XenForo 2.0 Discussion

[MetalAZ]

The style as it is now isn't finished, but the bulk of what you can see is going to be in the final product.

You can't please everyone, but we seem to have pleased most people so far.

For most people the default style is a moot point. The first thing most people will do is change it for something completely different. The most important thing, however, is that it has a strong foundation, and uses well implemented principles like the BEM design.

I'm a newb here and haven't bought a license yet so I'm sure my opinion isn't worth that much... but I'll give it any way. I really like the current site color combination and layout, at least in terms of forum part of it (where I've spent my time along with browsing resources both with a computer and smartphone). It feels more polished to me than most of the forum software I've looked at recently and I'm pretty sure I've looked at them all now. There's clear separation of content and multiple colors being used and it goes well together. The screenshots of the new style look pretty bland. The quote is also bland and becoming an old style.

I discovered XenForo like a week ago so I haven't been staring at this current style as long as most people so maybe people want a change but if it had looked like the screenshots I might not have stuck around to learn more about the product figuring it was just another low quality product. First impression of the forum does matter even if even most customers do change it after buying.

The main things I don't like are:

1. The breadcrumbs are no longer in a styled container which kinda makes it look messy.

2. It's quite strange seeing the buttons look like they're popping out of their container. It looks like a bug.

3. Not really liking each forum having a threads & messages heading. I'm not sure why that layout even needs to change unless it's for the sub-forums menu. Rather than having the headings another idea would be to put a font icon next to the number. Like the fa-book for threads and fa-comments for messages. Screenshot example:

4. The no avatar first letter style, which you've addressed by providing additional options.

Otherwise it just looks like a lot of blue and white and not enough of the peach (or whatever color that is). The entire quote background should at least still be peach. The left border can be a darker version of it.

 

[Unique Username]

I'm a newb here and haven't bought a license yet so I'm sure my opinion isn't worth that much... but I'll give it any way. I really like the current site color combination and layout, at least in terms of forum part of it (where I've spent my time along with browsing resources both with a computer and smartphone). It feels more polished to me than most of the forum software I've looked at recently and I'm pretty sure I've looked at them all now. There's clear separation of content and multiple colors being used and it goes well together. The screenshots of the new style look pretty bland. The quote is also bland and becoming an old style.

I discovered XenForo like a week ago so I haven't been staring at this current style as long as most people so maybe people want a change but if it had looked like the screenshots I might not have stuck around to learn more about the product figuring it was just another low quality product. First impression of the forum does matter even if even most customers do change it after buying.

The main things I don't like are:

1. The breadcrumbs are no longer in a styled container which kinda makes it look messy.

2. It's quite strange seeing the buttons look like they're popping out of their container. It looks like a bug.

3. Not really liking each forum having a threads & messages heading. I'm not sure why that layout even needs to change unless it's for the sub-forums menu. Rather than having the headings another idea would be to put a font icon next to the number. Like the fa-book for threads and fa-comments for messages. Screenshot example:

4. The no avatar first letter style, which you've addressed by providing additional options.

Otherwise it just looks like a lot of blue and white and not enough of the peach (or whatever color that is). The entire quote background should at least still be peach. The left border can be a darker version of it.

First things first, I would like to point out that as a community anyone who joins even if they don't have license they're still part of the community. Which means your opinion counts.

Second, We shouldn't really be criticizing the "Style" at the moment since like they said, it's not finished. We are more than welcomed to offer suggestions that may improve the appearance of the style.

Think of it this way; when a building is under construction it's not going to look pretty until the finishing touches are added.

 

[MetalAZ]

He said:

The style as it is now isn't finished, but the bulk of what you can see is going to be in the final product.

The bulk of what you can see is going to be in the final product, that sounds a lot like a nearly finished style. I was stating a few things I didn't like about and offered a suggestion for one thing. I'm sure that kind of feedback was expected, not to have people wait to say anything until it was 100% done. He can correct me if I'm wrong.

 

[Unique Username]

He said:

The bulk of what you can see is going to be in the final product, that sounds a lot like a nearly finished style. I was stating a few things I didn't like about and offered a suggestion for one thing. I'm sure that kind of feedback was expected, not to have people wait to say anything until it was 100% done. He can correct me if I'm wrong.

What they said was that the main functionality part of the product was finished. It's like a puzzle, you have all the parts but now you need to fit it into place. Don't get me wrong I wasn't nagging you for it, I was saying it to point that it's still under development. Now that they are finished the main parts, they're going to put more time into polishing it up. In couple weeks or so they are most likely going to post again with new screenshots showing us a cleaner look which will most likely fix some of the points you brought up

 

[Chris D]

To be clearer, @MetalAZ is probably more correct here.

The parts we have shown are mostly finished. Regardless, feedback is fine and expected, and especially welcomed if it is constructive, as the detailed post above was.

We won't directly comment on everything, but we are listening.

 

[Unique Username]

He said:

The bulk of what you can see is going to be in the final product, that sounds a lot like a nearly finished style. I was stating a few things I didn't like about and offered a suggestion for one thing. I'm sure that kind of feedback was expected, not to have people wait to say anything until it was 100% done. He can correct me if I'm wrong.

To be clearer, @MetalAZ is probably more correct here.

The parts we have shown are mostly finished. Regardless, feedback is fine and expected, and especially welcomed if it is constructive, as the detailed post above was.

We won't directly comment on everything, but we are listening.

Thanks for correcting!

 

[surfsup]

Now just add a widget top right to post anything, images/videos/text content and it will go into just 1 node section, like a free for all section OR a drop down menu for which node it should go into. You really need to set yourself different from all other softwares out there and become more SIMPLE.

This way we wont get 'hey how do you create a thread?' all the time - it will just be so stupid simple as posting on facebook, we really need this and im surprised we did not see it in the first screenshot.

You will help pull a ton of more members imo into posting more.

 

[Unique Username]

Now just add a widget top right to post anything, images/videos/text content and it will go into just 1 node section, like a free for all section OR a drop down menu for which node it should go into. You really need to set yourself different from all other softwares out there and become more SIMPLE.

This way we wont get 'hey how do you create a thread?' all the time - it will just be so stupid simple as posting on facebook, we really need this and im surprised we did not see it in the first screenshot.

You will help pull a ton of more members imo into posting more.

That's sounds like a good idea! Doesn't IPB have that?

 

[MetalAZ]

Thanks for correcting!

I probably came across harsher than I intended to when referring to the screenshots (I have that problem sometimes). I was just trying to give some feedback since I literally first came to the site like a week ago and saw the forums for the first time. I know what made me come back for another look and start looking through the addons. Then after that I started reading the Have You Seen forum and saw some pretty neat things in there that I was not expecting (like the quoting, for example). Definitely a lot of work going into making a better user experience which hopefully keeps people engaged. I have an existing community, but not a forum specific community. But I think this might still work for it with some customization or custom addons (I'm a long-time developer so no problem there).

 

[jmurrayhead]

Now just add a widget top right to post anything, images/videos/text content and it will go into just 1 node section, like a free for all section OR a drop down menu for which node it should go into. You really need to set yourself different from all other softwares out there and become more SIMPLE.

This way we wont get 'hey how do you create a thread?' all the time - it will just be so stupid simple as posting on facebook, we really need this and im surprised we did not see it in the first screenshot.

You will help pull a ton of more members imo into posting more.

StackOverflow - You simply click "Ask Question" put in your text and apply some tags. No forum categories or anything. This format could work for a lot of sites. Just replace "Ask Question" with "Start Topic" or whatever.

 

[Unique Username]

I probably came across harsher than I intended to when referring to the screenshots (I have that problem sometimes). I was just trying to give some feedback since I literally first came to the site like a week ago and saw the forums for the first time. I know what made me come back for another look and start looking through the addons. Then after that I started reading the Have You Seen forum and saw some pretty neat things in there that I was not expecting (like the quoting, for example). Definitely a lot of work going into making a better user experience which hopefully keeps people engaged. I have an existing community, but not a forum specific community. But I think this might still work for it with some customization or custom addons (I'm a long-time developer so no problem there).

In all honesty it's fine, I wasn't trying to say that you were wrong. I was just saying it's in development so anything could change

 

[CyberAP]

Does template editor in XF 2 feature code highlighting or maybe even code autocompletion?

I have found recently a very nice tool for LiveStyle (live scss, less and css editor) that analyzes your code and lets you see computed values/selectors/etc. It was released as an Atom plugin: https://github.com/livestyle/atom . Maybe we can see something similar in XF 2?

And one more question: how style properties correlate with LESS variables? Do they share the same namespace or they are separated?

 

[Luis]

There is some improvement in the translation system in XF 2.0?

 

[AndyB]

There is some improvement in the translation system in XF 2.0?

Regarding translations, it might be nice to see forum titles have translations also.

 

[AndyB]

In regards to attachments, I hope each extension type can have a KB limit and group permissions.

 

[drastic]

StackOverflow - You simply click "Ask Question" put in your text and apply some tags. No forum categories or anything. This format could work for a lot of sites. Just replace "Ask Question" with "Start Topic" or whatever.

There's a very good reason they are ranked 50 on Alexa and what you posted is a big part of the reason.

I did this with one of my old forums using prefixes.

Looked awesome and since you can click on a prefix and see more of it, it was also easy to navigate. Not to mention easy to organize as there was only single node.

Now if it had upvotes or likes present next to the thread, and it was a homepage with a form above it to post quickly, that would make people stay on the sites longer.

Hopefully designers can get more creative, because any forum that looks like a "forum" looks ten years too old.

 

[jmurrayhead]

Hopefully designers can get more creative, because any forum that looks like a "forum" looks ten years too old.

so true

 

[Lone Wolf]

I like what I see so far but I didn't realise there wont be an API. Forums are losing out to social platforms and a lot of that has to do with social platforms being far more mobile friendly.

This is a huge missed opportunity. Forget Autumn push it back to Christmas if you need to. A mobile unfriendly forum is a dead forum.

 

[Steve F]

Hopefully designers can get more creative, because any forum that looks like a "forum" looks ten years too old.

It really depends on the crowd, 80% of our customers want a familiar feel otherwise their users make a fuss. Each niche or market can be vastly different and taking to much of the "ten year old forum" feel away can be a bad choice. Being able to provide rich content and being unique in your niche or market is a key to success. Trying to make a forum something it isn't doesn't usually turn out well.

 

[Davyc]

What amuses me is that a lot of people are wanting a forum to not look like a forum, but no one is coming up with a vision as to what a forum can look like without looking like a forum and not becoming another Facebook/Twitter/Google+ etc.

What makes XF in it's current incarnation unfriendly to mobiles? What makes people think that the next iteration of XF will be less mobile unfriendly? What would those crying out for an API do with it to make XF more mobile friendly and are there any willing bodies to make use of the much cried out for API so that everyone can benefit from introducing an API? Simple questions, but perhaps the answers are not so simple; I don't know, so please enlighten me and the rest who are wondering what all the fuss is about.