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netsmithUK

New site design just went live!

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Cool, thanks for the quick response. Will look forward to the showroom stats update.

cheers,

Rob

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@IBIFTKH updated the viewing stats and they should stay up-to-date now. 26,000 page views were missing but have been added now :)

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Can anyone point me in the direction of the "add car to showroom" button when viewing the site in Safari on an Ipad please?

Thanks

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Click on 'Hamburger' menu in the top right hand corner

Click on your username (if its not showing you need to login)

This then expands to show you options

Im not set on this bit of UI so will add some bigger clearer options shortly.

Chris

 

addmodel.gif

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Thanks Chris.  It wasn't a clear option so I hadn't realised you could scroll down after clicking on my username which meant I couldn't see the rest of the options. 

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Agreed - its not right. Will do something better. I'm also working on a series of 'how to' guides and an update for subscribers in general.

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Can I just say great work with the new site...   thank you.

I really like seeing different large photos on the home page every time you visit the site, can I ask a question. Are they random or have you personally selected a few different ones. I visit the site approx 10-15 times a day (sad I know) but I've started to notice a few of the same ones re-appearing.  To be honest I thought if its random there's a chance of seeing a pic from my showroom or one of my buddies.. :) which got me visiting even more.... 

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@SRB Bloke At the moment they are random selected form previous competition winners. I do plan to expand that more in the near future - possible based on the number of times a model is favourited or even viewed but open to ideas. Because of the size and shape of the image not every photo would work but personally I don't mind  the cropping that happens, as it gives them a 'new interesting angle'

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Thanks for coming back to me so quickly, I think any idea that meant more members could see one of their own/best showroom pics could appear there would a create feature for all of us.  Maybe for now you could increase the range to the top ten of each competition..  Coincidentally, that might mean I get to see one of mine :);) 

or

maybe even any model thats been favourited over a given number of times.

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3 hours ago, SRB Bloke said:

Can I just say great work with the new site...   thank you.

I really like seeing different large photos on the home page every time you visit the site, can I ask a question. Are they random or have you personally selected a few different ones. I visit the site approx 10-15 times a day (sad I know) but I've started to notice a few of the same ones re-appearing.  To be honest I thought if its random there's a chance of seeing a pic from my showroom or one of my buddies.. :) which got me visiting even more.... 

I hear ya, it was a bit of a treat BITD when a model you might have in your showroom randomly showed up to the right in the "highlight reel" for the day, a quick 3 thumb collection that sometimes had a theme and other times were just cool to look at again. It was a bit of a treat to see your car pop up there from time to time. I am enjoying what little time I have had on the new site, but......

18 hours ago, netsmithUK said:

Agreed - its not right. Will do something better. I'm also working on a series of 'how to' guides and an update for subscribers in general.

THIS is what I will really be looking forward to as I am doing a little more iPad viewing these days more than I ever have. The Hamburger menu is a completely new and nearly foreign experience to me and I must admit it is off putting to learn all over again how to get to the things on the new site so I tend to give up fast and easy. I sorta miss the simple "MORE" link buttons to expand the showroom posts from the 10 or so front page thumbs into a little more detailed listing of all things put up for the set few days or such. As always, just my 2 cents worth. I am still pretty happy with the look, some fonts are a bit big, some are a bit cluttered and busy(sales,wanted,auctions area) and the learning curve is still with me, but it will sort itself out. I have to say the one thing I might be missing more these days is a way to make the photos bigger and centered in the window, the previous incarnation simply required you to punch on the photo to "zoom" in a bit and then there was the option to slideshow it. I know that it didn't always work like it was intended to, but, it was a neat feature to go through the post without a ton of scrolling. I find the bit where you can't look at a larger icon or avatar by pushing on it is another simple little pleasure I miss too. I know, progress, so getting used to it.

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Keep the feedback coming :)

I've made the hamburger menu a bit more obvious now. To be fair, its rapidly becoming a new standard in mobile sites so I didn't think people would struggle with it or not come across it before. That said I like things being clear so I like what I've done now more. I'm still working on how the drop down works. It was an initially idea that no one raised issues with during the beta phase testing, so it just move down the list of priorities to look at improving. It is on the list though.

The hover/more link wasn't really being used in any great numbers and also just doesn't work on mobiles or tablets (as there is no hover state) So I replaced it with the simple indicator that if you click on takes you to the relevant listing, pre sorted on date order descending. I think its going to stay this way for a while until I get more feedback or see the usuage stats dropping.

Zoom photo / Slideshow again we small hacks I put in years ago, but were very litte used by visitors to the site, so, talking of clutter - they just seemed to be noise on the page for most. That coupled with the fact the size I'm displaying them at now on the page itself is almost the size you got when you zoomed in any way, just made me think they were a good target for simplification/the chop. Again they may come back again in some form - jury still out on that.

Quote

I find the bit where you can't look at a larger icon or avatar by pushing on it is another simple little pleasure I miss too

I'm not quite sure I follow on this one? Can you let me have a bit more detail

Cheers

Chris.

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31 minutes ago, netsmithUK said:

Keep the feedback coming :)

I've made the hamburger menu a bit more obvious now. To be fair, its rapidly becoming a new standard in mobile sites so I didn't think people would struggle with it or not come across it before. That said I like things being clear so I like what I've done now more. I'm still working on how the drop down works. It was an initially idea that no one raised issues with during the beta phase testing, so it just move down the list of priorities to look at improving. It is on the list though.

The hover/more link wasn't really being used in any great numbers and also just doesn't work on mobiles or tablets (as there is no hover state) So I replaced it with the simple indicator that if you click on takes you to the relevant listing, pre sorted on date order descending. I think its going to stay this way for a while until I get more feedback or see the usuage stats dropping.

Zoom photo / Slideshow again we small hacks I put in years ago, but were very litte used by visitors to the site, so, talking of clutter - they just seemed to be noise on the page for most. That coupled with the fact the size I'm displaying them at now on the page itself is almost the size you got when you zoomed in any way, just made me think they were a good target for simplification/the chop. Again they may come back again in some form - jury still out on that.

I'm not quite sure I follow on this one? Can you let me have a bit more detail

Cheers

Chris.

Alright, that seems to give me the information that was lacking in my head, the site is geared a little more heavily toward MOBILE devices which I don't get to use as much as I mentioned, I am just starting my use of an iPad for computing and such. I am one of those dinosaurs attached to a desktop computer most times. I admit, my wife thinks I am married to it more than to her, so perhaps this change and use of the iPad could help my marriage, or not??? Who knows. LOL

 

Hamburger menus are something alltogether new to me, so there you have it, will work with sorting that out. Where I totally agree the photos are as big if not better than the old ZOOM function, perhaps it is the left margin justification that is throwing me a bit for orientation purposes. I know, visual/spatial, call me Sheldon Cooper I guess, but it seemed nice to have  the photos front and centered before with that function and perhaps now since the comments are below the posts, could you think about the option to put the photos in the posts in the center of the screen and not off to one side with a distracting amount of white space over to the right?? Just me asking, not demanding or throwing a fit.

 

On the Avatars, two things, the SUBSCRIBER ribbon does seem a bit distracting in its size, but it also sometimes covers up the finer details of the photo in the square, my own Avatar is a perfect example, but someone like SCollins Avatar isn't obscured as much with the ribbon. It is those same Avatars on the members "ABOUT ME"(old name) page that I always liked to see in larger format as often times, the photo was something not seen in a showroom post or anywhere else.


If that doesn't clear up a few things, let me know.
Thanks again Chris,
Chris

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Its not that its biased towards mobile devices now, as opposed to , while the first version was very definitely built for desktops (where I still had to limit things for average screen sizes 1024px at the time), this new version has been built to play nice on 'all' devices. That doesn't mean its built around the lowest common denominator, more that we don't build things that just don't work on different devices. There will still be some things that look better on the desktop. Thanks for all the extra info will look into it.

BTW for those into stats (like me ;) ) I've just about finished this new feature - only visible to the model owner. Should be released in the next day or so.  

dailystats.jpg

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Well, I sure hope I didn't imply that I felt it was only aimed at mobile, I realize that us dinosaurs will have to upgrade sometime this decade too, but I am figuring most code from this day onward will have to play nicely with all the gadgets in the world and I don't mind the learning, but it does make it interesting at best to go from one look to the other for me, and I FOR ONE am interested in STATS, so looks interesting to me.

Chris

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The daily stats view is now live. You should only see it on your own models (This is really down to Google Analytics limiting how often I can hit their API) 

Some times the number might not quite add up to the number of views shown in other places on the site but this is down to google not me :)

Chris

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I've introduced 'click for bigger picture' in just the showrooms at the moment also done some work on the same pages that should significantly make them quicker to load.

 

More updates later (wife out and no chore list left behind ;) )

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Im going to start displaying 'updated showroom' items on the site probably on the home page and possibly somewhere else, to show off any models entries that people have recently edited. With the new 20 photo limit (and the fact you can still link enteries together) I hoping its going to work really really well for recording builds and restoration projects over time on the main site. I've added the code to record the 'last edited date' now, so just need to decide how and where to display them.

Cheers

Chris

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I have just uploaded a new listing in my showroom but it seems only I can see it? When I log out of the main page it's gone...?

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@wandy the home page runs of a bit of a cache for none logged viewers. It should appear shortly. I'm still experimenting with the best options ( if it updates too often it slows the site for everyone )

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33 minutes ago, netsmithUK said:

@wandy the home page runs of a bit of a cache for none logged viewers. It should appear shortly. I'm still experimenting with the best options ( if it updates too often it slows the site for everyone )

Ok thanks...seems to have turned up now.

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Tried looking at the new TC site last night for the first time on a tablet running Android - the large logo at the top of the page shows up but scrolling down the page it just goes blank ?

 

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Will look into it.

BTW think I might have already mentioned it earlier but planning on showing 'updated models' on the home page, so those people that want to show a whole build/restore story over time or just want to update pictures can do that. You can see it here

https://tamiyaclub.com/defaultbeta.asp

Its all @Jimbo at the moment as I've not implemented 'user grouping' at the moment. Will see how its used as to if I need to do that or not.

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