Asked by:
Hard to read forums

General discussion
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Changes to the forums should be improvements. The following forums are hard to read since a few minutes:
Visual Basic General, Visual Basic Language, Visual Basic Express Edition, VB Interop, VB IDE
- Messages are just a small pipe in the middle no matter how wide the browser window is
- Indentation does not work anymore. Now it's even harder to see related messages. Oh, indentation is there, it's just barely visible.
- The box around each message is missing.
- The green frame around "the answer(s)" is missing.
- New topics in the thread overview are not bolded anymore, which was much better to see.
- As the contrast of the text appears lowered, it's harder to read for some people.
- Bold and italic formatted text is only displayed correctly while editting a message but not after submitting.
- When editting a message, the "Submit" button is often only partially visible.
Good:
Bad:
Do you see the difference? Please change it back!! Thank you.
Armin
- Edited by Armin Zingler Friday, August 17, 2012 11:54 AM additional points
- Moved by Naomi N Monday, August 20, 2012 5:40 PM This forum is better for complaints as 'Suggestions' forum' is not really checked (From:Suggestions and Feedback for the Forums)
All replies
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LOL So I'm not the only one who is having a lot of trouble using the new layout!
I was just coming to complain that this afternoon's change was NOT an improvement by any means... sure it seems to fix the issue with loading post headers on long discussions, but the overall layout is very messy. The threaded view is almost pointless now...
Moderating the VB forums already presented challenges... now I just want to poke a stick in my eye! =P
We should really be given a dropdown to select the skin of our choice!
Reed Kimble - "When you do things right, people won't be sure you've done anything at all"
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Can anybody help? In the topic overview, I'm not able to figure out which topics are new; the previously bolded ones. Am I overlooking a certain color or formatting of them?
Armin
- Edited by Armin Zingler Thursday, August 16, 2012 9:43 AM
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Armin & Reed,
It is even worse then you would believe, in IE 10 and FireFox the characters and borders are better, but icon information like if it is answered where currently IE8 icons are used in IE 9 and Google, are at my desktop completely invisible (and therefore unusable).
Be aware the text are in IE10 and FireFox better readable then in Google and IE 9.
I find it most strange that this is only in the Developer forums and not for instance in this one.
@Reed, I don't want a skin of my choice, that are features maybe usable for long time users, not for those who are searching for help. I've never heard somebody complaining in the developer forums about the former skin so why change?
Personal skins should not be a feature for web developers to do a lousy job they are for those who cannot read for 80% of the population well readable pages.
Success
Cor -
Hi,
...and whats the actual color of the text? Its not black anymore, it seems they lowered the contrast between foreground and background...
Its really bad IMHO and its not only the forums, its skydrive too... At least in skydrive a user choice for the appearance (as has been there indeed before changes wered made) should be there...
Regards,
Thorsten
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I use many forums. This one is the absolute worst of thm all with the layout/scheme used. I do not have very good eyesight and find this to be the worst of all from my perspective. There have been a few so called 'upgrades' to this forum, but non seem to have improved the ease of use, or the readability of it at all.
I do think a user should be able to choose a scheme/layout. Most other forums have this feature and there is no reasin not to have it here - especially if a high contrast scheme is included.
Regards Les, Livingston, Scotland
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I just posted another feedback thread saying that bold and italic formatting in posts are not rendered outside of edit mode. I'm not enjoying the new format either.
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I just posted another feedback thread saying that bold and italic formatting in posts are not rendered outside of edit mode. I'm not enjoying the new format either.
I posted regarding that issue as well, although mine has some more specific details about the problem: http://social.msdn.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/reportabug/thread/c87aa380-7a6b-43d2-b79c-b0f600598004
And I'm also unhappy with the reduced width and reduced contrast. I'd prefer a more compact layout that uses more of my screen.
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Thanks Wyck. I agree with your other points as well.
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I agree. They have broken those forums.
Also, there is no longer a pop-up showing the question in the list of thread titles.
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Andrew- Edited by Andrew Morton Thursday, August 16, 2012 5:56 PM
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- When I click "Alert me", animation effects will not show up as before so I don't know if I've clicked until webpage refreshes.
- When viewing all replies, answer/proposed answer is not obvious noticed since only a symbol on upper right quarter of this post.
- Icons for some operations haven't been added as below:
Some addition feedback here:http://social.msdn.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/vbgeneral/thread/b9b22717-2fc1-4ce3-a9e0-8e6918d05e7a
(BTW, the first character will become a link when press enter button after a URL link as is shown in this reply.)
Best regards,
Shanks Zen
MSDN Community Support | Feedback to us
- Edited by Youen Zen Friday, August 17, 2012 7:25 AM typo
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It is really impressive how ridiculous was the result after this new styling... It looks like nobody tested the layout to see how it would look like! How on Earth can anyone follow a thread like this with the new styling:
???
There is SO MUCH space not being used! No colors, no backgrounds! Really... I don't even know what to say about this change... Why hadn't you just kept the old layout (which was quite good) and fixed the tons of bugs that we have on the engine?? Unbelievable...
André Alves de Lima
Microsoft MVP - Client App Dev
Visite o meu site: http://www.andrealveslima.com.br
Me siga no Twitter: @andrealveslima -
The view of which links I have read, or not read is the whole point for me. It was VERY helpful, at my free time at work, i like to read, share some experience, and know from each other too. With this new design is hard to see, there is a lot of informations unecessary, a lot of blank space, too much colors, i dont think this was a good idea.
Web Developer
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I also particularly dislike how difficult it is now to see what replies were proposed or marked as answers - This makes moderation VERY difficult in the new view.
Reed Copsey, Jr. - http://reedcopsey.com
If a post answers your question, please click "Mark As Answer" on that post and "Mark as Helpful". -
While I'm ranting ;) - I also find it quite irritating how, when moving around "social.microsoft.com/Forums" - you can click around and see so many distinctly different styles. It's particularly bad when you're working from "My Forums Threads" or "My Threads", as clicking on a given thread can completely change the look and feel of the entire site to one of at least a few very distinctly different styles.
It makes the entire forums experience seem very schizophrenic.
I understand (sort of) the desire for different teams to have their own unique style, but it's also one company's forums - and they are crazy if you click around. Very difficult from a usability standpoint, IMO.
Reed Copsey, Jr. - http://reedcopsey.com
If a post answers your question, please click "Mark As Answer" on that post and "Mark as Helpful". -
Though - let me add - my worst nightmare right now is that they consolidate all of the styles to the new style used in the C# and VB forums :) That would be a worst-case scenario. At least, right now, you can do almost everything through "My Forums Threads" and "My Threads" and still be functional.
Reed Copsey, Jr. - http://reedcopsey.com
If a post answers your question, please click "Mark As Answer" on that post and "Mark as Helpful". -
Though - let me add - my worst nightmare right now is that they consolidate all of the styles to the new style used in the C# and VB forums :) That would be a worst-case scenario. At least, right now, you can do almost everything through "My Forums Threads" and "My Threads" and still be functional.
The almost everyone should be using "My Forums Threads" and "My Threads", i reallydisappointed to this new style, it makes me feel without any desire to read/write posts.
Reed Copsey, Jr. - http://reedcopsey.com
If a post answers your question, please click "Mark As Answer" on that post and "Mark as Helpful".Web Developer
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I agree that the new layout is far from what would be expected and seems that it was not tested. What appears odd when glancing thru the source code is the code looks well done, I would suspect the problem should be easy to fix at the script level thinking it has something to do with the tags below with Jelloxxxxx. What bothers me is that this is not fixed already and why is there a class for the body that is specifically targetting IE8 (there is a line above for IE6).
<body class="IE IE8 en-us Forums " dir= "ltr"> <div id="BodyBackground" class="ltr"> <div id="JelloSizer"> <div id="JelloExpander"> <div id="JelloWrapper"> <div class="Clear"> </div>
KSG
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I hate to be a "me too", but I agree with everything that's has been pointed out in this thread. Hopefully, if enough people post about it, there may be some improvements.
This particular forum doesn't seem as bad, but the LightSwitch ones, where I spend my time, is almost totally unreadable.
Some of these issues have already been mentioned, but here's my two cents worth (that I sent to one of the LS team, who then suggested that I post my thoughts in this thread):
Several issues have been introduced by the "new look" in our forums (& yes, I know it wouldn't have been the team's choice, but a company-wide effort to "dumb everything down" to supposedly to more "readable" on tablets & smart phones, regardless of whether it looks worse on desktop machine monitors):
- The extra width available to the large screens that many people have go to waste now that there's a "fixed width", resulting in larger amounts of required scrolling. (Good to see a different color for the background & the "rest" of the screen though) It's been previously mentioned that indentation gets lost after a certain "level". This new format just makes that problem even worse.
- The huge title on each question/discussion page now takes up significantly more space on each page, meaning that again a user has to scroll a lot more.
- Code that's more substantial than a few lines now takes ridiculous amounts of scrolling down/right, up/left to be able to read it all (I gave up trying in one post - I had to scroll donw to the end of the code to get the horizontal scrollbar, then back up to the code I wanted to see, then back down because I didn't scroll enough horizontally, & on & on). A smaller font would help a little, but at the very least, the code box also needs a vertical scrollbar, in addition the the already existing horizontal scrollbar.
- It's EXTREMELY difficult to differentiate now, between a post, a proposed answer & an actual answer. It's also hard to see where one post ends & another starts. Very hard on the eyes, which seems ridiculous, seeing as this new Metro stuff (shhh, I know it's not meant to be called that anymore, lol) is supposed to make the content EASIER to read, whereas it does the exact opposite.
- On a personal note (ie my own posts), I don't like that this new look strips out the italicising & bolding that I included in my tag line, to make it easier for people to follow its intent.
I REALLY hope that this gets changed back to something more useful, but I guess I shouldn't hold my breath.
Yann - LightSwitch Central - Click here for FREE Themes, Controls, Types and Commands If you find a reply helpful, please click "Vote as Helpful", if a reply answers your question, please click "Mark as Answer" By doing this you'll help people find answers faster. -
Almost everyone disagree with this new style. I really wanna know if they are seeing our posts with bugs, and other stuff that we dont like, and if they will do something about this style. For my 'happiness' i think that old style will never come back, but i hope for something. Because it's clear that somethins must be done.
Web Developer
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Almost everyone disagree with this new style. I really wanna know if they are seeing our posts with bugs, and other stuff that we dont like, and if they will do something about this style. For my 'happiness' i think that old style will never come back, but i hope for something. Because it's clear that somethins must be done.
Web Developer
Don't worry, they'll fix it. But probably not until a new forum code drop. Based on my non-scientific observations, it feels like code fixes are applied approximately monthly (maybe 3-4 week intervals?) But it may depend on what else is going on at the time.
Maybe someone official can comment on what the period of the maintenance cycle for the forum software is.
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I can`t do anything but agree.
In my opninion the last "update" has been a failure which should be reverted back asap. Just by looking at "My Forums Threads" doesn`t let you think anything bad, but opening a thread can scare your eyes to death.
My 5 ct: Roll it back !
Hannes
If you have got questions about this, just ask.
In a perfect world,
users would never enter data in the wrong form,
files they choose to open would always exist
and code would never have bugs.
C# to VB.NET: http://www.developerfusion.com/tools/convert/csharp-to-vb/ -
Hi again,
based on this thread: http://social.msdn.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/reportabug/thread/114d06ee-0b09-453c-a7af-5e8b03bb7706 changing the locale from en-US to en-GB will show the old (better) style.
Hannes
If you have got questions about this, just ask.
In a perfect world,
users would never enter data in the wrong form,
files they choose to open would always exist
and code would never have bugs.
C# to VB.NET: http://www.developerfusion.com/tools/convert/csharp-to-vb/ -
Hi again,
based on this thread: http://social.msdn.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/reportabug/thread/114d06ee-0b09-453c-a7af-5e8b03bb7706 changing the locale from en-US to en-GB will show the old (better) style.
Hannes
If you have got questions about this, just ask.
In a perfect world,
users would never enter data in the wrong form,
files they choose to open would always exist
and code would never have bugs.
C# to VB.NET: http://www.developerfusion.com/tools/convert/csharp-to-vb/
Yes, but be careful on this aspect: http://social.msdn.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/reportabug/thread/83b24647-b1cc-43fb-a2a8-be8d5979bcf4 (Bold is ineffective in the Microsoft Office for Developers Forums)Robert Breitenhofer, MICROSOFT
Bitte haben Sie Verständnis dafür, dass im Rahmen dieses Forums, welches auf dem Community-Prinzip „Entwickler helfen Entwickler“ beruht, kein technischer Support geleistet werden kann oder sonst welche garantierten Maßnahmen seitens Microsoft zugesichert werden können. -
I definitely agree, I don't know what happened to the forums lately, but I also noticed that the marked answer is no longer fully outlined and that italicized text no longer shows up italicized... It really looks horrible atm.... It would be better if it was reverted....
If you want something you've never had, you need to do something you've never done.
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Forum looks good today... Did they revert it?
Edit*** Looks like just .net express so far..
If you want something you've never had, you need to do something you've never done.
- Edited by Paul Ishak Thursday, August 23, 2012 2:45 PM
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On a personal note (ie my own posts), I don't like that this new look strips out the italicising & bolding that I included in my tag line, to make it easier for people to follow its intent.
Let's go back to the old conventions. From now on, I'm going to write *text in bold* with asterisks and /italics/ with slashes.
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We shouldn't have to!
Making *all* content "bland", & "everything look the same" is rediculous. Stripping out bold & italic is just WRONG.
Yann - LightSwitch Central - Click here for FREE Themes, Controls, Types and Commands If you find a reply helpful, please click "Vote as Helpful", if a reply answers your question, please click "Mark as Answer" By doing this you'll help people find answers faster. -
It's such a relief to come into this forum which is painted with the older layout.
The new forum layout lacks definition and so had to use because of that. Borders and areas are all washed out. Well there are no borders, no division lines.
Rob Chandler Help MVP http://Helpware.net/ http://mshcmigrate.helpmvp.com/
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- Bold and italic formatted text is only displayed correctly while editting a message but not after submitting.
them in the *new* forum format. But you *can* see them
if you switch to the old format for the forum.
This is a real PITA. While reading in the Visual C++ General
forum, I chose to post a reply. Aware of these issues I
switched the "Country" for the forum (lower left link)
from United States to Canada (English), This reverts to the
old (read "better") forum format. I composed two replies with
bold and italics. After posting the replies, they appeared
correctly when viewed in the forum threads (still in old
format).
When I reopened the forum in the new style (Country: United
States), the bold and italics were nowhere to be found, When
I changed the language again to Canada (English) - presto! -
there they were. So trying to get bold/italics in a post by
switching to the old format doesn't help - they only show
when the old format is set for the forum, the new format
just ignores the format codes.
- Wayne -
Handshake.
http://social.msdn.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/suggest/thread/d4d63d68-8182-47a3-9490-1d92a91f84e5
RainCast Lab - http://www.windowsphone.com/en-US/publishers/raincast
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Still no change? Well, then I won't come back. Seriously, reopen your news servers and we all can save 40% of our time. That's meant seriously. Bye.
Armin
I believe Microsoft is not that arrogant like Apple :p
Patience,man.
Have a nice weekend.
Think again!
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Still no change? Well, then I won't come back. Seriously, reopen your news servers and we all can save 40% of our time. That's meant seriously. Bye.
Ah you're on strike, I was wondering what happened to you...
Armin
If you want something you've never had, you need to do something you've never done.
Everyone(not just the thread starter) should take the time to mark helpful posts, propose answers, and mark answers to questions. -
Edward, i guess 3 months is patience enough.
Hannes
If you have got questions about this, just ask.
In a perfect world,
users would never enter data in the wrong form,
files they choose to open would always exist
and code would never have bugs.
C# to VB.NET: http://www.developerfusion.com/tools/convert/csharp-to-vb/ -
I'm still really curious why they would take something beautiful and completely ruin it(IMO)....
The only thing I can think of is maybe something went terribly wrong and they're having a hard time recovering from it...
Maybe the issue is bigger than it appears...
If you want something you've never had, you need to do something you've never done.
Everyone(not just the thread starter) should take the time to mark helpful posts, propose answers, and mark answers to questions. -
Hi Armin,
as Hannes sais above "changing the locale from en-US to en-GB will show the old (better) style. " This is still working. I only use the GB forums since the so called "update". Just update your bookmarks and you can use the forums again.
Regards,
Thorsten
- Edited by Thorsten Gudera Friday, November 16, 2012 5:13 PM
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Yes, I can change to de-DE, but many links I follow go back to en-US, so I have to change the URL manually again each time. Anyway, I don't belong to the target audience of that company anymore anyway. So it doesn't really matter.
Regards, GLHF, Greetings, bye.
Armin
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... Anyway, I don't belong to the target audience of that company anymore anyway....
Since Windows 8, I somehow feel the same.... it looks like all is going to be an extended TV-set with a lot to consume (controlled completely by the company) but nothing for people who want to work with it or doing education related things (and write apps to *work* with)... But where to go to? Completely switch to Linux? ...
Regards,
Thorsten
- Edited by Thorsten Gudera Friday, November 16, 2012 5:58 PM
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as Hannes sais above "changing the locale from en-US to en-GB will show the old (better) style.
Yes, but the vast majority of people won't be able to see any bold or italics I use to emphasize things in the pathetically narrow posts. So there's no point doing that. It's back to using *bold* and /italic/.
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Andrew -
Update: At least one of the issues has been fixed. Bold and italics now work correctly in the Visual Studio forums. Feels good to push the rock and see it move.
Do people still feel strongly about any of the other issues? I personally would like to see the next fix be the return of the obvious green border around posts that are marked as answer. The little checkmark icon just doesn't attract enough attention and it's not different enough from the icon for "proposed as answer" (green vs. grey).
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Yes, it's great to see, at least, the return of bold & italics!
I for one DO still feel strongly that the replies need more definition than they currently have in all of the "updated" forums. I find it SO much harder to be able to answer people's questions than it used to be, due to this lack of adequate visual indication of the status of any particular reply.
Yann - LightSwitch Central - Click here for FREE Themes, Controls, Types and Commands Please click "Mark as Answer" if a reply answers your question. Please click "Vote as Helpful" , if you find a reply helpful. By doing this you'll help others to find answers faster. -
I agree. However, the most important (to me) is to fix the 'Unexpected error' problem. I keep getting it every time I try to post and also I keep loosing points (up to 2K, I think) due to my answers being marked as answers but without a history.
For every expert, there is an equal and opposite expert. - Becker's Law
My blog -
I agree. However, the most important (to me) is to fix the 'Unexpected error' problem. I keep getting it every time I try to post and also I keep loosing points (up to 2K, I think) due to my answers being marked as answers but without a history.
I get the unexpected error problem frequently as well, has anyone seen any kind of official feedback in response to the forums being buggy? It's been quite a while now... For me, knowing that Microsoft has recognized that there is a problem and a confirmation that the problem is being worked on would be enough.
For every expert, there is an equal and opposite expert. - Becker's Law
My blogIf you want something you've never had, you need to do something you've never done.
Everyone(not just the thread starter) should take the time to mark helpful posts, propose answers, and mark answers to questions.