The Countdown

[Darth Fedora]

I liked the serif font too. I wouldn't mind the option to switch back to that.
That's pretty much the only thing I haven't liked about 5.0.

[Laser Jock]

While I love that questions actually post at 100 hours now, it has kind of thrown my morning routine off. Oh well.

You can still just peruse the [previous] day's posts in the archives, if you want to see things a day at a time for your morning routine.

[Indefinite Integral]

I'm just going to put in another quick vote for the serif font.

[Laser Jock]

As far as serif vs. sans-serif: you'll find that most sites use sans-serif fonts for body text, and only use serif fonts occasionally (like in larger text for titles and such). (Look around at major commercial websites and count, if you like.) Sans-serif fonts are widely considered to be more readable on-screen than serif fonts, although there isn't any real evidence for one over the other. It seems like familiarity with a style is actually the main reason people prefer serif or sans-serif fonts. In this case, it makes sense that people would prefer the same visual style that the Board has had for a very long time.

Personally, though, I much prefer sans-serif fonts for websites.

I think the best compromise is what Yellow mentioned: themes. This is something that we (or at least I) have been looking forward to for a very long time. That way those of us who really like sans-serif fonts can have them, and those who prefer serif fonts can have them too.

Why not include a feature allowing registered readers to customize how they view the page through javascript? Make the text larger, change fonts, maybe even change the colors? It would be a nifty thing to store each reader's preferences, or for the remainder of their session, but at least the index page!

When we were discussion the theme idea we talked about having them be user-customizable, but that's significantly more work to implement than simply defining several themes and letting a user select one. I'm not saying it won't happen (I have no idea how Yellow and CPM currently feel about the idea), but I wouldn't be surprised if a more limited version of theming happened first.

If you use Firefox, it's quite easy to create your own style for a website using a plugin called Stylish. No one else will see your style, of course, but whenever you visit that website, you'll see your styling rather than the site's own styling. And since Board 5.0 actually uses CSS now, Stylish works on it! If you do create a Stylish style, you can also upload it to userstyles.org so that other Board readers can download and use it.

[wryness]

I personally miss one aspect of the old system, in which each day's questions would have their own separate page. Now I have to remember where I stopped each time I've begun again.

Lazy comment? Maybe. But that's my .5 cents' worth.

[Craig Jessop]

I must say I agree. The Board has gone from an essential part of my morning routine, to another website to randomly check through the day, like CNN. I wouldn't mind if it went back to the way it was in that respect.

[bobtheenchantedone]

I still only check it in the morning. I don't have time to be checking websites all throughout the day (aside from this one, of course).

[Laser Jock]

Craig and wryness, have you considered checking the previous day's page in the archives, rather than the front page? It's functionally identical to what the front page of the Board used to be. (And there's also the daily RSS feed if you prefer that.)

[Craig Jessop]

Is there any way to make it more easily accesible? The way to get to it right now is a lot of clicking -- maybe you could put a link to "previous day's posts" in the sidebar?

[thebigcheese]

Also, I was just thinking...is there a link to the message boards anywhere on the new site?

[C is for]

Commander Keen linked to it in the last couple of days.

(I know that's not what you meant, but if we can get advertising like that on a regular basis maybe we don't need a permanent link.)

Especially links to the Borg thread. Those are great.

[Waldorf and Sauron]

For those who don't like the live posting:

There was a detailed behind-the-scenes discussion in which I argued against the new live-posting, and I made the same arguments you've made in this thread, among others. The editors took those arguments into consideration before deciding to go with this way.

[Unit of Energy]

I have no problem with the live posting. Honestly it's the first time in the 100 hour board's history that the name has been truly fitting. It just threw my routine off at first. But now I actually have a reason to visit the site throughout the day. Which I already did.

[Yellow]

Also, I was just thinking...is there a link to the message boards anywhere on the new site?

There's not; if there were, then we could potentially be held responsible for the content here, as it could be seen as an official part of the Board. We're not interested in having to do all that moderation when you guys are doing it just fine.

[Marduk]

There was on the old site, and it didn't seem to be a problem. Had you guys had complaints?

[Yellow]

Where was the link on the old site? I don't remember one...

[Marduk]

It was in the "links and other fun stuff" section, listed as something like "the unofficial board message boards".

[Yellow]

Ahh… yeah, the link library. I'd forgotten about that.

I don't know if the link library will be coming back or not. If it does, we could certainly put a link in there.

[Katya]

In the spirit of saying three nice things for every complaint:

(1) The new comment linking system looks great. I like how the comments are linked to their related question, but readers are still notified when there's a new comment.
(2) I like that the front page shows the last 48 hours instead of just the last 24. That alleviates a lot of my concerns about missing questions if I only visit once a day.
(3) I like the "recent popular questions" feature. (Obviously, I'll like it more when the new system has been up for a few months, so there's a significant difference between "last year" and "last week." )

However:

Some HTML tags appear to be broken. (See http://theboard.byu.edu/questions/46634/ and http://theboard.byu.edu/questions/46585/ .) It looks like it may be related to using capital letters in tags instead of lowercase.

[Yellow]

In the spirit of saying three nice things for every complaint:

(1) The new comment linking system looks great. I like how the comments are linked to their related question, but readers are still notified when there's a new comment.
(2) I like that the front page shows the last 48 hours instead of just the last 24. That alleviates a lot of my concerns about missing questions if I only visit once a day.
(3) I like the "recent popular questions" feature. (Obviously, I'll like it more when the new system has been up for a few months, so there's a significant difference between "last year" and "last week." )

However:

Some HTML tags appear to be broken. (See http://theboard.byu.edu/questions/46634/ and http://theboard.byu.edu/questions/46585/ .) It looks like it may be related to using capital letters in tags instead of lowercase.

Indeed, it does have to do with uppercase letters. We didn't catch it until just a couple days ago, after we'd already migrated things. So at this point, we may have to do things manually, which will be a pain, but oh well.

Regarding 3), I'd like to find a way to make "Save as Favorite" also count as a vote for the question. When I was playing with it last night, though, I couldn't find a way to do it that wasn't horribly slow. That would definitely add some more interesting results.