An appearance suggestion with an example.

[Severi Salminen]

Sorry for making a second post (this'll be the last whatever the "decision" , but I appreciate if you even check the layout example I made - to avoid confusions on what I actually meant. The change is very, very minor but improves the readibility greatly and is very easy to implement. I simply added an author column. I also vote for keeping things as simple and unchanged as possible (as opposed to what photo.net now did), but this change definitely would not make things worse.


http://webusers.siba.fi/~ssalmine/largeformatphotography.info.htm

Thanks for patience,

[Frank Petronio]

I like Severi's idea. FWIW I'm a web designer and his thinking is right on.

[David A. Goldfarb]

That's not what it sounded like in the original post. I think it would be a good change.

[Sidney Cammeresi]

Is it really necessary to restrict the table width to 80% of the browser window? I want to use all of my monitor, not just 80%.

[Ken Lee]

I suggest that the top of the page chould more closely resemble the bottom of the page: The links like "Recent Topics", "New Responses", etc. are in a small font. There is no need for those same links, at the top of the page, to be so huge. A little smaller would still be readable !

[jerry brodkey]

The "posted" and "last reply" are still too close together.

[Severi Salminen]

Here is a new example, where:

1. Full screen width is used everywhere
2. The links are rearranged so that they are in more logical places. This is not the final version, just a suggestion. I think the "Ask a New Question" is the most frequently used link so that should be clearly visible. Other links are also now grouped more properly.
3. The "Pages" links are now aligned left - I don't know which is better.

Using the whole width and smaller links works IMHO better now with 800x600 and 1024x768 than the original forum. With 1200x1000, the larger links would maybe be better. But here is the actual example:


http://webusers.siba.fi/~ssalmine/largeformatphotography2.info.htm

And my point is not definitely ruin the forum appearance, but to make it even more intuitive to use without unnecessary bells and whistles. The column widths also need a bit tweaking.

Regards,

[JohnnyV]

I do like the 2nd variation - it's a much easier and faster read.

[QT Luong]

Thanks for taking the time to clarify your new design suggestion. Personally, I like it, but it's up to Tom to decide whether to adopt it or not.

[Capocheny]

I also like the second version... I'm sure the "heading width and screen dimension" details can ultimately be hammered out at the end of the day but, overall, the second version is clean and easy on the eyes.

Cheers