Message Board Suggestions.

[cache]

What changes, additions, modifications, etc, would YOU like to see?? What would make your experience here more enjoyable?

As the Internet goes through its everyday changes, and users like to see upgrades/updates, please let us know what you like to see. What would make you and others use Hayabusa.org more often? What would create a more desireable forum than the other sites??

With the recent questioning of content change, and the way other forums are going through debate over real content and discussion, it is important to speak up and let all know what could be done to improve. Even when my words fade away, speak up and let everyone know what makes you NEED to talk about the busa.

 

[jwcfbd]

Being that I am currently using dial up instead of my dls.  Is there any way to speed up the connection reducing the time that a page takes to load or is that limited to the modem and connection speeds that you are getting through your ISP?  Other then that I think we have a good thing here and I like the way it is broken into the different categories.

 

[Dustman]

I don't think there's much we can do about that one. Dial-up sucks.. I've got cable access during the week but I'm on dial-up at home on the weekends. Overall the site isn't very slow.. I really only notice it on the larget topics that have lots of pics. There's not much we could do to help that..

I think I can build a script that will compress the pics that people attach to the post. It should effect quality of the pics much but it would definately help those slow connections. Some of the pics that people post are 250-500k.. not to bad when you're getting 300k/s dloads.. aweful when you're getting 5.6k/s on dialup.

I'll look around and see what else we can do. Thanks for the input.

 

[captain]

If you will go to your control panel you can tell the board to not load the smilies, the avatars or the pictures, that way you would only be loading text. Try that it should speed it up a lot.


Captain

 

[RonUSMC]

There are several ways you can speed up the site.

I think user submitted images are the last thing you should optimize. User submitted content is the last thing you should alter after you have done everything in your power on the site itself. You could write a script though, but you already have Gallery installed.. and its using either netpbm or imagemagick.. so one or the other is already installed. You could probably just port from gallery. There are several small php scripts you could do that already, just check the Gallery website.

I would start with cleaning up the pages if it were me. I would get rid of everyone's flash avatars. The object tags take up valuable processing time. I would take off the wallpaper also. Even though the wallpaper is only 19k, it still takes time to load into GPU and process.

Just glancing over the code I see some hard links, you should soften those up a bit,

Is that popup script custom for something that is inherent or did someone add that for a specific function?

Thought about going to a php platform instead of a cgi flat file?

I think if you did those few things and put this on a php platform, the speed would increase considerably.

Just some thoughts off the top of my head.

Whats the bandwidth like for the message boards only? Seems like its straining sometimes.

 

[jwcfbd]

If you will go to your control panel you can tell the board to not load the smilies, the avatars or the pictures, that way you would only be loading text. Try that it should speed it up a lot.


Captain

To do that you would spend most of your time here looking at blank pages.

. But seriously if no one else is complaning about the loading speeds don't change anything on my account. I will be back to using DLS soon so I can deal with it for now. I thought it was based on your modem and connection speeds but I thought that I would ask. You guys do enough hard work keeping this place running the way it does and I applaud you for it. Seeing the numbers that Captain post is mind boggling. Keeping that many people happy just goes to show that you guys are doing something right. Keep up the great work.
Jim

 

[cache]

Loading time, file size, etc is not what I intended for suggestions. Like jim said, he likes pictures. cat in the hat fan?

I have 56k dialup at home. loads just fine compared to alot of other medias on the net. Jim, hope you get your dsl back soon. The little town I live in finally got a $3.4 million fiber line dropped in by Sprint. I will have a quick dsl connection at home in a couple months. gonna be nice!

 

[Dustman]

I think user submitted images are the last thing you should optimize. ...

First of all.. I was only talking about compressing the images that are uploaded in the forums.. mainly resizing them.. do we really need 1600x1200 pics posted here?  If users want to post hq pics, they can post them in the gallery or upload them to their upload center.  ImageMagics is what I would use and no need to port it from gallery.. its a pretty simple function call.

I would start with cleaning up the pages if it were me. I would get rid of everyone's flash avatars...

As Jim said.. stripping the avatars and everything would be senseless.. the site needs to look good.  The object tags and everything are fine.. the final outputed html files are really small (just a few k) and thats all that effects the d/l speed, not the object tags.  Granted.. if you have a slow computer.. lots of flash on one page will really slow you down.. but thats not a dial-up issue.. you have the money for a busa.. spend a couple hundred and upgrade the puter..

Just glancing over the code I see some hard links, you should soften those up a bit, ...

You may be seeing hard links in the code but thats how they are built.  There are very few pages on this site that aren't built on the fly from php or cgi scripts.. most of the links come from variables therefore they look "hardcoded" when you just view the source.  The flat files you see are not flat at all.. almost all scripting is server side to keep the load time down.  We know what our servers can handle.. let us do the work for you puter

.

Thought about going to a php platform instead of a cgi flat file?

We're in the process of combining all the code and making the entire site customizable for each user.  Maybe we can put together a low bandwidth skin for people to use.. lots of images such as the reply buttons and what not could be turned into text links.

Whats the bandwidth like for the message boards only? Seems like its straining sometimes.

As far as bandwith is concerned.. I think with 2 T1s, that isn't even a factor.  It all boils down to one thing..

<span style='font-size:15pt;line-height:100%'><table style=filter:glow(color=#ff0000)>"DIAL-UP SUCKS!"</table></span>

 

[jwcfbd]

As far as bandwith is concerned.. I think with 2 T1s, that isn't even a factor. It all boils down to one thing..

"DIAL-UP SUCKS!" [/QUOTE]
You said it all with that last sentance, Dustman.
And yes Cache I LIKE PICTURES.

 

[Racer 222]

My experience here is usually very pleasant. I do have a few questions:

1. Is there anyway to have all the posts be marked as old and have the most recent posts or replies at the top of the first page decending?

2. Since I am not a post wh$#@%ing is there anyway to add a 2 or 3 places to add pictures instead of just one per post?

2A. Is there a way for you all to set it so all the pictures are the same size no matter what the user submits? (I got this idea from socalsportbikes.com)

Thanks for hearing me out. See you all in the twisties...

Marc "Howlin Mad"

 

[captain]

Marc

1. Yes

2. Yes

3. Yes

 

[Racer 222]

Captain Sir,
Thank you very much for your reply!

Semper Fidelis

 

[Narcissus]

Here is what I would like to see, 1) a million dollars, 2) a getaway car and 3) the letter 'M' stricken from the english alphabet.

Wait a sec, those are my ransom requirements... and who in their right mind would want a getaway car? I think I need to rewrite that.

 

[cache]

Captain, Dustman, Narcissus, Maximum71...

I did not start this thread with the intentions of creating more work for you, but to simply get the feel for what the membership would like to have done...

 

[captain]

Well it sounds like were getting the request, Marc I will post some instruction later tonight...... Sorry I couldn't help it.


Captain

 

[cache]

Cap if it helps you out, have any standard instruction requests directed my way.

 

[Odyssey]

I would like to see a little icon along with every memebers post that link it to a picture of their bike(that the member chooses). similar to the icq, email, etc icons. not very hard to do, if no one know how i can tell them. just my something i would like to see

 

[Cookie]

Hey Cache, a suggestion!

A delete option for the original poster. (I wadded on my first post here and noticed)

And, take out the 'edited three times' or however many statement that follows an edit.

Great site!

 

[cache]

Hey Cache, a suggestion!

A delete option for the original poster. (I wadded on my first post here and noticed)

And, take out the 'edited three times' or however many statement that follows an edit.

Great site!

good to see you cooky

delete option for original poster: edit to blank or 'oops'

the edit stamp is for viewers to see when an error has been fixed... comes in handy at times.

good ideas all, keep em coming... I'm sure Captain is thinking of a really good way to get back at me for bringing up changes...  

 

[captain]

You can delete your own post now..