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Although several of the best features will be carried forward, next week this design will fade into Jacksonville history.
We are also launching new section front pages (like History and Development and the others presently available) which are tailored to the specific topics. They will have their own news feed and eventually their own editors. Which brings us to our next announcement.
One significant and visible change is the announcement of our Contributing Editorial Board.
After more than three years, several long time contributors and posters will be joining our team as contributing editors on the website and helping out with the editing and story development.
Bob Mann, the noted train historian and in-house expert on transit and transportation, will be among the first of those editors.
Bob, or Ocklawaha, as he is known online, brings his brilliant insight as well as his astounding grasp of both local and transit history to the table and we are proud and delighted to have him join us in this capacity.
Also in the development pipeline are features which will allow even greater reader input, allowing our posters to add notable news stories from around Jacksonville to our news feed on the site.
Metro Jacksonville has, and continues to be, a labor-intensive passion. Not only ours but of hundreds of posters and tens of thousands of regular readers.
We are excited about the improvements - which reflect how much our readers and posters contribute to this site on a daily basis - and we hope that you will be as well!
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tufsu1
May 15, 2009, 07:36:06 AMat least on my computer, the existing design has already faded into memory....I get a littlke x in the corner :-)
Deuce
May 15, 2009, 09:41:03 AMI was hoping for a sneak peek at the new design. Guess I'll have to wait till Monday!
Steve
May 15, 2009, 09:58:57 AMNo sneak peaks - you must actually come to the site Monday
Purplebike
May 15, 2009, 10:02:59 AMCongratulations! Looking forward to the new design. I'll love this site whether you change it or not.
Ocklawaha
May 15, 2009, 11:36:34 AMThank you gentlemen for the magnificently cerebral introduction. I am honored to come aboard amongst this progressive websites movers and thinkers. Nothing could please me more then to stand up and be counted, as we influence the direction of both local history, and transportation. Together, along with our citizen posters, we strive to promote and improve the greatest mid size city on earth.
Thank you.
OCKLAWAHA
copperfiend
May 15, 2009, 12:29:54 PMWow, this is amazing. Piccadilly has meals starting at $4.99 every day!!!
Shwaz
May 15, 2009, 12:42:43 PMI'm really glad I stumbled across this site / forum almost a year ago. I've learned a lot on transportation & legislation as well as happening's & events around the city.
2 thumbs up to MetroJacks!
stjr
May 15, 2009, 01:28:26 PMSounds good. Looks like you will be creating more distinction between the various interests on the board which I have always been an advocate of. Looking forward to Monday.
coredumped
May 15, 2009, 08:42:11 PMExcellent! I hope that when you zoom in text (CTRL + or APPLE + on the mac) that the comments don't go across the screen. I often zoom (because I'm lazy and leave my glasses at work) and have to scroll left, right left, right when reading comments.
Keep up the good work
stjr
May 17, 2009, 03:29:23 AMI see the new changes are up already. Looks good but I do miss the apparent elimination of the feature that let you scroll through the last 10 pages of posts (typically the last 24 hours or so) to see what was missed. I see the new "unread posts" feature but that just gives you all the activity by thread. And when you click on the thread it takes you to the beginning, not the end, of the thread. Also, if not all threads show up under "unread posts" (you have confirmed some thread categories do not get publicized on the home page), it will be much harder to detect posts made to such excluded threads. So... could the old 10 page post summary be restored?
I see too that to modify or update a post, you must now go through "Forum" to open the thread. You can no longer just reopen your posts through the home page (that shows the opened MJ article with comments) and click on the icon to modify your posted comments. Nor can you use a scroll bar to view oversized images unless you go through "Forums" to access the thread. Could these be restored too?
Lastly, I notice under the "Transit" home page that their is a recent discussion section at the bottom, mimicking the home page format. But, I don't see this section on any of the other home pages. Is that coming?
Thanks for considering my comments.
Charles Hunter
May 17, 2009, 07:58:04 AMDon't know about the other things, but if you click the "NEW" icon next to the post title, it takes you to the first new post since you read (I think it has something to do with cookies, so if you don't have cookies enabled, you probably will go to the first post).
BridgeTroll
May 17, 2009, 08:46:00 AMCongrats on the new format. It may take long time users an extra minute or two at first but it is certainly cleaner ans seems quicker. Ultimately it should be much easier to revisit past articles in particular areas. I look forward to re exploring Metro Jax!
urbanjacksonville
May 17, 2009, 08:53:25 AMCongratulations on the hard work! Thanks for continually innovating, and pushing the city forward. You guys are awesome!
stjr
May 17, 2009, 11:29:28 AMGreat, this morning I see this feature is back. Thanks for that and all the other good work you are doing on this site.
Springfielder
May 17, 2009, 01:56:31 PMPerhaps I'm missing something, but I don't really see a big difference....it basically still appears the same to me.
Lunican
May 18, 2009, 11:13:19 AMI see a big difference. It looks a lot better.
hightowerlover
May 18, 2009, 01:00:20 PMlooks pretty much the same except they changed the picture at the top and now you cant tell what its supposed to be because its so dark.
stephElf
May 18, 2009, 02:20:09 PMI have to admit I was expecting a more major re-design.
The changes are minimal. I prefer the old header.
Overall, I am pretty indifferent about the changes. I like this site and will continue to frequent here regardless of the site design (and I am a designer) - so long as it is nothing headache-inducing.
Lunican
May 18, 2009, 02:27:38 PMJust as an fyi, the 'redesign' was a backend system redesign rather than a visual redesign. We did throw in some visual improvements, but that was not the focus. Changes will be evolutionary.
BridgeTroll
May 18, 2009, 02:43:06 PMI like that quote.
thelakelander
May 18, 2009, 02:56:30 PMI think the opening statement in the announcement sums up the changes pretty well.
stephElf
May 18, 2009, 03:56:53 PMahh.
Deuce
May 18, 2009, 05:26:48 PMLike the visual improvements, specially the header graphic, but I too was thrown by the first sentence:
I think a more correct term would have been re-engineering if you concentrated mostly on back-end systems.
mtraininjax
May 18, 2009, 06:18:15 PMNice changes!
hightowerlover
May 20, 2009, 05:23:23 PMhardly worth the weekend cliffhanger though
nicktooch
May 20, 2009, 09:19:11 PMhaha yay we have facebook uploadability! now people will understand where i'm getting all of this crazy info from!
JeffreyS
May 21, 2009, 11:46:16 AMI will interested when the rest of the new editorial contributors will be announced.
thekillingwax
May 22, 2009, 02:04:13 AMDid the message forum scheme change? Any chance of an alternate color scheme option. It seems super-white now and it kinda hurts my eyes.
thekillingwax
May 22, 2009, 07:05:11 AMActually, it's weird. I use firefox at work and home but at home I see the different shades on posts. Odd. Still though, a dark scheme would be cool at some point.
stjr
May 31, 2009, 03:55:47 PMI noticed MJ dropped details (such as poster and lead wording) relating to posts making up the "Latest Discussion" on the home page. Could that be restored? Stating how old the post is doesn't help much unless one has a photographic memory of the times of the last post made or read on a particular thread.
It would also be nice if this list was a bit longer. Maybe it could be placed in a scroll box.
Lunican
May 31, 2009, 04:36:55 PMstrj, now if you hover over each item it will show you the poster and preview.
stephendare
November 14, 2009, 04:35:51 PMwow. this new site redesign is beautiful!
check out our original front page! Weve come a long way baby.
Lunican this is just amazing! Good work!
tufsu1
November 14, 2009, 10:19:25 PMagreed...the new design is very nice...great job guys!
sheclown
November 15, 2009, 01:39:36 PMI like the new look!
Lunican
November 18, 2009, 12:22:37 AMThe comments on the front page now show up as a live feed. No need to refresh.