Re-skinning the Forum

GospelTruth

So, there has been a lot of discussion about how users don't like the layout of the new forum. I showed in some other threads what Polk could do to make the forum look better by editing the stylesheets for the forum site. I figure that's never going to happen and we are left to live with what we have.

Never one to settle, I wondered if there was a way to override the stylesheets for a website within a browser. After a little research and some trial and error, I found a method to make the site more palatable for myself. I wanted to share that with you all so you can do so if you want as well. This is browser specific stuff, so it will only apply to browsers that you install the add on for and override the stylesheet.

Here you go:

1. First, you will need to download a plugin for either Google Chrome or Mozilla Firefox and install it. The plugin is called Stylish.
   
   • Stylish for Chrome
   • Stylish for Firefox
2. Once installed, you will see the icon for Stylish in the upper right of your browser. I have an example below highlighted.
   
3. Click on the icon for Stylish and edit the style sheet
4. Once open, look at the highlighted fields in the image below:
   
5. You will need to edit the style to save. I called it Polk Audio Forum in the name field.
6. You will need to edit what sites this applies to. In the dropdown pick URLs for the Domain. In the free form field put forum.polkaudio.com. This will apply your style to any page under the domain for the forum.
7. Lastly, you will need to insert the overriding styles. I am attaching text documents in subsequent comments with the styles in them. All you need to do is put the content of the text files in the code section area.
8. Save.

You are done and the new styles should apply to the forum. See subsequent comments for styles.

GospelTruth

Here is close to the style I was working on before. It's not perfect by any stretch, so please don't critique at this point. I'll try to refine and fix little issues. It's a starting point though.

Main objectives:

• Allow widescreen mode
• Segment Comments better
• Clean right hand navigation
• Better font colors for reading ease

You will need to open the SytleCode-001.txt file, copy the code and put it in your Stylish plugin.

The style will give you this look:

MrBuhl

That's pretty impressive! Good work!

Sherardp

Worked for me, thanks for sharing.

GospelTruth

If you want something closer to what we currently have, here's another style you can download (it's attached to this comment)

Main objectives:

• Allow widescreen mode
• Better display breadcrumbs
• Segment Comments better
• Clean right hand navigation

You will need to open the SytleCode-002.txt file, copy the code and put it in your Stylish plugin.

The style will give you this look:

GospelTruth

If there is something you don't like about the forum look/feel and would like to see if I can change it for you all as a group, let me know what you wish was different. I can only edit things through the stylesheet and cannot do any HTML changes using these plugin tools. If you want something like hiding the Share This button that took up it's own thread, I'm pretty sure I can incorporate that type of change.

These changes doesn't remove ANY of the functionality of the forum itself - it just may hide certain things, change the look feel and so on.

Let me know if there is something I can help change using the Stylish plugin. I'll take all your suggestions and put them in a new stylesheet.

BlueFox

You are doing a great job. One question. Is your picture above widescreen? It looks the same to me. Also, can you move the column on the right side to the left side? Thanks.

GospelTruth

I can look at moving the column to the left side. I think that is doable if that's what a lot of folks prefer.

As to the widescreen, yes it is set to expand depending on your screen size. I have the center being 80% of the screen width with this new format. Polk has this fixed at 960 pixels max. On my laptop I can tell, but on my 24" monitor I can really tell. I can set it to be 85% instead of 80% and you could probably tell more so in the attached images.

Try it out and see what you think and thanks for the feedback.

tonyb

Re-skinning ?

Only one dude worthy of that....Rick88. The man has a way with "skin".

GospelTruth

BlueFox wrote: »

You are doing a great job. One question. Is your picture above widescreen? It looks the same to me. Also, can you move the column on the right side to the left side? Thanks.

Something along these lines?

BlueFox

Good job. Yes. For whatever reason, I prefer that type of thing on the left. Maybe because I am left handed. Too bad Polk is DOA on fixing this forum.

F1nut

Something along these lines?

No, that's just wrong. Probably because I'm right handed.....LOL

WilliamM2

Looks much better. If the sidebar can be moved to the right or left, can it be put at the top or bottom?

That would allow post to actually be widescreen.

BlueFox

Good point, or make the side bar a separate page. Then just a link is needed to switch back and forth.

GospelTruth

WilliamM2 wrote: »

Looks much better. If the sidebar can be moved to the right or left, can it be put at the top or bottom?

That would allow post to actually be widescreen.

BlueFox wrote: »

Good point, or make the side bar a separate page. Then just a link is needed to switch back and forth.

Well, those things will require changes to the HTML and how the page is actually built. I agree with you that it would be better to have all that information in something like a header with drop down menus for login, categories, new discussion, logout and so on rather than taking up all that space on the side of the discussions. It would be better web design. However, that's not how the site is currently built and there are limitations on what can be done with the stylesheets. I'm sure it could be done with access to the application itself, but it can't be done by stylesheets alone in this case.

I can always make the "widescreen" wider. Instead of 80%, I can make it 90% or 95% of the page width instead. I can make some changes, do a screenshot and post it later tonight.

WilliamM2

I was afraid of that. I already tried making the width 100%, works fine but the Polk logo stays on top of everything else, which just looks weird. And it doesn't gain much with the sidebar anyways.

I also noticed the edit button no longer works? I had to turn off stylish to edit this post.

Thanks for your efforts.

TennMan

Good job @GospelTruth. The last posts about moving things around prove why it is so hard to come up with the perfect forum layout. Everyone has a different idea of what the perfect forum layout should be. Some people like information boxes on the right, some like them on the left, some like three columns with the main forum in the middle and some people like a forum to be like a clean sheet of white paper with only text and no clutter at all. It's just hard to please everyone. I'm left handed and I like the information boxes on the right. It seems like they are easier to ignore on the right but they are still available when you need them.

WilliamM2

TennMan wrote: »

Good job @GospelTruth. The last posts about moving things around prove why it is so hard to come up with the perfect forum layout. Everyone has a different idea of what the perfect forum layout should be. Some people like information boxes on the right, some like them on the left, some like three columns with the main forum in the middle and some people like a forum to be like a clean sheet of white paper with only text and no clutter at all. It's just hard to please everyone. I'm left handed and I like the information boxes on the right. It seems like they are easier to ignore on the right but they are still available when you need them.

I don't really care where the sidebar is located on most forums. The problem with Vanilla, is that they take up too much real estate. That makes the post area too small.

TennMan

WilliamM2 wrote: »

I don't really care where the sidebar is located on most forums. The problem with Vanilla, is that they take up too much real estate. That makes the post area too small.

I agree. I like a forum to be simple with lots of room devoted to reading and making posts. I hate a long list of sticky posts that make you scroll to read recent posts. I think something worthy of a long term sticky should be added as an item in the main menu. The photo below is an example of what I think a simple forum should look like. It's not based on Vanilla so I it's not useful for modifying this forum. It's just something I've been playing around with.

fossy

this has been beat to death ....cut to the chase ... Polk forum is run by Polk and they rule .... they choose what the forum looks like , not us .. we are guest here because we admire/ use polk products ...wanna run the forum ... buy polk ... I mean the company ..just buy it out right & you can run it the way ya want

fossy

i guess im a bit grouchy today .... no disrespect to anyone meant

TennMan

fossy wrote: »

i guess im a bit grouchy today .... no disrespect to anyone meant

No disrespect taken on my part. We all have a right to voice our opinion. I think most people participating in this thread are just sharing their ideas on forum design. I don't think we are beating it to death. We are discussing changes we would like to see. I don't expect any changes to come from it and I doubt anyone else does.

F1nut

The last posts about moving things around prove why it is so hard to come up with the perfect forum layout.

We had the perfect forum layout, vBulletin.

GospelTruth

fossy wrote: »

this has been beat to death ....cut to the chase ... Polk forum is run by Polk and they rule .... they choose what the forum looks like , not us .. we are guest here because we admire/ use polk products ...wanna run the forum ... buy polk ... I mean the company ..just buy it out right & you can run it the way ya want

You're right, this has been beat to death. I'm just providing a way to fix some things that Polk doesn't seem to want to fix that members here wish were addressed. You can fix some of these issues with stylesheets. The intention of this thread was to show folks here how to fix these issues with their specific browsers without altering the functionality of the forum website.

fossy wrote: »

i guess im a bit grouchy today .... no disrespect to anyone meant

No worries.

GospelTruth

Here's an example with the content container set to 90% width instead of 80% width. Both will allow expansion for widescreen and expand appropriately. I have included what it looks like normally without stylesheet changes so you can see.

Before:


After (90%):

GospelTruth

WilliamM2 wrote: »

I also noticed the edit button no longer works? I had to turn off stylish to edit this post.

I see you are right about that. Hard to figure what changes that I made could be affecting that, but I'll look into what may be the cause and try to get that fixed.

hochpt21

Wow...a lot of good work GospelTruth.

Thank you!