Phoronix Redesign is live!

[David]

Recently we've been working on some underlying CMS improvements and restructuring to improve the user experience at Phoronix. Over the past two weeks specifically we've made some great improvements and decided to push it out to the public a bit earlier than planned. About 5 minutes ago we just launched it live, so ladies and gentlemen refresh your caches! As always, your feedback is greatly appreciated.

--Phoronix Team

[Malikith]

Looks good, I like it. I'd have to say its a improvement.

[1c3d0g]

It's beautiful, especially the new logo.

/me likes... :D

[rolz]

it had a nice wow factor

i only feel that the green color of the bottoms and the article titles doesn't fit in with the rest of the color scheme anymore.

Now I'm a geek so 'taste' is not my forte, so do get a second opinion ;-)

Overall I like it. I still think that article comments could be better integrated, rather than 3 clicks away. But again I'm a geek ...

those 3 boxes on the "home" page
"Popular In The Forums" and the like do appear to be out of place.

[yatt]

While i like the overall feel of the new design, I think it could use the browser's width better. This is what I see:
http://img480.imageshack.us/my.php?image=screenshotdz0.png
The wasted space on either side is about the same width as the Latest Articles column itself, which should be taking up the bulk of the space IMO.

Fix that, and I'd say the new design is better.

[petercruickshank]

I sure
was
surprised
at the
new
design!

I found
it
unusual
at
first,
but I
guess
some
cultures
like to
read
a narrow
column
of text
vertically,
so I guess
I can't
complain.

[David]

it had a nice wow factor

i only feel that the green color of the bottoms and the article titles doesn't fit in with the rest of the color scheme anymore.

Now I'm a geek so 'taste' is not my forte, so do get a second opinion ;-)

Overall I like it. I still think that article comments could be better integrated, rather than 3 clicks away. But again I'm a geek ...

those 3 boxes on the "home" page
"Popular In The Forums" and the like do appear to be out of place.

The green colored boxes are the last remnant of the last scheme and they are being changed as well. So you actually support my opinion :).

We're still debating how to integrate the comments, but yes right now there is essentially no integration.

[thoemy]

I would like to have the preview of the news back because I'm not really interested in most of the reviews posted. Many news weren't longer than the preview text, there was no need to click on them. Now you have to click on every one.

Imho the preview text of the articles is too long. Displaying a short summary and an indicator that there is more should be enough for most people to see if they are interested or not. It also doesn't look nice to cram the long text into a small column.

I also don't like the 4 columns layout. The third and fourth columns share too much information. The third column also looks to much like the google ads. If you would display the news together with the reviews/articles and remove the third column completely, I would be happy :).

And maybe it's a good idea to separate hardware reviews and the other articles posted.

[Michael]

I would like to have the preview of the news back because I'm not really interested in most of the reviews posted. Many news weren't longer than the preview text, there was no need to click on them. Now you have to click on every one.

Imho the preview text of the articles is too long. Displaying a short summary and an indicator that there is more should be enough for most people to see if they are interested or not. It also doesn't look nice to cram the long text into a small column.

I also don't like the 4 columns layout. The third and fourth columns share too much information. The third column also looks to much like the google ads. If you would display the news together with the reviews/articles and remove the third column completely, I would be happy :).

And maybe it's a good idea to separate hardware reviews and the other articles posted.

Here's a hint for something I did just for people hesitant to change:

http://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=old_home

[thoemy]

Here's a hint for something I did just for people hesitant to change:

http://www.phoronix.com/scan.php?page=old_home
It's not the old home ;).

I'm not reluctant to change just because I want something back. I want it back because I think it was better.

[DanL]

I would like to have the preview of the news back
I agree. I just fought this same battle with the admins of techreport.com. Their argument was that they were trying to attract new readership by featuring reviews/articles. I understand that the people who work for Phoronix put a lot of effort into and are very proud of their reviews. However, being a daily reader of Phoronix, I'd like to see news as the dominating feature of the front page, since news changes a lot faster than your reviews come out. You should at least give your readers that option (like techreport.com eventually gave its loyal readers).

And yes, there's
a lot of wasted
space and extra
scrolling that I
shouldn't have
to do since I
own a widesceen.

[Michael]

You should at least give your readers that option (like techreport.com eventually gave its loyal readers).

Using the old_home link I mentioned allows that as well as subscribing to the RSS feed.

[joshuapurcell]

Nice changes... definitely like the new banner and overall layout. I'm not sure which I'll use more though... home or old_home, but we'll see after a week or so.

[niniendowarrior]

Over all, I like the redesign. I do think it's a tad bit cluttered. That's a lot to squeeze in the home page. I suggest doing a tabs sort of organization (e.g. tabs named "Latest Articles" "Phoronix News" "Phoronix Reviews" "Popular In The Forums") That way, you have ample space to talk about each stuff without jamming it all down readers throats.

I also think these two sections are a bit redundant...

http://img223.imageshack.us/img223/5157/redundancyja4.th.png (http://img223.imageshack.us/my.php?image=redundancyja4.png)

[yoshi314]

much better. i guess i won't have to tweak it with ff+greasemonkey/stylish...maybe ;-)

[David]

Over all, I like the redesign. I do think it's a tad bit cluttered. That's a lot to squeeze in the home page. I suggest doing a tabs sort of organization (e.g. tabs named "Latest Articles" "Phoronix News" "Phoronix Reviews" "Popular In The Forums") That way, you have ample space to talk about each stuff without jamming it all down readers throats.

I also think these two sections are a bit redundant...

http://img223.imageshack.us/img223/5157/redundancyja4.th.png (http://img223.imageshack.us/my.php?image=redundancyja4.png)

We are still discussing whether or not to use tabs, but it does seem like a cleaner option.

We haven't tweaked the redundant sections yet but it's on our list.

Thanks for the feedback everyone. Keep it comin'!

[niniendowarrior]

Well, as long as you arrive at a cleaner solution. Might be interesting to do an ajax form that hides and shows those sections of the website.

[ivanovic]

Hmmm, to be honest:
I don't like the latest change in the design. I did prefer to see the news topics and articles mixed in the main column and having the articles listed on the left side for easier access. IMO it just looks really strange when using a width of ~1000px for the website since the single columns are rather narrow and reading ain't much fun.
Maybe the best mix of the old and current style would be to have news and "starts of articles" mixed in the middle, the general navigation on the left and the "complete article list" on the right. This would leave quite some space for the text in the middle and the news would be noticeable as they were before. I did really like those news...

[user5124]

Really
don't
like
the
new
design.

Makes
Phoronix
Look
Like
A
Google
Ad.

Totally
ugly
on
a
widescreen.

Will
probably
stop
browsing
the
front
page -
again.

[niniendowarrior]

Hmmm, to be honest:
I don't like the latest change in the design. I did prefer to see the news topics and articles mixed in the main column and having the articles listed on the left side for easier access. IMO it just looks really strange when using a width of ~1000px for the website since the single columns are rather narrow and reading ain't much fun.
Maybe the best mix of the old and current style would be to have news and "starts of articles" mixed in the middle, the general navigation on the left and the "complete article list" on the right. This would leave quite some space for the text in the middle and the news would be noticeable as they were before. I did really like those news...

I do think that most of these narrow article complaints is from the mere fact they really tried to jam a lot of sections in that one poor home page. I think it'll improve dramatically as soon as they can clean up the front page.

[Michael]

I do think that most of these narrow article complaints is from the mere fact they really tried to jam a lot of sections in that one poor home page. I think it'll improve dramatically as soon as they can clean up the front page.

By this afternoon the front page should be revised.

[Licaon]

can these layouts be made out of CSS or somethin so that i can choose which one to use?

i barely got my self familiar with the last one, but the new one is terrible, too many columns :(

10x

[David]

Really
don't
like
the
new
design.

Makes
Phoronix
Look
Like
A
Google
Ad.

Totally
ugly
on
a
widescreen.

Will
probably
stop
browsing
the
front
page -
again.
Point taken, keep in mind we are working on this.

[David]

New front page is live. We removed the right sidebar for home pages. The information seemed redundant anyhow. We hope this is an improvement. We may work on a widescreen version very soon.

[1c3d0g]

Oh yes! It's *perfect* now, IMO. Job well done! :cool:

[David]

Oh yes! It's *perfect* now, IMO. Job well done! :cool:

that always makes us feel good =)

[niniendowarrior]

Much more improved, David. Cheers!

[DanL]

Using the old_home link I mentioned allows that as well as subscribing to the RSS feed.
:confused:
The old_home link looks exactly the same as the new page and it still has more detail on the articles than the news headlines.

[user5124]

New front page is live. We removed the right sidebar for home pages. The information seemed redundant anyhow. We hope this is an improvement. We may work on a widescreen version very soon.

Didn't mean to sound harsh about the old interface :-)

It would be great to see a version that uses all the available screenspace for widescreen.

[ivanovic]

Okay, my general impression after the latest set of changes:
When reading a news or articles:
It is really good. The main text in the middle, normal top/left bar and the latest news/articles on the right. That is really good, *but*...

When reading the "frontpage" (the one you reach when typing http://www.phoronix.com into the browser) I would prefer to have the same "article bar" on the right that you see when watching the articles. And seeing the normal news and articles mixed in the middle. I come to the page rather often to have a look for new news, not for new articles (cf the number of new news and the number of new articles). So in this matter I would prefer the old way with showing the whole news/article (if it is not too long) and adding a "read more..." link when that news/article gets longer than one paragraph. This way it is a whole lot easier to realize that there are new *news* and articles, not only new articles.

[Source Of Radiance]

Nice redesign. However in my opinion the forum section should be above the reviews section or on opposite sides of the screen.

[Kano]

The design is ok, but how about changing the forum cache settings that the already shown threads are not marked?

[Source Of Radiance]

Now it's perfect. You guys rock!

[KohlyKohl]

I can actually read this site for more than 5 seconds without my eyes hurting. Thank you and keep up the great reviews.

[David]

I can actually read this site for more than 5 seconds without my eyes hurting. Thank you and keep up the great reviews.

lol. I'll take that as a compliment, and then I won't show this comment to the previous designer (cough).

[phenom]

post #1 -----------------------

[phenom]

post#2 ================================

[David]

post#2 ================================

Looks to me like someone is just trying to download videos :P

[Michael]

Guys, do you still like the theme of the forums or would you rather see black text with white background?

[d2kx]

Guys, do you still like the theme of the forums or would you rather see black text with white background?

Show us how it would look. But I guess that the current theme will fit better.

[mrshappy]

sweet friends are like the wind
you cant see what inside their heart
but you can always feel their presence
and sincerity.
thanks for being a good wind
IN MY LIFE......


Good Day ^^

[dust]

Show us how it would look. But I guess that the current theme will fit better.

http://www.vbulletin.com/forum/
give the user the option back to select how it looks!

http://www.phoronix.com/forums/showthread.php?t=15234
change forum color