IPB 4 Demo Site

Laughs, oh dear, here we goooooooooooo.

http://xenforo.com/community/threads/ips-4-preview-now-available.77328/

Will be slow, it's only a Beta test site yet. And currently getting hammered by visitors.

 

Matt has agreed about the font-size in editor and is increasing it to same as in posts. Good!

http://zend.ipsdevserver.com/ips4/t...-on-another-site/?do=findComment&comment=2629

 

They changed lots of things according to the supplied feedback. Check older threads on feedback section

though there are still things they don't want to listen

 

Is it me on the test site but the example advert is that to close to the forum name and/or topic title. Also the follow this is jumping some pages its rigt below the advert and sometimes its further down.

 

Have you noticed when creating a new paragraph that you only press ENTER key once to do it.

But XenForo and most other forum software, you need to press the enter key 2 times to create paragraph spacing. I kept doing it out of habit "using other forums" and creating double spacing for paragraphs on the IPB 4 demo. That takes some getting used to, because you press it 2 times out of habit when creating a new paragraph line.

 

The approach IPB uses is accurate

Return -> creates new paragraph
Shift - Return -> creates new line

Forum world tried to invent a new method but it didn't work well. IPB now choose to use the default configuration which is a great news imo

 

Thread Title hover popups are more advanced than XenForo. You have tabs to click in them.

 

Sidebar "latest Topics" shows reply counter number as well. That can come in handy in knowing which topics displayed in sidebar are most active with replies made - to click first for reading.

 

Rounded avatars seems to be the new internet rage now, seen lots of new wordpress themes doing same of late. But because they are rounded (not straight lines used) like square avatars, they lose a bit of sharpness on image quality with rough edges shown (being rounded). If anything, I'm not that keen on the new post icons used, must be the worst looking ones IPB have used.

But yeah, still prefer square avatars myself with a border around them.

 

For me the slowness usually lie within model windows rest of the pages load really fast even with my mid size adsl connection. Specifically notifications , i am really disappointed with current notifications. I understand it is still in beta but my disappointment usually lies on the initial planning. Let me highlight the problems i see to see what you guys also think :

1. Duplicate Notifications : When you have an active board , notifications play a very critical role to notify user. However on IPB 3.4 and 4 they choose to display notifications separately http://d.pr/16R8/3EBJSocK This is kind of problematic because for end user it is very hard to identify differences on notifications. Neowin and we both tried some possible solutions but the limitations on 3.4 made improvements impossible. Best way to achieve perfectness is when you receive a notification that is duplicate, previous reply notification should automatically expire. Facebook does this perfectly so there is no reason to reinvent the wheel and adopt facebook notification model imo.
2. Instant Notifications : It doesn't exist in IPB 4 and it is kind of lame imo. We are on an age that nearly all websites, including social media, forum solutions, comment solutions etc.. display instant notification. IPB 4 should also support that, in fact they should think big and create built in OS X push notification support where any preferred websites can create their own account and have this feature.

However all of these things can be custom improved and developed. I just hope framework will not have IPB 3.4 limitations.

One additional thing that made me happy is , with IPB 4 i believe IPB team's old approach My way or the highway is changing. As stated before they welcomed the feedback and made really nice changes.

I am also happy because i see active webmasters supplying good feedback with mockups and a team who tries to work with their testers to achieve perfection. Kind of reminded me vBulletin 3 beta days

 

What is it, an Alpha version test site. It's very early days yet for people to be complaining about speed. When I used phpBB 3.1 beta 2 it felt slow compared to 3.o stable version. But now using RC 1 it's a lot better. The speed optimizing side of things I'd imagine will come later on once they're happy with everything else in it first. In the later RC stages maybe.

 

Dude no one is complaining about speed, in fact i am very happy with page load times

 

I didn't mean you, but have read others going on about it already on other sites. I also have not really noticed it being slow either.

 

That's very interesting. I left last year with the impression that IPS wasn't for me. Good to see positive change.

 

The start a new topic button on forum index is good, makes it easier in trying to help incite members into starting a new topic, rather than always replying to topics, usually.

 

To be honest, I think it's counter-intuitive. For example, after clicking the 'Create Thread' you have to scroll through a list of forums. It's probably quicker to go to the forum in the first place and create a thread.

 

I saw this yesterday. I knew I had to visit XF forums just to see what they had to say about it and I certainly was not disappointed for the laughs.

Especially harping on the "fact" that IPS copied Brogan's "Featured threads" add-on

But anyway I really do love this beta.

Monday Night I was in fanboy mode and I was really excited Tuesday I got out of fanboy mode and really just started exploring the software more.

Visually it is way more appealing than our current version and I enjoy using it.

There are a few annoyances.

I dislike how the status updates are being handled in 4.0(the current way we do it in 3.4.6 is perfect just about)

@Lizard King brings up two good points.

1. I dislike the fact that Instant/Live notifications are not apart of the Core. Especially for my users who I have to get out of chat and posting, but when you're in chat and talking and you get a noti of a reply to a thread you made or posted in, it is so convenient to have it pop up in the tab without having to constantly refresh.

I was a bit disappointed Charles seemed a bit close-minded towards that.

2. Notifications have been OKAY but as LK mentioned, I hate the multiple notifications....if I am following threads(Which I rarely do), I do not need a notification for EVERY SINGLE REPLY.

Other than that, I am quite thrilled and ready to test it on my own site<3

 

To be fair... Brogan posted about leaving the crap out the topic so it could stay open.

 

Agreed. Other members got out of hand. There's really no need for it.