This forum is really ergonomic

[trademark2 485]

Whoever designed this forum is to be commended. Its the best forum i have ever been on. I love the notification system, the recent post system, the status update system, and the private message system. They are all just so ergonomic.

And also the character limit. Basically everything about the forum is perfect.

[SynBassilicious Pony 322]

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Edited January 30, 2023 by SynBassilicious Pony

[trademark2 485]

It really makes the whole place more articulate and promotes discussion though. In a long post, there is ussually enough thought for a response

Edited December 29, 2016 by trademark2

[Scrubbed user 3,416]

 

 

love the notification system, the recent post system, the status update system, and the private message system. They are all just so ergonomic.

 

 

Notifications, status updates are part of IP Board, which is what this forum is built on with an MLP theme placed over it. Private messages are pretty much a part of any forum software.

[trademark2 485]

 

 

Notifications, status updates are part of IP Board, which is what this forum is built on with an MLP theme placed over it. Private messages are pretty much a part of any forum software.

 

Yes, but whats not a part of just any forum software is the ability to invite other ponies into the private conversation!

[Scrubbed user 3,416]

Yes, but whats not a part of just any forum software is the ability to invite other ponies into the private conversation!

 

I've seen it one Xenforo based forums, as well as notifications and status updates, so it isn't exclusive.

[Prospekt 11,018]

I've been on one Xenforo forum and several vBulletin forums. None of them are laid out quite as well as this one. Also, the character limit is genius, it helps boost post quality rather than filling threads with random "I agree" posts that have no substance.

[viper213 224]

I've been on one Xenforo forum and several vBulletin forums. None of them are laid out quite as well as this one. Also, the character limit is genius, it helps boost post quality rather than filling threads with random "I agree" posts that have no substance.

 

I have to agree, this forum is set out really well, and the character limit does stop really short answers that either derail a topic or just bring it to a grinding halt. very good design overall

[Rikifive 24,183]

As said before, all of these systems are given by IP Board, not the forum itself.
I'm active on some other forums that are powered by IP Board, so when I first came to MLP Forums, I recognized the forum structure instantly, which was nice, because I knew how things work right at the beginning.
 
Since we're talking about forums and how ergonomic they are, I wanted to mention something~
I do not like 4th version of IP Board, as its text editor is heavily bugged. In v.4, it's more automatic, thus easier to use for inexperienced in BBCode users. That would be a good feature if not the fact, that it messes the code very, very, very often, thus breaking your post. I've managed to discover these bugs (or apparently I have no idea how to use that text editor):

- sometimes not being able to select all (ctrl+a) when having multiple quotes in the post

I like to copy my post before posting it when it's long, to make a backup in case if sending would fail.

A workaround is to select the text manually using the mouse.

 

- Getting stuck in the quote and/or (I don't remember) spoiler, when it's at the end of the post.

When you have a spoiler/quote at the end, then you can only type in them or above, but can't get below them as using down key/mouse can't get past these, due to not having free space in here. As you know, to create a new line you can press ENTER, but even doing this makes a new line IN the spoiler/quote, so you're still stuck in them.

In v.3 you can double enter to leave the quote and type further, but it doesn't work in v.4 as it makes next lines in the quote/spoiler.

A workaround is to type above the quote/spoiler, then drag&drop quote/spoiler above the text. Then, you'll be able to continue typing.

 

- My favorite: Using <spoiler> tag manually causes problems when sending the post.

Many, many times when I tried to wrap things by typing manually <spoiler> content </spoiler>, the post was getting totally messed up after posting. For example, the end of the post being 'eaten' by one of the spoilers in the middle, thus basically misplacing things around. Now imagine a very long post (it was a presentation in my case) getting messed up - Yep, it took ~20+ minutes to fix the things around, because managing the spoilers through the special boxes in the editor takes much, much longer, than just copying things around spoiler tags like you can do this on this forum at the moment. At the beginning, I just thought I've derp'd, so after I fixed things, I tried again putting spoilers.. Aaaand. the same result.

After being unable to do anything with this, I've reported that to administrators. They told me, that now there's a spoiler button in the editor, that creates the spoiler box in the post and I should be using that instead of manually typing that code. I admit I didn't notice that button and after giving it a try, it worked perfectly. However, dealing with these boxes is still frustrating and that's why I love the version, that MLP Forums still use.

 
Besides these bugs it's worth mentioning, that in v.4 you can't view the raw version of your post (that's accessed by pressing the very first button in the upper-left corner) and that's a fatal flaw, because with that possibility, I would be able to bypass the bugs mentioned above, except the last one, as it's breaking while posting, not editing. Also, being able to copy the raw version makes it compatible with other forums etc. and even allows you to save all of it in a .txt file, unlike in v.4, where it has special boxes and stuff, that you obviously can't paste in a notepad.

 

v.3 isn't bug free either, as there are bugs and glitches related *something*. I'm pretty sure many of us experienced issues such as broken notification bar, messenger or status updates' comments, that won't open. It's possible to break these for other users on purpose, so that bug is one of the ways to troll members. (Since I know how to trigger those, I also know what to do to fix them)~ There are more bugs like glitching the whole page when putting *something* in post. Though these bugs are a minor thingie comparing to inconvenience coming from v.4.

 

I always knew, that I have great game-breaking skills, but wasn't aware, that they also work everywhere else. 

 
Why that wall of text is somehow relevant to the topic? Because I also love the current forum's systems and such, but I won't love them anymore if they'll decide to upgrade it to v.4.   I've heard something about planning to upgrade, so I'm sliiightly worried. 

 

Anyway, I agree with OP, that everything works nice now. I also love how things look like and it all is nicely organized. If I'd have to say few bad things about the forums, then that would be limited amount of off-site images in one post (10 I believe?). This ruined my post when I encountered that limit for the first time, when I was unaware of it. I had to reupload all images and redo the post here and there. Now that I'm aware of it, I'm working with attachments in the first place, but still, they're kinda inconvenient, because there's no preview (in the text editor, not preview post function), so it can get messy when working with many of them. Also, spamming 'My Media' with these isn't nice either. It's worth mentioning, that you can't attach these in some areas, so that makes troubles leaving you unable to post images. Personally, I've cheated on that by creating a thread in testing forums, where I'm hosting the attachments there and then 'calling' them from 'My Media' in threads, where attaching is disabled.

On top of that, you can't create clickable images as it's not possible to put a link in the attachment.

 

 

BUT! I have to admit, that I love the amount of customization thrown into the look of these forums. Everything is nicely ponified, thus creating a great atmosphere along the theme and the community. I really like the idea of testing forums as it allows to prepare thingies before deciding to post them, not mentioning other silly functions.  :-P

 

So.. what I wanted to say is that I love the current system.

 

 

Oh my princesses, these walls of text of mine. Now nopony will read it. 

Edited December 30, 2016 by Rikifive