Read / Unread

[Steve]

I've changed the icons on the main page.

This indicates a board with new posts:

This indicates a board with no new posts:

You should now be able to see at a glance if there are new posts, without having to look at the times of the last posts. I'll be looking at what else can be changed within the individual boards to make it clearer which topics have been read and which haven't.

Let me know if you have any comments please. Thanks.

[Steve]

I've also added a smaller version which sits alongside the thread title on a board, if the thread is unread. That's this one:



Once the thread has been read, that will disappear until somebody else posts, whereupon it will reappear, to indicate that the thread is unread once again.

[Steve]

Yippee, it works. Bex just posted on the Friends Links board and the green indicator lit up on the main page. This will make keeping track of everything so much easier (for me anyway).

[Flick]

I think it's a really good idea.
I've been dying to use the above smiley! ;D

[SpyMaster]

that is a good idea. It's used on the YTDAW messageboard I go on. How do you do it?

[Steve]

Well the interesting thing is that the feature already exists and is active on all the Proboards forums, Spymaster, but if you didn't look really carefully you would never know it. Here are the default icons for read/unread:

Read board:
Unread board:

Unread thread within a board:

You have to look really carefully at the first two to spot the difference eh. So all that I've done is changed the icons to something which is easier to interpret. Also, in all the time I've been on these forums I've never even noticed that little 'new' icon so I've replaced that too. I made my own icons, to fit in with the rest of the design but if you just want a quick solution I'm sure you would find a million green and red LED gifs available for download which would do the job nicely.

I replaced:

This: with this:

This: with this:

This: with this:

In your admin control panel, just go to Customise Board Images and put the URLs for your new images in there.

I've made new icons for almost everything and I'm pleased with the effect but the Photobucket server was down for about 15 minutes earlier this evening and the forum looked a mess, with half the icons missing. So I may be having a rethink about where we host the images.

[SpyMaster]

If you find a really good place let me know will you ;D

You probably know this already but I introduced a nifty redirect script today. Makes the messageboard look a lot better. Unfortunately it also makes it look sparser as I had to delete boards and stuff for it to work. You can check it out and see.

If you know how to do it then I won't bother explaining it but if you don't, miracle upon miracles, then I'll tell you ;D Took me an hour or so on the internet before I worked out how to get the script and a couple of hours to get everything set up but then I'm slow. ;D

Thanks for explaining that images thing ;D ;D

[Steve]

Yes I saw the redirects yesterday evening, Spymaster. I wouldn't have spotted them if you hadn't put a notice up though because they're quick and they're invisible to the user - I had to look at the URLs to see what was happening.

By the way, I've been meaning to ask for a while - did you close the Midsomer and JDD forums?

[SpyMaster]

Steve said:

Yes I saw the redirects yesterday evening, Spymaster. I wouldn't have spotted them if you hadn't put a notice up though because they're quick and they're invisible to the user - I had to look at the URLs to see what was happening.

By the way, I've been meaning to ask for a while - did you close the Midsomer and JDD forums?

Yeah I did close them. Nobody really went on and I didn't see the point in maintaining them.

The one problem that I have now with the whole redirect thing, which means more messageboards, is with the people who have already registered. For new people I've changed all the buttons so they get directed to a form I made to signup. I can then sign them up to all three and so they'll be no problems. Unfortunately with the people already signed up I can't do that so it'll be infuriating for some, for a while until everybodys signed up to the parts they want. No way round that though. Still, cross fingers, so far everythings looking good. ;D

[Steve]

I like the registration form, Spymaster - very neat!

[Flick]

admin said:

Well the interesting thing is that the feature already exists and is active on all the Proboards forums, Spymaster, but if you didn't look really carefully you would never know it. Here are the default icons for read/unread:

Read board:
Unread board:

Unread thread within a board:

You have to look really carefully at the first two to spot the difference eh. So all that I've done is changed the icons to something which is easier to interpret. Also, in all the time I've been on these forums I've never even noticed that little 'new' icon so I've replaced that too. I made my own icons, to fit in with the rest of the design but if you just want a quick solution I'm sure you would find a million green and red LED gifs available for download which would do the job nicely.

I replaced:

This: with this:

This: with this:

This: with this:

In your admin control panel, just go to Customise Board Images and put the URLs for your new images in there.

I've made new icons for almost everything and I'm pleased with the effect but the Photobucket server was down for about 15 minutes earlier this evening and the forum looked a mess, with half the icons missing. So I may be having a rethink about where we host the images.

Did you make these icons yourself, Steve?
It has been mentioned to me that on my messageboard the read/unread icons are difficult to decipher, so I wondered if there was a way to make them clearer?

[Steve]

Yes, I made them myself, Flick, to fit in with the overall colour scheme of the forum. They each took probably 3 or 4 minutes to make so it's easy once you know how. If I hadn't felt like making them though, there are lots of sites which provide free icons/banners/buttons/animated gifs etc. to use on your website or forum. Here's how to change them from the default ones:

• Make new graphics, or download some from a freebie graphics site.
  
  
• Upload them to your Photobucket account or similar, and take a note of the urls.
  
  
• Go to Admin - Skins / Forum Colors - Customize Images - Default - Continue
  
  
• Scroll down the page to the image you want to replace, and enter the new image url in the box beside it and then Save Changes

That's all there is to it. If you want me to make some read/unread indicators just let me know because that wouldn't be a problem, or you can try it yourself in whichever graphics program you use for making/editing pictures. MS paint will do the job.

Edit: If you want to search for images to use, look for free graphics sites (there are millions of them) and then I'd suggest LED indicators would be a good thing to look for, so search for green led and red led.

[Flick]

Thanks. I'll try them both.

If I make them myself, do they authomatically change colour, or do I have to make both colours and put two URL codes into the default section?

[Steve]

You need to make both and then add two urls, one each beside the two default icons for read and unread.

[Flick]

Ok, thanks. ;D