I really, really miss the old forum....

[AggroJones]

This new format ain't doing it for me. Difficult to figure out. Not as user friendly either.

[jwar]

Me too and we lost a few great modelers that had headaches posting. But then agro I surley dont miss the polling and the stars....John. .

[tigerstripe]

Me too,  I'm glad to see all the polls and trolls are gone. but it just ain't the same.

A lot fewer posts and new topics. Also before you could see the threads that are new and new replys

since your last visit that were a different color.  I dont know if I'm just stupid or what but I can't

figure out alot of the new features.

I also miss my daily Spacemouse fix.

[canazar]

Oh, its not all that bad.  There are few features that are diffiicult, or wishfing that had done something else.  But then, they are quite a few things that I like too. 

 Like the fact that you can see my happy dance under my name.

 

 

Nice to see your face again.  Hope to see more of it.

[ATSFCLIFF]

Agree with you, it is NOT user friendly.
Cheers,


http://cliffordconceicao3310.fotopic.net/c328807.html

[Dave-the-Train]

Hang in there please guys!  We need to keep going to build this forum back up.

I agree that the change has been annoying.  I think that they didn't appreciate how stuck in our ways we get and how PC challneged some of us are.

I've only just figured out how the "My Forums" and "Persoanl messages" work... and I'm not entirely thick... mostly just not used to the jargon.

Would it help if I posted more weird questions for you to comment on?

To tell the truth I get a bit concerned that I post a lot and long stuff... I don't have Spacemouse to compete with currently...

COME BACK SPACEMOUSE! 

WE MISS YOU!

[Fergmiester]

I've been waiting for someone to broach this subject and yes I couldn't agree more with most of the comments made.

I do not find it user friendly nor very navigable.

A lot of the friendly banter that I thouroughly enjoyed is gone.

I dare not say more as I may invoke the wrath of the "Old Wife's Club"

However that said it is still one of the better threads for getting quick answers to questions asked.

Fergie

[Anonymous]

Couldn't agree more.  I'm fairly new at this, but the change, in my opinion, has not been for the better.  I have recently spent more time trying to find other model railroad forums than lurking here.  I have noticed a marked drop in participation, which seems to be getting worse.  Hopefully the powers that be at Kalmbach will take notice and make changes (quickly?).

In the meantime what are some other forums that I should visit.  I've already tried Atlas, which isn't all that bad as an alternative.

Tom

[Pruitt]

I might be considered part of the "Old Wife's Club" - I don't miss a lot of the inane chatter. It was just static on an otherwise informative channel.

The forum change is kind of a wash - some better features, some worse.

[electrolove]

Aggro,

I think the worst thing is the totally lack of interest for solving the problems on this so called new and better forum.

I have emailed Bergie but I don't even get an answer.

As a Mac user I can't do much here. I have all kind of problems. The pdf videos for example that seems to be the new great thing is not for me, I can't use that feature at all.

Mac users are model railroaders too, but when the importent thing is money, things like that does not mean much... I'm 100% sure they calculated and said, we can sacrifice Mac users because they are a minority.

[Anonymous]

Well,

The age old Mac Problem. Not sure what it is, but I am sure it will get worked out. I've volunteered to help, not sure if it's needed or not.

I stay here inspite of change. I never posted much. Too many people with better ideas and experience than I have. I post where I feel my point can be made after reviewing the topic. Sometimes I even make a post on a topic I need help with. That is what I thought a Forum was all about. Giving and receiving help.

I have learned a lot here in 2 years, post count be damned.

Chris

[MAbruce]

I don’t know.  While the new format is not perfect, I think it’s better than what was there before.  But then again, I’m not a high post count members that is reading/posting through nearly every topic and demands advanced features.  I’m an average user that realizes this is a free forum and works with what they have.    

[Anonymous]

Do I miss the old forums? Yes.

These forums are ok. Just overbuilt and cumbersome.

I have a feeling a little something may have gone by the wayside when the new forums was implemented.

The recent troubles over the weekend assured me that some things never changed.

[pcarrell]

Spacemouse has been hanging out in the layouts section lately.  He's still here!

As to the new format.....I don't miss the polls or the stars, but I do miss being able to copy from a post before it's posted.  It was handy for my spell checker, you know?  It's not as user friendly, but it has it's good points as well.  It's kind of a tradeoff. 

Also, does anyone know how to look up a specific members profile without having one of their posts to click on?  Like lets say I want to look up Spacemouse, and I don't have any of his posts to just click on.  How would I find his profile?

And TMLEWI, there's one in my signature.  It's kind of new so the membership isn't what this one is, but it's pretty good.  Since there aren't a lot of members yet you really get to know everybody.

[MisterBeasley]

To me, there's really not much that's different.  Sure, the keystrokes have changed a bit, but it's mostly the same things.  I would say that the performance is better, particularly in the daytime hours.  The old one used to hang up for 10-20 seconds once in a while, and I don't see that problem anymore.

I don't know if Kalmbach did a server upgrade along with the forum change.  Since the old forum has been around for quite a while, it may be that the old forum software wouldn't even run with new servers and new OS's.  This happens a lot when you upgrade.

[MisterBeasley]

Also, does anyone know how to look up a specific members profile without having one of their posts to click on?  Like lets say I want to look up Spacemouse, and I don't have any of his posts to just click on.  How would I find his profile?

Go to the top or bottom of this page and click on "Model Railroader Forums."  That's one step up from the General Discussion or Layouts Page.  Find the line that says something like:

There are 34 of 28,821 member(s) online

And click on the big number (28,821 in this case.)  That takes you to the member directory.  I think I'll bookmark that page, because getting there is really obscure and I'm not sure I could do it after a couple of beers.

[CSX_road_slug]

Some members of the "old" forum don't visit as much because they don't have as much free time as they once did; others have changed their screen name (myself included).  IOW many of the changes may not totally be the result of the new software.

[Don Z]

 Also before you could see the threads that are new and new replys

since your last visit that were a different color.  I dont know if I'm just stupid or what but I can't

figure out alot of the new features.

I also miss my daily Spacemouse fix.

Tigerstripe, instead of using the "Back" button on your browser, click on the forum name that you are reading in (General Discussion, for example) at the top or bottom of the page, and when it reloads, the topic you just read shows up in grey, while the unread topics are blue. Also, when coming back to the forum, those grey topics will again be blue if a reply was posted in your absence.

I hope this helps,

Don Z.

[grayfox1119]

Change comes very hard for some people. Working in high tech comapnies most of my working career, I had to deal with many radical changes. I had to help people through many of these changes as I had over 100 techs working for me.
You will get through it trust me. Change is how we get better, grow stronger. Heck, if our bodies never changed, we would still look and act like Neanderthals.....ohh ohhhhh, some still do!!!! LOL

[simon1966]

I am in high tech as well.  I deal with new software and changes all the time. Yet I echo many of the complaints written above.  I am dissapointed with the new forum.  It really is not a significant improvement in any way, except for speed.  It is faster to load, no doubt, but I can not think of a single other improvment over the old forum.  I don't hate the new forum, I am just ambivalent towards it because it does not seem to have provided the user any advances. 

[cripp12]

I've only just figured out how the "My Forums" and "Persoanl messages" work... and I'm not entirely thick... mostly just not used to the jargon.

Coould you explain how they work?

[Anonymous]

I guess to each his own, but quality has gone up and quantity is down. This forum has become better imho, more train talk, less idle banter, much ado about nothing...............

[CAZEPHYR]

Sure the new forum might be a little difficult for some people to figure out but they will eventually.  I don't miss the dumb polls or the rediculous posts though from the old forum. 

I agree with your comment on the dumb polls.  Most of the polls were repeat subjects over and over. 

 

[Paul3]

You know what I miss?  I miss:

1) Typing in plain text.  Yep, I figure that in this reply window, we're actually typing html, not plain text.  Because of that, things like copying and pasting from other websites is a mess.  For example, try copying and pasting from Wikipedia.  All their text highlights are there and you can't get rid of them.  I find myself having to manually type things into this reply window to get rid of unwanted text highlights.  That's annoying.

2) A single line return key.  For example, see the extra space above this line?  That's because I hit the return key once, yet it double spaced it.  Why?  I have learned that if you hold down the shift key while hitting the return key, it makes it a single space.  But why this extra step?  It's annoying.

3) A reliable delete button.  I tend to go over my posts and edit them before posting.  Yet for whatever reason, my delete key sometimes doesn't work.  To erase anything, now I use the backspace key and make sure I put the cursor to the right of any corrections.  That's annoying.

4) Not seeing the whole thread page when replying.  It means that if I want to reply to multiple posts, I either have to make individual replies to each post in question, or I have to open another browser window in order to see all the posts I want to reply to.  That's annoying.

Paul A. Cutler III
*************
Weather Or No Go New Haven
*************

[Railphotog]

Boo Hoo!  Things change.  Live with it.

[Casey Feedwater]

As a Mac user I can't do much here. I have all kind of problems. The pdf videos for example that seems to be the new great thing is not for me, I can't use that feature at all.

Mac users are model railroaders too, but when the importent thing is money, things like that does not mean much... I'm 100% sure they calculated and said, we can sacrifice Mac users because they are a minority.

I am also a Mac user. But as I reported on pages 2 and 3 of this thread http://www.trains.com/trccs/forums/3/895844/ShowPost.aspx#895844 the solution is to download Firefox for Mac OS X and use it instead of Safari when logging on to this forum. I use Safari everywhere else I go on the internet with no problems, so it seems reasonable to assume the problem is with the Trains.com forum software and not with our Macs.

I installed Firefox yesterday and discovered that the photo posting problems have disappeared and that I'm also able to use the text formatting options in the posting window - something I was never able to do with Safari on this forum.

[Darth Santa Fe]

I've gotten used to this new forum, but I still like the old one better. Logging in and posting was easier (login box at the top of the page, quick reply box), pictures and urls were easier to post, and everything loaded in half the time it does now for me. When you've got an 8 year old computer and less than a cable connection (like me), loading this place can take a very, very long time.

[modelalaska]

I don't like this forum software either.  One really annoying "feature" is that some posts don't have a scroll bar available and I can not read the entire message unless I cut and paste it into some other program.  Anyone else have this problem and a solution?
Peter

[jfugate]

I am probably considered part of the "Old Wifes Club" too, but I agree with many of the concerns about this forum's software -- and especially with the odd silence on the part of MR about them. It would be nice to hear *something* from MR, even "get used to it".

KNOWN PROBLEMS
As to the posting problems, it is clear from reviewing CommunityServer's bug reports on their support site that two major snafu's exist in their code:

1. IE 7 is a problem. If you are using that browser, the version of CommunityServer MR is using on this forum has *serious malfunctions*. CommunityServer is developed by a Microsoft-Centric development group, so no doubt they will address the issues in time to be out with the release of Vista next year, but that also means MR will need to plan an immediate upgrade in early 2007 or they will have a major mess on their hands.

2. Macs and Safari are a problem. Since the CommunityServer developers are Microsoft centric, it appears from their responses to their bug reports that they rigorly test their software on the two major browsers, and that's it. The two top browsers right now are IE 6 and Firefox 1.5. If you are not using one of these browsers, then you will have problems, period.

MY PROFESSIONAL OPINION AS A WEB DEVELOPER
Since I am a senior internet software developer in my day job, I have a couple of professional observations on these issues.

1. Browsers are free, and if you want the least hassle and the most enjoyable internet browsing experience, then keep your browser updated, and get familiar with using one of the two top browsers on your computer. You need a working copy of IE 6 or Firefox 1.5 installed on your computer and you need to be familar with it. Even if these two browsers are not your favorite, you need one of them as a second browser for sites like this one that require one of these two browsers for a good browsing experience.

2. On the other hand, web software that only works well in lastest versions of the top two browsers and misbehaves badly in anything else is a really sloppy development practice. It appears the CommunityServer developers' official stance is: "If you use our software and it doesn't work right for you, get one of the approved browsers and use it. Browsers are free, so if you are unwilling to download and use an approved browser, then getting bad behavoir using our software is your own darn fault." Yes, sloppy, unrealistic, and rather heartless.

MR's SILENCE
MR's deafening silence on this whole issue doesn't do much to dispell the rather heartless aspect of CommunityServer's stance on their software problems, either. I've emailed Bergie myself, but it appears he has lots of irons in the fire at the moment, and my guess is the upgrade caused him to get behind in his other responsibilities and he's playing catch up. But it would be nice to at least hear a peep out of him now and then.

[selector]

I agree, Joe, and said as much recently.  I have gotten used to the new flavour, but I was never a big fan of plain old vanilla.  Thanks to Jon (alco_fan), my picture problems are history.

I am no more comfortable with change than the next person, but a wise old Roman said, "Who does not advance falls behind."  I am happy there are no more polls, althought the enterprising person could figure out how to make one work.  Don't, please!

BTW, where is Dave Kelly?