damned_lounge | Layout Contest + new layouts for other Damned journals.

Entry tags:

!mod,
*poll

Layout Contest + new layouts for other Damned journals.

Well, isn't this long overdue? We've heard a share of complaints about the different layouts and it's about time for a change. Obviously the most pressing issue is the layout for the main community. Seeing how we currently have paid time for that account, we can have a custom layout for it. We decided the best way to get a new layout that's specifically made for Damned was by having a layout contest! That means any current player could design and code a layout for the game provided that it adheres to certain guidelines (more about that later).

The layouts would have to be submitted to us through email (or in some other secure way) and the whole thing would be anonymous -- the winner would be decided by a comm-wide vote, and the winner would get some kind of prize (most likely an LJ certificate or something along those lines).

As for what the layout should have on it, there have been a few things asked for by various people over on the suggestions post. There are a variety of things mentioned there, but there might be more things that people might see as a must-have. We don't want the guidelines to be too restricting, but we do want to get an idea of what aspects people generally would want to see on the layout.

So, what should the new layout definitely have?

[Poll #1446809]

Note about having visible tags on the posts, though: remember that dayshift posts in particular have a ton of tags, so it would result in more scrolling. Just something to keep in mind...

---

Now, we also have a share of other official journals with varying layouts. These layouts would need to be changed/customized using LJ's themes and such, since most of them aren't paid. We'd also be glad to find someone who would be willing to change these layouts around and tweak them depending on which themes are decided on, but we need to get some more basic questions out of the way before we get to that part. At the moment, some of these have nicer layouts than others and might not need changing, so... WELL, SEE POLL:

[Poll #1446810]

Keep in mind that what it means by same theme is that the theme would be the same with each journal having its own set of colors, so they wouldn't all look exactly the same or anything like that. (Or if you do want them all to look exactly the same, let us know that too.) Oh, and please be careful about how you answer. We realize it's a bit confusing, but double-check to make sure that you don't contradict yourself so that we can best organize this for you guys.

So yeah, once we... get more of an idea of how this is all gonna shake out, then we can take theme nominations and see if anyone would be willing to get down and dirty with fixing things up/color coding, etc. 8D;; As far as the contest, we'll be giving out more specific details once we've decided on the criteria from the poll.

Oh, as an added note, we got some new nurse icons from

stopcounting a while back that we've been planning to upload, but that made us wonder if people wanted new icons for some of the other journals as well. If so, we can try to work out taking care of that too, probably also by appealing for more help from you guys. ;;

Thanks and keep it real!

~~P.S. My brain is officially broken after trying to figure out how to organize that poll orz~~

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A mini-version of the link list in the side-bar would be nice. Important places like contact list, maps, schedule. I've been setting these up in my IC journals because always going around my elbow to get to my knee has been tricky.

Just putting in my two cents that I really love the

damned_lounge layout as is. >>; I mean, maybe it's not custom themed, but it's functional, easy to browse and read, and I like the colors. :> Maybe just a few tweaks with specific links and such would suffice?

Also, I definitely think that all IC communities, at least, should have different layouts with different thematic organization considering they are supposed to be IC and such. Especially the bulletin, since that's supposed to be somewhere that the characters all physically write.

That's really all I have to say except for THANKS, COURT. ♥

Oh, also, I think I've made it pretty clear how much I dislike the main layout and have felt it should be changed for years now THIS COMING FROM THE ONE WHO MADE IT

Edited 2009-08-21 12:38 (UTC)

The Lounge is Bloggish, right? Or possssssibly Flexible Squares?

The thing on my character journal is very similar, but custom, and I've customized it further (wallpaper and more colors); I have it on journals that don't have paid accounts at all, and I've used something similar for communities without a paid account. It's a useful layout!

The only thing is that you have to go to the post itself to be able to edit; the main page doesn't have edit links.

(I'm being super-vague here; I think it's that Bloggish has edit links on the main page, and Flexible Squares doesn't. There are unfortunately a lot more custom layouts available for FS.)

As to what someone suggested about making important links available in a given community's sidebar: that could be useful.

What I did was to make a folder that sits on the bookmark bar in Firefox (which I know not everyone uses); it's a list of links to the things I refer to constantly. If there's too much that needs to be linked for a sidebar list in a free community, it'd be pretty easy to put together a list of links that people can drag and drop into a bookmark folder. (Mine is like... friends page, damned_info, the contact list, maps and descriptions, the schedule, any bulletin posts I want to refer back to, character journal, character profile, and so on.)

Getting organized with that before I started has helped me feel sliiiightly less clueless. (Though let's not be getting ahead of ourselves, here; I'm still working on becoming more clueful! ^^; ) Anyway, I'd be happy to provide that list of links to anyone who wants it, if there's ever any interest.

Not a fan of tags on the posts or the sidebar, since that would make the page stretch on forever. However, I think a link to the tags page on the sidebar would be a good idea.

Additionally, could you maybe please please PLEASE stress that the layouts be as cross-browser compatible as possible? Maybe a pet peeve of mine, but people can make very pretty things that look good on only one screen. Since this a majority vote, it's probably something that should be taken into consideration for people who don't use the most popular OS/browser/resolution/what have you. Using a cell phone as my web browser sometimes, I come across this a lot. Also, when the new profile layout was done, I was one of the few who didn't the table backgrounds as grey, but this sort of ugly yellow that didn't match the green. So it's something that, imho, should be considered.

And lastly, whatever you do? Please don't turn on the custom comment pages in whatever new layouts you choose? In rp communities in general, it's REALLY hard to keep up with comments if the design isn't one that makes use of the whole screen, particularly as a thread gets long.

Edited 2009-08-21 12:20 (UTC)

I can't say anything for sure on the rest of your comment, but I can assure you that we will not turn on custom comment pages for the RP communities. :| I mean unless there's an overwhelming consensus for it or something, but I seriously doubt that. XD;

Ha ha. That's probably the biggest one, so yay! :D

Mobile phone user here, too (y helo thar fellow CrackBerry user)! \o Most of the time, I have images disabled by default and only load them on request per page. And JS is almost always disabled on my phone; I have rarely had occasion to enable it. So, I don't even see what you get on yours; the style sheet simply never loads on my phone, so it's this ugly-looking default layout that doesn't even have direct links to the entry other than comment links. =X

Edited 2009-08-21 12:49 (UTC)

I'm curious about what kind of layouts your browser is capable of viewing, like. How simple it has to be? I mean, if you look at my layout (http://continuum.livejournal.com/), does it look whacked out or...?

As for colours, those are difficult since it's all up to the individual monitor which means the only way everyone can go across the board with the same colours is if they all can calibrate their monitors correctly/have recently bought a monitor or laptop that's been pre-calibrated and hasn't had the chance to go funky. My monitor's calibrated, for instance, so that's just the standard I tend to when making icons and such, under the assumption that most people have properly calibrated monitors as well.

But yeah, the easiest way to avoid that is to dodge using colours that depend on being a very specific shade between two stronger colours (like peach, which can easily turn too pink or too orange).

deleting my other comment because it. Went in the wrong place and I JUST REALIZED NOW adfasfa *fails forever*

I don't really think that the journals all need to be the same necessarily. I mean, the journals as they are now? They're functional and they work, so why change them?

As for the main comm layout, the problem of tags stretching the page is definitely a good point, so that should be avoided. I actually...like the comm as it is now? It looks just fine to me - maybe change the profile codes, but otherwise, I don't see a reason for any huge changes.

I agree with the tags concern for the main comm, and maybe instead of that use a link to the tags list. There are a lot of tags, after all. Having them at the subject would make the subject stretch too long, especially in dayshift threads such as the cafeteria.

EDIT: And for RPing, I'd prefer no custom comment pages. ;__;

Edited 2009-08-21 12:33 (UTC)

Link to the tags list.

^Seconding this notion. |D

To be honest, I view all journals in my own journal's style (one of the benefits of having a Paid Account that I prize almost as much as comment editing), so I rarely ever see any of Damned's journals' layouts. So... as far as aesthetics goes, it doesn't matter to me. But I'm all for as many utilities as possible... And yes, even if there are a hundred tags on a single post, I'd rather have them there because it tells me who has definitely posted to an entry, without having to open the entry itself and having to load nearly a thousand comments (which cripple, if not crash, my browser or mobile phone).

The only thing with that though is when you have people who forget to add their tags to the entry. I'm one of the worst about it...I mean, I've had Kakashi for a year come November, and I've only listed his tag 11 times. I can definitely understand what you're saying though, which is why if I know I want to stalk somebody, I usually end up tracking them. Definitely feel you on the huge load on a mobile phone though.

Oh, and for my own tags, I email a list of those links to myself, so I can just go directly to them on my phone. Makes it so so so much easier.

Just out of curiosity, what sort of Blackberry do you have? I had a 83-something something curve before, then I upgraded to the 8900, and it's so much more favorable with stuff like damned.

Edited 2009-08-21 12:56 (UTC)

Oh yeah... Even I've done that, and I'm probably one of the most OCD about tagging here. XD;; The problem with tracking is that you still have to sift through the post, which may already have hundreds of comments, to find their starting comment for the thread. I try to jump on these as early as possible to avoid the overload, but that's not always doable.

I've done that, too... although, I've also found that keeping vK's tracking post up-to-date is a huge help for me there; all I have to do is go to his profile page, which links to his tracking post. XD

It's a BlackBerry Curve, which is model number... IDK! 83-something sounds about right. Alas, I can't upgrade for another year (unless I want to pay several hundred dollars). :< But that's definitely good to know, and perhaps by then, they'll have something even better. I'm already thinking about upgrading because, frankly, mine's starting to freeze up occasionally for no reason, where I have to remove the battery, and it's such a PITA.

Seconding the comments about cross-browser -- I don't yet have a mobile web device, but am probably going to get one (and that'll be mostly driven by wanting to keep up with RP from more places), but I do use a lot of different browsers. I don't see sidebars in the browser I generally use at work, but I also just type damned.livejournal.com/tag/character if I'm hunting my own posts or stalking.

I marked "no" on making everything match -- I don't really care, as long as they're functional and legible. I think it might be useful to use a similar layout for all of the town/monsters/etc so that if you've browsed one, you know exactly where to go to hit the info for another -- muscle memory and all that.

My only personal want for the main comm is having it stretch to fit a browser. I like the color scheme -- I find it easy to read. I pretty much always read the lounge from my friendslist, so I really don't care what it looks like.

Oh, and for the bulletin: a layout where the icons don't oddly shift text on the first few lines might be good -- I've had trouble getting text formatting right there (because <center> is something people do in handwriting frequently).

Uhh... just so people know, I actually went and counted how many tags would show up if they were included with the posts. :P

- under the most heavy of circumstances- the entirety of Day 41 (a Friday, which has few locations with lots of characters in them, as well as being an intro day so that even the intercom posts have more tags), plus some of the heavier NS posts to even it up to 20 entries (as well as heavy rounding up to account for people not tagging their locations damn you): 805.
- Right now on the main comm's front page (no rounding, I got lazy): 407.
- Number of tags the community has as a whole (AKA how many would show up if all of them were added to the sidebar @_@): 671.

I still vote for visible tags on the posts, because yeah, I'd really dig that being able to scroll the comm and catch the characters I want to read rather than having to go into the entry itself. Using the tag list itself is near unworkable, because you actually have to think of who you'd like to read and search for them, while sometimes you're just looking for something to stave off boredom or something. In the end ~~it doesn't even maaatter~~~, it's just loading fewer pages.

Plus, I hate the idea of having the tags in the sidebar... whenever I see that on a comm that has so many, I think it looks hideous. :( However, I do support a link!

As for which comms need "revamps," Iiii just went to them all and voted for the ones that I think really need new colors slapped on them.

Ahhhh, okay, yeah, that's a very good point about the tags. XD;;;;; They display as a tag cloud in my character journal's style, but as a long list in my personal journal's style. Most of the time, I don't even give it a thought, but now that you mention it, a link to the tags page would be a great compromise (since I do visit tags a LOT). *Ought to learn to be as meticulous about tagging her personal journal stuff as she is about Damned-related stuff, no?* XD;;;;;;;;

Question: are you looking for original CSS, or are you fine with preexisting templates created by a non-player (from

refuted or whatnot)?

I think because they're doing it as a contest, probably original CSS? :3

That's what I thought. Sweet.

I think the only comms that need sprucing up are the main one and the bulletin board. The only other comms/journals I use the most are the lounge, cafe and info journal, and I think their formats suit their purposes just fine and are fairly functional.

Personally, I think listing all the tags on the main page would make things clunky and annoying to scroll through, but I understand where people are coming from about not wanting to load pages with huge amounts of comments unless necessary.

Since it's being considered for a revamp, I kinda have a suggestion about the

damned_doctors journal... This concerns the therapist doctors mostly (and yes, I play one)

With how the therapist doctors are applied for, I have always wondered why they all go under one journal while the NS-only characters - also applied for in a similar manner to ths therapists - are allowed separate player journals. Also, with the rotations, the NS-only characters are played about the same amount as the doctors are.

Could the doctors be considered for having their own journals? It would (hopefully) make things easier on the mods, and doctor players would be able to set up their own journals with more icons and their own Time Zone (which has always bugged me about having to log in as a Doctor). The

damned_doctors journal wouldn't have to be abandoned completely either, but could be used as a generic journal for those doctors who handle the MU sessions - just like how the generic NPC monsters are put into

damned_monsters.

Seconding this.

A link to the tags list in the sidebar would be more practical than a list of tags in the sidebar for the main

damned comm. 'Cause. Lots of tags = waaaaa. So yeah, would take up less space that way/look much neater. |D; Same for the bulletin. AND UHHHH, stuff. ... TBH, I'm of the opinion that only Damned and the Bulletin really need the layout revamping, the former to include a sidebar and easy navigation to other reference pages and the latter for TAGS TAGS TAGS (andalsothecolorschangeplz), but after glancing at some of the other journals/communities, I think like they look like they could use some prettifying, too, so why not hit them all? That sort of thing. Not strictly necessary, again, but um. Shiny things are shiny.

... And I like the idea of there being a different base layout for IC comms, OOC comms, IC journals, and OOC journals, with the variation being on color scheme between each one to make it all yeah, easily identifiable. |D; That might be too much work, though, so just having the same layout for comms and a different one for journals with color schemes being different there would work, too. I am horrible, I know.

... Um, but yeah. D| I'm not so sure what to say about tags being visible on entries in the main Damned comm 'cause I'm thinking of how much nicer it'd be at NS rather than the headaches that'll arise from DS tags. I mean, since NS is three weeks and there are more posts, as opposed to DS which has fewer posts as dictated by shifts and whatnot...? So it'd look D: during the day but be :D at night. ... Pretend that made sense. Anyway, it might just be a necessary evil, assuming people even remember to tag entries with their characters' names and actually make it viable.

Edited 2009-08-21 18:00 (UTC)

All tags being visible sounds like it would make things really cluttered, especially during dayshift when some posts have, like, eeeeverybody.

I'm not a fan of sidebars because I like layouts that will allow me to keep my browser window narrow (as I like having other things visible on my screen while reading

damned) without stretching it. So I really like the current layout for that, and a big thing I'd look for in a new layout would be how small I can make the window without cutting things off. If it stretches to fit bigger windows for other people, and still minimizes nicely, it'd be pretty A+ for me.

Honestly, the only things I'd change about the main comm as it is now would be adding a link to tags (although I normally just go "/tag" in the address bar, since that's just as easy), and maybe making usernames visible.

Didn't vote on the last two polls, since it really doesn't matter to me if the journals match or not. It's not like we read the NPC journals that much, anyway.

Edited 2009-08-21 19:07 (UTC)

I'm not really big on whether or not info or the board or the cafe or whatever match, just so long as the colors change from, say, the orange board or the pink mods comm. Something a little more...neutral, maybe?

And for the layout of the main community, my personal priorities are a link to post and the username with the icon of the poster on the main page. The other communities (info, bulletin, etc) in a sidebar would be nice too. The rest? I'm not so worried.

I love tags, but after reading everyone's arguments in here I have to agree that it probably isn't practical to display them on the front pages of the communities.

I'm all for communities belonging to a single game having something cohesive about their layouts -- probably similar color schemes. However, you're very busy mods, and so in this case I think the only really important thing is the usability of the communities themselves.

New games do get judged sometimes on the prettiness of their communities, but I don't think this is a game where that's a factor or an issue. So, while I think it'd be cool if the communities matched better... they've been good enough all along for the game to be successful, and that's what's most important. ♥

I'm pretty neutral with these things, but I'm just going to add that I'm pretty against the tags list on the page. Not only would it stretch the page forever, like Tad said, but it would look pretty bad, too. A link to the tags page would be cool, but having them all there seems a bit like overkill.

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Layout Contest + new layouts for other Damned journals.

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