Out of all the dozens of forums I visit and use, this is one of the worst as far as being user friendly. It borders on terrible!
1. It doesn't allow saving of log-in data (username & password). I beleive this is the only forum that doesn't allow this in Opera. Operas 'wand' feature is great. I know Firefox has a similar feature, I don't know if it works there or not. As far as that POS browser from M$, it don't waste my time with inferior bloated software so I can't comment there,
2. It uses the longer, annoying e-mail as a username (which wouldn't be a problem if #1 was addressed),
3. The actual area for the 'forums text' is very small, occupying 1/3 of the screen width (on a 16x10 monitor), the rest is wasted space AFAIC,
4. There is no ability to do a quote w/o typing in the brackets,
5. There is no ability to add attachments w/o going through the complicated process of host them elsewhere and creating links that don't always work properly,,
6. The log-in process is beyond annoying. Normally if you are in a thread or at least in one of the sub-forums, 'login' is at the top of the page. OR, when you hit reply the next page is the log-in page (which it is here) and it will return you to the thread and a reply box. NOT so here, it returns you to a Trains non forum page, nothing to do with where you were. You have to hit the return/back button several times, then do a page refresh to post the reply. If you remember to login first, that problem is solved, but most other forums the software works and is laid out properly,
7. When you do enter a post, the next page doesn't re-direct you back to your post,only back to the sub forum you were in. You then have to re-enter that thread and navigate to where you post is. If it is in a long multi-page thread, then there are more button presses. BUT, it does return you to your post if you just edit your existing post.
Is it cost or something else that vBulletin software is not used like well over 90% of all the other forums??