Forum Section Layout

[OzStick]

WOW! They are some great ideas there Chris.

My wife always tells me off because I come up with ideas and don't do anything with them. Mind you, she also reckons I "think too much" - women! :wacko:

I've been contemplating a new website of my own so some of these ideas are ones I'd considered for my site but decided they weren't appropriate. Rather than having them go to waste I figuresd I'd "share".

[Dazz]

OZ - On the HS site we allow vendors to sell their items, but we really don't have a dedicated location setup for it. I'm all for allowing vendors/buyers a location to easily find what they need and to ensure they are getting a good deal. I'm a firm believer in the free markets and allowing competitiveness as it allows the buyers to get the best deal.

I have been thinking about ways to add an online store to the site. The thing with a shop is that I don't want to be responsible for any money/transactions. I'm thinking of something more like a classifieds type store to the site. This would allow people, like you, to submit your items. Then any interested parties would work directly with the seller when purchasing. I'm going to have to look further into what's going to be the best way to handle this.

Awards system - this wouldn't be difficult to implement. There is actually an IPB mod already that I can easily incorporate into the site. I'll dig into this more as we get established.

Your last idea about the Kickstarter... I have thought about ideas such as this. I was actually thinking about a Kickstarter to hire a Direct X developer to update VP to the newest Direct X version, a Kickstarter for someone to come up with a plunger solution, etc.

The thing that I really want to get behind is the open sourceness of this hobby. We need to embrace the open source technology that's out. Such as taking advantage of newer products such as the Raspeberry Pi and Arduino for alternatives to LEDWiz, etc.

[unclewilly]

A kickstarter for payment to a directx developer is a great idea.

I thought about this myself. Problem is i dont know any dx developers.

If we could find one i think we could raise quite a bit of funds from the community to bring vp up to date.

Although this might be quit a task for a developer

[oooPLAYER1ooo]

finding one is easy, there are freelance dev sites where you can tender out software jobs. all you need is enough cash to get a good ones attention. i have been thinking of this for yrs and we should defiantly look into it.

[zebulon]

Great looking layout & design guys!

[Dazz]

Great looking layout & design guys!

Thanks Zeb! It's all still a work in progress, so things are still changing. I've set up an area for Pincab/Pinball Hardware Development. If you guys need more or anything else please let me know. If you need a private/passworded forum for further development discussion just let me know. Also, once you are ready to start selling products let me know. We'll work on getting an online store setup for things such as your boards, etc.

[Jeepguy]

I agree that I really like a new and "different" naming convention, keeps things fresh but I agree a little with OzStick, to make sure not have to much head scratching at least from new people hitting the site. You always have the "where things are" learning curve when joining a new forum, but I think as long as things are kept from being buried in to many layers then it'll be fine. And if someone gets a stick up their arse due to a forum being labelled "Tutorials", well sometimes you just can't help stupid. Every technical based forum out there has a "Tutorials" labeled forum of some form or another.

edit: of course I hadn't refreshed the page since I walked away from the pc for dinner before posting and most of these points have been noted, HAHA!

[shimoda]

Can't figure out where the best place for this problem is, so site layout seems to be where, maybe I'm blind and missed the right place:

 

The latest posts section shows things from a couple of months ago whereas I'd like to be able to come to the site and see the latest posts listed (if the client supports it).  Kinda the way on the PD tracker you can see the list of most recent posts from the forum down the right.  Would make it easier to quickly see if responses have been made etc.