Changing to old format

[CommonHumanity]

I thought that the original announcement of the new format said that you could revert to the old format if you want to. Is that correct? If yes, does anyone know how? I loved how the old format allowed me to open to a page new posts and breaking news and videos on the right side.

Thanks in advance for any help!

[highplainsdem]

2. I've also asked EarlG about this. It seems that activity is down, and DU4 is simply not working well

enough for enough people at this point. So I asked in DU mail if we could return to DU3 and have DU4 back in beta test mode until all the problems people are running into with lots of different devices can be solved.

There are a few improvements over DU3 with DU4, in a few areas, but in general DU4 strikes me as less user-friendly than DU3.

And it isn't because people are dumb, or old and unwilling to change, or even "troglodytes" as one reply in this forum suggested the other day..

No one should ever be insulting people having trouble with the board. Boards should be easy to use, for everyone. I don't recall ever seeing lots of complaints about DU3.

[EarlG]

3. You can now change DU's "skin"

If you prefer the old look, go to My Stuff > Account Settings and scroll down to the Visual appearance section.

Select "Skinner Mode" and click the "Save all settings" button.

This mode retains the navigation structure of the new site but looks like the old version.

If you need help finding anything, let me know. Also, if you're missing stuff from the old version, we are still working to tweak and improve the new layout now that we can see how it's all working with a full visitor load. More to come.

[Easterncedar]

4. As always, thanks, EarlG, for everything

I have been enjoying the new features along with the comfort of Skinner mode. Can’t please everyone, ever, in anything, but I appreciate all your thoughtful work.

[EarlG]

8. Thanks

Glad you like it! Please let me know if you have any other questions.

[highplainsdem]

5. Skinner Mode looks quite a bit like DU3, but doesn't work as well. I wish it did, but no matter which mode

I try (and I've used both Default and Skinner mode a lot), I find DU4 more difficult and time-consuming to use than DU3.

Including with reaching forums other than the main ones. And I don't want to have to subscribe to all the forums I occasionally want to check, just to be able to reach them easily, since it means way too many notifications when I look at the subscription page.

Would you please at least add a couple of lines at the top of each of the displays of forums - in the confusing new arrangement with the forums grouped under Issue, Culture, Alliance, Region, Support - naming all the different forums in that grouping ALPHABETICALLY, so people can click those links and don't have to hunt for a forum's name in a vertical list where the placement may be constantly shifting depending on how active the forum is? Even if you already know which of the five buttons will eventually take you to the forum you want - and those names do seem to be causing more confusion than what we had on DU3 - there are 50some forums under Culture Forums, for instance, and good luck guessing where those individual links will be on the page at any particular moment, though the most active forums do tend to stay near the top.

I'm not talking about a vertical list of just the forum names. Definitely don't want that. But a few horizontal lines at the top, above the table with the latest discussions in each forum, with all the forum names in alphabetical order would help a lot.

[EarlG]

6. For alphabetical sorting on a category page, just click the "Forum name" table header (nt)

[highplainsdem]

7. And how are people supposed to know that? At least put those instructions on the same line as Culture Forums.

but in a slightly smaller font.

Culture Forums - Click "Forum Names" heading to see the list in alphabetical order.

It'll look fine there in a slightly smaller font, maybe the same size as the "Related..." font. But it needs to be above the Related line so people can see it right away.

And it still requires more clicks, if you want to get the table back to showing most recent discussions at the top.

And skimming down a long vertical list still takes more time than locating the alphabetical listing in a few lines of text and clicking that.

The way I suggested requires one click and no scrolling to get to the forum. Your way requires two, and a third if you want to go back to most recent at the top.

On DU3, it was necessary to click on the group name for topics to see the full list, but that list was in small enough font in the sidebar that was on every page that you could find the alphabetical listing in a split-second. DU4 requires a lot of scrolling to see the full list of names.