STH Forums a New Look and How to Switch to Dark Theme

[BlueFox]

I preferred how the old theme showed considerably more of the thread titles on the index page for the latest posts in any given subforum. It's really short and gets cut off at as low as 20 characters now. Don't think the subtitles (subforum descriptions) are really all that useful since the subforum titles are pretty self-explanatory already either.

ServeTheHome and ServeThe.Biz Forums

A place to discuss servers, storage and networking

web.archive.org

 

[Octopuss]

Dont fight change so much my friend, change is good. We are actually a premier site, where many, many people come to view and read about our posts and discoveries. We cant take that for granted. Alot of the stuff we do here, even prominent tech people in the industry come to ask us advice and how to do stuff. So having an updated look isnt a bad thing. Anything new is slightly unfamiliar, but you can get used to it.

Just use the website as normal, and before you know it, it will be ok. So far, I havent found anything that is lacking. Just a new look. Thats it :.)

I don't understand why things are changes for the sake of being changed. What was wrong with the old theme?

 

[Patrick]

Is anyone else missing the navigation footer at the bottom of the page? Finding I'm having to page up to the top to get a link back to the forum root.

Let me see if we can get one. Perhaps this will help you scroll up in the meantime.



@Octopuss - old theme required an older and now out of support version of the forum software. This had to change.

 

[amalurk]

There is too much white space. Reduce padding, margins etc that cause all the white space and bump up the font sizes so that actual content uses a larger share of the space.

 

[Patrick]

Pushed padding down a bit. Fonts larger.

 

[Blinky 42]

Nice job @Patrick / STH on rebuilding and upgrading "on-demand" in a pinch like this!
I noticed the "toggle width" button down near the theme selector needs to be hit each time to use the full page width (yea! - Inches of wasted space on the sides of the window is SO annoying!) Also there is a blank white header with just the 4 social link icons in blue top right that scrolls off the screen when you scroll down, but the normal forum navigaion header if fine and sticky at the top of the window. Not sure if the icons are intended to be incorporated into the header nav bar, or the space is being reserved for ads etc once you get the rest squared away - it just looks odd being a white bar when in the dark theme.

 

[RyC]

Looking better every day! Keep up the good work!

 

[Rock]

Theme = CandyCrush

I think I'd rather be color blind than deal with this eyesore.

 

[Spartacus]

Is it just me or does marking everything as read not working? When i mark everything read and check new posts theres still 28 pages of ‘new’.

Edit: annddd as soon as i post this it decides to take, odd nevermind!

AH HA! I figured it out what it is the "New Posts" on the front page of the forums links to newest posts not 'new since you last visited': https://forums.servethehome.com/index.php?threads/newest

The actual new posts links is under whats new-> new posts (at least what I think they should both link to): https://forums.servethehome.com/index.php?whats-new/posts/

 

[mackle]

AH HA! I figured it out what it is the "New Posts" on the front page of the forums links to newest posts not 'new since you last visited': https://forums.servethehome.com/index.php?threads/newest

The actual new posts links is under whats new-> new posts (at least what I think they should both link to): https://forums.servethehome.com/index.php?whats-new/posts/

View attachment 13869

heh, that latter page is my bookmark, so now I know why I was getting the news since I last visited’ still.

 

[elag]

Is there a way now to see if there is new unread response in a topic?

Previously the title of the topic was bold if there were new messages, if I am not mistaken

I really miss this in my workflow. Is there chance we get this back?

 

[NachoCDN]

i actually like the STH Pro Dark theme!

 

[Tom5051]

such an ugly theme. old one was way better.

 

[alex_stief]

My thoughts on the new theme: so far, I haven't found anything I particularly like about it. And I would prefer the old theme.
Shrug that off as "uggh, me no like change, me want keep old stuff".

The theme looks like it was optimized for mobile devices with tiny screens. Fair enough, if the vast majority of users come to this site using their phones. What's the breakdown between mobile and PC users? And despite looking like the feedback forum for a shitty mobile phone brand, there is just sooo much wasted space.
And what's with all those colors? Apart from being a general eye-sore, I don't find a plethora of seemingly random colored items scrambled across the screen helpful for finding anything.
And last not least: bold font for threads with messages I haven't seen yet, regular font for threads with no new posts. That's how it always has been in pretty much every forum. Because it works great.

Rant over, I will now return to my tribe and tell them why this newfangled "fire" invention won't catch on.

 

[Rock]

I'd like to stop seeing the explosion of skittles all over the screen. This abuse of color is not welcome on the dark theme.

 

[Patrick]

@alex_stief I get it. Change is tough.

Here is the problem: We are not going back to a now unsupported version of XenForo.

I get feedback. This is still getting worked on.

 

[Patrick]

Quick heads-up. We now have a bigger delta (light v. bold) for read v. unread threads.

 

[foogitiff]

Quick heads-up. We now have a bigger delta (light v. bold) for read v. unread threads.

I like the difference in the light theme, but on the dark theme it's a bit hard (for me) to see the difference. But I prefer the light theme anyway.

Thanks!

 

[alex_stief]

@alex_stief I get it. Change is tough.

Yeah yeah, change itself can be tough. But you know what is even tougher? A change to something that I perceive as worse than the starting point. Without seeing a compelling reason for why this change had to happen this way.
I don't know the first thing about UI design principles, so I can only point to contributions from other users, who can call out the flaws much more eloquently, and in a more constructive way.
I see that you are taking feedback, and change some of the issues that are pointed out. Which is great. But the overall "look and feel" of the new mobile-focused theme will probably never be my cup of tea. The discrepancy between the overall low-contrast color scheme with all rounded edges, mixed with the straining contrast of brightly colored labels, is just too much for my taste.

 

[LukeP]

i complained about this on the previous design. The Deals and For Sale pages, its 100x more useful to sort by Start Date, not last post. I want to see the latest deal or sale. Why do I care what people are chatting about on irrelevant threads? Yet you have removed the sort option completely on this new design. Making it completely unusable for me. So I am very sad.

Also regarding the fonts, they can be hard to read on poor monitors. Good monitors its a nice font, but the colour aliasing on TN type monitors makes the thin fonts hard to read. So you should use the thin fonts sparingly (ie not for body text).