What is the "mouseover effect"? Is that the text greying out when you mouse over it, i.e. if it's doing that it should be reported as a bug?
posted by brook horse at 6:36 PM on March 10

I also don't know what "removed mouseover effects from posts and comments" means, but right now, it doesn't show the name of the poster, post time, and number of comments on the front page unless you mouse over the post, which is honestly kind of bad UI.
posted by Joakim Ziegler at 7:08 PM on March 10 [1 favorite]

Yay kirkaracha, for keeping it going! It’s getting better and will keep doing so!
posted by Brandon Blatcher (staff) at 7:12 PM on March 10

Sorry, forgot to build new CSS. Should be fixed now.
posted by kirkaracha (staff) at 8:24 PM on March 10 [1 favorite]

Yay, much better! There is still a mouseover on titles and names. Not sure if that's intended but I'll pop it in bug reports in case.
posted by brook horse at 8:37 PM on March 10

The mouseover thing was still there for me, but went away after bouncing around a few pages, so maybe a cache issue?
posted by dg at 8:39 PM on March 10

Damn, I already hopped off my computer for the night but I’ll try to check in the morning if it’s still there for me.
posted by brook horse at 8:48 PM on March 10

For browser recording purposes, should all Chromium browsers be "Chrome"? I'm using Vivaldi.
posted by Shepherd at 2:38 AM on March 11

If anyone wants to try a rolling conversation with me, I have kicked off a "what are you listening to these days" at https://www.metastaging.net/481/qui-dolores-tempora-deleniti-velit#2504. Ignore the double comment -- editing creates a second comment, which I see somebody has already logged as a bug.

Also -- "Reply" doesn't work, just add a new comment (that bug is also logged).
posted by Shepherd at 2:47 AM on March 11

Noting the discussion about icons versus text from the last thread, I realised that I don't mind icons per se, but it does really bug me that the icons below posts:

(a) don't match the text colour, particularly in dark mode
(b) aren't aligned with the rest of the text

It bugged me enough that I shopped up this image showing how I think it could be improved. In other words, use icons but make them appear like they're just special text characters, similarly to how ⚑ is used in the current site.

Of course this is totally minor visual stuff that shouldn't be a priority above other things, but since you took a decision to diverge from the current site on this, it's inevitably going to draw people's focus and I think this might help.
posted by automatronic at 3:22 AM on March 11 [2 favorites]

Dropping a note here to thank the developers, sysadmins, feedback organizers, testers, and other contributors! Appreciate your work!

In the previous post on the work-in-progress rebuild, there was a note:

I’m working on developer documentation and instructions to make it easier to contribute

Is this now available, or further along? I could probably help make suggestions on improving a draft, if you would like.
posted by brainwane at 5:27 AM on March 11 [1 favorite]

coming along really nicely! I like the background on individual posts, it's a nice visual separator. (in your dummy data, can you set it up to have multiple posts on the same day here and there? I've been using the "duplicate element" tool in the inspector to replicate it, but having that variation will help gut-check the spacing)

one quick thing: I notice that the dark/light mode text is visible when you're invisible but ends up the same color as the background when in dark mode.

otherwise I think many of the notes I sent over last time still apply, which makes sense since they're all pretty low priority. I'll take another pass at some point this week!
posted by Kybard at 5:58 AM on March 11

I see that https://www.metastaging.net/archives/2020/03/06 no longer results in a 500 error! What was the issue?
posted by grumpybear69 at 6:52 AM on March 11

Thank you to everyone for testing and suggesting improvements! We've had a couple of people help with coding already. This week I'll work on the remaining bugs, a WYSIWYG editor that supports Markdown, and developer docs.

It bugged me enough that I shopped up this image showing how I think it could be improved.

Ooh that's nice! I'll make the changes.

Of course this is totally minor visual stuff that shouldn't be a priority above other things, but since you took a decision to diverge from the current site on this, it's inevitably going to draw people's focus and I think this might help.

I want the site to look as nice as it can, and I really appreciate any tips for improvements.

I notice that the dark/light mode text is visible when you're invisible but ends up the same color as the background when in dark mode.

It was hard to work on the dark/light mode stuff before I got the switch working. I'll fix that this week.

I see that https://www.metastaging.net/archives/2020/03/06 no longer results in a 500 error! What was the issue?

I don't know. Elves?

I could probably help make suggestions on improving a draft, if you would like.

Thanks! I'll work on a draft this week.
posted by kirkaracha (staff) at 8:22 AM on March 11 [3 favorites]

This isn't a bug, per se, but it's very odd that the comment reply workflow is:

Hit Reply
Hit Yay Reply
Make comment
Hit Save Reply

Why is "yay reply" a step? It's just adding clicks/taps for no real reason, from a user perspective.

Also, when in a reply to a comment, the Cancel button does nothing. Hitting Yay Reply collapses the comment box but doesn't actually remove the contents of the comment. I would expect Cancel to wipe the contents of the box and collapse it, and I'm still not sure why Yay Reply is a thing.

I logged the Cancel-does-nothing thing as a bug, but the rest seem more workflow-y than bugg-y, so here I am and here they are.
posted by pdb at 9:55 AM on March 11

Why is "yay reply" a step?

It's for debugging. Also, it's fun!
posted by kirkaracha (staff) at 10:01 AM on March 11 [3 favorites]

I would expect Cancel to wipe the contents of the box and collapse it

That's how it will work. It's not there yet.
posted by kirkaracha (staff) at 10:02 AM on March 11 [2 favorites]

Ah, ok, cool on all counts. Thanks!
posted by pdb at 10:15 AM on March 11

Has a decision been made about making favourites/likes public or private?

20 years ago the norm was for 'likes' to be public, but most centralised social sites like Twitter, Facebook, TikTok have shifted to making them private, while federated sites Mastodon, BlueSky do still make them public (largely because that's unavoidable when federating) so I think people's expectations around this have shifted a little.
posted by Lanark at 11:39 AM on March 11

so, I looked at the new sign up page everything seemed good though, I think on the bottom one section, it said method payment ( PayPal etc) is this for new members or all members that are going to migrate to the new site and is it $5.
same as the old site.
posted by clavdivs at 1:46 PM on March 11

@clavdivs it doesn't actually charge you anything, it's just a test site, click through the buttons and it will let you in.
posted by Lanark at 1:56 PM on March 11 [1 favorite]

Lanark is right; the signup fees will be for new users only.

is it $5. same as the old site
$20, same as in town
posted by kirkaracha (staff) at 2:09 PM on March 11 [1 favorite]

These may have already been mentioned, but Dark Mode toggle is working, but doesn't appear to be persistent. I go into a thread, I have to toggle it. I leave a thread, I have to toggle it. Toggle, toggle, toggle!

Also, when you sign up, it won't take www or even http://, it requires the https:// when adding your own URL. Most other websites accept any of those and still conform the link. Here, it just tells you the URL is invalid and won't continue the sign up.
posted by headspace at 3:36 PM on March 11

Hit Reply
Hit Yay Reply
Make comment
Hit Save Reply
Why is it 'save reply' instead of 'add reply' to match the terminology of commenting?
posted by dg at 5:19 PM on March 11

when you sign up, it won't take www or even http://, it requires the https:// when adding your own URL

I took out the requirement for the URL you enter to be secure and secured it on the backend. BTW, the validation still checks for an active URL.

Dark Mode toggle is working, but doesn't appear to be persistent

I'll take a look.

Why is it 'save reply' instead of 'add reply' to match the terminology of commenting?

Because it's a beta version of a website and we don't have a functional spec or a copy deck. I'll change the button text.
posted by kirkaracha (staff) at 8:01 PM on March 11 [1 favorite]

Has a decision been made about making favourites/likes public or private?

I'm sorry, I haven't done a very good job at managing expectations. Up until recently I've been doing all the rebuild on my own*, with the goal of recreating the current site and only making relatively minor functional changes that I'm suggesting might be improvements. Which is fine.

Anything on the beta site so far* is either incomplete (very likely) or reflects whatever I typed in at that moment.

At some point we will have a pre-launch review where everything should be seen as a proposed final site, but we are very far from that point.

tl:dr; There haven't been any policy decisions like that. It's not my place. It's an early beta website.

* Several people have made code contributions, and others have volunteered. I need to write some documentation to make it easy for them.
posted by kirkaracha (staff) at 8:11 PM on March 11 [6 favorites]

At some point we will have a pre-launch review where everything should be seen as a proposed final site, but we are very far from that point.

Crap, that means I have communication fail, too. I will plan on having a roadmap next week.
posted by kirkaracha (staff) at 10:31 PM on March 11

Testing note: until we have a pre-launch review, assume anything you enter into the site (accounts, posts, comments, & etc.) could be replaced at any moment by the latest update.
posted by kirkaracha (staff) at 10:35 PM on March 11 [2 favorites]

I set up a feature request form for the new site.

Please check the list of requests to avoid submitting a duplicate.
posted by kirkaracha (staff) at 8:51 AM on March 13 [2 favorites]

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