New Forums Look - Live Today!

[ATMINSIDE]

Hey all,

We've pushed a new forum theme live as of today, let me know of any issues, but thanks to the mods and seniors of the forum I believe we've tracked down the vast majority of the issues already!
This is part of our continual push to speed up the site and make it more secure.

For now, the old theme will stay available for use but it will be removed at a future date.

Features to come:
- Light Theme

 

[ATMINSIDE]

And it's 100% live, I'm sure some of you noticed your default theme changed.

 

[Robert17]

Freaking the old guys out! As if aging weren't already shocking enough......Looks good though, once I wiped my glasses off. Next thing you know you'll add audio and I'll have to put in my hearing aids to browse....snarc, snarc, cough.....

 

[trents]

If this change happened on 4/1, why did it not manifest itself for me until today?

The only thing I don't like about it is it shrinks the text down and makes things a little harder for aging eyes to see clearly.

Can you explain how the changes speed things up and make it more secure? So there must be more than just cosmetics involved here.

 

[ATMINSIDE]

If this change happened on 4/1, why did it not manifest itself for me until today?

The only thing I don't like about it is it shrinks the text down and makes things a little harder for aging eyes to see clearly.

Can you explain how the changes speed things up and make it more secure? So there must be more than just cosmetics involved here.

On 4/1 the theme went live to the public, but today I forced it to be the new theme for everyone and have deprecated the old one.

Font size is unchanged, so I'm not sure why it would make things harder to read. The contrast is very good everywhere there is text as well.

There are numerous reasons. I'll go through a few:
1) The old theme had lots of old leftover code from years of changes from different companies. It called for old and unused vB plugins. I'm working through removing more unused plugins now that the theme doesn't call for them. Less old code means less potential exploits. It also speeds the site up by not being in the files. This also puts us back toward a more vanilla vB, which makes updates easier, taking me to point 2.
2) Once we finish some background cleanup, the plan is to go vB 4.2.5 for a few reasons. This is a very small change from the 4.2.2 that we are currently on, mostly bug fixes and the ability to use newer PHP versions. Functionality/layout/etc do not change when going from 4.2.2 to 4.2.5.
3) Newer PHP. This is the big one and is the end goal. There are huge speed and security benefits to newer PHP versions. This will increase traffic to the site as better speed and security mean better search results, which drives more people to us.

 

[petteyg359]

I don't especially like it. It seems far brighter and eye-stabby than before. First thing I did when I loaded OCF today was flinch and squint

 

[Alaric]

It feels zippier, and with my lousy internet speeds every little bit helps. It also seems to squish the content towards the middle, leaving larger (empty) borders. I had to bump my browser's zoom to 130% from 120% to see it comfortably. Not a big thing, but noticeable-and fixable on my end so not a deal breaker, either.

 

[rainless]

Hey all,

We've pushed a new forum theme live as of today, let me know of any issues, but thanks to the mods and seniors of the forum I believe we've tracked down the vast majority of the issues already!
This is part of our continual push to speed up the site and make it more secure.

For now, the old theme will stay available for use but it will be removed at a future date.

Features to come:
- Light Theme

"Issues"... umm... It's WEIRD.

Everything but <H1> and <p> is too tiny to read. (For example: signatures. and this

View attachment 209436

Is there a way to change the overall font size? It seems like there's just a bunch of wasted space on the sides of my screen...

 

[Alaric]

^ That's what I got. I just upped the zoom on my browser.

 

[Mr.Scott]

It also seems to squish the content towards the middle, leaving larger (empty) borders.

This. ^^^^^

Fix it please. I don't want to have to run separate settings for just one site.
Fill the page.

 

[Robert17]

^^ I use the Brave browser and can set up each site for separate settings.

 

[Mr.Scott]

^^ I use the Brave browser and can set up each site for separate settings.

Yeah.........you're more forgiving than I am. Not changing browser. Staying with the standard Chrome......just like 75% of the rest of the world is.

 

[RollingThunder]

Austin,

Will we have the choice of background colors when the new one is implemented? If not, why not?

This light background certainly isn't very considerate of older sets of eyes.

 

[bassnut]

It feels zippier, and with my lousy internet speeds every little bit helps. It also seems to squish the content towards the middle, leaving larger (empty) borders. I had to bump my browser's zoom to 130% from 120% to see it comfortably. Not a big thing, but noticeable-and fixable on my end so not a deal breaker, either.

This. ^^^^^

Fix it please. I don't want to have to run separate settings for just one site.
Fill the page.

Yup …. about 1/3 of the page is unused split between the left and right making the text smaller …… I'm with Alaric and Mr Scott on this one.

 

[dejo]

I actually like the looks. What is hard for me to get used to is the new ocforums.com tab thumbnail. I tend to look past the new one after seeing the same old one for so many years

 

[ATMINSIDE]

To all:
The shadowboxing of the site content is intentional, to keep a more cohesive feel of the overall site when going from the front page to the forum and vice-versa. It isn't going away. That said, I've increased the content width, hopefully this appeases some of how you feel.

It feels zippier, and with my lousy internet speeds every little bit helps. It also seems to squish the content towards the middle, leaving larger (empty) borders. I had to bump my browser's zoom to 130% from 120% to see it comfortably. Not a big thing, but noticeable-and fixable on my end so not a deal breaker, either.

It should, there's less junk now. Amazing how much removing old and unused code can help an old site along huh?

"Issues"... umm... It's WEIRD.

Everything but <H1> an <p> is too tiny to read. (For example: signatures. and this

View attachment 209436

Is there a way to change the overall font size? It seems like there's just a bunch of wasted space on the sides of my screen...

Both the font and font size remains unchanged from the old theme to the current one, not sure why you're having issues reading certain fonts. Try clearing your browser cache.

Austin,

Will we have the choice of background colors when the new one is implemented? If not, why not?

This light background certainly isn't very considerate of older sets of eyes.

Dave,

The new theme is implemented already. When the light version is available the user will be able to choose.

This is a dark theme, not a light theme. It has a dark background. The background is actually the exact same color as the old theme, I just went and double-checked to make sure I wasn't misremembering.

I actually like the looks. What is hard for me to get used to is the new ocforums.com tab thumbnail. I tend to look past the new one after seeing the same old one for so many years

Thanks, dejo! No question, the new favicon is definitely a change, but such is life. In my browser, the new favicon still stands out from other tabs, so hopefully, others will grow used to it as well. The front page has had this same favicon for a while now.

 

[Alaric]

That said, I've increased the content width

It's noticeable on my end, and looks more like the old site as far as the border to content ratio.

 

[RollingThunder]

It's noticeable on my end, and looks more like the old site as far as the border to content ratio.

That's what I'm seeing too and it suits my eyes like previously. Happy camper here now that I know what we are going to choose from.

When I looked at the new theme last week it was noticed how narrow it was and signatures were not wrapped correctly among other preliminary issues. This is just fine!

 

[rainless]

To all:


Both the font and font size remains unchanged from the old theme to the current one, not sure why you're having issues reading certain fonts. Try clearing your browser cache.

Cleared the cache... no change. The person posting just under me confirmed the same... So it's not just me...

Also... not just the header on the main page... It seems to be everywhere. DEFINITELY wasn't like that when I was trying to explain to people that COVID-19 wasn't "just a cold."

I mean I'm already wearing glasses... but whatever happened has definitely increased the eyestrain.

Maybe it's browser-related?? Which one are you using?

I know firefox and chrome process things a little differently...

 

[ATMINSIDE]

Cleared the cache... no change. The person posting just under me confirmed the same... So it's not just me...

Also... not just the header on the main page... It seems to be everywhere. DEFINITELY wasn't like that when I was trying to explain to people that COVID-19 wasn't "just a cold."

I mean I'm already wearing glasses... but whatever happened has definitely increased the eyestrain.

Maybe it's browser-related?? Which one are you using?

I know firefox and chrome process things a little differently...

Can you send me a screenshot of the entire screen for a few screens?

As mentioned before, no fonts or font sizes have changed from the old theme to new.

I'm using Chrome.

Example screenshot:
View attachment 209458