaming News subforum yet. When I do, this problem should be fixed by then.
When logged-in to the main site using the original xenforo navigation link set up, the user info menu breaks because there were too many navigation menu links. To fix this issue I originally moved all of the user info menu links above to the moderator bar using a combination of both Forsaken's Moderator Bar and Floris Xen User Bar guide. Unfortunately, Forsaken's Moderator Bar looks horrid in the old version of IE, that's why I'm using the original xenforo user info menu for the main site theme. To make room for the main site theme's menu links I moved the Sportsbook subnavigation menus to the Arcade and changed the name Arcade to Games since it now reflects eBookie betting events as well. I removed the taigachat box link which was a sacrifice since now members can't select the popup. I tried putting the popup link in the taigachat subheader but I don't know how to write the code for it so I just renamed the subheader link to Chat - Click here for full view. I moved XenCarta's sub navigation links to LnBlogs so that I could remove the navigation menu tab for that. I also moved the T8L Games main tab link as a sub navigation link for the Games tab.
Uh that's about it. Gotta go do some yard work now, burn some leaves. I wrote this so that I could look back on what happened and reflect on the amount of work it took. Sh!ts ridiculous. I'd rather play Halo.
DRE
Well-known member
Wow that's tight! I forgot about the sidebar completely so no, I haven't thought about it.Nice active forum well done and good job.
Have you thought about styling the sideblocks so they're a little more prominent? And somewhat separated making it easier on the eye to see what block and content is what.
How did you do that?
- Status
Similar threads
- Question
- Question
