Implemented [Suggestion] Animations...

[digitalpoint]

Some animations are really useful (like the pagination scrolling), but others seem to just be there for eye candy and beyond the initial, "Wow, that's neat...", they don't seem to make things faster/better.

For example, the forum main page with needing to mouseover to get forum descriptions. That one seems to only make things take longer (reading the descriptions) vs. being useful. In my opinion, a better way would be to have the descriptions show for all forums without needing to mouseover, but then with a small description toggle for the page (clicking it would fade out all the descriptions and collapse the page to how it is now, clicking it again would do the reverse). With the user's preference being saved of course.

In the end, it seems something like that would make finding the forum you are looking for (based on description) more efficient/quicker.

 

[Grover]

Isn't that what most users like? Facebook is full of eye candy and everyone loves it. With a database of 400 million people, they have to do something right, no? You are looking at the product from a developer perspective and neglect the fact that 99% of people using forums are not.

I always look at a forumproduct from a user's point of view. The UI/UX of xenForo is awesome, but looking through the eyes of an enduser I happen to agree with digital point that for instance the mouseover forum descriptions are not really that functional/userfriendly. The sames goes (more or less) for the BIG 'Your changes have been saved' when you edit your Personal Details and stuff.

 

[Kier]

I've added a pre-delay to the forum home descriptions. They won't pop up immediately when you mouse over them now (the delay is 250ms)

 

[Kier]

Facebook is full of eye candy and everyone loves it. With a database of 400 million people...

500 million and counting, actually.

 

[Shelley]

Isn't that what most users like? Facebook is full of eye candy and everyone loves it. With a database of 400 million people, they have to do something right, no? You are looking at the product from a developer perspective and neglect the fact that 99% of people using forums are not. Plus, everything is client oriented, so it does not affect the server in any way.

You could make the comparison that facebook uses the same/similar feature but the majority of the users don't sign up to facebook primarily for this feature. It's a nice implementation, but the longestivity factor of this effect becomes tedious very fast.I still think the toggle path would be a nice option giving the end user that option.

Related. Links within the mouseover (hover) are very hard to read, darkblue on a dark backdrop clash. Perhaps another colour for embedded links if this is remaining here?

 

[Kier]

Link colour in the tooltips is a bug.

 

[Brandon_R]

Some animations are really useful (like the pagination scrolling), but others seem to just be there for eye candy and beyond the initial, "Wow, that's neat...", they don't seem to make things faster/better.

For example, the forum main page with needing to mouseover to get forum descriptions. That one seems to only make things take longer (reading the descriptions) vs. being useful. In my opinion, a better way would be to have the descriptions show for all forums without needing to mouseover, but then with a small description toggle for the page (clicking it would fade out all the descriptions and collapse the page to how it is now, clicking it again would do the reverse). With the user's preference being saved of course.

In the end, it seems something like that would make finding the forum you are looking for (based on description) more efficient/quicker.

Digitalpoint, you look at things with a developer/coder perspective which i must agree is good in some situations like backend stuff but in design it bodes well to have a creative mind.

 

[Grover]

I've added a pre-delay to the forum home descriptions. They won't pop up immediately when you mouse over them now (the delay is 250ms)

Thank you very much for thinking along. Direct communication with the developers... we didn't even see that happing much during Jelsoft's vBulletin! I hope in the future you guys can make it an option or change the functionality so that the forumdescriptions can be shown all the time beneath the forumtitles. I really believe this will make it easier for our visitors. This is the only 'big' point I have with this UI/UX, because for the rest it is really such a breath of fresh air. The '1999-looking' vB4 interface looks so... 1999 compared to xenForo... what a difference! Finally I enjoy working on/using a forum-product again!

 

[Onimua]

Thank you very much for thinking along. Direct communication with the developers... we didn't even see that happing much during Jelsoft's vBulletin!

There was. The only times where they were silent was a few months before a beta was released. Otherwise it wasn't unusual to see the developers posting and communicating with customers.

 

[Grover]

There was. The only times where they were silent was a few months before a beta was released. Otherwise it wasn't unusual to see the developers posting and communicating with customers.

Well... not so much when it came to interacting with us concerning Customer Suggestions.I have been a vBulletin client since 2001 and have been unbelievably active on the Suggestions forum overthere. Until a few months ago when I realized that vBulletin as we knew it was in fact dead and would never be resurrected by Internet Brands. 8 months later, I still can not install the zipped vB4, because the package is still flawed. On so many levels.

Anyway, I still believe this (direct communication between developers and customers) is sooo important. Even during Jelsoft's days I most of the time had no clue whatsoever what the developers thought of our (sometimes amazing) suggestions.

 

[digitalpoint]

I've added a pre-delay to the forum home descriptions. They won't pop up immediately when you mouse over them now (the delay is 250ms)

Not *exactly* what I had in mind... slowing it down just makes someone finding a forum (by reading the descriptions) take even longer.

Not too worried about it though... that's what the (presumed) template system is for.

Digitalpoint, you look at things with a developer/coder perspective which i must agree is good in some situations like backend stuff but in design it bodes well to have a creative mind.

Agreed... I'm definitely have a more logical/coder oriented brain. When it comes to UI stuff, I definitely focus on efficiency/speed. If there are animations/eye candy that make things more efficient (like scrolling pagination), I'm all for it. But when eye candy makes something take longer *because* of it, I generally don't like it.

That being said, xenForo is off to an amazing start as a first public view.

 

[Erik]

Not *exactly* what I had in mind... slowing it down just makes someone finding a forum (by reading the descriptions) take even longer.

Have to agree here. I would like it better if there was no delay and the animation was actually faster, so I don't have to wait for the animation to pop-up and then finish before I can read the description.

 

[digitalpoint]

What about instead of a toggle to make them always show, a mouseover point that simply shows ALL descriptions at once?

 

[Mike]

There was a design/structure reason for the descriptions going into a tool tip at one point, but I think we may have made changes to the forum list since then so it might not be a requirement anymore. (Addendum: just tried it, nothing obviously wrong with showing them without the tool tip.)

 

[Grover]

There was a design/structure reason for the descriptions going into a tool tip at one point, but I think we may have made changes to the forum list since then so it might not be a requirement anymore. (Addendum: just tried it, nothing obviously wrong with showing them without the tool tip.)

I would be really great if you can change it back to permanent text without the mouseover, Mike!

 

[vijayninel]

I love all the animations here .. makes it look modern and different.

 

[Erik]

I would be really great if you can change it back to permanent text without the mouseover, Mike!

Option. Option to change it back to permanent text. I really don't have that much of a problem with the way it is now. I would like to see it as static text for comparison though.

 

[Floren]

Is just a template edit, 2 seconds to implement.

 

[Floren]

If there are animations/eye candy that make things more efficient (like scrolling pagination), I'm all for it. But when eye candy makes something take longer *because* of it, I generally don't like it.

The only way JS can slowdown your page display is when you use an old computer or my grandma' browser.

Then again, you are a developer and can customize very easy the forums to your likings.
I'm ready to bet that all your users will complain if you remove their eye candy.

 

[digitalpoint]

I didn't mean the JavaScript execution slows it down, but the animation cycle. If you animate something and it takes 1 second to run through the animation, that's 1 second slower than it needs to be in some cases (when something doesn't *need* the animation).

 

[Enigma]

There was a design/structure reason for the descriptions going into a tool tip at one point, but I think we may have made changes to the forum list since then so it might not be a requirement anymore. (Addendum: just tried it, nothing obviously wrong with showing them without the tool tip.)

I'd like to see how it looks with the descriptions on the page instead of in the tooltip.