New Theme issues

Please post here to let us know about problems with the new theme.

I've already noticed:

• the black border around the post text entry
• the buttons are inset instead of proud
• the odd black box that pops up when you hover over the post format buttons

These should be fixed shortly.

Also, if someone can figure out how to fix the quote boxes so that there isn't always a scrollbar, that would be great. The quotes are in the .ubbcode-block, .ubbcode-header, and .ubbcode-body divs, and the basic issue is that they're set to a specific pixel width. But I can't figure out how to make them line up properly with a relative width.

Bitt, are you going to make the larger font version of the default theme? I can make the changes if you post the relevant CSS files for this theme or let me know how to download them.

Do you know if the font sizes are all specified per element in an absolute measure like pixels, or is there one base font and are the rest specified in relative terms like ems?

I can also take a shot at the post quote though someone will likely beat me to it. I'd probably start off by looking at specifying the size as a percentage of the containing element. Or set it with margins so it otherwise takes up 100% of the containing element (minus the visual space caused by the margins).

I'll go back to the other thread in case it's already been mentioned where to get the files.

I didn't realize there was a larger font version. Buy some glasses

Font sizes are specified in points in many different CSS elements(?), which is why some of them are still a little screwy.

The quote block is implemented as two sibling divs (the header and body) inside a single containing div. Currently their widths are hard-coded in pixels. The closest I've come is setting the containing div to 85% and the two child divs as 100%, but most of the time that makes the body 1px toowide, though only where the text is (see attached screengrab).

Not really a problem, but I think it would help with readability. Previously the column headers were bold.

Forums, Threads, Posts, Last Post.

Good one. Got it. Updated soon.

Here's the fix:

You just need to remove the width on these three elements.

Oh, well.

That's too obvious.

Fixed soon.

I've now started attacking this with the excellent CSSEdit for Mac OS. I can override the CSS for the page "live" which makes editing so much easier. I can also click on any part of the page to find out what styles are being applied to that element or block.

I'll need some accurate screen grabs or live demo of the old BBS as a starting point. I think I missed links to that, mind tossing them in here?

A number of things, as mentioned, involve more changes than just the CSS. Some logic needs to be edited for some and others might require some adjustment to the way the markup is written (nested tables and the like).

I will probably try a version specifying only the body text as pixels and then every other size as ems. That will allow changing all the text on the page simply by altering the base measure in the body element.

old.empegbbs.com

Some things are going to be downright a PITA to modify because while the guys behind UBB may know some php they really don't seem to know jack about writing markup that's separate from style. There are empty table cells in a lot of places used as spacers. Ugh.

I'll try some changes based on the current markup and move things with CSS as best as I can where needed. I'll attach any mods I come up with and hopefully they can be included as an alternate theme. The current one uses too many instances of 8pt font size.

All the previously mentioned things have now been taken care of, plus the font sizes on the "Last Post" column inside the forums, and keeping the "Last Post" column on the main page from wrapping.

Here's a modified CSS for large fonts. It's not done yet and I'm also waiting for Tom to get back to me about whether or not the markup can be changed on a per-theme basis. When i have some time I'll play in the admin interface to tune this all up.

I've removed the double outline around posts as well as the black space between them. Also change is the subject heading for each post, though because of markup I'm unable to make it the same as it used to be (need to move where a table cell gets created). But I did push the subject over so it better matches where it used to start in the old forum (same indentation as the message body instead of being pulled over the poster info/icon)

I've used ems for everything except the quotes. Because ems are always based on the parent's size, nesting quotes would progressively make the text smaller. Specifying as pixels for this was the work-around.

I updated the current theme to have a base point size and base all other font sizes off of that in ems. The one place this breaks is that the user and time of the latest posts on the front page are unnecessarily small due to nesting. But hardly a big deal.

By the time you read this and try to test it, there will be an empegbbs-large available that has a single change for a bigger font.

I've also replaced the stupid series of underscores above signatures with a white line.

Any way to get rid of the line completely? It's just more unnecessary visual clutter...

For those of us using the ubbthreads stock theme that is a bit of a problem, the white line is invisible and signature like mine that aren't in bold or funky colours just merge into the text of the post.

Change the white line to a horizontal rule (hr) that can be styled per theme. That will give the ability to set it to compliment individual themes, including making it shorter or hiding it (display:none)

I'll give the admin interface Tom linked to me a shot, since the css I attached includes a number of changes the current large font variant doesn't.

Whoops. How about now?

Yes.


No, it's not. As Andy notes, there needs to be a delineation between the body and the signature.

Okay, I changed the templates in a few places.

Instead of the row of underscores separating the post body from the signature, there's now a ruled line (which is/can be styled in the CSS). (These were in post_top.tpl, post_side.tpl, and post_comments.tpl inside <div class="signature">.)

The main page no longer styles the name and date underneath the most recent post as "small". (These were in gallerylist.tpl, postlist.tpl, and cfrm.tpl - the span containing the term "lastposter" used to be class="small".)

The double column of icons in the forums looks really cluttery to me. Does anyone agree?

It's not too difficult to kill one or the other of the columns via CSS alone.

The first column indicates whether the thread has new posts or not, but the background color of the row does the same thing. Also, these icons are friggin' huge.

The second column shows the thread's icon, which is like the old BBS.

The old board used to use an alternate colored icon when the thread contained new messages. It would be good to get that back. Of course it would also be good to axe the crappy icons and replace them with nicer ones from the old forum.

The signature line now appears as an HR plus the original full-length line you created previously. At least in the large-font empegbbs theme.

The font color for number of unread posts, next to number of total posts in a thread, in forum index view, is a little dark and hard to see.

Who cares. The old theme rocks. Thanks!

Would you consider changing:

1. The background and border of the area around "New Reply" to blend with the black background.

2. Also the look would be better without black separation between posts and instead substituting a darker blue as shown.



edit: Also, same background change for page numbers on the opposite side from 1.

When hovering over various links the orange text shifts to white.

In various locations:

The foreground text remains orange while the background color shifts to black. (My Stuff and siblings)

Or the link shifts to white foreground with black background.
(buttons for reply, quote, quick reply... )

I don't know if this has been mentioned, but did the old board have that annoying space between every single post? I would check, but the old.empegbbs.com link doesn't show threads in the old theme, just the forum listings.

I just find it a little annoying, and eventually adds a bit more scrolling.

I'm pretty sure it wasn't there. I dug into the css when dranko made his initial request.

One of the things I couldn't eliminate was the double border between the posts. You can see it if you look close. In the end I figured it wasn't noticeable enough.



Image was cropped from http://gkb.servehttp.com/empegubb7/posts.html


edit: here is the relevant css

.t_outer {
border: 0px solid #000000;
border-spacing: 0px;
background: #000000;
margin-bottom: 0px;
}
.subjecttable {
font-weight: bold;
color: #CCCCCC;
background: #000044;
border-width: 1px 1px 1px 1px;
padding: 2px 2px 2px 2px;
border-style: solid solid solid solid;
border-color: #555555 #555555 #555555 #555555;
}

This should always be the case.


Whoops. Fixed.


This is the same as the expected result, right?

No, but the general layout was a little different. The subject line didn't go all the way across the top. The user info went all the way from top to bottom.

I'll take a look at this further, but I'm not sure what the best thing is to do right now. Maybe I'll try a few different things, take screenshots, and post a poll.

It looks like the developers decided to move away from what I remember being a combined new/old and mood icon to separate ones. There doesn't seem to be a way to recombine them. I have the row backgrounds colored lighter for new posts. Maybe I could make the borders lighter, too?

Agreed about the icons, though. Working on that.


Whoops. Fixed.

Unfortunately, the class that is used for those two elements is reused all over the place. There's no way to single out those particular elements without rewriting the HTML, and I got deep into a rabbit hole doing that this afternoon for a much easier change; I'm disinclined to do it again. If I do, it'll be after the simpler CSS changes are done.


I'm still contemplating the separation between posts. The subject line you want to give a different background color, ironically, uses the same class as the elements you wanted a black background for.

The styles they use are overcomplicated in some areas and not complicated enough in others. Go figure.

I tried making it a whiter color, but it didn't help until it got all the way to white, so I tried making it bold. That seems to help some. What do you think?

Can we also please have a LARGE fonts (+2 pts) version of this? The teensy fonts are tricky to read on a 100dpi screen here.

Cheers

Bitt, are the colors for the rows on threads with new posts really the same as they used to be? They look different to me...

There is a large version already.

Probably not. I have no real way to find what the old colors were, so I made up some new ones.

I was given multiple ways to discover the old new-post colors. As it turns out, there was no alternation between colors. All new posts were the same lighter color, and wasn't all that close to what I had come up with. It's fixed now.

I've created two new styles, one each way, just so you can see.

Yeah, I definitely like the style without the folders. They're pretty useless, since it's extremely clear which threads have a new post based on the very different background color.

Thanks for fixing that background color , by the way. For me, that was the biggest improvement in terms of making it look like the old board. I just had this weird feeling that all was not right

I'd like the no new/no mood themes combined! Get rid of everything except the title. The folders in the main page are also kind of large - was it that way with the old board?

No. I'm working on that.

Agreed.

And thanks, Bitt... all the work you've put into this project is appreciated.

I've added a neither-icon theme.

Let's try the poll again now that everyone can see the final results for themselves.

Of course, once it's finalized, there's not really a particular drawback to having all four available. For now, though, it's a pain to update four different ones for each change.

I changed my vote from the first poll to the second after playing with the stylesheets. Thanks for making them available. If we do go with mood icons only, is there any way to tighten up that column so there's not so much extra space in it?

I'm not sure. The way I'm doing it now is by removing the border between those two columns and then setting one image to not display. But that means that that other column's cell is still there.

I don't want to remove that column from the template, because that would probably break other themes.

I can use CSS to tell it to not display the cell, but that shifts all the other cells back one column and breaks the table layout. CSS doesn't have a way to redefine colspan in order to fix that, either.

I don't think there's a way to get the image to span two columns.

The only thing I can think of is to make that other column zero width. Hm. I wonder if that's possible.

BRB.

Okay, weird. Setting those cells to have a width of either 0px or 1px makes that extraneous space even bigger, by a lot. Like ten times as much.

perhaps make it display: none ?

That's what I meant by:

Thank you to everyone for the effort put in on this theme - as was mentioned in another thread, this feels like home again!

I changed the style to try to use Arial before trying Helvetica instead of the other way around. All the browsers I tried either looked better that way or the same.

The reason for the change is that Firefox under MacOSX renders small-point Helvetica horribly, but Arial just fine. This change probably should have been made years ago.

Let me know if this causes an issue for anyone.

Thanks again for all the work on the stylesheet. It's looking really good.

I agree completely about the Arial->Helvetica ordering, too.

I too want to thank you for making this theme look exactly as the old board used to. I just love it and feel at home. I have to say that this color combination is quite unique. It just means "empeg" to me.

Thanks, Bitt (and others).
I appreciate the dedication and skill of everyone here to keep this community going (and comfortable).

+1 more on that sentiment.
It really is good here.