BA v3 development

[Andy]

Howdy all,

As you have all probably been wondering for a while, where exactly are we up to with BA v3 development? Well I'm happy to say that development, although slow, is moving.

It's only been slow until now because of my lifestyle: I get up, I go to work, I code for 8 hours and I come home and I do that 5 days a week. After that I'm usually too tired or bored of coding to do anything on BA's development. Come the weekend I spend that time how I want to spend it, be it out with friends or on personal non-web related projects.

This said, I have been working on an interesting project at work which has made aware of how much I enjoy doing it when I'm into the stride and the right frame of mind for it, so this evening I really hunkered down and started on the forum template. It's not much at the moment, but it's good progress.

Before anyone says anything, yes I am using Twitter Bootstrap, which I know some of you may dislike for professional reasons. Why? Because it's incredibly easy to develop with and also makes it easy to make a combined desktop and mobile responsive site, something you have all been asking for since as long as I can remember.

Now I must mention that this design is not final. It is a work in progress and the final design may will ultimately change.


Desktop view of the forum:


Mobile view of the forum:



More images will follow during development.

Whilst feedback is appreciated, I can't guarantee I'll read or use all of it because I want to do things my way first, then implement suggestions later. I will keep the topic so I can review it later and pick the ideas out that will work.

Andy (Admin)


Update 22/March

Desktop:


Mobile:



Update 24/April

Desktop:


Mobile:



Update 02/May

Desktop:


Mobile:

[hounsell]

Before anyone says anything, yes I am using Twitter Bootstrap, which I know some of you may dislike for professional reasons. Why? Because it's incredibly easy to develop with and also makes it easy to make a combined desktop and mobile responsive site, something you have all been asking for since as long as I can remember.

Tom approves

Bootstrap is awesome. Hated it at first, found it rather restrictive, but it's incredible for rapid development, and the limitations fade away as you get to grips with the framework. My work now uses Bootstrap on all new websites or major redesigns.

Happy to help if you need it.

Side fact: my greasemonkey was essentially just reparsing all the tables into a bootstrap site.

[Andy]

Thanks, I may take you up on it if the need arises. At least someone approves, that gives me faith

[Derf]

While I'm certainly not a fan of BootStrap, got to admit I'm glad to hear that BetaArchive is finally coming into the twenty-first century with a decent looking and functional new layout. Glad things are coming along!
If you need any help with any design just drop me a message here or on Facebook, I've worked in that field for months (and done it for personal projects for a lot longer) now and would be happy to help you out.

[q3hardcore]

Looking good so far, could you add a high-contrast colour scheme too, though?

[Andy]

There will be a single theme only due to the development work required unless I can discover a way to use the inverse function on bootstrap throughout the templates. If the theme is not suitable then you must use accessibility tools available to you through your OS or device (they do exist for this reason).

[The Distractor]

So finally you're working on a theme..

Bootstrap? Never used it, but I'm looking into using it for some future projects.

[James]

Looks far too simplistic... Seems very void, IDK.

[The Distractor]

Looks far too simplistic... Seems very void, IDK.

Andy already mentioned in the OP the following:

Now I must mention that this design is not final. It is a work in progress and the final design may will ultimately change.

[Patrick]

Looks very nice! Great job!

[WinPC]

The colors seem a bit bright, though, in some areas. I don't personally see how it would be a problem, in my opinion, to use the same graphical design and adapt it to the particular layout that you've shown.

Anyway, though, I think that you're an excellent web designer and all, Andy, but I still think that the main point of BetaArchive v3 relates more to how the site is run than how it appears or even how it functions feature-wise. But still, it looks like you've worked quite hard on the web design part of it already, so whatever it turns out to be, I hope that you finish it soon.

[jimmsta]

If you're going for a Metro UI look, take a look at how the reboot.pro forum was redesigned - it fits with Windows 8's style very well, and doesn't compromise functionality. Overall, I like the direction you're headed in.

[Boris]

It has a very spartan quality to it, but it isn't finished yet so I guess I can't really judge. Good luck!

[Gnome]

Upto now it seems a bit empty, a bit *too* plain. But as you've said it's not the final design.

[Venetik]

I agree with gnome. I don't like it.. It's just like withe, plain space with some text.

[hounsell]

Christ, it's early days. At the moment, most of the styling will be dictated by the framework defaults, which for bootstrap is white and blue.

Styling is something you add on after you have a solid base to build on. No point trying to add styling in when your structure's still changing, you'll only end up duplicating work.

[DeFacto]

I'm glad to see things are starting to move...

[Wheatley]

Can't wait

[win2k8man]

Can't wait looks good Andy

[MSUser2013]

It looks nice, Also, It would be a good idea to update the icons on the left (The icons that indicate whether a topic is locked, new, sticky, etc) to look like Metro-styled Icons

[Wheatley]

It looks nice, Also, It would be a good idea to update the icons on the left (The icons that indicate whether a topic is locked, new, sticky, etc) to look like Metro-styled Icons

Why everyone wants metro?

[BetaLH]

BA v3 Logo Concept by me

[Boris]

It looks nice, Also, It would be a good idea to update the icons on the left (The icons that indicate whether a topic is locked, new, sticky, etc) to look like Metro-styled Icons

Why everyone wants metro?

Because Microsoft's new focus IS Metro, and since this is a mostly MS-oriented site it's not surprising that most people think the site should reflect Microsoft's ambitions (a notion I don't necessarily share, mind you).

[dj_cityboy]

hey Andy although my views are fairly irrelevant around here and I mostly lurk, I like what you have done...so much so that it made me log in to post!

cheers and good luck with finishing it...

peas
cityboy

[xZEROx]

Will there be a V3 beta? oh the irony