View Full Version : Forums and Subforums
I like the new site and the work you guys are putting into everything. Thanks for that. One complaint, though... the new forum/subforum titles are a mess. I always make a point to post in the most appropriate forum and that's now quite a bit harder. I can just imagine you're going to get a lot of posts in the wrong places now.
I don't know if VBForums (I think that's what you're using, right?) has the ability to do multiple levels of sub-forums, but here's what I would suggest. Instead of making a forum for each flavor of XBMC ("XBMC for Linux - Developers Only Forum", "XBMC for Gameboy - Developers Only Forum", etc), how about making "Developers Only Forum" with subforums for each platform? This way people could post in the general "Developers Only Forum" if they need to, or they can post in the specific platform's forum. Same for the End-Users forums.
Another thing that is unrelated to the recent changes, is the Skin Development forum. Perhaps there should be a "Skins" forum under the End-User area where skin creators can post their mockups and releases. That would free up the "Skin Development" forum for questions from the skin creators to the XBMC devs.
Anyway, just trying to help a bit, since it seems a little confusing now (and I'm normally not easily confused... ask anyone except my wife). :)
edit: 300 posts! Hurray! :/
smcnally75
2008-02-20, 20:42
I was actually just thinking this same thing. I've been kind of lost lately here.
jmarshall
2008-02-21, 02:25
Sounds like a good idea to me. Gamester17??
Gamester17
2008-02-21, 14:17
Could maybe be a good idea if implemnted for all forums so that eveyone will learn the layout, but we had it like that before with the Vortex Development furum as a subforum for the standard development forum and because of that no one knew it was there, ....so we will have to think about it
agathorn
2008-02-21, 14:37
I agree this is a good idea if done globally.
I would also be happy to see skins broken up a bit into sub forums for release, users, and developers.
jmarshall
2008-02-21, 22:54
Gamester17: Shall we perhaps post a suggested layout so that people can comment?
The parent forum could be more descriptive if necessary so people still find what they're looking for. Example XBMC for Developers (Xbox/Linux/OSX/Win32)
jmarshall
2008-02-21, 23:15
Agreed. I think that if done globally on the forum it will aid in people finding where they should post what.
Heavy forum users probably won't be affected - I just use getdaily or getnew for instance ;)
Cheers,
Jonathan
SandmanCL
2008-07-12, 01:56
Based on current view count, the Skin Development forum is constantly among the top three forums where people like to hang out.
This makes sense, since the xbmc core is getting more and more stable, and for most people and their needs it is almost feature complete. And hence there are more visible activity in skin development.
With that in mind, it would make sense to me if we had two Skin sections: one in the User Area and one in the Creator's corner. The User Area section would probably get a lot of traffic form the start, since it would now be visible in the browser without having to scroll down on the page. More traffic would generate more ideas and possibly bring out the creativity in more people.
Many of the current skin threads could be moved to the user area, where people could submit skin feature requests, discuss current skins, etc. The current skin thread would instead be more technical discussions about the skinning engine and where the skinners can talk about how to achieve certain things in their skins.
I really don't see the point users will still just read both anyway because they like to know whats going on in development as well and really questions on how to do stuff greatly outway the actual skin / user comments anyway
But Its not really up to me :)
SandmanCL
2008-07-12, 03:06
When I first started writing that post I was thinking of suggesting that the forum be moved from the creators corner to the user area, maybe I should have stuck to that idea :)
In fewer words: If the Skin development forum was placed higher up on the page I think it would generate more traffic,
Gamester17
2008-07-12, 12:57
I was thinking of instead just renaming the "Skin Development" to "Skin Development and Skinning Suggestions", and also create a seperate subforums for each of the activly developed skins to make it easier for everyone to track mods and such without reading through one topic-thread with 100+ posts in it.
So Project Mayhem III (PM3), AEON, and so on all get thier own subforum under this "Skin Development and Skinning Suggestions" forum.
ShortySco
2008-07-12, 16:47
That does sound more user friendly.
I'd think that now with linux, mac and windows functionality, we'll be seeing alot more users as time goes by, and thus more skins too :grin:
I was thinking of instead just renaming the "Skin Development" to "Skin Development and Skinning Suggestions", and also create a seperate subforums for each of the activly developed skins to make it easier for everyone to track mods and such without reading through one topic-thread with 100+ posts in it.
So Project Mayhem III (PM3), AEON, and so on all get thier own subforum under this "Skin Development and Skinning Suggestions" forum.
:nod:
Splitting it up into different forums for the skins is a silly idea it just create un needed nested groups, do you really think it needs a seperate forum for each active skin thats probably at least eight sub forums and would be a nightmare to read them all instead of just looking at one.
Not to mention so would barely get any posts at all
NineT9mustang
2008-07-13, 12:03
Would be nice for a subforum of all the official 'SVN Skins'... this way itd only have 1 thread of each XBMC SVN skin, and the other forums could be cluttered with the skin questions, suggestions, other skins, etc ?
just giving some input is all
Having the most popular skins have their own forum is a common practice and would make it easier to read if you are only interested in one/few skins.
Then if you want to see what is going on 'specifically' with that skin you go to that forum and no hunting for topics you are interested in.
The general forum would have all the other discussion so you are no loosing anything, just gain.
Jezz must not use folders for his computer files... everything is in the root! ;)
jmarshall
2008-07-14, 02:50
I just hit "Get new posts" so I don't give a shit how it's laid out :p
Gamester17
2008-07-14, 12:35
Team-MediaPortal (http://forum.team-mediaportal.com) seems to have good success with that sub-forums layout structure, see:
http://forum.team-mediaportal.com/skins-50/
PS! The main AEON skinning thread in our own skinning forum is now 250 PAGES(!) long, ...then there are more than one AEON threads as well.
I would really like this to be made, think when the skins set off, this layout will never hold.
We really need subforums. Take a look at Aeon threads, created new threads yester day already a huge number of post.
Can I add to this the suggestion of having subforums for popular skins? I've had to branch the Aeon discussion into three threads to keep it manageable, which could become a problem if others follow suit.
MikeBeecham
2008-07-20, 19:36
I would go for this also...if nothing else it would save having to trawl through 5 Aeon threads to look at others....just my tuppeny's worth!
+1 vote from me. It makes things easier on end-users as well, since we don't have to look through multiple forum threads to find the thread for the skin we're using and then don't have to sort through 100+ pages in that thread for a response to a question.
agree, the forum structure needs an overhaul. and some replanning.
I have set up a test forum, just for showing the structure (which can always be improved) .. dont mind the quick hacks to get the right looks, this will be looked into if we decide to set the forum up to somewhat this structure.
There is a need to tweak the templatefiles (which i did a quick hack at) also the vbulletin icon could be changed into something nicer.
If and when this happens, I am more than glad to set things up. Edit templatefiles, change forumstructure etc.
check it out: http://demo.vbulletin.com/
user: Demo5f9f
pass: a96a6f87
jmarshall
2008-07-21, 01:23
Looks fine to me.
I think we should implement a policy such that a bug is only a bug if it's in trac.
Feature requests can be in one forum, support is fine split up (many issues are with installation) and bug reporting should be encouraged to discuss on forum then report bug to trac, where it can be marked as platform specific or otherwise. Whether it's split up or kept in one forum doesn't really matter.
Cheers,
Jonathan