Suggestion Forum for Website
Submitted by Stephen Rockwell on Mon, 04/28/2008 - 14:55
Post suggestions for CrossLeft website here.
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Stephen Rockwell IPC Facebook Cause: http://apps.facebook.com/causes/49560?m=6bb60a8b&recruiter_id=2297088 1 week ago
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Front Page Posts
I am suggesting we put recent front page posts on the front page instead of posts that are several days old. This is the norm in the blogosphere. We would still have the last ten most recent posts listed but the front page posts that are actually highlighted and featured and that the readers see the beginning of, or the "tease" would be the most recent. They would be up as soon as they have been screened by Steve or I for profanity, hate speech, etc. This would make the site more up to date and contemporary. I know I will sometimes write about issues that are going on NOW but the post isn't on that front page for a week and the issue is dead by the time the piece is up. I think it would help keep things moving and fresh around here.
What thinketh y'all??
re: front page posts
It sounds like a reasonable idea to me. I'm for giving it a try.
The site formats that I like best not only have the most recent posts on the front page, but have an extended list of most recent and less recent posts that are visible somewhere on the front page -- without having to click "more" to see the longer list. I think it would be helpful to incorporate that into a changed front page.
And while you're at it, I suggest (again) that we have more than the last 10 most recent comments listed on the front page, or at least accessible by clicking "more". At times it's easy to miss something because of (relatively) high volume. The 10th most recent comment might be only 10-15 hours old and if you haven't checked the site for a day or more, you might miss something on a thread that's not so current or that you're not contributing to.
Website Changes
There is no Crossleft meeting until August so lets go ahead and try the most recent posts on the front page. If people don't like it they can bring it up at the meeting or comment on line.
I think you are absolutely right about the comments. I have lost a couple of blogs and had to spend some time finding them because 10 comments replaced the last relevant to the blog I am looking for.That is the kind of thing can put the fire in a conversation out real quick. I will check with Steve and see if we have any other options on that if he doesn't see this and respond.
I am pondering all your suggestions and trying to visulaize how that would look and work.
Preference
I kind of like the idea of having the "hottest" conversations up on the front page. That way, when people arrive, the see the best of what we have to offer.
Hottest conversations
There is some merit to that idea but we could have one post up for weeks as we tend to go off on tangents and have all sorts of in depth conversations that have nothing to do with the original post.
It is an idea worth thinking about though. Possibly when we have have a really hot topic I could figure out how to keep it at the top of the front page longer than normal, or at least while the topic is really cooking.
PM system
Personally, I prefer a PM system to e-mail. I don't know whether that would be possible here though.
I would really like a chat feature
I know of several PHP chat room modules that we could add to the site, or if you're real industrious you can install ircd software, that would give us our own chat room using the standard IRC.
If we had a chat room, we could plan chats and schedule them and people could come and KNOW there would be people chatting at a set time and date. I'd even volunteer to run a political trivia game, like once a month, or even once a week. (I'm a triviot at heart.)
So I vote for a chat room!
check the front page
hi Janet,
Check the front page on the right hand side. That is our chat room...it actually renders on this page and our myspace page. Would you be interested in helping to organize those chats? Feel free to call a meeting time and topic and we'll get folks there.
that's not good enough
That shout-out box on the front page isn't really what I had in mind. I'd love a full-fledged IRC chat, but the various PHP type modules would do as a minimum.
I think we need a chat room (not the one-liner box) that we can schedule various events in. Perhaps a weekly chat on the issues, or a nightly hour of what the hay? news reflection. Even chats either replacing or augmenting our conference calls.
Perhaps trying to have a chat in the shout-out box would convince you. How much lead time do you need? If just a day or two, let's have a Thursday evening chat, starting at 9 p.m. Eastern time, topic Zimbabwe votes tomorrow (aka tonight). An hour of thoughts, wishes, prayers and hopes for what once was a nation poised on the brink of self-government.
Nonetheless, I want a real chat room. Don't forget that's what I want. And yes, I can organize chats and topics, perhaps even guest speakers. Heh, I got Bishop Shelby Spong to guest at a chat hmmmm think that was about 1991 or so. He was marvelous. I wonder how hard it would be to get ++Tutu? Might as well dream big, don't you think?
gonna have to be good enough for now
We can look into other chatting modules, but this one will have to do for now.
By the way...if you click on the top of the chat it will open into a full screen chat that sound similar to what you are asking for.
It's really not
Not that similar, it's sloooowwww. and the screen redraws are excruciatingly slow. But yes, can we get a crowd (or a few?) for Thursday night?
slow?
I have not experienced the chat room being slow...have others?
did you see the full screen view?
yes okay
So when do you think we can schedule a chat? I'm guessing tonight is a no go. Hope I'm right, cuz I'm fixing to go out.
scheduled staffed chats??
I'm serious about agreeing to do these, when do we want to start scheduling them? I'd suggest a weekly one to start out, and my schedule precludes Mondays or Thursdays for sure. Which really only leaves Tuesdays, since Wednesdays are "church nights" for a lot of folks. Uh and for me, too, although my responsibilities end early and it could be a doable thing if need be. Or Sunday nights, Sunday nights could be really good. And I'd suggest setting the time at 10 p.m. EDT, any later and the east coast is going to bed, but any earlier and the west coast is still at supper.
Another fly in my scheduling ointment is vacation times (mine! yay!)... I'm taking my daughter to Turkey the first half of September (yay!) and then the hubster and I are going on the south sea cruise (Hawaii to New Zealand, stopping in French Polynesia. yay! yay!) the last half of October. Seems like everything I think about doing (getting another dog, planting trees) I decide it's best to wait until November. And I don't really want to wait on chats until November.
Comments in chronological order?
The way that comments are presently viewed they are usually if not always out of chronological order? It would be nice to have them either read from first to last or last to first whichever would be great. The way they read now is at best difficult and cumbersome to track.
Can this be 'fixed'?
interesting question
Jerseyguy,
Interesting question...the comments do in fact show up chronologically, with the latest comment on top. the one exception is when someone replies to another comment...those comments are nested under the original comment. I think this is actually a good thing because it allows us to follow the line of the back and forth conversation.
nesting
I have to say, while I like the nesting approach a lot, I would prefer if most recent comments were at the end of the discussion.
Bookmarking
I used to use My CrossLeft as a way of bookmarking things. I understand that eventually we're looking at getting it back. Any idea on when that might happen?
Voting
It seems voting disappeared. Can we bring it back? It was fun.
voted down last call
on our last call that functionality was voted down. i tend to agree with you that it was fun...maybe we should put this to a vote of the whole site.
Reversal
If I recall correctly, voting will be back. I just wanted to update the thread with the most recent info.
What about "Quotes"?
Ever since the site changed, I've been running across some really pertinent quotes. Are we going to be able to access the Quote section again?
Granted, one can post them as blog entries, but they eventually get lost in the shuffle that way. There's something to be said for a collective, easily accessible quote collection.
Bill
they're coming
Bill,
Thanks for asking...that particular module is still in alpha stage of development...i would anticipate sometime in the next couple of weeks, we'll have our quotes back.
s
Banner size?
I'm torn with this one. I really like the black into gray into blue scheme. However, I'm not fond of having to scroll down so far to get to the meat of the page. Perhaps moving the recent blog posts to the right column. Then placing the crossleft tidbit on the left of the blue, with the announcement on the right. That should half the blue box. Also, it's a nice blue, so it might be good to have more of it on the page. There's a lot of white space.
Also, thanks for working to get the my crossleft up again. I'll be patient.
I like that, too.
But on some screens, for example this screen you get when you reply to a post (like I'm doing right now) is all black with that chiseled gray fat rule. Just the black and white and gray and it is very striking like that. And it's much shallower, maybe an inch and a half.
But I really like the blue. And I know even the abbreviated one I'm looking at now (without the recent blogs on it) is deeper than it has to be, if we dropped the Home button back down with the rest, and also if we used lighter colors we could use smaller type on the buttons. Using dark background, you have to use larger type for it to be readable as a reverse.
And so, what if we flipped the gray gradient (which I do love, so subtle but so fine) so the lighter end was on top and moved all the buttons up to the chiseled gray, and narrowed the bottom rule (now without any buttons in it) but had the main banner background and that newly narrowed rule be all the same gradient. And I think I'd experiment a little with that, because I'm wondering if it started with that luscious blue that you used, Steve, but perhaps moving lighter from there rather than darker. Maybe. If it still looked good. And if the type size could be reduced if we could use dark letters onto a lighter background. In theory we could. Maybe.
I still haven't played with this the way I want to, let me do that tonight or tomorrow. I'm not sure what I'm saying is very understandable, a picture would be better.