New Forum Look - Line-Length Difficult to Read

Ecquillii wrote on 9/4/2009, 1:30 PM

I am ambivalent about the changes to the look of the forum in general, but one aspect is causing me distress: the line-length for a posting is now about 170 letters (before it wraps), which is far too long for the eye to scan comfortably. Long lines also impede comprehension. A shorter line-length, say 70 letters, would be both easier and faster to read, and much easier to understand. Having to maximize a window (or scroll side-to-side) before I can read it is also aggravating.

In a related manner, the new width of the first column on the forum postings page separates the information in the other columns by an unnecessary degree making it difficult to take in the other columns at a glance.

These changes do not aid intelligibility. I would hope that good design sense will prevail, and that we will see the return of a readable page.

Tim Robertson

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Comments

baysidebas wrote on 9/7/2009, 8:44 AM

The new non-wrapping line length slows down my access to the forum considerably.

I use Firefox with CoolPreviews (nee CoolIris)to make my forum surfing exceptionally efficient. The main Firefox window shows the bytopics page. From that i launch CoolPreviews and size it so it lies to the right of the topics and displays each thread individually. Before the forum "improvement" that thread would resize and wordwrap to fit, so i could easily follow the discussion thread and read each post without horizontal scrolling while keeping the topics in view for instant selection (if you're unfamiliar with CoolPreviews all you have to do is hover over the link and the preview window displays the contents of the linked page).

In the current forum, resizing the preview so it's legible makes the preview window so large that it totally obscures the bytopics window.

PLEASE restore the autowrap functionality of the thread view. That will in no way affect the forum layout, but will allow others to use it to maximum efficiency.

Harold Brown wrote on 9/7/2009, 8:01 PM

When the main replies to a website upgrade or change are either "hate it" or "I suppose I can live with it", then I mark the project as a giant F-A-I-L

So what do you have here...less than 10 people complaining? How can this be proof of a giant failure?

24Peter wrote on 9/8/2009, 6:36 AM

"Could be a browser issue, there is a "Submit" button on the Preferences page in my browser."

None here - I'm using IE8

farss wrote on 9/8/2009, 7:40 AM

I'm using IE8 too and that button is sure there.

Bob.

LReavis wrote on 9/8/2009, 9:53 AM

I rarely make negative comments - but silence of the majority does not mean acceptance; for that reason, I break my silence and agree - I'm having difficulty reading to the end of the long lines. Firefox running on Ubuntu . . .

erikd wrote on 9/8/2009, 9:56 AM

I have to concur that the width of the posts are now cumbersome to put it nicely. Maybe, maybe they will address this problem as we all spent quite a bit of time on this forum.

jabloomf1230 wrote on 9/8/2009, 10:04 AM

Hmmm, now I guess we know who all doesn't have a 16:9 monitor.

erikd wrote on 9/8/2009, 10:32 AM

No, actually I have 5 16x9 monitors. This is about how written text should be displayed on monitors, books, magazines, you name it.

jabloomf1230 wrote on 9/8/2009, 10:52 AM

I was saying that tongue in cheek.

But, to be serious about this "non-issue", John Cline and others have already described a simple work around for the long lines. Personally, I like the new look of the forum. The old format was getting pretty long in the tooth

FuTz wrote on 9/8/2009, 4:10 PM

Well, on my Acer Aspire One KAV10 everything's fine... :O)

Laurence wrote on 9/8/2009, 4:34 PM

Count mine as another vote against the current format. The lines are too long once you zoom in the text big enough for the reading glass set to read.

On Firefox or Explorer, if you hold the control and spin the mouse wheel, the browser web page will zoom in or out. My 47 year old eyes need reading glasses with a power of at least 2. Even then I like looking at large print. When I zoom into this forum large enough for my eyes, the words run off the page.

LReavis wrote on 9/8/2009, 5:23 PM

I can read the words when I fit the entire line on my screen; the problem is that scanning horizontally such long lines requires considerable attention in order to avoid getting lost - especially when several lines are in the paragraph (it's too easy to slip down or up to adjacent lines). We publish books for a living, typically in 8-1/2"x11" format, and ALWAYS use at least 2 columns; 3 is even more readable and we'd always use it except for difficulty with locating graphics in their proper place in the paragraph (they're either too small or else spill across the other columns).

erikd wrote on 9/8/2009, 10:36 PM

"But, to be serious about this "non-issue", John Cline and others have already described a simple work around for the long lines"

I don't think this is a non-issue. As I described earlier, I do not have a submit button on my preferences page in both IE7 and Firefox3.5. From what I can see, I'm not the only one with this issue. Whoever did the code on this latest update IMHO is not that experienced in doing this sort of thing.