OSNews

I think my only real problem with it is everything is to the left of center. It appears more then a third of the right side of the screen is used up by links and dead space, making things a little awkward on a 20 inch monitor because everything else is shifted so far to the left. With the current version, everything is centered nicely making it easier to read. The lemonade color scheme seems a little garish as well compared to the nice subtle gray. I do like having the recent comments on the right hand side, though this site gets commented on a little faster then I can follow. I also like having direct links to some of the account things, like messages there.

I must say i don't like the new look of the site, it kind of looks too traditional, however, the new features seem very promising.

CSS

RSS

Javascript

So this is the "Internet Explorer Only" version of OSnews?

At least the layout's main column is no longer fixed-width...

I think the current layout with the boxes around the news items is much clearer than the new layout where news items and Google ads are mixed without any kind of separators.

The title boxes are very nice. It does get difficult viewing threaded comments though. I also think the highlight for "my comments" is a little colour-rich when compared to the rest of the site.

Love the new feature list! Congratulations to OSNews on getting the infrastructure together.

The new look is pretty scary. The OSNews logo is a little too web2.0ified for my tastes, and the "Submit News" button looks quite unprofessional. Plus, it wouldn't be a bad idea to columnize things again so that everything doesn't just flow out of everything else.

Still, always nice to see OSNews come out with a new version of the site. There has definitely been a lot of hard work that should be appreciated.

There is too much clutter. The news features (especially the headlines) are hard for the eye to skim. And the lines of text grow too wide to read in a big window.

Here's an example of what I mean: The headlines have one indention due to the star icon on the left. Then comes the dating with another indention and then the main text with a third kind of indention and the comment count with a fourth indention. This stuff needs rational alignment.

All-in-all: Better alignment, more boxes and more spacing. That's how you make stuff easy for the eye, and that's really a key concept when you make a site that people skim through 2-3 times a day.

Sorry to say so, but I really think you can come up with something better.. or at least improve stuff.. I don't mean to say "redo the whole thing".

I like the fresh colors though. The current OSNews is a bit sad... you should do more prozac commercials

Edited 2007-03-22 15:03

I'm digging the new look. Everything is so... green.

The eye... It's talking to me, the eye is talking to me! It tells me to do things... Burn things. Kill things.

Instead of the "Add Bold" and "Add Italic" (or was well as?) how about using the

document.selection.createRange().text
document.getSelection()
window.getSelection()

functions to allow a person to type, drag select the text and click the button (which would then grab the selected text, parse it and paste it back in?

I would like to be able to click on the link of pending news.

Today you can see the list of news not published, submited by readers. I would like to be able to see which article they are refering to because:
1) I don't want to link the same article.
2) Sometimes I saw interesting articles that the 'moderators' are not interested in and thus not published.

Thanks!

I must say, with a few nitpicks that I won't mention, because I don't really care that much, I really like the new schema! Bravo, my winged simian web-coding friends, bravo! i hope they give you an extra banana!

I consider the current site design to be the absolute best out of all the tech news sites I visit. It's always fast and it literally renders everywhere. We'll see if the new one matches it.

It's definitely good to see osnews step up to the plate to update a bit, and I generally like the new layout. I will agree with some other commenters that there are a few things to look at:

-new logo is too web 2.0
-things seem to be a bit left
-there should be more boxing or dividers or something to keep the meat of the content as the focus
-submit news image looks like something from a late 90's site that said "Under Construction"

OSnews is probably the most important news site to me, second only to my personal email as something that I keep up with, so it's nice to keep the simplicity to it. I'm very excited to see the preview of the new layout, and hope with some tweaks we see it soon.

Renders fine on opera mini on my cell.

Browser: Opera/8.01 (J2ME/MIDP; Opera Mini/3.1.7139/1644; en; U; ssr)

Nice features, but I don't really like the look. Too bland for my taste. That submit news button... the font doesn't does well with the overall look, and the inclination serves no purpose. The right bar really needs some love, you need better separation between blocks.

As I said, the features are great, but the look needs major improvements and polishing. Keep the good work guys!

Interestingly, none of my Firefox browsers seem to be able to render the stuff on the right side of the site (recent comments, etc.). 3 different distros and a Windows machine, and none of them seem to be able to do it (yes, javascript is turned on); it shows up at the bottom of the screen. Opera and IE seem to be fine, though...is there something I'm missing?

Edited 2007-03-22 15:12 UTC

I'll have to test it out later, but one of my favorite things about the current OSNews is that it actually renders very well in links, I wonder if this new version will too?

I miss not having theme options in user preferences. It's nice to be able to switch between the blue and green themes from time to time.

Also on the front page and comment pages, I don't like how all the articles are simply separated by empty space on the page. I like how the previous setup was with each article summary and each comment being in it's own aesthetically pleasing box.

Much nicer than the old site, particularly the "recent comments" feature.

OK just reading about this, first thing, top has background color, bottom does not. I'll be looking at your CSS, though I know that will evolve. The end product I am sure will be quite excellent. However If
I look at current site, it's quite excellent already.
I can see you intoducing some new features. Anyway don't rush. We shall do cross-browser testing.

There isn't any favicon with the new logo. And I think OSnews team should do a clean up in the CSS at http://www.cleancss.com

I like more the menu in the left and the news on the right.. :-)

Good work!

* Revamp of comments is nice.

Two major dislikes:
- The lack of separation between stories (versus current "box" and space between each story which makes it easy to read through titles fast)

- The left alignment (versus current center). At least invert columns - menu/tools on left so it would make the beginning of main story around center.

I love the new design! The only thing I would change is the font of the "Submit News" link at the top right. The "stencil" style is indicative of a fact or information, not exactly of interactivity.

Unrelated: you guys need an internet radio show! Get some guests and discuss things! That would be greattt.

Finally, no more click-through moderation. Instant AJAXy moderation is mucho bettero.

A few things:

-Get rid of the huge submit news button in the corner.
-Make the text under the logo "exploring the future" darker so it can be read on the background
-Make a fixed width version of the site, 800-900 pixel ought to be enough.

Great job overall I think.

I think when I click to open a story it should be the comments one. Why click two times.

At the main page I can see the news text..

Thank you very much for all your hard work.

Just to my eye, but a small amount of line space between the headline (and the linked line) and then the summary text might help. And perhaps it might look neater if the summary text didn't run round the icon but stayed to the right of it?

Everything works out nicely on my widescreen here, anyway, better than do many sites which are set up for 4:3 but struggle to manage 16:9.

Why don't you put the ads over to the right? I can't imagine Google is happy about the adds on the bottom, and having them on the right would even out the weight of the page a bit.

The submit news button looks painfully out of place with the rest of the site.

I'd go to putting it as "just another link" on the site, if you want it to be prominent then in the top menu but not as a huge great image there.

If it was there to try and balance out the top of the page, you need another plan for that because it looks tacky.

I like it, but I'd like to see a clearer separation between stories. Like slashdot, having the backgrounds of titles another color or something.

Two thumbs up. Much appreciate your effort.

About the submit news button: it's not final. All artwork (i.e. the logo as well as the submit news button and even the colour scheme) is not finalised yet.

I am really sorry, I love the new features, but I *hate* the new look.

I have been reading OS News daily for as long as I can remember. It is the only web site I visit daily. If the new look comes in, I'll stop coming here. It makes my eyes hurt!

The main problem, for me, is that the main body of the page is left of centre, with the navigation on the right. This is feels very awkward indeed.

Secondly, I really miss the boxes around things: they made things easier for me to pick out of the page.

Thirdly, I really dislike the stark background. I have problems with dark text on a bright background, and the OS News Beta is one of the worst examples I have seen.

Finally, I thought the old site looked great.

Please, please, please rethink the new look and feel. I really don't want to give up my OSNews addiction!

* Avatars. It just becomes competition who has the biggest Avatator.
* Ajax. It gives too much trouble.
* Messaging. I have e-mail for that.

No, seriously, I like OSNews as it is. It looks like you guys are transforming into some kind of forum. For reading operating system related news, the current site does the job perfectly, I have absolutely no complaints. I can even read it in Links. I prefer sites that do one thing, and do that good.

Technology is nice, but it must serve a purpose.

Edited 2007-03-22 16:01

The features seem real nice. The design less so. My comments about it (sorry if I'm repeating other posts here, didn't read them all)

- Others mention that the text is too much on the left side - I think its OK, we are just too much used to the current layout

- The main menu is unattractive though. How about rounding the corners, making the gray lighter?

- The big "Submit news" is silly, but i guess its temporary

- I would move the recommend/email/print buttons to the page where the full article is and nove comment count next to the title

- The green gradient background needs to go. But that might be my personal taste

- On the right side all the links in black bold letters - its really not obvious that they are links

edit: umm the ultra-green under the title of my post hurts my eyes a bit

Edited 2007-03-22 16:02 UTC

Hate the new logo. Go with the old logo. And tone down the squashed catapillar gut green. Other than that, looks pretty good.

Are you changing the site just for the sake of change? I think the current site is one of the best on the web.

It's great to see OSNews updated. It looks way better, and the has some useful features compared to v3.

There are a few things that I think could be improved:
- the HUGE "Submit News!" image - it's way out of place
- the right column:
- on resolutions > 1024x768 it's too big. There is too much white space around it (I suggest making it fixed)
- on 800x600 it goes at the end of the page (???) - Firefox 2.0, WinXP
- there is no clear separation between the sections (search, welcome, your account etc). I've searched for quite a while the link to my profile. The right column is a big mess
- I don't like that I get taken to a new page when I post a comment/reply. I'd like to see what has been said before me. The Add Bold and Add Italic buttons are too ugly and plain

Overall, v3 looks more simple, readable, inviting, but v4 is cuter, has some much needed features and has more potential.

I still prefer the old site, albeit just a minor adjustment say to the width of the boxes,make them a little more wide. I prefer the a new color scheme, not the green type implemented in the new version. Can we put different themes on it? If it is then you have my vote.

I actually like the layout myself. On my aging 17" monitor at 1024x768 res, for the most part it looks good, though the banner ads on the main page bleed over into the search box area until they disappear. (using firefox oe Konqueror)

Also unless I maximize my window, the right column moves all the way down to the bottom below the articles, but as I usually use maximized windows in my browsers, I didn't notice at first.

logo, I do like the original better, but the new one is still nice

avatars and messaging I could do without, but if the graphics are kept small in size (both dimensionally and in filesize) I could live with them.

You should use CSS slicing so that you use only one large .png image file with all your graphics and map them. It'll load a LOT faster.

Also, gather all your .js files into one single big and optimized .js file with no carriage retuen and comments.

You can dramatically optimize your CSS files. There are many ways you can do it, also, remove spaces and carriage returns as much as you can. There's an article on how to achieve better CSS optimization: http://www.osresources.com/9_3_en.html

The new logo is not very esthetic. I prefer the current one. Good luck.

I like the new site, especially the comments page. The ad banners that are fairly wide cover up the search and other things on the right side though if you are not viewing with a wide window. Other than that one quirk I think the site is pretty nice.

*edit* I'm an idiot!

Yes, for your first error, to fix it would be a simple style="text-align:right;"

Edited 2007-03-22 16:40

Yeah! I like your new design, at first glance, it's less heavier than before, it's cleaner, shinning, I have not digged yet inside it but i am, by now, comfortable with it.

Expect Demo not to be like ms longhorn,

Keep it real, you're great!!

On the plus side it seems you've added a bunch of nice technical improvements, and some nice AJAXy bits and pieces. I also like that my posts are highlighted for example.

On the minus side I don't like the new layout and color scheme at all. And another thing I noticed is that when I click to reply to a post I can't read the post I'm replying to while composing my reply. Very annoying.

So if you want my opinion, keep the look of the site essentially like it is and just add the technical improvements.

I'll have to post my vote against the left-sided orientation of the site, as well.
Overall, the new look makes the site feel more "modern", but I prefer the old site's 'straight-down-the-middle' layout.

If you read OSNews using a RSS reader, the links to the articles still point to the current site, not to the beta. So it is not possible to try the beta site that way. I'd like to suggest that you make the links to articles in http://www4.osnews.com/files/recent.xml point to the beta site.

and you're still sending the old version out to devices! (Opera Mini, p910i)

I do like the new site, even with the "needed" JavaScript and the awkward inline images. So can our mobile browsers get the new love too ?

I like the new comment system, No longer do I have to hold the ctrl/apple key(linux/mac) to mod someone up without reloading the new page

No disrespect but...that looks clunky. This version we are currently on is much "cleaner". However, seems to be working with my Firefox 2.0.0.3.

It's said "without further adue," but it's not written that way.

It's supposed to be beta, right? It looks really weird on safari. The main content is not centered (alright, this may be a feature), but the right "column" with info runs AFTER the main one stops, on the right. Now this is weird! Also there's a stranded "Older Stories" at the bottom which is alone and looks all out of place...
Something's not right.
Will there be an OSNews Classic though?

Why is there no box around the left side page like in earlier design. Current design doesn't look that clean.

I would prefer a box (or boundary) to separate sections.

There's nothing wrong with current design. And you know, if it's not broken, don't fix it.
New features are a different story but they don't really require a redesign...

I don't like the new design. It's somewhat "painful" to read, as in - it actually hurts my eyes. Kinda like trying to look at a bunch of black/white stripes in any kind of pattern. I think the gradient in (some of) the background(s) contributes to this. I noticed it's not in the main site/comment view, but those hurt too. Must be the color combination.

Also, the information seems disjointed. Comments have a far-to-large header. Same for stories. Too much "bloat", in other words.

I don't mean offense, but it seems like a poorly done version of digg. I'm not a huge fan of digg, but their interface is at least aesthetically pleasing. This "new" design, is not. At least, not to me.

I do agree the site needed some work done, but hopping on the "digg"-like site bandwagon was not the way to go about it. I realize the sites are sim. and thus will share sim. interfaces, but this is just silly.

Something more akin to how old-slashdot "modernized" to new-slashdot would have been MUCH better. The old interface really wasn't that bad. It could have used some aesthetic changes and usability changes, but this v4 interface is unusable to me.

If it goes live in this current form with no way for me to continue using v3, I will be leaving this site. I simply can't read the news for more than 10 seconds without my eyes hurting.

Edited 2007-03-22 18:35 UTC

New look is interesting, but I feel like something lost. Can not tell what is it exactly. May be nice flat boxes, may be careful text color or weight selection. Old osnews was balanced, original, do not stress eyes but same time have good contrast in main text areas.

And i just hate avatars and PM. Avatars are for kids, but now computers are most complex devices in all history, but people who like to contest "I find c0o1 flashing vibrant picture (distracting, impact, schocking), you loose" are even more turned from real information ( that in plane text) to that useless feature.

PM is different story. It force people not to discuss in public but ask personally. Then it will be not a forum but free mail -like service. Use mail then.

Edited 2007-03-22 18:57 UTC

There are four things that immediately stood out to me about the new version that I do not like (a lot!):

* The logo (the old one was much better IMO)

* The floating news articles on the main page (I really liked the border and divider area around news articles the old version had, at the very least there needs to be a solid box around article titles)

* The right-handed navigation (I really liked the old OSNews left sidebar, I'm left-handed )

* The colors are too bright! Having so much white everywhere makes it hard to read the text. I like the old site's usage of a solid neutral color for the main background, and the use of white only for readable areas where the news articles were.

Awesome work!

There are a few enhancements I would like to see:
- hyperlinks (http/https ONLY) in the profile description.
- bold and italics in the profile description.
- The ability to set default "Headlines" where it defaults to staff blog. I prefer to always see gnomefiles newly added software and then check the staff blog only occasionally.
- The ability to "Ignore" selected user and never see comments from them

Looks good so far

Edited 2007-03-22 19:00

Pros:
- Mice comments layout/design
- AJAX used in a reasonable manner (e.g. when previewing the comment -- Nice!)
- PMs
- More RSS options
- The avatars (just uploaded one, it works! )

Cons:
- The design is... well, in general... it sucks. It's my private opinion of course. The colors, the fonts, well it just does cannot compare with other recently redesigned webpages like Digg or Slashdot.
- Lots pf wasted space, e.g on the top, next to the logo
- The right column is a complete mistake, it looks like it nobody took the time to actually design it.
- The general usability -- it leaves an impression of randomless: the ads and the features look the same confusing readers (perhaps it's on purpose...)
- The "Submit news!" button -- first it doesn't look like a button, second - it looks awful. Serious redesign is needed here

OK, enough for now. When I have more ideas I will submit them as well. Hope they were helpful.

1. Your Account -> Comments displays an error:
Warning: Invalid argument supplied for foreach() in /home/osnews/www4/includes/user-comments.inc.php on line 49
2. My color theme is gone
3. Main logo is cool
4. Logo in URL bar is missing

http://www4.osnews.com/?spit=theme-v3

This is a VER VERY QUICK MOCKUP. If anyone dares say the theme sucks, I'm going to personally come to their house and punch them. It's just to prove that with no more than 15 minutes of work, we can change the theme.

http://www4.osnews.com/?spit=theme-leftalign

Same idea.

Everyone here is focused on text and colors, which is totally the WRONG thing to focus on, since they are trivial to change with style. The idea is the USABILITY.

Edited 2007-03-22 19:08 UTC

I find the site to be very aesthetically pleasing. It reminds me of a newspaper. The previous site certainly was better on limited hardware and small devices, but I do find the new site easy to navigate and pleasing to the eye.

However, I have been known to wear polyester pants, striped shirts and sombreros!

My Messages works but the navigation above it is inconsistent. It would be nice if the tabs just stayed there.

I find the general look of the sight to be pleasing to the eye. It reminds of a colorful newspaper. I like the icons, and I find it easy to visually separate content from "decoration".

However, I have been known to wear polyester pants with a striped shirt and a sombrero, so my opinion may be suspect.

P.s., I had to go to the V3 site to post this. Posting anything on the V4 site has become near impossible to me, it seems to never make it to the page to do the actual post. Things may be a bit overloaded.

[EDIT: I now see that my previous attempt to post did make it, but I was never taken to the page after posting, my browser just kept spinning. Sorry!]

Edited 2007-03-22 19:31

Don't like the home page.
Nicer gradient green, and that's all.

Better the old menu on the left.
Better the old boxed abstracts.
Don't like the hanging icon, much better on the title as in the old one.
Too much unused space on the right.
No clear separation betweeb articles.

Edited... error already mentioned.

Edited 2007-03-22 20:18 UTC

it would look a lot better without the ads

I am using a Firefox nightly, and the side panel is actually appended to the bottom of the page. Is anyone else seeing this?

I think the "inline" ads in the comments should be a bit separated (those that appear every 5 comments). They look like part of the comment above them. A horizontal line or similar would do the job.

The background is not actually white as it should be, rather it is the default background color for the browser. If that color is not white the gradient ends very abruptly. The site would look better with a defined background color.

Thanks

ps I prefer the old box-color theme as well but I appreciate the new features.

Some random questions, some about the new design, some that apply to both the old and the new:

- Why is Comment Title required at all?

- Why did the mod buttons switch places? I really prefer the [-][+] ordering of the old site (which is more usual anyway, look at your tv volume indicator on the screen, or the remote control buttons for instance)

- The color scheme definitely need a bit of work. Also, the site is overly bright right now.

- Some people complain about wasted space. I don't. Why? Having a 2000px wide line of text is NOT comfortable to read, particularly since most comments will end up with a large gray heading bar (with the title, date posted, etc), one long line of text, and a line of buttons below (link, mod, etc). There is a reason why magazines use columns. Of course, columns in a forum doesn't make sense, but limiting the maximum width is the best next thing. The ideal would be to define the width in terms of "em" no "px", so making the text larger would in fact make the text with grow too.

- The "Add Bold" and "Add Italic" buttons are mostly useless in their current form. They should allow selecting text and then clicking on them to add tags to the selected text, instead of asking me to type the text in a pop-up and then adding it at the end of my post. The code to implement this is not complicated, and it would make those buttons a lot more practical. I made this sample code that implements Bold and Italic, feel free to use it/modify it as needed:

http://rafb.net/p/YiwspU97.html

Works in Safari 2 and newer, Firefox (any version), Opera 9 (and probably older versions too), Internet Explorer 6 (probably all the way back to 5.0, and likely IE 7)

Honestly, I don't like the new style one bit.

If it ain't broke, don't fix it... the style is good as-is IMO.

Sporting the myspace tom logo and all.

Looks good!

First 'bad' thing I noticed: "30 comment(s)". Please make it clever enough to know when to put an 's'.

I know it's a small thing. Hopefully it's all that's needed to make osnews perfect. ;-)

Though you say not to fret, I'd like to go on record as stating atomic vomit is not the best colour to use for the site. Really, the current site looks fine, just lose the width contraints on the current site and you're good.

after typing the password it would be nice if you could tab straight to the login button, as opposed to register.

I like the 'all' nested view.

(the) change is good, thanks.

1) URLs is not user friendly... it should be remember-able, but number make it harder to remember

http://www4.osnews.com/story/$cataloge/Help_Us_Beta_Test_OSNews_Ver...

2) avatar on comments should be attached to title comment's title, and please remove unnecessary information aka I-don't-care-since-when-he-became-a-member

3) is this wannabe /. thing?

4) hover mouse over bookmark and + - score doesn't suggest its clickable

5) replace "(bold|italic) selected text) with bold B and italic I

hum! what else!?

perhaps this might be a useful idea (since V3 has it):

adding a 'read more about' feature at the end of let's say an editorial. maybe an editorial about amiga, then right below the story we'd find a list with suggestions for related readings (plus topics related to some other tags/keywords aside amiga within the editorial)

but hey, great job so far with V4. always nice to know that OSNews keeps evolving and growing. sign of prosper.

good luck!

Edited 2007-03-23 00:34

It needs WAY more spacing on the news atcle listing between the

Title
Who wrote it
The news content
.. and the icons.

Maybe set the line-height: CSS attribute to space these out a little more, because everything seems to be clumped too close together.

Look at http://digg.com/ to see how they make it look better.

It doesn't work very well on konqueror 3.5.5 since the CSS of the right bar doesn't float right (this div should be rendered w/ top priority), it comes in the end of the page on my small size konqueror window. Also - on konqueror 3.5.5 - the ad banner overlaps the new logo some times. The logo can be improved if you clarify the OS part; the S is easy to get but not the O, thus seems like S News and not OS News, to a "stranger". Yes it looks more modern; but the old logo was more charismatic.

I personally prefer the old site design (one of the best, IMO), specially the all in a box for each of the several comments. A wider comment's area is also preferable (but not more than the old 610 pixels) instead of the 470 pixels of the new version (judging from my K-Ruler).

The old colors were better. The new yellowish background makes for more eye strain. (BTW the new background color doesn't appear in konqueror; only the repeated top gradient - my default konqueror background color is peach)

Can you leave the old version on the air ?
It looks less news-board site like.

(Posted fron konqueror 3.5.5 - KDE 3.5.5)

Edited 2007-03-23 02:04 UTC

It would be nice if the controls to the right could be moved to their original position on the left, or at least make it user configurable.

Having it on the right side, increases the amount of mousing around the users need to do, as most windowing systems have the horizontal scroll bar to the right and most of the things users interact with on the posts are closer to the right than to the left.

Another thing, the box around the controls on the old site made much easier to separate them from the contents.

Other than that I like the new features, and the colors but please keep the old layout.

feel bad that you had to append that update. i would have thought that both of those would have been assumed by osnews readers. osnews has always proved to be alt friendly, and guis .. well they come and they go .. and they always look bad in beta..

anyways ... i like v4 .. good stuff. even under net+ hehe

I'm not good with change. I still use the BeOS.

Looks cool so far.

I guess we all just have personal preferences. I don't like the new site at all. It has zero personality and looks like a conservative IT site (whatever that means). I love the current site. I've never had any problems with it, and it loads very quickly for me (on OS X, Ubuntu, Windows, and Zeta). Please reconsider the new layout, or at least offer the old layout as an option.

Just want to say i like how it now resizes to my screen instead of being fixed width.

Also just wondering if theres a way to turn user avatars off from comments? ;o)

Edited 2007-03-23 06:46

Personally I don't like it. The web site running now is clean cut whereas the new one....just doesn't feel right.

I think the bright green/yellow heading at the top is kind of distracting.

The dark green font is hard to read...again that's just me.

On the right side...I can't easily tell the difference between advertisements or links that I can use (To access comments, profile, etc)

The layout of the articles have a "diggish" look on the front page...I'm going to stop bitching now...

I guess not everyone will love the new look but I for one do. As for the new AJAX-ed features: there very nice too. Keep yo the great work!

*throws up*

I don't like the news on the left of the screen, it should be on the right and all features should be on the left. Not that it really matters but it feels much better. Rest looks cool to me.

...we definitely need more boxes in there, like with the old layout. They make it easy to skim the site and separate content, title, author and so on from each other.

And do away with the white background. It hurts my eyes. The gradient is cool, though. Maybe a pastel green background may do it.
And, of course, the sidebar has to be on the left.

I love the current look of OSNews. Everything is clean, centered, and professional looking. I realize that you have all worked hard on the new site but to me it looks awful. Everything runs from one edge of the screen to the other, solid white background, huge logos, etc. It looks more like a web site from the mid 90's in my opinion. I also hate text ads, you just end up with a page full of text and it's hard to pick out the content from the ads. Finally, the current design has personality. I can look at it from a mile away and know that it's OSNews. The new design just looks so generic. I hope you'll reconsider, or give everyone the option to continue using the old layout.

It looks nice, but I prefer the original site, it was simple and straight to the point. There just seems to be too much on the page, that it is a little overwhelming, but then again it is probably because I am so used to the old site.

How will the site look for subscribers?, i.e. Will you still remove all the slow loading adverts.

I really like it

It's clean and modern design, but I'm probably quite conservative so I really don't like it.
Especially the avatars in discussion and the abandoning nice green and silver colours of old design are the worst decisions.
I only hope it will be possible to choose color palette, switch off avatars OR stay using old design.

I miss the "view all 180 comments in a single page" link.

I think the mod up and mod down links were clearer when they were either side of a comment's score (also the 2 buttons' vertical alignment looks a bit off in Firefox v2.0.0.3/Win2k)

Other than that it's a great new design. Well done to all concerned!

Its a lot more spread out, so its harder to quickly scan through the material and pick what you want. Whether its number of threads on a page, or number of comments in a thread on a page. Could perhaps be helped by using smaller font in the headers and smaller avatars. Yes, its a more lively and graphical display, but I find the sense of a rather small window into a rather big document a bit claustrophobic. The current display is a bit dull visually, but it packs a lot into a small area.

I've come round to the new layout, thanks to Firefox and some page editing extensions

http://img250.imageshack.us/img250/1781/osnewsv4au7.png

:)

Please make adsense pub centered with news column.. it's on the left.. and give it some more space.. like one in the top and another in the bottom.

Cluttered, busy, distracting, stupid fscked up avatars and icons for users on every message, looks like some 10 year old kid's crappy blog.

Far, far less enjoyable to read and much rougher on the eyes than the grey/green site. Totally loathe it.

As a web designer, let's see what we have for comments.

First off, it's not valid XHTML 1.0 strict... despite your using that doctype.

The following properties are NOT valid XHTML
target
align
language
name
border

and it looks like you failed to close at LEAST five tags properly.

It LOOKS like you are resorting to a number of browser specific hacks you shouldn't be needing to go anywhere near (like the stuff that's IE7 specific) given the simplicity of the layout... you've restricted yourself to 'crappy little stripe' again, just this time a BIGGER crappy stripe (that's a 'fixed width design' complaint)... You should probably be stating a XMLS statement on your HTML tag, and most certainly should be including a character encoding meta... and you are using non-semantic markup with tons of classed div's instead of using meaninful tags like H1, H2, UL, OL, LI, etc meaning you aren't giving search engines OR non-css users any real clues as to what's what.

Oh, and the text in the sidebar is too damned small on 'large font' machines, likely from using too small a px sized font instead of %/em or pt.

You folks want, I could work up a VALID template for you to work from that would be more SEO, Semantic and use a LOT less code overall.

Of course, I'd also make no guarantees as to IE 5.x support, but you did that yourselves the moment you used a XHTML 1.0 strict header.

Edited 2007-03-23 14:08

i think the design looks very good, but there are some thing that have to be fixed. i thing the main thing are news items listed on the first page.. needs little more space around the news text.
but anyway, great design! keep up the good work.

Glitz and features may be nice, but this site is about operating system news. Some operating systems just don't have access to web browsers with all of the new fangled stuff, so you can expect to drive away users of some operating systems. Much of what remains will be Mac/Linux/Windows oriented. Which may be fine for the majority, but not everyone. (Some Linux users would even have trouble because you cannot run Firefox on low-resource systems.)

Browser: ELinks/0.11.2 (textmode; Linux 2.6.16-ARCH i686; 80x25-2)

- the link in "Recent comments" does not jump to latest comment but just to the story. Not sure if on purpose or my browser (Firefox Linux amd64).

- Highlight on my own comments is very neat - but it is not visible when I browse from another computer even if I am logged in.

- Sort Newest does not work

Edited 2007-03-23 14:59 UTC

Made a two comment votes yesterday. The count shows 9. The count has not been reset today.

I apologize ahead of time if this is already mentioned (or a known issue that I should know)

Each session, my view keeps reverting to "flat", and then I have to reselect "threaded", which forces a reload. The selection is not remembered across sessions.

Here's a thought:
A darker, more subdued theme makes the site look like it could conceivably be work related. The bright green stands out a bit too much

Would be nice to implement it.

( I'm still shocked about the new colour scheme but that'll change right? I love the old blue diagonals )

Enjoy.

http://www4.osnews.com/theme

This is temporary until we migrate to v4. For now, please note you MUST ACCEPT COOKIES to set a theme.

It took my brain a second to wrap its self around the new site, but it looks good. The best part I can use the sidebar in Firefox without losing anything I actually want to read!

There are a a couple nitpicks though. the headers on the left side link bar seem like they would be a natural place for a link, and I liked the old logo better.

Anyway, it looks great.

I quite like the new site! I do *not* like having the links and stuff on the right hand side though Can you make it optional? I much prefer having it on the left. having it on the right just makes the site look weird to me...

I really love the new design though!

oh, I don't like the ne wlogo at all either. it's really really really UGLY! IMO of course

How about you guys have a logo competition? That would be awesome! You might get some VERY good submissions!

Edited 2007-03-23 18:11 UTC

Adam,

On the front page, if you look at this news story, the comment count isn't displaying correctly. It's saying "20 comments" for this, when there are over 200. This is in FireFox 2.

What about making the Sidebar customizable? So that you could remove several columns, like the 'recent comments'.

The "Classic" theme is for the people who prefer the look and feel of OSN4. Since it's so different, there are still many areas of this theme that are incomplete.

I think it should read "The....look and feel of OSN3" instead of OSN4.

This has probably been mentioned already, but...

Why can't you set themes in your profile? So when you log in to OSNews, it's back at the theme you want? I use several PCs constantly and having to change the theme to left everytime I log in is rather annoying...

So far, I enjoy it. The theme is quite drastically different from the original obviously and I'm pretty fond of this original look, so that's probably just something I have to adjust to. You can always go back to original mode, so that's good too. I like the "lefty" theme also even though I'm right handed.

I haven't gone too deep into other things yet, but I can say that I don't like the ads in between the entries. I never minded the ads on the side of the side and top, and maybe you have to do that now for more clicks or something but if there would be one thing I'd change right off the bat it'd be getting rid of the ones in between entries. It's probably something that could be gotten used to though if it needs to be there... I just feel that it takes away from the reading itself to be honest.

As a few other thoughts:
Firstly, I love the ability to edit comments (as I'm doing right now) so props to that! I also enjoy the starring feature and all of the XML going on here now.

Secondly, this is more of a question, but is it possible to paginate the threaded/nested views at all? I kind of like the idea of both, but I don't like the idea of going through hundreds of comments on one page. I don't know if the design allows for pagination to occur in these views so I'm more curious than anything.

Edited 2007-03-24 21:49 UTC

I like the new site. While I could probably nitpick if I wanted to, the fact is that I found the old layout to be somewhat dated looking.

Two things come to mind with the new layout:

a) Since you highlight the topic header for user messages, how about highlighting new messages posted since the last time the comments were viewed? Something as simple as using a cookie to record time and trigger highlighting of posts displayed since the last view time? Taking this article as an example, with 238 posts, it can be cumbersome finding newer posts in a threaded view.

b) For the avatar thingy, can it be changed to display a blank avatar for users that have declined to set one, rather than using the generic default one? Avatars are useful in recognizing posters, using a generic one sort of defeats that because it adds clutter. Using a profile setting to view them is an all-or-nothing alternative, so I'm wondering about something in between?

Just my 2c...

Just a couple of pixels of padding on the body of the news items would improve the front page enormously IMO.

It's difficult for the eye to make sense of what's going on without any gaps between all the different font sizes and styles.

Looks good though.