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this forum - how to change skin?


vinifera

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IMHO this Metro pastel low-contrast crap is like martian red weed: Growing everywhere and ruining everything.

I's not necessary related to Metro... Many of the so called "modern" websites seem to use those low contrast themes. Add to that the already small fonts (12 px or even smaller) and the result is just a disaster in terms of accessibility.

This website says it all:

http://contrastrebellion.com

That is a great website, thank you for the link!! :thumbup

Here's a fantastic article that's referenced on that page.

Thanks to both of you for these links!

Contrast Rebellion :: Low-contrast font color and unreadable texts? To hell with them!

Note that the UX Myths site does perpetrate a myth themselves ...

Myth #11: You need to redesign your website periodically

To many, a redesign means revamping the look of a website in the hope that it will increase conversions and attract new customers. In fact, such projects are often counterproductive as user feedbacks on numerous redesigns proved that users hate change, even if the new design is clearly superior to the original.

That is a load of horsecrap. Notice that they never show a clear example of "new design is clearly superior to the original" with users resisting it. It is illogical. I blame Microsoft and their MetroTards for creating this meme.

ADDED: I edited the crap out of this reply to make the quoted portion tighter and more legible, to minimal success. Anyone else noticing that because of the uber-bright quote style, that quotations are disappearing into the comment now. And we are drifting back to what looks like USENET era >>> nesting! :yes:

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if somebody know how to edit the .css files s/he can make a personal MSFN-forum-skin customization specific for his/her browser,
with help of Proxomitron's $RDIR function.
like this:
1734519-Q6BV1HY.png

steps:

  • Find out the URLs for the MSFN .css file
  • Download the files from said URLs
  • Edit the said .css and save it to proxomitron html folder
  • Create header (out) filter to intercept said URLs and redirect it to the saved css files

EDIT: my .css manual editing skills & coloring sense are just as sucks, please recommend me a good .css editor

Edited by Joseph_sw
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if somebody know how to edit the .css files s/he can make a personal MSFN-forum-skin customization specific for his/her browser,

with help of Proxomitron's $RDIR function.

steps:

  • Find out the URLs for the MSFN .css file
  • Download the files from said URLs
  • Edit the said .css and save it to proxomitron html folder
  • Create header (out) filter to intercept said URLs and redirect it to the saved css files

This is a definite possibility once we exhaust the others. We may be able to get a useful theme added server side. But even before that we should wait to see if Xper tweaks the current one enough.

Note that at least Opera lets you use supplemental or replacement style sheets on an ad hoc basis, so your idea is definitely do-able, but redirection is certainly complicated! I'd list that as 3rd on the list of choices overall.

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This is a definite possibility once we exhaust the others. We may be able to get a useful theme added server side. But even before that we should wait to see if Xper tweaks the current one enough.

I also think that it's probably better to wait for a while until the forum update has been finished completely before creating more advanced custom themes. Nevertheless, you can easily apply some tweaks to the current one to make it at least a little better.

There's a cross-browser extension called Stylish:

Stylish (Firefox)

Stylish (Chrome)

Stylish (Opera)

You can apply custom CSS to websites on the fly like this:

UItkNUj.png

BEFORE

Vuzykje.png

AFTER

k8tD2v0.png

I've just removed the fancy background and changed the background colour to the one used in the previous MSFN theme. Through custom CSS you can modify the layout however you like. If the current theme remains unchanged then I'll probably create a separate topic about theming MSFN so that everyone will be able to post their ideas.

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This is a definite possibility once we exhaust the others. We may be able to get a useful theme added server side. But even before that we should wait to see if Xper tweaks the current one enough.

I also think that it's probably better to wait for a while until the forum update has been finished completely before creating more advanced custom themes. Nevertheless, you can easily apply some tweaks to the current one to make it at least a little better.

[...]

I've just removed the fancy background and changed the background colour to the one used in the previous MSFN theme. Through custom CSS you can modify the layout however you like. If the current theme remains unchanged then I'll probably create a separate topic about theming MSFN so that everyone will be able to post their ideas.

Agreed. I predict that custom style sheets are the next big growth industry ( following Start Menu replacers ). :lol:

Look at the quote in this reply, that text color is madness and I find it hard to believe it helps on any smaller form factor device. God save us from fleeting trends and bandwagons.

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God save us from fleeting trends and bandwagons.

+1

jaclaz said it best here:

But I doubt that you (we) can stop the mindless from mindlessly go towards what they mindlessly think is the future. sad.gif

Jaclaz - at the time (and just for the record and besides and after the light blue ribbon campaign for FREE skin) - also fought a partially successful battle to have §@ç#ing READABLE text on reboot.pro, see here:

http://reboot.pro/topic/12391-new-theme-for-our-site/

And still fights them :w00t::

http://reboot.pro/topic/18215-site-skin-in-progress-metro/

Particularly, these considerations:

http://reboot.pro/topic/12391-new-theme-for-our-site/?p=108196

http://reboot.pro/topic/12391-new-theme-for-our-site/?p=108208

http://reboot.pro/topic/12391-new-theme-for-our-site/?p=109199

http://reboot.pro/topic/12391-new-theme-for-our-site/?p=109564

represent "universal" concepts on readability:

  1. Colours (foreground text/background)
  2. Fonts
  3. Contrast

DO MATTER, and the choices to produce something readable are limited.

The eyes and the brain work in a given way and the "mindless" can do *whatever*, but ignoring several tens years of research and experience in readability is simply foolish.

BTW IMHO the current MSFN theme is not at all that bad :), the only really senseless setting :ph34r: is the "quoted" text having been dimmed/faded into the background to such an extent that is HARDLY readable (if readable at all).

It really hurts my eyes.

jaclaz

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represent "universal" concepts on readability:

  • Colours (foreground text/background)
  • Fonts
  • Contrast
DO MATTER, and the choices to produce something readable are limited.

The eyes and the brain work in a given way and the "mindless" can do *whatever*, but ignoring several tens years of research and experience in readability is simply foolish.

BTW IMHO the current MSFN theme is not at all that bad :), the only really senseless setting :ph34r: is the "quoted" text having been dimmed/faded into the background to such an extent that is HARDLY readable (if readable at all).

It really hurts my eyes.

jaclaz

Agreed that this one at MSFN is getting better, and especially agree about the quotes!

Do you notice what I am noticing here? Because of the lightness of the text and background, the quote blends into the post. Remind you of anything? If you just add in angle brackets we will have come full circle to USENET era style. Check this out ...

> ----- SITE & FORUM ISSUES appended at 04:56:00 on 13/07/14 GMT (by JACLAZ at MSFN)

> Subject: this forum - how to change skin?

> From: dflkjks sfkljlkfjlk ljflkjljf lkjdflk

> Message-ID: <kjjrkeljkjdfiouoijlksdjflkj>

> Date: 14 Jul 13 04:56:00 GMT

> From: sdlkjlk slkjfsljlkjl'ljkjdfkl kljsdflkj

>

> represent "universal" concepts on readability:

>

> 1. Colours (foreground text/background)

> 2. Fonts

> 3. Contrast

>

> DO MATTER, and the choices to produce something readable are limited.

>

> The eyes and the brain work in a given way and the "mindless" can do *whatever*, but ignoring several tens years of research and experience in readability is simply foolish.

>

> BTW IMHO the current MSFN theme is not at all that bad :), the only really senseless setting :ph34r: is the "quoted" text having been dimmed/faded into the background to such an extent that is HARDLY readable (if readable at all).

> It really hurts my eyes.

>

> jaclaz

:o Am I right? In the text-only era in the 1980's there were no good ways to nest quotes so they used what they had available with angles ( and yes it got ugly as the nesting deepened ), and this is still seen in low bandwidth settings in email. The problem from that era was that reading the thread is challenging because the quote is ambiguous, the angles blending into the margin, thus the quote blending in to the reply ( yielding the wonderful invention of the SNIP ). After reading these for years you get message blind!

Then came HTML and the concept of tags and containers, and finally CSS to allow tweaking of these objects using all available formatting styles ( rather than the styles preassigned to tags by Tim Berners-Lee and W3C ). Now this was hugely important because going forward we could address the text in the quote container via CSS and instantly push it around, color it, and everything else. The results were quotes that could be easily made to stand out prominently and unambiguously ( satisfying due credit ) and simultaneously promoting legibility by preventing blindness B)

Now here's the ironic part. Thanks to the MetroTards with their fondness for flatness and disdain for "frills" and "chrome", they are reverting the world back to the bad old days. It's ironic because they say "You hate change you Luddite!". But this is change BACK. And this is a perfect demonstration of how wrong they are because nobody who lived through the USENET pre-Internet era wants > brackets instead of CSS quote boxes. We made this change ourselves, gladly! So in reality with this ( and indeed with Metro ), we are resisting change BACK to the worse case of all. The past!

Thank you RetroTards!

UPDATE: Just want to point out that when I originally posted this comment the above quote box and the simulated USENET section both matched almost perfectly. Xper is busy tweaking the style and has improved things as the text color in that quote box is now much darker. All we need now is to get that gray background out of there! The general appearance of the theme with white and light gray is kind like a cellphone flashlight app. Indeed it actually brightens the space around my screen more than before. But it is terrible for the eyes.

Edited by CharlotteTheHarlot
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You're right but this particular "issue" is a little bit more complicated. The ideal length of a line of text is thought to be between 50-75 characters

that rule may worth for phisycal (or whatever its spelled)- solid books

but for monitors you can't tell me that THAT is practical

yes I know that in nature it is better for human to stress the neck as little as possible

hence why non wide-screen monitors were favored as you don't need to go constant right-left with whole head

but just short with eyes

but as it is that age doesn't exist anymore

not to mention small fonts, not only it will ENABLE people to become blind 100% faster but will make you suffer alot

on my old Opera I have auto zoom every page to 130%, just to increase fonts to READABLE state

and fill the screen as it should with such lame webpages

Edited by vinifera
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BTW IMHO the current MSFN theme is not at all that bad :), the only really senseless setting :ph34r: is the "quoted" text having been dimmed/faded into the background to such an extent that is HARDLY readable (if readable at all).

It really hurts my eyes.

Agreed that this one at MSFN is getting better, and especially agree about the quotes!

The quotes are the biggest headache but there is at least one more issue. The fonts have become smaller compared to the old theme. 11px fonts are used in many places where the old theme used 12px fonts. I personally prefer larger font sizes (there's a reason why 100% font size for browsers usually means 16px) but apart from my personal preferences I can't really see any valid reason to use anything smaller than 12px which itself may be difficult to read, especially for people with not-so-great eyesight :ph34r:

Font sizes on websites should be defined in % / em instead of px anyway...

that rule may worth for phisycal (or whatever its spelled)- solid books

but for monitors you can't tell me that THAT is practical

Maybe not practical but long lines are really difficult to read... Just have a look at my website in its current form (I'm preparing a new version at the moment):

http://windows2000.tk

There's no fixed width set so it will be stretched as much as possible. Frankly speaking, it looks awful on a wide screen display and the text is difficult to read, isn't it? :P

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it looks awful on a wide screen display and the text is difficult to read, isn't it?

not to me

as I have zoomed page for bigger fonts (and if you'd increase your font size too, 1em should do it, you'd get same result)

some words are pushed to next line

thus instead having 4 lines and small text as is now originaly

I have 5 lines and bigger/readable letters

and my resolution isn't big at all, its 1600x900 with 125% DPI

so who ever has 1080p (and they are more common) and sadly 100% (default) DPI is screwed as you say looks awful on wide screen

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@vinifera You're 100% right but my goal is to make it look good without being forced to rely on zooming -_- The default font currently used is set to 81.3% (13px) while in the new version I'm working on now it's going to be 106.3% (17px).

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its a simple fix

make page content centered, and make it take 80% of screen
something like this forum has

then as suggested increase your font's (i use em's)

that way it will all scale better as there is no perfect solution

(check your PM)

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