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Hey guys just a quick update. I wanted to let everyone know I'm now using ThemeHouses new style called REKT. I just set it up last night. It fits the site very well in my personal opinion and I think we have the potential to do very well now that traffic is picking up. I think @Jake B. would get a huge kick of how much I customized the style. You can still tell it's the style REKT but it has been customized quite a bit. I remember Jake emailing me on my programming site a long time ago when I used to have it asking me if I enjoyed the UI.X theme I was using. Well personally this theme's front end looks great in my opinion as it's not too complicated and simple enough to bring in some real postings. The back-end isn't too bad either though. I found myself easily able to change certain aspects of the site that I wanted and just added CSS for the rest that I didn't.

Though I think the guys at @ThemeHouse would get a kick out of what I did with the theme. To be honest it was made for gamers but really the only aspect of the style that has gamers in mind is the welcome notice which I was easily able to change the background to fit my needs. Still using Bassman's advanced footer add-on and just added a template modification to replace the UI.X extended footer.

I hope you guys like it.
 
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Hey everyone, I just wanted to update this thread after a very long time to let you know I made a custom theme for my site again and this time it's much more professional than the one I had when I first made the thread. Far better then what I've done before. I just added collapsible categories and considered even making a framework for it for quick changes if necessary. The dark alternate should release in 1-2 weeks with a moon/light switch changer in the navigation.

We have come a long way since I started the site. We still have a long ways to go before getting big but we are already at 5,519 posts and approaching 1,000 threads and I am very happy indeed. Mobile seems to look good too. If you want your welcome to join but either way thanks for reading and I appreciate your support. ~Brad Padgett
 
nicodak said:
agree, just THIS pink is not frank, seems to be a grey with a bit of red. But it's ok, different tastes and colors makes the world ! :)
Click to expand...

Hey thank you for the comment and the input. I personally wanted to make a flat design with a 4 color combination. Green, blue, yellow, and very light red and red in some areas. I was tired of my site constantly having a single color without any other combinations and wanted it to be more fluent/fluid with a flat design.
 
Hey guys I recently have moved onto Pixel Exit. Their new style called Bolt is what I'm now using and I plan to use this one for years into the future. If I ever change the style I will build off this one. So far the theme has been the best I've used in a long time. We've been in and out of themes for a while but Pixel Exit seems to be the best solution.

A quick look at our statistics:

Threads: 1,076
Messages: 6,459
Members: 195
Latest Member: Empire

I've been able to get a lot of my members from good ole forumpromotion.net which is a site you should give a check on. If your having trouble getting your site off the ground it's a good place to check out. So far we've achieved 6,459. I also started advertising a little bit. One of the sites I advertised on is called bizdustry.com with an ad in their header

So far we are on the right track. I've just decided on also advertising on the site. I have not setup ads yet but wanted to give us some revenue for the site so plan to use adsense, Info Links, and I'm looking at one called PropellerAds that I hear is the best alternative to adsense. Thanks guys.
 
Brad Padgett said:
So far the theme has been the best I've used in a long time. We've been in and out of themes for a while but Pixel Exit seems to be the best solution.
Click to expand...

I'd have to agree with you here :D.

Great tweaks! I might suggest possibly changing the main logo to text only and moving the icon into the sidenav to reduce the height of the top bar. We provide templates you could easily move it there (xb_canvas_top). This would also allow for a better mobile view as right now that bar is really too large on most phones.
 
@Russ thanks for the tips. I will say the framework is probably the most useful. While uix seems to be the most advanced, regardless the theme has the most useful options by far.

The top bar seems to fit nicely on my own phone. Narrowing down the window to check responsive shows the bar a bit bigger then it actually is when you check mobile. I have the iPhone 11. I did actually change the width though of the logo area. As the logo did not fit initially. That wasn't an issue though getting it to fit. I did increase the height of the top bar via style properties a tad bit.

But at having a check via iPhone 11 it's actually normal size. Though you may just be confirming it's bigger then intended which is quite fine with me. I would prefer the logo to be above the actual main content, that's just my personal preference.

Though your work is quite good. My plans if I ever run another site or want to make my site any type of new theme is to just build off of one of your styles and change the initial style. A little coloring change is mainly what I did for customization, not much else outside the welcome notice particle js.

I was actually planning on releasing an update to the free welcome notice add-on for particle. Currently it may be a bit as the particles will only display circular. I will probably use a different one such as particle ground and release the update later. I personally wanted them to be circular anyway so just updated it for my own site. It may be a couple weeks but I will push an update before too long.
 
Thank you @Gemma I also see you joined my site a while back. We've been in and out of themes. I never knew how advanced pixel exit was. I actually did join your site but haven't made any posts. I will come back and check it out in the next 2 weeks and make some posts. I think I've found my fit with this theme though to be honest. Creating my own theme was fun to do and that's mainly why I did it but if my sites going to grow into a larger site I feel more comfortable with using a theme creator like Pixel Exit.

I appreciate the compliment.
 
Just a quick important update to let everyone know we have changed our domain name from Mind Piff to CafeDiscussions.com

It's probably the best domain I've ever found for the fit I wanted for the site and type of atmosphere I was hoping for. I am still using the pixel exit style bolt and very proud of how good it is. Feel free to sign up if your are interested. Either way check it out. I updated the theme with some edits to pixel exit. The same logo but this logo seems to fit the site even better in my opinion for the name. Links in my signature and in the first post.

Just wanted to let you know about our new domain is all.
 
Sorry that the logo is always a character who smokes a cigarette...
You justify this because you think that often people smoke in cafes but it seems to me that in a good part of the world it has become forbidden, and rightly so !

It's so sad to think in 2020 that smoking makes you cool, smart, pensive, intellectual...
I say that as an ex-smoker who has tried to quit several times. I would regret my first cigarette for life even if it has been 3 years since I managed to get rid of it.

A cafe is no longer a smokehouse ! Wake up !
 
Hey @Brad Padgett

Nice changes! One quick bit, I'd change the color under: style properties -> header and navigation -> navigation row to better suit the style. This is manually set on Bolt but is being fixed in our next release.
Good luck!
 
Yeah @Russ good eyes. I can tell you are right and looks more professional then to have the nav be the same color as the header. Gives off a better vibe too. I fixed it.

@Oblivion Knight I may change the logo. If I do it will be within the next couple days to kick things off so that I don't have to change it again. It will be something very professional no matter what. But I honest to god don't want to change it because that's the official logo I wanted and it's the one I wanted to keep. I probably will actually keep it.


@Oblivion Knight @nicodak You also have to keep in mind the site isn't about cafes themselves. In amsterdam and states in the US where certain "enhancements" are legal it's actually fitting. I don't smoke anything but cigarettes and the site was mainly meant to envision a cigar or cigarette but in my personal opinion this can really have an effect on the sites atmosphere. I can't imagine a coffee cup as the logo if that's what the 2 of you are imagining but I definitely more then appreciate the thoughts on it and honest take on the site. Especially since the footer design is setup. Seems the idea of changing the site may have lead at least you @Oblvion Knight to consider that but it strikes me that because I plan on sticking with the punch it may be what I had wanted, at least myself. The changing of themes also may have lead so much of the thought though I can only guess.

Pixel exit all the way my friend. I just changed the color since it all seemed to go well. Big shout outs to you @Russ for your helpful tips and fantastic work on Bolt. I am also proud of how the favicon looks which is a better one then I've had in past years from a nice generator I found in google where you can use text with any google font.
 
I will say one last thing is this decision to change the domain was primarily based on the fact that it was literally the best domain I could have ever chosen for what I wanted in atmosphere. Site colors seem to do the most in how an atmospheric site can be. But that type of scenario where someone would open up and share their honest opinions may actually be what in the future will keep debates from getting too heated. Which is a good reason I chose that. If I had an iron shovel as the logo and red forum headers in that example it might not be as pleasant. I am one to know how debates can be if the site does grow into the future. I hope it does. Other reasons for the decision is we were seeing 20,000 or more visits a month but only 3,000 or more unique visitors. Visits usually maintain when there are redirects so this will give us a chance to increase in new traffic.
 
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EDIT: We are using the domain CafeDiscussions.com as our official Rebrand. It won't change again.

What's been updated are the node icons and the logo. We are set now. I won't re-post and just edit this post since there were so many but I am proud to say this is going to work out great.
 
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