Responsive Project: Forum Enhancements

[Former-Member]

Hello everyone 👋🏼

This is a space for us to update everyone about the enhancements we're making for the forums. If you'd like to provide feedback on the enhancements as they arise, you can post here. And if you'd like to know more about the project, you can read about it here. To kick off the updates, the first six changes we have coming up are...

1. Better readability & contrast for grey text by darkening it slightly

2. Making the "post options" button larger & easier to read & click

3. Allowing members to set the number of posts they'll see listed

4. Simpler, consistent, messages that appear to confirm that you've done an action 

5. Removing the signature field as it's not compatible with our moderation software

6. Improving the search function with clearer language

More information on these changes coming soon! 💻

[Former-Member]

Hi everyone 😊

Here's a bit more info about some of the enhancements we've got coming up first. 

Better readability & contrast for grey text by darkening it slightly: An example of this is that the text highlighted below will be darkened. 

Allowing members to set the number of posts they'll see listed: You'll be able to customise how many posts you'd like to see on each page through your settings. 

Making the "post options" button larger & easier to read & click: The "post options" button highlighted below will be made larger and the menu will change colour from grey to green.

Simpler, consistent, messages that appear to confirm that you've done an action: An example of where this has been improved is when you choose to 'report a post'. The message displayed on screen after a post has been reported will change from 'Moderator notified' to 'Your report has been submitted. A moderator will read your report and check the post as soon as possible'.

Improving the search function: Changing the language on the search filters to help with finding the content you want. 

We anticipate these first set of changes will be put in place on July 9th 🐻

[Former-Member]

Hi everyone,

I'd like to update you about our next stage of forum enhacements which will be ready to go by Tuesday 24th July. This wave of updates will include:

- Improving the clarity of emails when signing up and resetting your password

- Clarifying text and standardising names for "sign up'

- Improving the initial welcome email that members recieve 

- Rename "My settings" to "Settings"

- Show that you've successfully favourited a post (sneak peak below)

Hope you've been enjoying the forum enhancements so far. As always, if you experience any tech issues related to the enhancements, please let us know here.

[Former-Member]

Hi everyone 👋🏼

Our forum enchancements are progressing well, with updates soon to improve the 'request removal' feature, and (more exciting) allow you to easily reply to a post from an email, rather than needing to return into the forums.

We'll share some screenshots as we get closer to 7 August, when these updates are scheduled ⭐️

[Former-Member]

Time for another Forum Enchancements Update 👏 Next week, you will notice the following changes in the forums...

1. You'll be able to reply to a post directly from your email

2. When you click "likes" to see who has liked a post, you'll be able to see the original post, plus the members who liked it (rather than just a list of the members who liked it)

 

 We hope this is another step towards improving your experience on the forums. Thanks everyone 🌈

[Former-Member]

Hello everyone,

It will be a bite sized update today about our next forum enhancement. Here goes...

To improve navigation in the forums, we'll be adding a title above the 'banner' section on the website. We hope that this will help to signify that the highlighted content relates to discussions within the forums (as opposed to links to fact sheets or other resources).

We're also adding a short blurb underneath "Discussion Topics" to provide members with a bit of information about what they might find in that section. 

Here's a sneak peak...

Thanks everyone 🌈

[Former-Member]

Finding your way around the forums can be a challenge for new members, or even if you've been here a while. On Tuesday we'll add a fresh "site map" in the footer. If you get a bit lost, just click on the link. Each topic and page shows in the site map - just click to jump straight to the right spot. Here's a sneak peak...

We'll be in touch again in the coming weeks about our next updates. Stay tuned ⚡️

[Former-Member]

Hi everyone,

A small enhancement update for you! These will come into action on Tuesday 11 September.

1. The process for logging in or signing up has been standardised. Where previously a pop up will have appeared for you to sign in, you will be taken to stand alone page log in. Once logged in, you will be redirected back to the area you were browsing or the landing page if you are just arriving for a new day in the forums!

2. Thanks to feedback of you, our members, we are updating our ‘like’ button to a ‘support’ button. Through the votes from the community, the icon will be *drum roll*🥁 ….

The thumbs up!

Here is what that will look like:

 

And that’s the latest from responsive enhancements 👍

[Former-Member]

Hi everyone,

We have two small enhancements that will be put in place next week on Tuesday 24 September. After feedback from the community, this will include:

• The amount of ‘views’ on a thread will no longer be displayed, however replies will stay
• I don't know if many of you know or use the permalink tool that is in 'post options' however this will be changed to be called 'Get Link' which we think will just be a bit more useful!

Some larger enhancements will be coming up about mid way through next month (we are hoping). We will be looking to better match/syndicate content such as fact sheets and blogs with discussions in the forums. This content will sit where the current ‘resources’ box is. The responsive project team are also consulting with forum members previously recruited on some design enhancements.

More details and screenshots will come so keep an eye on this thread 🙂

[Former-Member]

Hi forumites!

As I previously mentioned some more exciting enhancements will be coming through this month which will have a few visual impacts. This will be going live on 23 Oct which is super exciting. In the lead up, we have summarised the changes below and will follow up with screen shots next week. 

The changes we are rolling out focus on improving the ways readers and members can navigate to and around the forums, in particular:

• simplified information and navigation on the homepage
• improved forums header and footer with consistent headings, guideline links, breadcrumb navigation, help and support options
• clearer topic descriptions to help navigate to relevant discussion threads
• easy access to the latest and unanswered posts within each topic, and for members, easy access to posts you haven't yet read and favourited posts within each topic
• related SANE information and publications appearing alongside post threads
• headings appearing within posts to more clearly highlight post titles and replies, plus a consistent link to the original post in a thread
• updated member profiles with easier visibility to posts you've contributed, posts you've supported and posts you've favourited

These changes have been worked on in partnership with forum users and have also gone through user testing. As you can tell, the changes will be very positive to the way you can use the forums. For some of you that have been members for a while now, you may not have realised some areas that are clunky or in need of these enhancements (or maybe you have!?) as you are so used to it, so it may be a bit of an adjustment when this rolls out! Never fear - we will be here to help as always with any bugs or queries.

I think you will definitely see how much sense it makes and that you will be able to navigate the forums in a much more efficient and comfortable way.

Stay tuned for screen shots next week!