RF Generation Message Board

This (http://test.rfgeneration.com/) is the reason why this forum has been created. There isn't much there, but the long, arduous process of redesigning the site has begun. It's goal is to give a more professional feel to the site in addition to creating standardization on the site as a whole, something that currently just does not exist.

The goal of this site is to keep you guys, the people of significance on the site, posted on the progress of the redesign. This project is not something that just will be done overnight, and I need input on design changes and any new features that will be added.

That being said, you can find the baseboard for the redesign here (http://test.rfgeneration.com/). Right now it is just a page with CSS classes instead of horrible font color tags. But, overtime the site will begin to change to something more accessible and meaningful.  For starters, the first thing that is going to change is that the navigation bar on the left is going to change. It's going to run right below the static at the top of the site. Through tweaking, it'll look great.

Any suggestions you have regarding the redesign or anything else regarding the site please feel free to post here and we'll try to give a mostly straight answer.

I have to say I like the contrast between the newsposts white background and the grey of the menus. Makes it stand out more, not sure if that's a planned part of the idea behind the frontpage or not but I thought I'd mention it.

I've only just begun, but I'll keep that in mind. To be honest, the left bar won't exist on the front page of the redesign.

One thing I have noticed from my personal use of the site is that I sometimes miss feature updates or news posts on the home page since I tend to go to the forums first.  So I guess I would like to see an indicator on the forum index page that shows updates have been made to the home page.

Let me know if you want some help, Dave. 

Don't worry, about 90% of you go to the forums first. That being said, I am hoping that the ability to subscribe to the news posts will make readership of the front page go up, as will the ability to comment about these news posts.

Here is a page with Eddie's and my Proposed new navigation:

Looks great! ;)

I like that!

I love the nav bar across the top, matches the forum nicely.  8)

But the left side...it's so, so empty.

I think that's where the Sony Ads should go ;)

Left side empty? Yes, that's purposeful. Don't worry, most pages that are not the front page or a news page will have a left bar, but no right bar. Evil, no?

Speaking of which, here is the front page, complete with a right bar and news formatting. Most, if not all links are broken, so I highly encourage you not to click them. I hear that such an action makes baby Jesus cry.
REMOVED

I think the affiliates should be moved to the bottom and recent topics moved up.

"Mario Kills Luigi in Nervous Rampage"    :laugh:

Also, I agree with Scott on the recent topics.

I should ask is there anything additional that you want done with the right bar? I can arrange the right bar however I want, but I want the IM Box, Quick Search, and Site Statistics to stay where they are. I can add additional boxes and things to the right bar, but keep in mind that each additional thing adds an additional query, and subsequently increases the server load just a tad.

The affiliates are where they are so that they too display our banners in a prominent spot. This decision was a holdover from when Mike Designed the site, as that was his perspective. If the general consensus is to move the affiliates I can do that though.

I went through the affiliates, Rene's  Retro Computers & Games  Site and the Cinci Classic pages we are not on their home page. I say we remove those. Cinci Classic site has a description of RFG under the link that is out of date.

Cinci Classic has been removed from the live site, and replaced with hardcore gaming. Rene's I'll have to look into.

I thought that might be the case once I went to the live homepage.

Well, the  new front page is completely and totally coded, sans for a javascript function that doesn't change the appearance of the site. It's even valid XHTML 1.0 transitional, though the only areas of the site that will probably be valid XHTML are this here forum and the front page.

Please note that this is 1 page of many. So, while this page is finished there are so many other pages to make work with the template and then also use CSS / pseudo XHTML. So, I guess the moral of the story is be patient, there is still a hell of a lot more work to do.

Looks very nice!

Nice work!!!!!

I learned that IE sucks and was displaying things differently than in Firefox. I fixed it, and I have since tested the site design on Opera as well.

While it looks fine on all browsers, I'll go ahead and say looks best on Firefox. So, yeah, ditch IE and download Firefox. If you have Opera, go ahead and keep using that.

How much is Mozilla paying you to say that?

I'm a little late to this party, but while I do like the look of the new front page, it does feel like the left side is a little empty.  I'm assuming once the newspost have more on them then one or two lines it will look better.  Just throwing in my two cents.

I like the new layout. Everything looks good in Firefox, but in IE7 and Opera the text on the front page is centered instead of left aligned, and that's why the left side of the page looks so empty.

So, David, please fix this for Opera and IE and things will be great.

This might help you out:
http://validator.w3.org/

Having dabbled in CSS a bit myself I can appreciate how much of a pain in the ass it is finding a happy medium between FF and IE. Both seem to handle CSS quite differently, Sometimes you have to make small sacrifices because IE interprets it differently and is a bit behind the times, especially older versions.

I fixed that a long time ago, and I've tested it in Opera 9, Firefox, and IE 6.5. Before that I tested the site using XHTML 1.0 Validation, which it passed (total pain in the ass to make compliant), but it centered on IE and Opera. Screwing around with things rectified the situation.

The test design is located here. It took me several days to get it to look good while also being XHTML compliant, and I can assure you that the front page and forum will likely be the only things that pass validation. Everything else will be tinkered with until it looks good.

Just curious I was wondering if the link for the searches will remain "Databases"?

Professional sounding and also what we refer to it as, but perhaps not as user friendly to new members or visitors as it could be? We live in a world where ebay types out each system's name so people know where to click, I would expect Database might be a bit intimidating for some or perhaps they wouldn't think to associate it with searching.

Ah, ok. Now it looks great in IE7 and Opera.

Well, that link is what it is, the link to the databases. What would you like to call it? Repositories? Search? Certainly Database Search Would be too long. I'll entertain ideas.

Here's another couple of ideas i had. The tabs not necessarily in that order but you get the idea  :P Frees up more sidebar space as well.

I like the first one better, Tan.

I like the nav bar the way it is currently set up, the blank area is purposeful for the poor kids who still use small monitors.

It is my intention to have quick search on the right bar of the front page, and somewhere in the theme of the forum. Elsewhere, use the advanced search. It works wonders.

Forum Design. Check out how it is set up.

For those of you who saw it earlier I've finished tinkering with the setup and I feel as though I've come to a nice stopping point for the forum setup. I think it looks pretty good. Please note that this forum design is essentially a template for all other designs on the site.

REMOVED

I like the 3 added links on the left.

Wow, I saw the theme for the next major release of SMF. It looks quite nice, and will fit in well with the new design.

Submit info is all tidied up.

REMOVED

Looking good!

Nice work, well written and very clear. That'll definately clear up any confusion.  :)

The about section is written. Additionally, the site templates are essentially finished.

REMOVED

Nice work! I like it!

I second that!

The PHP search scripts and the submit info pages are completely and totally finished.

I'd say they look good.

News Links now actually go somewhere, and each news post / page is now indexable by search engines.

Also, no, the individual news post page is nowhere near complete.

One of the things about writing your own news script essentially from scratch means that complicated things like commenting take a while to craft. Boy this is a blast.

Everything looks great Dave!

Hey, looks good.  The site now works for lynx, so those Linux geeks (who traded their GUIs for l33tn355 a long time ago) can check us out too.  That should also mean that it should work well with text-to-speech software for the blind.  Now, how the blind would ever play video games is a mystery to me. 

They play pinball by intuition (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pinball_Wizard) and sense of smell (http://www.lyricsdomain.com/20/the_who/pinball_wizard.html). Not sure about consoles though.  :P

Tan: props for the awesome Who reference.

The commenting system is finished. Please, please please add comments and if you are an admin or Tan delete and edit comments to make sure it works. Also, if you are on staff I encourage you to fool around with the news post system, or if you are Tan, the blogging system.

I still need to work on some things with individual posts, and there is the RSS thing to get working, stay tuned for that.

Works great!! Commenting is very smooth and easy, I think it'll get allot of use.  ;D

Tan-

Make sure you can delete and edit if you have not done so already.

Looks good! I also added a news post. I had problems with the tags but I am just dumb.

We might need a spell check for Scott, he has special literacy needs.  ;)

So so true

RSS Feeds Work.

I think the news script is completely and totally finished for now, save for bugs.

Wow, I haven't checked out the test site in a bit.  I love the progress you are making, you guys must be working day and night.

guys = Dave

I was just going by what I read, either way it's a lot of work!!

Eddie is working on his stuff, but he has a lot of back end stuff to do.

For reference

Me: Anything that ends in PHP and is not the forum
Eddie: Everything ending in .pl

This isn't anywhere near completion, but here is a hardware page in the works:

REMOVED

Wow very nice, I like the use of bold and three different colours for the page text.

Here is a hardware page:

REMOVED
And here is another:
REMOVED

holy cats, they look better every time I check back here.  Keep up the good work!

Me likey. Keep it up.

Those Hardware pages look awesome!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Good, the game pages will look virtually identical.

Additionally, Eddie coded the javascript function that parks the gray on the navigation bar to the corresponding section.

We've also started the debugging process for the scripts, I am having someone look over my PHP scripts to fix holes, and I am extremely appreciative.

Nice.  Good job.

How much longer will it be until the relaunch?

Only the shadow knows.

Shadow?

No.
This Guy:

[img width=350 height=491]http://lifeloom.com/Shadow.jpg[/img]

Oh thats much better!

What about:

(http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/b/bf/Sotc_boxart.jpg)

Was Shadow the name of the character?

Trust me, Eddie wants you to check this out:

REMOVED

That looks awesome!

This does look great.  Very nice job!

Great job guys! The site is going to be better than ever once the new layout launches.