Site Design

[Cthulhu]

IDK what's up atm. Firefox was awesome and about standards and shit. Then came Chrome which was over 9000 times faster. Then Firefox caught up in terms of performance (or, some of it, idk). Then everyone started coming up with new web standards, HTML5, CSS3, ES Next I mean Harmony I mean ES6 I mean ES2015 I mean ES2016 fuck if I know.

I do know Firefox is doing some Good Shit when it comes to tech though; they've developed a new language (I think it was them anyway) for safe low-level programming and they're working on a new and re-engineered rendering engine which can make betterer use of parallel shit (see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Servo_(layout_engine) ).

So IDK, they're not dead yet.

 

[Lex]

Part of the reason for a mass migration to chrome was the performance thing. Chrome was one of the first to intelligently split tabs and modules into their own processes that only used memory/ cpu when they were actively being looked at, meaning it ran usually performance-heavy content on relatively shit systems (like my old laptop). Firefox was always innovative in the features department (one of the first to do tabs and addons iirc) but the browser itself was/is just a performance hog.

It still has that "feature-rich" design in mind too, it just looks like a busy browser. At the end of the day if you put the two side by side with the same add-ons Chrome just runs better and is an all-round smoother experience. Not only that, but you can have a crapload of features and a minimalist design to boot.

Idk, I used to be in love with Firefox. I've installed it a few times for testing purposes but I could never go back to it for the above reasons. It might not be dead, but it's a shadow compared to Chrome and that position is now well deserved.

 

[Flintlock]

I'm definitely glad Mozilla is still going, even if I don't use Firefox much any more. I feel a bit sorry for them; they were the David that took down the Goliath of old, shitty Internet Explorer, but according to this, they only overtook IE in usage share about a year ago, when they were already about 60% down from their peak. They did the whole internet a massive favour but didn't get much of the glory.

Re: site design, I'm currently wondering why the author and tag pages are broken on the test site. They just redirect to the archive page.

Update: so I guess I was wrong when I said this theme doesn't come with an archive page. It does; it's just not called archive.php. I can't say I understand how it's generated; it contains all sorts of Javascript and stuff. Uploading a custom archive.php file screwed it up, and since author and tag pages are classified as archives, it affected them too.

 

[Flintlock]

Question: how much do we care about IE8 users? IE8 is the most-used browser with virtually no CSS3 support; it accounts for 1.62% (see edit) of our visitors this calendar year per Google Analytics.

Four options, in descending order of giving-a-shit (and effort):

1. We care about them enough to make our new theme work for them. This would be an enormous task, since Fraction itself doesn't seem to support IE8 (screenshot).

2. We care about them enough to implement something like this, which will show them a different theme - perhaps the one we've got at the moment, which seems to be alright.

3. We care about them enough to show a notice that says "hey, you're using a browser that hasn't been updated in five years, don't expect things to work around here".

4. We don't care.

Edit: I think I misread the analytics. It seems to be that 1.62% of IE users are on version 8, which means only 0.06% of our total visitors use it. Definitely not worth doing option 1, then.

 

[Lex]

My brain says 2 but my heart says 4.

 

[Ghost X]

3 because it would be a public service.

 

[Fangu]

If Fractions doesn't support it, leave it. A message can go on the "Nice to have" list IMO

 

[Cthulhu]

4. It's not worth the effort. Don't support anything but the latest. Maybe IE 11.

In the past month, the front page only had 272 IE sessions, of which 7 were IE 8, 4 were IE 9, 18 were IE 10, and 243 were IE 11. You'd be spending all that effort for supporting 2.57% of 2.93% of our users, or like, 0.07% (I can't math)

Same with the images, focus on the big stuff first. The new forums software (if I ever find the arsedness to work on it again) has been built, as they eloquently put it, for the next ten years of browsers, not the past.

I wouldn't even bother with a "u're browser is not supportered", that stuff is a relic of the past now.

FREEDOM!!11

 

[Fangu]

^ Yeah, was going to say what usually happens to things that end up on a 'Nice to have' list

 

[Cthulhu]

Way, waaaaaaay down on said list










waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay down

 

[Flintlock]

I think you're misunderestimating how much of a perfectionist I can be.

On that note, we've probably reached the point where I have to stop worrying about the tiniest details on our new theme and say "it's ready for beta testing". Saying that makes me feel like I've probably missed something huge, but that's exactly the point: I want to get as many eyes on it as possible, with different devices, screens and browsers, to flag the things I've missed. I'll probably make an announcement tomorrow.

It's important to remember that I haven't edited the posts themselves much, and a lot of them will need updating for the new theme. (Well, to be exact, they should be updated so that they're fit for any theme.) If you see a broken image on a post, like this one, that's not because there's a problem with the theme.

I'm a bit behind schedule but I think we'll be able to get it up in time for the XV launch.

 

[Cthulhu]

Have you ever considered a career in software development? Perfectionism and "I must've missed something important" are common traits

 

[Obsidian Fire]

^You have no idea how much graphic trouble those two traits have kept me out of.

Edit: Can we have another link to the alpha/beta site? It's kinda gotten lost in the pages of discussion.

 

[Cthulhu]

It's http://test.thelifestream.net

 

[Flintlock]

I'm going to put this in an announcement later (if and when someone gives me the necessary permissions) but I might as well put it here as well.

Help us launch our new front page!

Hello Lifestreamers,

You may or may not be aware that we're in the process of redesigning our website. This specifically refers to the front page, where we post news articles and other features; the forum isn't changing (yet).

You can find a preview of the new website here. It's nearly ready, but we need your help finding bugs and inconsistencies before it goes live. After all, many pairs of eyes are better than one. We'd also love to hear what you like and dislike about it in general.

If you'd like to help, you don't have to do much. Just head over to the preview and explore the place for as little as two minutes, or for as long as you want. Then make a brief post in our site design thread answering these questions:

• What kind of device did you view the site on? (PC/tablet/phone/other)
• What is the screen resolution of that device? (Leave blank if you don't know)
• What browser did you use? Does it have any settings or extensions that might make pages display differently, like an ad blocker?
• Did you find anything that looked out of place or like it wasn't working as it's supposed to? If so, what?
• What did you think of the site overall? How does it compare to our old homepage? How could it be improved?

There's just one important thing you need to be aware of: We haven't yet updated our old posts to fit the new theme, so the layout of individual articles may be a bit wonky, some articles are missing images, and so on. The process of fixing those issues will take some time and we want to get the theme ready first.

There's no deadline for giving feedback, but the sooner the better! Here are the important links again:

Old front page | New front page | Site design thread​

We appreciate your help.

- Flint

N.B.1. If you've visited the new front page before, make sure to clear your cache (pressing Ctrl+F5 on the site usually does the trick) so you don't see any remnants of previous versions.

N.B.2. I'm not going to make any changes to the new front page for the rest of this week at least, so people viewing it get a consistent experience.

 

[Lex]

Now would be a good time to talk about the menu options we have and/or need (and what they actually link to), because I've had a poke around and I don't have any critiques, I really like it.

 

[Flintlock]

Yes, we should discuss that. I'd rather not use a drop-down menu though, so space is somewhat limited. The things that I put in the current new front page menu are a combination of the top-level links from the old menu and our most popular content, like the audiobooks (thanks Google Analytics).

The other things on my to-do list are:

• Assign a default "broken" image
• Discuss our banner ad locations (also, Yop asked to be reminded about filtering out ads for donators, so consider this a reminder)
• Add an RSS link somewhere
• Sort out our image gallery plugin

 

[Jason Tandro]

Spoiler: Test Site Evaluation

Device: Laptop PC

Screen Resolution: 1920x1080

Browsers Tested: Google Chrome, Mozilla Firefox

Browser Altering Extensions: None on Firefox, Google Chrome I have a "Fair Adblocker" Extension. I tested the site with it enabled and disabled and there didn't appear to be a noticeable difference.

Errors: The only thing that looked odd is the spacing in some of the test articles, particularly on images is very out of whack. The Cloud in Smash Bros analysis for instance has images appearing very sporadically and the text looks scrunched. Starts off looking fine then it starts shifting, hopefully you see what I see, if not I can get a screencap for you.. I figured this may just be for the time being and will be fixed but just thought I'd report it.

Opinion on the General Layout: I like it. I think it has a good flow and it feels like there is a ton of information but all easily accessible. Very aesthetically pleasing as well.

 

[Flintlock]

^ If you mean the images on the right-hand-side of that article, yeah, that'll be fixed. It's an article-specific problem rather than anything to do with the theme.

Thanks for the feedback!

 

[Claymore]

What kind of device did you view the site on? Laptop.
What is the screen resolution of that device? 1600 x 900
What browser did you use? Does it have any settings or extensions that might make pages display differently, like an ad blocker? Chrome, IE and Firefox on laptop. All I have on Chrome is Chrunchyroll Unblocker and Lazarus Form Recovery, so I doubt it could be causing the issue below.
Did you find anything that looked out of place or like it wasn't working as it's supposed to? If so, what? Yes, on Chrome the FFVII Cloud image on the sidebar is acting weird - kinda stretched out with empty space but it is still clickable. See attached files below. On IE or Firefox I do not see this issue.
What did you think of the site overall? How does it compare to our old homepage? How could it be improved? It's looking really good. Definitely a step up!

In terms of the menu, my only issues are what I've highlighted a while back with the VII pages and stub pages, as it's rather confusing for visitors to the site. There should be just one VII page (the franchise guide as that looks ace) and the 'original VII page' - which is just a page acting as a menu - should just be integrated into a sidebar menu on the Franchise Guide page.

 

[Flintlock]

Thanks. Have you visited the test site before on Chrome? You might need to clear your cache by doing a Ctrl+F5 refresh. I should probably have added that to the instructions. I can't think why else that remake logo would be appearing twice because it isn't in the source code twice.

 

[Claymore]

Ah, that fixed it. That was weird, lol.

 

[Shademp]

What kind of device did you view the site on?
Stationary PC.

What is the screen resolution of that device?
1920x1080

What browser did you use?
Chrome. I use ad blocker, but apart from that all settings are default. Nothing weird spotted.

What did you think of the site overall?
The site overall is great. I would be happy to see it replace the current frontpage, like, right now.

That said I am sad to see the drop-down menus go. I really liked the ease-of-access- and exploration they represented.

I think the "Search" in the search bar should be written with three dots, a proper ellipsis, rather than just two dots. "Search..."

 

[Flintlock]

Ack, that kind of thing always bugs me as well. Not my fault though; that's just one of many places in which Fraction's use of language is poor. Just look at that banner ad space in the sidebar, for example: "reposnive"! I've changed all the mistakes I've noticed and I should be able to change the search one too.

Thanks.

 

[Tetsujin]

What kind of device did you view the site on? (PC/tablet/phone/other)
PC

What is the screen resolution of that device?
1920*1080

What browser did you use? Does it have any settings or extensions that might make pages display differently, like an ad blocker?
Firefox w/ adblocker

Did you find anything that looked out of place or like it wasn't working as it's supposed to? If so, what?
Everything seemed to be working for me.

What did you think of the site overall?
I want to invite it to my room maybe have a few sips of wine and see where things lead