Right. That’s it. Enough already! I’m just going to go and launch the damn thing and let everyone else find all the bugs and the crappy bits of code and the hacked together bits of shit and I’ll fix em all later when I’ve had a bit of a break. Otherwise it’s going to suck up every last bit of my life forever as I fiddle and fuss around some of the obscurer areas when I should be throwing enough people at it and see how many land on something spiky.
So with that in mind, I’m here to announce the 87% complete new version of Barbelith – the online community that actually doesn’t just talk shit all day (although it does that too). As ever with a redesign it’s got a good few rough edges that will get worn into shape over time. Unlike most redesigns that I’ve been involved with it’s also full of really bad code and there are places where the new lick of paint could do with a couple of more coats. But then again, unlike most commercial redesigns of any scale, this one took four weekends from start to finish. I am sooo looking forward to going outside again. Anyway – have a poke around – be nice to the locals and feel free to leave your thoughts:
16 replies on “Paint the whole 'lith with a rainbow…”
Great design Tom!
I never seen anything so sexy in all my life!
Looking goood..
Preedy colour coded menus – but wot, no CSS positioning in a 21st century redesign?
No – I’m afraid not. This was more of an evolution of an old design, although it’s not necessarily obvious to anyone that that’s the case. I was using the Barbelith redesign as an excuse to get more deeply into PHP and as such decided that I was going to concentrate on that side of things rather than moving it towards CSS positioning. It was quite satisfyingly retro to go back and do a site in tables again, although I don’t think I’ll be doing it again – and hopefully I will be able to move the site to CSS positioning at some point in the nearish future.
Hmmm…I’m not so sure. The design looks nice, yes, but I think the former was more “fitting” to the general feel of the community.
Oh, now that is good. It might even get me to come back and waste all my time there again.
“Congratulations, it’s a buoy!” And what a beauty!
I’m not a regular by any means but I was struck how readable it is. I tend to stay away from forums because they’re so messy and impossible to follow. This is very nice indeed.
It looks excellent to me. Unlike most community websites, it loads extremely quickly and doesn’t have an abundance of undeeded code. The design is simple, colourful, tasteful and it fills the whole page. The title font is attractive.
And as far as I know, it’s a new forum template, which, while it’s not exactly the same as most traditional online forums/message boards, it’s still intuative and easy to use; something quite rare when you consider how many people attempt to create new forum styles and fail miserably.
Excellent work, IMO.
I think it’s great! Really different from any forum I’ve ever seen, in a good way.
Looks hott. I’ve joined. Loving it so far.
Yeah, gave me quite a shock though when I first saw it but it looks good. Different but good. It’s going to take a while to get used to but more time on Barbelit was just what I needed right now.
It was shocking at first, having spent a ridiculous amount of time in Barb over the past year. But now I like it. The only thing I miss is being able to spot the 3 most recent topics of each forum from the Index page. Now I have to go in to each to see what’s new. Not so bad, just not quite as easy as it was. All in all, I’m getting to like the new look quite a bit. Cheers!
Another.. Online.. Community..
But this one looks interesting. It’s called BarbelithTom Coates from PlasticBag seems to have something to do with it. Here are some other things I haven’t had a chance to blog about but wanted to:…
I think it’s a great improvement – I was never sure what barbelith “was all about” before (being lazy and not looking hard), now it’s nice and obvious. For the entry pages the little block of colour sticking out the left looks a bit clunky – have a look at subtraction.com, the layout of the individual post data (date, time, etc.) is beautifully done.
Ok, I give up. I love the design nowadays. It’s a beauty.
But, as a lot of people has pointed out I’m sure, a “last updated threads” on the first page would be great – even though that might break the design. In that case – forget about it. And a “last post by” showing on every thread would be great to – in case you forget how many replies the thread had when you wrote in it.
Great job.