Some comments about the forum design

[Anonymous]

Two usability problems on your website:

1. Pale blue lettering on a white background? You have to be kidding. I hate wiping noseprints off the screen. Come on, please use a little more contrast, and increase the size while you’re at it.

2. For a site aimed at people with ADD not to have a search engine to find topics, especially in the forums, is really thoughtless. You know that we are easily distracted, but you’re going to make us search line by line for the subject matter we need? What’s wrong with THAT picture.

Combine these two problems. and you end up with someone hunched over with his face in the monitor, scrolling down line by line to see if any of the headings contain a clue that indicates the information that he’s looking for. And just how long do you think I’ll do that before I just give up and post the question as a new topic rather than accessing the info already published.

Speaking of which … see the next post!

REPORT ABUSE

[billd]

RESPECTFULLY, I disagree, and will back my OPINIONS, such as they are:

I find the colors relaxing for a change………. which I need badly. No bold red, no bright distracting colors, no flashing images or moving text. THANK YOU! I feel more relaxed here than at the car forum I RUN myself (with some moderators helping)

This is a calm relaxing place. Again, my opinion only, yours may vary……….

I agree with the lack of search, however, on forums that are in the world for a little while, google will allow you to search by domain.

So you CAN use google’s advanced features and tell it you want to search the totallyadd.com domain for whatever key words you choose. Bing probably does the same – search by domain. Keep a tab open to google, a tab open to this forum.

Just a thought –

Actaully, I’m pretty calm right now, but reading your post, sorry while I LOL – I see myself posting that exact thing on a different day!

I guess so far, little problem and I’m 53, far-sighted, bad eyes, one doesn’t even work and I guess I”m getting by.

Maybe later I’ll try to find something and get frustrated and come back agreeing with ya!

REPORT ABUSE

[Anonymous]

I think the format is exceptional but it does have room for improvements. We should have access to emoticons and smilies. They are very effective tools for us to express our thoughts, emotions and feelings. A customizible skin would be helpful. Make a list folks. It might take a while but I hope they will be taken into consideration. After all isn’t creativity one of the strongest rewards of having ADD is all about?

REPORT ABUSE

[Anonymous]

I was not, at any point in my comment, advocating flashing images, moving text, or anything else of the sort. Where you might find cyan on white relaxing, I find it almost impossible to read, I do a lot of work online, historical research, contracted information research and development, even a bit of information design, so I have seen a lot of web design, good, bad, and indifferent.

So for a website’s design to seem to actively discourage people from using it as effectively as possible seems to me to be worthy of comment.

The point of web usability is to make the site as useful to the greatest number of people immediately. Of course I could impose my own set of standards, I could zoom to make the letters larger I could force the website to display the colors that I choose, I can use another search engine, but I shouldn’t have to.

I will readily admit that my eyes are old. I medicate them for glaucoma. I use a special set of reading glasses for my computer. Even so, the use of color and the size of text in these forums is harder to read than the many hundreds of other websites that I visit daily.

Probably one of the reasons that I find it so frustrating is that I used to do a lot of work in concepts of universal usability of information, trying to make sure that the information that my group produced would be available with minimum effort for people who had any type of perception or mobility impairment.

A simple change of the heading color from cyan to something that has a bit more contrast would not be dreadful for someone with normal vision, but makes a great deal of difference to someone whose eyesight is less than perfect. Ditto for increasing the type size a couple of points.

REPORT ABUSE

[Anonymous]

i think this site could use a “new posts” button that shows the new posts since you were last on rather then just showing everyone that last few posts made.

REPORT ABUSE

[billd]

I agree on the “new posts” button…. that really comes in handy for an active forum and busy people.

We have one – here’s the site/forum I run:

http://theamcforum.com/forum

The entry page, designed by my son, a professional web designer and advertising person, working for Gannett publishing company (the ads on cars.com – many of them are by him)

Here’s the entry or home page for the forum:

http://theamcforum.com

Unfortunately, my OWN home page for personal use is acting up..

From a design standpoint, for signage, etc., black text on a canary background is proven to be the most visible….. but certainly not great for a web site.

I understand that different eyes have different needs, and certainly can’t argue that you should have no issues with these colors….

The text size you’ll find is pretty standard for almost all forums. i’m a member of several forums, mostly automotive, several computer, internet and security related sites, some have SMALLER text! Not saying it’s ok, or good, etc. – not by any means. Just saying – compared to quite a few, this one is pretty “standard” and I wonder if the colors were not chosen on purpose to relax. Colors have everything to do with mood. I get really wound up with certain colors, myself.

I believe it’s certainly worthwhile for everyone to have their say and the site owners do what’s best for the majority, or for the site type. It that means it’s no longer these colors, so be it

(yes, we need smilies, etc.)

REPORT ABUSE

[Saffron]

Hold down your “Ctrl” key and move the little wheel on the top of your mouse. Your type size will increase or decrease, quickly and easily, to whatever extent you like.

I’m sorry to hear that the site doesn’t meet your needs, and I can’t imagine how challenging it must be to deal with impaired sight when you read so much. Please take care not to confuse your frustration with an assumption that the site founders are “thoughtless.” They are anything but.

I’m one of those who keeps coming back here partly *because* of the site’s calm, clean design. I like it very much.

REPORT ABUSE

[Anonymous]

This is an important line of information and needs to be stored by us and our computer engineering team.

info@totallyadd.com

REPORT ABUSE

[billd]

>>I’m one of those who keeps coming back here partly *because* of the site’s calm, clean design. I like it very much. <<

Make that two of us……………and I run a forum myself! Granted it’s for car folks, but this is a much easier calmer and more pleasing design. Mine is bright and bold and “busy”.

I am a web designer (though my SON is a ton better, and a professional) and IT person, and there’s a whole lot of tricks one can use to make any site more usable – including your own CSS file to apply to web pages, the trick mentioned about type size, you can go into the browser settings, you can even use some of the Windows features to increase type size, set screen resolution, get a bigger screen, use dual screens, etc.

I’m blind in my right eye, my left has such poor vision I can’t make out the nose on your face if you are 5 feet in front of me unless I have my glasses- and I use a computer about 16 hours a day. I have to for my work – I write VBScripts and run the av/security here.

Saffron’s tip is one of the most useful I’ve seen in a good long time, and I work in Voc Rehab with computers!

Way to go, Saffron!

REPORT ABUSE

[Philabuster]

I like the forums, but there is room for improvement.

This is an international forum. People are sharing medical knowledge but depending what country you are in matters. We need to have our LOCATION listed under our screen name. It can be as generic (USA, Canada, etc) or as specific (my hometown, and state) as the poster wants it, but it really needs to be there.

Emoticons are a big part of effective forum communication. I can make a statement have several different meanings depending on which emoticon I put next to it. Conversely, the reader can also interpret my post through his eyes and he may not get my intent without a little additional facial clues the icons convey.

Search would be nice, but not mandatory as Google can work for that.

REPORT ABUSE

[trashman]

all i can say to the site people is Thanks for all the information i can find my way around ok, so great job. thanks for the free site without all kinds of ads. so AGAIN i SAY thank you>

REPORT ABUSE

[Anonymous]

Anytime you have trouble with the size of the font, just remember that you can enlarge the screen’s viewing size quite easily. Now that I’ve developed old-age eyeitis, I need to magnify the screen’s size all the time. That particular feature is located right on my tool bar at the bottom (and I’m forever hitting it when I really mean to be adjusting the volume for a video clip).

The colour? Why I vote for a beautiful pink! Why? Because I’m a girl and used to play with Barbies eons ago(and Barbie loves pink!) and blue is so….well, blue! Anyway, experts would say that pink is so much more calming. Why? I’ve no idea but they must have spent $$$$$ testing all the colours out for some strange reason.

Or what about yellow? Such a sunny warm colour!

Really? I find the colour great as it is. The web page is clean, clear and uncluttered. It makes it much easier to look at when I’m here. The font size is difficult for me to read but I’m finding any normal sized font to be trying right now. All that means is I need to go and put on my glasses and then it’s perfectly fine.

REPORT ABUSE

[Anonymous]

I didn’t design this site but I am a graphic designer by training, a Sr. Technical support rep with an Internet/Hosting company and frequent user and Admin of many forums.

This forum is a WordPress based forum so it is possible to include a search feature and the extra profile information under your profile image. The question would be would be will it negatively impact the site as a whole? Will it cause extra bandwidth to be used?

@melmoth The site is clean, uncluttered laid out well. This being a forum for people with attention issues I say it works. I recommend using the Accessibility tools found in windows or adjust your monitor’s resolution.

Also people may be allot more likely to take your suggestions if they didn’t come across like you were tearing into them. If the designers are ADD that sort of stuff will just shut them off to what you’re saying.. I know it did for me.

REPORT ABUSE

[Anonymous]

I agree with the emoticones idea! I find it clarifies what tone I’m intending when I write. I’ve had problems before with the tone of an e-mail being misinterpreted. As for adding more info about us, the country or city name… I disagree. The more info about me, the more the people who know me could identify me on this forum. Not that I’m ashamed of what I say or anything but I like my anonymity. I feel really free to express myself. Altough, the name of the country is vague enough. That’d be ok I guess. They could also, like on Facebook, let us choose our confidentiality settings.

REPORT ABUSE

[Anonymous]

Thanks for your comments. You can now search to your heart’s content in the search box on the forum home page. Don’t search rude words though, it will make your computer explode. ❗

REPORT ABUSE

[Author]

Posts