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_ Forum Information Archive _ The new look

Posted by: Somey

Hi everyone...

I've almost got all the bugs in the forum fixed, and I'm currently putting the finishing touches on the new skin we're going to use. Since all the bugs were skin-related, I copied the settings from the existing default to a new one, and then merged in some stuff from a skin I found... somewhere, and for the last two days I've been debugging it. You wouldn't think that would be so difficult, but there were some, ehhh, complications.

Anyway, the All-New, Super-Sexy, Fabulously Exciting New Wikipedia Review will look sort of like this:

FORUM Image

Expect this to occur sometime in the next 48 hours...

The "white hat" logo may or may not worth keeping. Actually, I regard it as a pseudo-logo and I don't really have a problem with it, but if anyone has any ideas for improvement in that area, feel free to start a new thread in the "Wikipedia Review Review" forum on that, and any other stuff you'd like to suggest, with the understanding that I'm probably not going to be capable of doing whatever it is anytime soon.

And now, back to our regularly-scheduled WP-bashing! smile.gif

Posted by: Herschelkrustofsky

I don't have a problem with either the new skin, or the old skin. I actually like the White Hat logo. However, the "New shoes, three-way" blurb strikes me as nonsensical and weird. I mentioned in some other thread that I was particularly taken with the "Now with 98% fewer premature obituaries than Wikipedia" blurb, and I would urge you to adopt that one on a semi-permanent basis.

Posted by: Somey

Well, I try to change the blurb on a weekly basis... Sorry I haven't been more solicitous in asking for blurb suggestions...! sad.gif

As for the "classic" skin/logo, it just has to be fixed. I figure the new skin will become the default, and then over the next 2-3-4 weeks, Selina and/or I will try to fix the classic one so that it works properly again. Once it's fixed, we'll post a notice, and anyone who wants to switch back to the classic skin can just send us a PM and we'll switch 'em.

We could also activate the user-profile skin chooser at some point, though that puts a certain amount of pressure on us to keep any available skins working, which is not as easy as it sounds! (Or should be...) Still, that's not out of the question - it just won't happen immediately is all.

Posted by: Herschelkrustofsky

I'm not really happy with "new look... same vicious attacks!" either. I think it goes a few notches beyond "self-deprecating humor." Why don't we start a thread in this section to nominate and discuss funny sayings? In the meantime, "Now with 98% fewer premature obituaries than Wikipedia" is a winner.

Posted by: Somey

OK, I changed that, and also added an avatar gallery... details http://wikipediareview.com/index.php?s=&showtopic=10457&view=findpost&p=37104...

At the moment, I'm inclined to start letting non-members see the avatars, unless I hear at least one or two good objections.

Posted by: Somey

We now have a skin chooser! WOO HOO!

Look down at the very bottom of the board, just to the right of the little RSS icon. It should stick between sessions - let me know if it doesn't, and I'll throw up my hands in frustration.

BTW: The default skin is called "Brack," and the old one is called "Green." The next one will probably be called "Darko"...

(This feature is one of those members-only things, of course. Sorry folks...)

Posted by: Somey

I've just enabled the "Darko" skin for anyone who wants to try it. It's still not quite finished - all of the topic icons are ripped off from another skin and have to be changed, and since this is the first time I've actually written a post in this skin, I'm now realizing that the font size is way too small in the edit window. Nevertheless, those of you jonesing for a really dark, gothy-emo-industrial version of Wikipedia Review now have something at least vaguely similar to that.

That's probably the last skin I'll do for a while - and possibly ever, since they're fairly difficult to implement, what with all the various hacks and so forth that have been applied to the board, apparently from Day One. That doesn't mean the three that are working are now finalized, but if any changes are made to them, it should only be to the CSS and images. That should help avoid any repeats of the "Line 91" incident...

Posted by: Herschelkrustofsky

I tried the gothy-emo-industrial version and couldn't handle it. I wouldn't mind trying my hand at designing a skin, but as you know, I tend to get befuddled with complex software. If you would care to give me a short tutorial, or point me to one, I'll give it a try.

Alternatively, I would simply say that I don't mind "brack," but I would like it a whole lot better if the dark-grey-verging-on-black bars could be changed to a darkish navy blue, and the dirt-brown-grey bars could be changed to a burgundy color.