My only big concern is not having the search box. I genuinely think that that will help. There have been plenty of old threads I wish I could find from back when I was a newer member, but I have to go through about 20 or so pages of my posts to find them. 

Honestly, I never use the index page; I just go straight to the board. But, looking at the index, and the donation thing... I think it would be best suited, in my opinion, to put it in between the Retro Game Room / Vizzed Board tables and the Site Announcement Table. Maybe move the Donation Info over too from the Information Table into the box. If you at least did the new placement for the Donation Box, instead of putting it up between announcements and Private Messages, it would still seem eye popping, but not so " gimme gimme, I'm not doing so well, so I'm going to shove this in your face and beg for donations. " I mean, I get that you need money to run the site and support your family, and I have no experience unlike you, but I would think that you wouldn't want to seem so begging, but that would you rather want to seem more... requesting, for a lack of words; I'd think you would want to seem more requesting than begging. 

As for "3", that was basically going to what you replied with saying you had plans for that space to the left and the right of the Navigation and Information pages. 

Also, I just thought of something you could add. I'm not sure where you would put it; probably in the middle scrollable tables ( which I find very attractive and inviting, by the way )... a list of recently active threads, and maybe a list of new threads. That would invite people to post more... and more page views means more money for you, right? 


I mean, I guess I like it, thinking about it, now. My main concern is just all of the unused White Space floating around, and the donation button being where it is. 

Yes, that one. I think it had a nice look to it.

I agree with thing somewhat.  But if it must be done, I'm totally cool with it and can get used to the new design.  Whatever is best for the site.

Would you give an option to go back to how vizzed looks now for users? 

I really don't like how it isn't stretched to the edge of the page, all of that empty space is just annoying. And the page just looks bunched up, and its kind of hard to read it all as it is all over the place, and it seems that the text is smaller. 

And the OCD in me says that the donation button isn't in a good spot. Having that splash of yellow/orange right in the middle of everything, throws off all of the colors. 

If you need to do this to keep the site going, then that's fine, but I just don't really like the look of it. 

If you're going to keep it how it is, I'm agreeing with thing1 and saying that stretching the text boxes to the end if really what we would really like to see different about the new look. 

I'm probably in the minority here, but I like the new design pretty well. It's more concise (something I really prefer in a website. Just me), and I'm just really liking it. It also doesn't lose the iconic look of Vizzed that much.

Also, for the life of me, I can't find the donation button. I'm probably looking right at it, but I just can't see it, lol.

And all the coding simplifications sounds great. It will definitely help when coding in new features, and just decrease the amount of space required for the website. I say go with it .

I actually tried something interesting... I asked my family which layout is better. (I showed them the original and the new layout. My family never goes to vizzed)

My whole family liked the new one better. And I seemed to be the only one to like the original one better. I guess David is right about how the new site layout can look more appealing to new comers, though, users with some experience on vizzed may not like it until they get used to it. 

So it's really about getting used to it. I hope the new layout ends up great. 

I rarely spend any time on the index page of the site, so if changing it to the more condensed version makes it a lot more practical while not drastically changing the page I'm all for it. What I'm concerned about is the Boards Index Page. I spend most of my time here and I love the layout of it. I like how the "Your Information" "Your Friend Actions" "Your Online Friends" and "Site Information" boxes are set up and I really don't want to see them go.

I do not like that layout. I am so used to the normal one, it's going to be really frustrating for me.

I'm willing to compromise and listen to feedback in order to make this new design as appealing as possible to as many of you as I can. So here's how you guys can help.
1. Tell me 1 thing you guys like most of the previous design and I'll try and keep it.
2. Tell me 1 thing you guys hate most of the new design and I'll try and change it.


thing1 : I'm hoping to find a place for the donation link that would be part of every page and not just the index but I've removed it from the message center. Currently the donation stuff is on every page and if I were to do something that made it not appear on every page, the site would get a huge drop in donations and donations help me fund events and RGR Plugin updates.

The space on the left and right will be reserved for cool things like "Most viewed pages", "Your favorite pages", "Your last posted in threads", "What you're friends are currently doing", and stuff like that.


imamonster : So you'd like this?
https://www.vizzed.com/indexnew.php?pageBackground=images/circuit-nebula-background.jpg&pageBackgroundRepeat=repeat-x

Fortunately with the way I'm creating things, you'll be able to use that old background again


supernerd117 : Thanks, I appreciate it when users have that kind of attitude.


Barathemos : Not really because a lot of work has gone into this new design, not just what you guys are seeing but the entire architecture of the code behind this. If I were to allow users to use this the old look then it'd increase the time it'd take me to do updates to current pages and the time it takes me to add new pages and features to the site by almost 200%!

As I already mentioned, I plan to utilize that empty space with some very exciting and innovative features.

If the text size is an issue, I can look into increasing the font size a little.

The donation stuff has been removed from the message center.

When you say "stretching the text boxes", you mean the side menus right? Unfortunately that's just not possible as far as I know. First of all, the point of the menus are to move with you when you scroll the page so they can't go to the end of the page. Second of all, I have to have them fixed height so that they match each other, otherwise 1 would be taller than the other if their height was based on the content within them and that'd look unbalanced. And last of all, their current height should be perfect for small monitors.


ZeroTails : Thank you. I feel the same way, it still has the iconic vizzed look and yet looks more modern, easier to use and far more efficient. The entire site will have a consistent layout now as I migrate each page to this new look.

The donation button actually disappears if you're a staff member since that box is filled with staff inboxes. I ended up just removing it though for now until I find a better spot for it.


mohammedroxx3 : That's an awesome test and it proves that this really is a far more superior design and layout. I think sometimes nostalgia and what we're familiar with can cloud our minds. It'll just be a matter of getting use to but I think once users do, they'll like it better. I've changed the layout and design of vizzed multiple times in the past and usually users admitted that once they got use to the upgrade, they liked it better.


tgags123 : That layout and design will be applied to most of the pages of the site. I'll try and keep what I can of the elements that you guys like of the forum index.


GamingN00B : Basically refer to what I said to everyone else.

Davideo7 : Yaaay! I am really happy about that, thanks for doing that, I think a lot of us like the old layout.

imamonster : It wont be the default scheme but I'll definitely make it possible for you to choose that scheme for yourself

Davideo7 : np!  

"Here are some things you can test out with that design. First of all, press refresh a few times. The page may not refresh instantly but you may not even notice that it reloads because the page is incredibly light weight (compare the refresh time to the site index for example). The HTML is less than half of the size of the original page, the graphics are a lot smaller and the overall code is much cleaner (I've eliminated tables, have made better use of styles and classes, eliminated a lot of unused stuff, etc)."

Confirmed. The page reloads in tab only (as if the page isn't even being refreshed).

"Another thing you can test out is the menu. If you scroll the page, you'll notice the menu follows you and if you shrink your browser, you'll notice that it will not overlap the footer."

Confirmed.

"Also try clicking the Announcement links in the left menu to see how this new design will benefit various pages such as the game pages."

The Announcement links work... they go to the different announcements on that page.

tRIUNE : Cool, thanks

Hm... it depends on the monitor I'm using. With my old laptop with a big screen, the page looks all empty and lifeless with all those spaces thrown around (the space at the left and right side irks me a bit) the font doesn't look well there either (too small). However, using my desktop with smaller screen and resolution, it looks cool and the font is okay. Overall the page looks more organized and cleaner. As for the donation link or image, I can't see it anywhere... It would be nice to have an image custom-made primarily for vizzed donation instead of using the usual paypal donation button/image.

Juliet : I have some pretty cool and innovative plans for the empty space on the left and on the right. I also made the font slightly bigger from 12px to 13px.
https://www.vizzed.com/indexnew.php

Awesome Glad to hear it's not going to remain empty forever. I'm not sure about the other users but the page looks neat for me and I like it better so far (after the font size change) compared to our current index. For the sake of nitpicking though, are the options in the message center supposed to have different font sizes? The table cell for the mod inbox considerably has smaller font than the other cells. The 'Announcements' cell also doesn't display the whole info or caption properly.

Are you going to redesign the whole site (forum + rgr + index)?

Image upload: 271x80 totaling 12 KB's.

Juliet : Since some mods have a lot of inboxes, the font size of the mod inboxes are smaller to fit multiple links to multiple inboxes. A global has access to 3 and admins 4 so they all have to be able to fit in there. I'll come up with a solution to that in the future but non-staff users don't have that box so all of the links to the inboxes will all be the same size for them.

As for the announcements box having text that cuts off, I guess that's sorta my fault for making an announcement title so big. Usually those should be a lot smaller so it's rare that it'll cut off like that.

I do have plans of applying this new design to every page of the site in some way eventually.

Davideo7 : Just a little something extra, it seems as if the new page doesn't show who sent a private message under the message. Is this the same for you or is it just me? There seems to be enough room as to where you would be able to fit who sent the message. 

And I see you're currently testing with the side bars lol

Barathemos : It does for me, that's weird. Could you take a screenshot of what you're seeing?

Yeah I've been working on the page on and off. I'm currently working on implementing optional content in the empty spaces on the left and right. Keep in mind that if you look at the page when I'm in the middle of testing certain things, it may not display properly lol.