New Site Worklist: Needs, Questions, Ideas

[Driven2]

Hey Ken, not to be too picky - but can you set it so that they are centered in the post-bit whether there are both images, or just one? Also - the gold bar behind custom titles (the prefix I believe it's called) - is it possible to have that just large enough to contain the text without going all the way across the post-bit? If not, not a huge deal, just an aesthetic preference.

I've centered the images.

Getting the user title banner background color only on the actual text is actually a bit of work with Xenforo. Xenforo does not apply a background color there to the text, but rather to the box the text is in, and that box is always as wide as the other elements.

Driven2 Also - some of the members have a broken image showing in the post-bit (looks like it might be related to 'Rival Allegiance' options when they pick 'None'). We don't really need that option anymore if we can just remove it.
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[Boone]

No worries - that's not a big issue. Onward.

 

[testuserjj]

Driven2
Hey Ken, the hover over profile text is fixed, but the actual text on the full member profile page is not.

 

[Boone]

bumping

 

[Driven2]

Driven2 - logo looks good from my vantage point.

On the rotating banner code, it was a custom coding job and the settings in our vB admin cp are under 'vBP BGO Tools' (does that help?). The banner images are in the vB 'Images' folder in a subfolder cleverly titled 'Rotation'.

Looking through this code, it's not purely templates and some javascript on the backend. The custom PHP coding is very much "married" to vbulletin's templating system. Every time it runs, it grabs a list of all filenames in the Rotation folder, shuffles them randomly, then dynamically creates Javascript and places this into a VBulletin backend template variable. The VBulletin template then inserts this template into the page header.

There are two ways this can be implemented:

1. Using javascript I copy from a rendered VBulletin page (and modify it to shuffle in the javascript instead of PHP).
Pros:
Quick to implement
Cons:
Every time you add an image to that folder, you'll need to paste the image file name into the ad code (the ad manager in Xenforo will be placing the Javascript there since it handles placement in the header).

2. I write an addon to duplicate this functionality
Pros: Add an image to the rotation folder and it starts showing up automatically.
Cons:
Writing an addon takes software development time and will increase the budget.

 

[Boone]

Driven2 With option 1, you're saying i would only have to do that for ADDITIONAL photos - is that correct? If that is correct, option 1 is good. We don't add photos that often. I just wouldn't want to have to do it for the large number of photos already in there.

 

[Driven2]

Correct, you'd only need to edit it for new images only.

FYI, home page is underway, I'll have it done today.

 

[Driven2]

I'll need a list of urls to either articles or threads you want for the feature slider, and the image to go with each of them.

 

[Boone]

I'll need a list of urls to either articles or threads you want for the feature slider, and the image to go with each of them.

Can we just do some mockups so I can get an idea of what it looks like? I know what a slider is - but how does this get updated? I thought the thread 'promote to feature' option might be involved, but just played with that and see it puts a large image/thread at the top of the Home Page. Give me a better idea how it works and that's help me know what to give you.

 

[Boone]

Driven2 Like the way the Home Page is coming along. What I'd like as the first section at the top is a 'Latest Posts' section with about 20-25 threads listed (most recently posted to) similar to The Hacker's Paradise Home Page (see image). I'd like to have the ability to advance through unlimited threads with a 'View More' button as they have. We don't need any post snippets showing up as I want to keep the height of each thread row reasonable so it doesn't take up a huge amount of real estate. I have a 'thread snippet' mod that shows the first sentence or so of a post enabled but may not need that in this section if it can be set up that way. The article modules you have already built would all be below this 'Latest Posts' section. You may be envisioning it that way and I'm just getting ahead of you.

 

[Driven2]

Can we just do some mockups so I can get an idea of what it looks like? I know what a slider is - but how does this get updated? I thought the thread 'promote to feature' option might be involved, but just played with that and see it puts a large image/thread at the top of the Home Page. Give me a better idea how it works and that's help me know what to give you.

Yes, its the promote to feature in threads and resource threads, and it will then prompt for the image. The max number of slides is in the Xenporta settings in the admin panel. I set it where to display via a widget.

Have you looked the progress so far on the home page?

 

[Boone]

Yes - looking good. See my post I just made above yours. Where would you envision the slider going if we go with the 'Latest Posts' at the top per my preference? Maybe at the bottom of the page?

 

[Boone]

Driven2 - Hard to converse via post... so sorry about that. I see your example. Basically, I set the image any time I 'promote a feature', right? It looks like the image is fit to that field regardless of image size right. Obviously that's meant to be an attention grabber with a large image and it probably makes sense to leave it there. Could we have the feature slider at the top, then Latest posts section, then the article widgets you've built?

 

[Driven2]

Sure, I'll set it up that way now.

 

[Boone]

I've been wondering what the hell 'promote to feature' did for a week Now I know...

 

[Boone]

Hey Driven2 this is the look I am looking for

 

[Driven2]

I'll see what I can do. I have to make custom CSS for every type of header that goes on the home page. I made the football one for the articles list. I'll duplicate it for the widgets.

 

[Boone]

Yeah - on the 'View More' button and ability to see more pages of results, that's not a 'must have' as it might involve creating something unique beyond the existing widget.

 

[Boone]

Driven2 is it hard to change the font awesome icon in the 'Latest Discussions' header? If not, could we use something other than the football? We will have plenty of non-football related posts showing up there. Maybe the 'users' icon (or if you know another one that represents conversing or discussing? If it is a big deal, not a problem leaving it as is....

 

[Boone]

Driven2 I see what you've made all the headers in that same style. Tweaking my last question - is it possible to have a different font awesome icon in each header if you wanted? I'm not expecting you to do that - but if that is an option, where would that change be made (is it in 'style preferences' or a template)?