New site feature requests thread

[mikkyx]

Hello you lot,
Work will shortly commence on a redesign / rebuild of Darlo Uncovered. This thread is for you to provide any feedback on things that you feel could be done / designed better on the current site (so we can try not to repeat them in the redesign) and anything you would like to have in the new site (so we can try to add them).

If there are any other footy websites you like the look / feel of, let us know so we can see what's good about them and see if we can try and replicate those ideas here.

I will keep this post up to date as best I can with anything I plan to implement / feedback I like and will try to act upon. I look forward to constructive criticism and cool feature requests.

Things you don't need to mention in this thread:

• Board moderation policies (nothing to do with a redesign)
• News archive / news search (these are already being added)
• No advertising (there WILL be advertising - to fund the server and then the club - but ways to turn it off will be available)

New features planned:

• Mobile version (via responsive design [Hilly] Will not include forum - Tapatalk covers this)
• News archive / search engine
• Match centre (a single page with links to the preview, result and report for a given fixture)
• Improved prediction league
• Volunteer alert system [princes town]
• User uploadable match photo galleries [Ash_Quaker]
• Improved Twitter usage [fat tony] - social networks in general, for that matter...
• Better historial info [fat tony] - probably won't be ready for launch....

Forum features:

• Like button (either to "like" threads or post them to Facebook)
• Spellcheck

Feedback I like:

• TBA

[andi_darlo]

like button on forum would be nice.

[mikkyx]

like button on forum would be nice.

As in something to Like a thread so it shows up on Facebook?

[Hilly]

First off apologies about not sending you a visual about what I had in mind for a new 'official site' but I'm guessing that has little relevance to this? If things come off though, I'll be spending that time improving the DSU site because I'm sure you'll agree that's a higher importance!

In terms of improving the site, I'd say rather than a mobile version, it would be worth looking at converting the site into a Responsive site, so effectively the same site just served up differently on different devices.

[mikkyx]

No worries - I'd still like to see that visual though as it may provide a good starting point for the design (with your permission and you being credited, of course!) Haven't even opened the sketchbook yet so all ideas welcome!

The new site is going to be built responsively as you've said, so will expand up. Might even put a tablet layout in for the middle ground.

[TFDM]

Agree with Hilly about the responsive design. I've been playing with that a bit recently and the CSS Media Queries are a really good way at getting something which scales to different devices easily. Having not done much design work for over a year (I mainly do programming and server side work these days) I'm impressed with it.

It would be nice to have some player bios as well since the official site always seem haphazard in this regard.

[andi_darlo]

like button on forum would be nice.

As in something to Like a thread so it shows up on Facebook?

yeah, or the like dislike buttons on the articles just to stop people doing that stupid thing where they quote exactlly what someone else has just said followed by "This!"

its just fricking annoying and fills up the thread full of crap, (queue someone quoting me and writing "this" )

also maybe spell and grammar check would be awesome, my spelling is awfull and the grammar police are always out in full force ?

[Darlo_H]

like button on forum would be nice.

I would think more a like button for posts, so that half decent posts within a thread get a few thumbs up and those which get a certain number of thumbs down could be marked for deletion...

I can imagine people having vendettas against certain people and taking the piss with it a bit though...

[Fatty eats roadkill]

like button on forum would be nice.

As in something to Like a thread so it shows up on Facebook?

yeah, or the like dislike buttons on the articles just to stop people doing that stupid thing where they quote exactlly what someone else has just said followed by "This!"

its just fricking annoying and fills up the thread full of crap, (queue someone quoting me and writing "this" )

also maybe spell and grammar check would be awesome, my spelling is awfull and the grammar police are always out in full force ?

Yes it is! A spellcheck is definitely needed!!!!

[mikkyx]

Hmm. Would rather discuss new site stuff as opposed to things we could add to the forum but all things being taken on board...

[comeondarlo]

like button on forum would be nice.

As in something to Like a thread so it shows up on Facebook?

yeah, or the like dislike buttons on the articles just to stop people doing that stupid thing where they quote exactlly what someone else has just said followed by "This!"

its just fricking annoying and fills up the thread full of crap, (queue someone quoting me and writing "this" )

also maybe spell and grammar check would be awesome, my spelling is awfull and the grammar police are always out in full force ?

Yes it is! A spellcheck is definitely needed!!!!

CoD 'Likes this'

[Hilly]

No worries - I'd still like to see that visual though as it may provide a good starting point for the design (with your permission and you being credited, of course!) Haven't even opened the sketchbook yet so all ideas welcome!

The new site is going to be built responsively as you've said, so will expand up. Might even put a tablet layout in for the middle ground.

I'd take a look at the various examples out there:

http://mediaqueri.es/

...so unlike set style sheets for different resolutions e.g. tablet layouts, proper responsive layouts should cater for every resolution possible (between a minimum and a maximum at least).

[mikkyx]

Was looking at that site the other day, it's well good. Have been working on a couple of responsive sites at work too to get some practice in!

[Earl_Lee_Dawes]

How about a button to easily insert an image with the message? I've never worked out how to do this.

[Darlo_H]

How about a button to easily insert an image with the message? I've never worked out how to do this.

Get the image link.
Click the [img] icon above the text field when you post.
Paste the link inbetween [ img ] and [ /img].
???
PROFIT.

[princes town]

Given the emphasis on volunteering, I'm just wondering whether there is a high level tab for alerting people to 'any help required' by the club etc and contact number for Jason. They get announced in the Echo but I think this site is equally as useful as a medium. Like a rolling message across the top. i noticed in the threads a lot of questions about pitch help but it would be better if this was done more visibly as these threads get lost.

thank you for the volunteer database - great innovation. I guess the club web-site would be best place longer term for volunteering but it might fill gap short term

other than that 'likes/dislikes' would alert you to potentially malicious posters (trolls).
fine site overall.

[mikkyx]

Good one, added - don't forget you can also feedback anything you think could be done better design wise too.

[Mr_Tibbs]

like button on forum would be nice.

As in something to Like a thread so it shows up on Facebook?

yeah, or the like dislike buttons on the articles just to stop people doing that stupid thing where they quote exactlly what someone else has just said followed by "This!"

its just fricking annoying and fills up the thread full of crap, (queue someone quoting me and writing "this" )

That

[Mr_Tibbs]

I hate it as well!

Back to the feature requests - something I mentioned when you first did the current design (you had a thread going then) was to have a show/hide thing showing a preview of a post so you could quickly see if it was worth opening up the whole thread or not. Especially useful when we have a slack period and people post crap with subject lines such as "[insert footballer's name here] signs..."

[Darloloyal]

are you aloud to intergrate the live match feed from the BBC on a match day?

[mikkyx]

are you aloud to intergrate the live match feed from the BBC on a match day?

I don't think so, no.

[Fatty eats roadkill]

are you aloud to intergrate the live match feed from the BBC on a match day?

Spell check needed more than ever Mikky

[Earl_Lee_Dawes]

How about a button to easily insert an image with the message? I've never worked out how to do this.

Get the image link.
Click the [img] icon above the text field when you post.
Paste the link inbetween [ img ] and [ /img].
???
PROFIT.

Thanks Darlo H, I'll try this.

[Darlo_H]

Thanks Darlo H, I'll try this.

No worries

[Ash_Quaker]

A place for people to upload pictures they've taken at a Darlo match?

[fat tony]

Two things for me that I'd really like to see...

1) How about making more of the Twitter feed? A lot of threads I read on here are off the back of something on Twitter and there are probably quite a few people who use Twitter it as well as this board, so there is already a bit of crossover. Makes sense to inegrate those conversations on here. It could be a larger box that pulls in #darlo and #savedarlo or just a dedicated Uncovered Forum timeline following relevant people (players, journalists, fan groups etc.)

2) It'd be great to have some form of information architecture within the site where we can view and search match stats, historical info, player histories etc. This Poolie site does it well - http://www.inthemadcrowd.co.uk/cgi-bin/itmc_welcome.asp

Also, no qualms from me about having advertising; I think you guys should really be making the most of the traffic on here to cover costs.

[Darlo_H]

Personally I feel the site is pretty solid as it is now, with only a couple of minor tweaks needed.

Overloading it with all sorts of new features, facts, figures alongside the adverts (which are fine with me, as there's no reason you shouldn't use traffic to cover costs) could lead to the core of the site being lost. Less in more in my opinion.

On the subject of the ads, are they likely to be just around the edges of the web pages/banner ads or is it going to be something a bit more invasive?

[princes town]

Good one, added - don't forget you can also feedback anything you think could be done better design wise too.

Actually, a dynamic 'rolling' news/message thread would be useful for notifications other than just volunteering. I was thinking of a news feed that runs horizontally. Something like a link on the scrolling feed with more detailed information revealed when clicking it. i appreciate that this might be time-consuming so just an idea.

[mikkyx]

Current thinking on advertising is a banner at the top (not sure on 468 in the corner or a 760-ish between banner and content - trying to keep a more compact header so I know which is more likely....) and a new right hand sidebar with relevant content to the page you're on, and adverts. We would also have links to places like TheTrainLine or internal airlines for those who arrange their away travel online.

[Hilly]

Current thinking on advertising is a banner at the top (not sure on 468 in the corner or a 760-ish between banner and content - trying to keep a more compact header so I know which is more likely....) and a new right hand sidebar with relevant content to the page you're on, and adverts. We would also have links to places like TheTrainLine or internal airlines for those who arrange their away travel online.

This might come in handy when you come to make decisions on adverts:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Stand ... _sizes.svg