Jump to content

Unofficial Home of Old Simplicity & Allis-Chalmers Garden Tractors

Kent. I think you moved us off of Yahurl! none ...


JBLACK

Recommended Posts

... to soon! Tim's Bolens club (no offense intended, Tim) is already running behind on message posting. I then took a look at the JD garden tractor club, 320 members, and their messages are running 48 hours behind! Looks like you made a correct decision, buddy.
Fred
BTW, I found a couple of stray new posts on our Yahoo! and 'replied' them to come here. I'll try to keep an eye on that little detail for us.
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Thanks for the feedback -- and for keeping an eye on the old Yahoo forum. Thought I'd give you an update of what we're working on for the new "Clubhouse" and ask for comments and feedback:

1. We have a new registration function designed that will require joining the club to post messages or replies, though you can view them without joining (similar to Yahoo)

2. Registration will REQUIRE:
(a) an address (so we can show city & state, though street address will not be displayed. The club will then have a mailing list, if they need to mail anything to members
(b) an E-mail address that will be displayed
(c) identifying yourself as an owner, collector (multiple tractors/brands) or a dealer
(d) a user name and password to protect club members' privacy (only members can view other members info, and then NOT all of it) and prevent posting messages using someone else's name

3. A Members list that only members can view that shows name, city, state, E-mail address, and comments to describe your tractors, etc. Hope to be able to sort it different ways (state, name, category ((owner, dealer, etc)) date, etc....

4. A Calendar function that members can update to show chats, auctions, shows, etc.

5. A public area that describes how to join, benefits of membership, etc.

6. A section restricted to Club members where we can put anything we'd like to be "private" to only club members

7. Classified ads that members can add themselves, edit or delete, viewable by anyone, but only members can post ads (similar to the discussion). Still haven't finalized the format though... Do you think a modified "forum" style would work well, where members could ask public questions and get public answers to questions about something listed in the classifieds? We could then search the titles of the ads....

8. I'd like to add a Chat function, but haven't figured out an easy/good solution yet....

9. We've made a couple of enhancements to this Discussion Forum software while we're at it:
a) Increasing it to 10 messages per page, to cut down on the number of pages to go thru
b) Adding a "top of list" link that allows you to quickly jump back to the top, instead of having to use Next or Previous to page all the way through...

10. A couple of enhancements we're trying to add are:
a) A "confirmation" screen that allows you to edit your message before posting it
b) Pre-filling the "Name" and "E-mail" fields on new messages or replies with the info from your membership record, based on your "logon" with user name and password...

I hope to have at least most of this stuff available for public testing within a month or so. However, I'm asking for comments and feedback on what YOU would like to see now, so we can evaluate it and see what we can do....

Please respond here publicly, so everyone can "vote" on the enhancements. We may need to prioritize what gets done first....

One of the great things about this approach is that we now have the programming code and the database of messages -- as long as we're carefuly we can retain any previous stuff that's here (NOT YAHOO!!!!) and continue to enhance the functions without losing content....

Thanks for your patience. Please let me know what you think -- or want!

Meanwhile we need to be thinking of a design for a club logo or emblem to put on these new clubhouse pages, and our t-shirts, hats, or whatever. Tim had started with some ideas for t-shirts....
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Sounds great Kent - as usual you've been busy! I'll
watch for the registration function as I never did sign-up
through yahoo. I like the idea in #9 as far as increasing
the page size, also I don't really see the need for the
"Post New Message:" area at the bottom of each page when
it can be accessed from the top of each page. I feel
that anything that minimizes having to ‘turn' to the
next page will help.
John
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Kent, Re: #1: I'm a little concerned that this would discourage questions from non-members. Seems to me that I've seen some, and I would think that we'd like to give tech help to anyone.
Re: #2&3: Security is a must, here. I don't mind sharing my mailing address or even my unpublished phone number with members, but this must be hack-resistant.
Re: #10: Yes! Just the thing for ham-fisted geeks like me.
Fred
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Good ideas Kent.

I would like to see a list of article titles like Yahoo had perhaps 100 titles long that we could scroll, click on and read the replies w/o just reading 2 or 3 titles and then going on to the next page. With this arrangement, we could find articles much faster and read the replies. If each article title had a number like Yahoo, we could find articles quickly such as the recent referral to "belts" or the one on the way to identify a Briggs engine. New members could be referred to that article rather than searching what I find a somewhat clumbersome arrangement we have now for such an article. I don't want to be critical but you asked for what I want to see. This is one thing.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Guest
This topic is now closed to further replies.
×
×
  • Create New...