This forum is very hard to work with.

[Hatchet]

Coming from a person who has wasted many hours on many different forums for almost two decades now.
I'm not bashing it, i want to to be better because the way i see it, without wanting to cause any offence, this is the worst forum i've ever been to in terms of it being user friendly, (was better before previous updates)
Without explaining it any further, does anyone else feel this way?
Not that i won't explain it, heck i came here to make a topic 'bout it so i better explain the issues i'm having.
For starters, people who haven't yet been on any forums or have very little explerience with forums, this one is very annoying & hard to figure out.
I think it's the reason why most people don't stick around that long.
I'm not talking about the layout, i'm mainly referring to issues with creating topics or replying to one.

-Why do people double post almost every time when quoting multiple people? Because it's not obvious how to multi-quote, while it is possible it's a tad bit hard and requires you to have two open tabs (or an extra program) on the Hinterland forums.
And we all know bandwidth isn't free, you're actually throwing away little amounts of money each time someone can't figure out how to multi quote and therefore "has" to double post.

-Posting an image or a link creates a whole load of other issues, i don't think i need to explain this one any further?
But incase i should; One of the biggest problems is that whenever you post a link (you also have a chance that your font will change) anything you will type after you have posted that link, will also be attached to that link, yes i know it's possible to split those or "remove" the link, but it's all so much more easier said than done, especially for new people.
I sometimes use another program to type my posts in before i post them on the boards.

Also, images take up bandwidth, it is however very hard to legitmately "edit" someone their quote.... and why would you edit someone their quote you ask? Don't interrupt me i am going to explain that.
Well for starters, imagine i posted an image, and you quote my post, you will quote that image, so that image will be on the topic twice, or even more if more people quote the post.
It would be so much more effective, and not only that; easier to read and navigate through posts without having a single image (or multiple for that matter) being constantly reposted due to quoting someone.
Not trying to be a wiseguy here but that's a huge oversight, again, throwing away bandwidth just because this format the forum is based upon lacks so many bits! (PHP?)
HTML is the way to go :>, but if you prefer something else, please make it work properly. (People know HTML, but do people know PHP? Please add HTML to your PHP boards!!!)
Also, when being able to edit someone their quote you should be able to see any HTML tags applied to the message, so for instance if i'm new to this forum but don't have a clue on how to post an image but do have common sense, i could just hit the quote button on a post with a picture in it and see the codes the person used to upload that image, even the site they used should i require one myself.

Those are the biggest main issues i'm having, there's some more smaller ones i won't be talking about right now, i just want to get this cleared up, is it just me or do other people also feel this way? Please add any constructive thoughts you might be having. Thanks!

Well i'll just explain on of the smaller issues as well, HTML provides codes that teach people, what we have now will not teach anyone anything.
Want bold text? There!
Want aligned text? There!
Does anybody know why the text suddenly changes? Not if they didn't already...
It might seem easier just having to click a button to make it work, but infact it's not. It restricts users, allowing people to embed the codes themselves creates tons of oppertunities, topics will also tend to turn out to be more creative.
The people i know that turned to coding because they spend their time on a forum that has HTML (had nothing to do with their education), i can't count them on one hand anymore.
Heck i even figured out some small things myself here and there but i'm nowhere near as good as them in coding, won't even come close

-There's also a glitch; When typing an emoticon, for instance you use the symbol ':' and ')' to create a smiling emoticon, when you don't hit enter it won't turn into an emoticon, which is not the issue.
If you then proofread your post and feel like you need to edit anything to it, when you use your cursor to edit anything and start typing you will suddenly start typing right behind the emoticon symbols you used (and in some rare cases type infront of it) the symbols will than change into the emoticon, and any text will appear behind it.
But i know how i was when i was young, couldn't look at the screen, had to look at the keys or i would make a lot of typo's, and then sometimes it turned out i wasn't typing at all, so with that said, it will eventually occur (if it didn't already) that someone will edit his/her post or start typing in a different location somwhere in between a sentence or something without looking at the screen (after making an emoticon) only to see the text has not been edited but only made worse.

-This was on my mind for a while, hoping Hinterland team would once again update it, but this time "properly" (please don't misunderstand me, English is not my mothertongue), but they didn't so i just had to make a topic about it.


~Hatchet
 

[JoseyWales]

Agreed.. Actually it was pretty good before they updated it and you could get around just fine. I still have issues just figuring out what is new or trending on the site. Unread content does us little good and they should have it going to the activity feed. I could go on and on.

I'm also a forum dev and have advanced experience with multiple products like vBulletin, Wordpress and the rest of them. This product is one of the worst I have seen in terms of usability. I tried to talk them into letting me help out on the site early on, but that went nowhere..

[Tbone555]

i've never had any problem whatsoever with it, personally. i thought the updated board is pretty slick

[nicko]

I find the new forum much better than the old, easy as to add images, links etc. If you want to add an image just drag it to the Drag Files here to attach area, which is below where your reply box is. Then select a place in your reply where you want an image placed and click the file/image you want to add, it should then load that image in your replay window.  I guess some people just find some tasks harder than others. Like anything new it may take a couple goes to suss things out.

 

[Tbone555]

i literally cant stop watching that ^

[Hatchet]

On 14-6-2016 at 7:34 PM, JoseyWales said:

Agreed.. Actually it was pretty good before they updated it and you could get around just fine. I still have issues just figuring out what is new or trending on the site. Unread content does us little good and they should have it going to the activity feed. I could go on and on.

I'm also a forum dev and have advanced experience with multiple products like vBulletin, Wordpress and the rest of them. This product is one of the worst I have seen in terms of usability. I tried to talk them into letting me help out on the site early on, but that went nowhere..

Thank you for trying. And you could indeed go on and on. I'm atleast glad i'm not the only one who thinks this "product" is ehm to put it lightly; 'weak'
I also edited my post to sound a little less foreign, didn't ha(*edit:)d time to proofread it at first.
But then when i did proofread it and edit it and pressed 'save' i went back to the previous post, now that might just be my laptop but i highly doubt it.
So now i tried it a second time (i hate re-doing stuff)
Right now i was typing and suddenly it posts itself (see '*edit'), this forum is full of glitches

Edit 2: Can't quote you Tbone555 because i forgot how, i had figured it out a while ago but i lost it, when i was talking about not being able to easely multi quote multiple posts i was (not per se only)referring to this; editing a post to insert another quote, yours for instance, i wanted to ask you what your experience with other formats are.

You can't miss what you don't know if you know what i mean.
If you've never tasted meat and are used to eating veggies you won't ever miss the meat.

[Patrick Carlson]

Thanks for sharing your thoughts on the forum software. Even if changes may not occur as fast as some would like, we're always looking for ways to improve everything we are doing. That being said, I don't know of any plans to return to the old forum software. But that doesn't mean we can't improve the community experience on the current platform. 

On 6/15/2016 at 4:33 AM, Tbone555 said:

i literally cant stop watching that ^

 

58 minutes ago, Hatchet said:

Thank you for trying. And you could indeed go on and on. I'm atleast glad i'm not the only one who thinks this "product" is ehm to put it lightly; 'weak'
I also edited my post to sound a little less foreign, didn't ha(*edit:)d time to proofread it at first.
But then when i did proofread it and edit it and pressed 'save' i went back to the previous post, now that might just be my laptop but i highly doubt it.
So now i tried it a second time (i hate re-doing stuff)
Right now i was typing and suddenly it posts itself (see '*edit'), this forum is full of glitches

Edit 2: Can't quote you Tbone555 because i forgot how, i had figured it out a while ago but i lost it, when i was talking about not being able to easely multi quote multiple posts i was (not per se only)referring to this; editing a post to insert another quote, yours for instance, i wanted to ask you what your experience with other formats are.

You can't miss what you don't know if you know what i mean.
If you've never tasted meat and are used to eating veggies you won't ever miss the meat.

@Hatchet

Hatchet, to multiquote you simply hit the "Quote" button at the bottom of each post in the thread you wan to include in your message, and then edit accordingly. I've done this above, quoting both you and Tbone555. 

[Hatchet]

6 minutes ago, Patrick Carlson said:

Thanks for sharing your thoughts on the forum software. Even if changes may not occur as fast as some would like, we're always looking for ways to improve everything we are doing. That being said, I don't know of any plans to return to the old forum software. But that doesn't mean we can't improve the community experience on the current platform. 

 

@Hatchet

Hatchet, to multiquote you simply hit the "Quote" button at the bottom of each post in the thread you wan to include in your message, and then edit accordingly. I've done this above, quoting both you and Tbone555. 

Jup i did learn something new, not only can you click the '+' button to multi quote but you can infact just hit quote button on each post individually and it will be added to yours, thanks for letting me know however...
How can i include another quote in this already posted post? That's my issue
Edit: when i enter 'edit' mode and hit quote the quote goes into a new post, not in the edit window.