Piano Tell looks "clean" and modern. But I would prefer the posts to be more densely presented, so that you can see more at once, and there is less need for scrolling. It's all too "open". I have noticed this on a number of current arts web sites, and it irritates me. With PW the text is larger and easier to read, but despite that I can see more at once and there is less need for scrolling, compared with Piano Tell.

    The pianoworld layout is excellent actually - for a forum. It just needs an upgrade - while preserving the convenient list and paging format, which had been purposely chosen and designed for convenience - less scrolling etc. And also needs to have any intrusive advertisement activity removed. It's ok to have ads - but they need to first do adequate testing to ensure it's not fully in-the-face kind of advertising that create issues with many users.

    Upgrades would need to be along the lines of more direct file (pic and or music) upload. pianoworld doesn't even support music upload. Flarum sites do, but PT probably doesn't have it set up, or probably has been configured to not have it.

    Also, pianoworld not only has a clunky out-dated way of uploading and presenting of pics .... but also has an out-dated system that actually modifies your uploaded image by either making the screen size smaller, or further compresses your image, so whatever image is uploaded eg. 500 kbyte image will turn out to be something small, like 60 to 100 kbyte at the end (after upload) - with significantly reduced quality.

    Yes, PW needs an upgrade. The BBS software on which it is based is stale and antequated.
    It's usable on the desktop, but it's a horror on a cell phone.
    There were threads about the need for a change a decade ago ... but no action.

    Meanwhile I'm finding that this format (based on Flarum) is vastly better, both on the desktop and on the phone.

    Hmm... I'm ok with how this Piano|Tell looks. I just wish we could rearrange the subforum lists to put them in a more personalized order! 😅

      Engage curmudgeon mode
      A cellphone is pretty much unusable for reading anything longer than a couple of sentences because the screen is too damn small.
      Disengage curmudgeon mode

      --
      If you're a zombie and you know it, bite your friend!

      David-G I'm curious about how you can see more at once on PW, could you share an example?

      ShiroKuro I think it would make sense to move Tuner Technicians down to Teacher Talk since those are the least popular forums. Per-user configuration isn't really supported, but hopefully we can strike a good balance that works for most.

      Let me know if you have any thoughts on this. 🙂

      --
      Beach L168, Wish, baCh, WOW Petrof, Fake Steinway, VS
      TIME

            Hmm maybe it should go acoustic pianos —> digitals —> adult beginners—> member recordings —> pianist zone and then the rest?

            Maybe?

              ShiroKuro personally I like Pianist Zone higher (would put it after Digitals) but I guess we're all focused on our own interests 🙂

                  navindra looks great! I think grouping the "pianist" related posts makes more sense, too 🙂

                    5 days later

                    I don't see a "quote" feature. That's the main thing I feel is missing. Apart from that, everything feels great! 🙂

                      navindra I'm curious about how you can see more at once on PW, could you share an example?

                      Perhaps what I am saying is that I feel that the lines "X likes this" and "X replied to this" take up too much space vertically, leading to unnecessarily large spacing between posts. Couldn't these "likes this" and "replied to" go at the side somewhere?

                      Also, the space between posts is rather large. Couldn't you reduce this a bit? Then I could see more posts at once without having to scroll quite so much.

                          navindra I think it would make sense to move Tuner Technicians down to Teacher Talk since those are the least popular forums.

                          I disagree. I think the tech forum is in some ways the most important, because a healthy tech forum adds weight and credibility to the whole site. If Piano Tell is to be a success we need to encourage techs to post here. I think the tech forum should be as high up the list as possible.

                              And what about a Recordings subforum in the pianists forum? Or maybe we could just let members post their performances in the pianists forum?

                                Rubens And what about a Recordings subforum in the pianists forum? Or maybe we could just let members post their performances in the pianists forum?

                                There's a whole "Member Recordings" forum:
                                https://forum.pianotell.com/t/member-recordings

                                David-G Also, the space between posts is rather large. Couldn't you reduce this a bit? Then I could see more posts at once without having to scroll quite so much

                                Unfortunately this is probably just how the forum software layout is, and there probably isn't any customizability. Hopefully I'm wrong, though! I'd also like to see everything be just a little more compact.

                                @navindra

                                      David-G I think the tech forum should be as high up the list as possible.

                                      A lot of techs only hang out in the tech forum, so my opinion is that it should exist but they'll probably mostly be only checking there anyway and not looking at the list to find that forum every time, so it doesn't need to be very high up. But I agree that tech activity and expertise would add credibility to this site!