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

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Patrick

Administrator
Staff member
Dec 21, 2010
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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.

1588355669842.png

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

Active Member
Dec 16, 2016
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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.
 

Blinky 42

Active Member
Aug 6, 2015
615
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PA, USA
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.
 
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Spartacus

Well-Known Member
May 27, 2019
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Austin, TX
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/

1588382269555.png
 
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mackle

Active Member
Nov 13, 2013
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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

Member
Dec 1, 2018
79
14
8
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?
 

alex_stief

Well-Known Member
May 31, 2016
884
312
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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.
 

Patrick

Administrator
Staff member
Dec 21, 2010
12,511
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@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.
 
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Patrick

Administrator
Staff member
Dec 21, 2010
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Quick heads-up. We now have a bigger delta (light v. bold) for read v. unread threads.
 
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foogitiff

Active Member
Jul 26, 2018
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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

Well-Known Member
May 31, 2016
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@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.
 
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LukeP

Member
Feb 12, 2017
183
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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).
 

Patrick

Administrator
Staff member
Dec 21, 2010
12,511
5,792
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@LukeP we have this feature now, and the ability to search in specific date ranges. Use "Filters" and "First Message" which is the post date.
1590971931671.png
 
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