Adding depth to the forum

[Jammer]

I was thinking along the lines of a picture section, but I like yoose guys ideas better. Could be a lot of studios though, one for each member that has some project. I suppose if you don't post in yours it would slowly get pushed off the page.
Yes, by all means, let FC be the crash dummy. A place without endless, mind numbing drivel, like many of my posts lately, would be refreshing. Pure content...are there sub-sub-forums where others could post comments?
It would be nice if some of the greats would join us...Abby, Murray, FrankG, BobS and HHWC (he is always thinking outside the box) . Of course there are many others that have shown some great stuff but don't seem to come around anymore.

[Harry]

Could be a lot of studios though, one for each member that has some project. I suppose if you don't post in yours it would slowly get pushed off the page.

Thats why I was thinking some number of projects before setting up a studio. This might encourage people to post more projects, maybe somewhere around half a dozen to get set up. This will also get people used to posting in the regular forum first so the studios dont become the initial posting location. I think this is important to build out the forum in the drill down by topic style, the studios will get shadowed threads to collect the members projects all in one place by member.

All in all it doesnt seem like it would be too much work to keep up on, when a member wants a studio they would send me a pm with links to the threads they want included and a name for their studio. I would set it up and shadow the threads over there along with placing the subforum that only they have posting rights to. As time goes by and they post new projects in the regular forum and want them included in their studio all it takes is a PM with a link asking for it to be shadowed to XXXXX studio. I cant imagine it being more than ten or fifteen minutes to set one up once I get the steps down.

Like you said, if they quit posting it would drop down the page.

[Jammer]

That sounds good Harry, Keeps the one hit wonders in check.

"Hi, name's FC... I walk on water, women everywhere love me insatiably to a point it's annoying".

I wonder what his date going to be??? A TV dinner and some old Star wars videos...

[Harry]

Nah, FC is full of crap but he does have it going on. I am pretty sure it was a classy date topped off with a little honky tonkin'

[Harry]

Nah, FC is full of crap but he does have it going on. I am pretty sure it was a classy date topped off with a little honky tonkin'

[Heimo]

Something I have seen on a different forum that I quite like...

a small box at the side of the screen that displays the recent topics....this is also on a phpBB forum...like so


I quite like the recent topics box because sometimes I do something, then it does not show that there are new posts...

[Harry]

That looks like more of a portal where the forum is displayed with the portal and you can add lots of things like that that are drawn from the forum database.

I think there is a view recent posts somewhere, might have to turn it on or add something for it.

[GypsyTinker]

F.C. I was thinking about that type of feature... I was thinking it would be best as a profile enhancement. Have a Workshop section, projects... etc... maybe even a spot where you post some junk you have and people can comment with suggestions on what to do with it.

As far as the categorization, I think it is a slippery slope. It easily gets over classified and also people don't often take the time to find the right place to post things. So you end up with a lot of duplicate post topics in separate sections and people pointing each other back and forth.

[Harry]

Yeah, it is a fine line to walk on just how in depth you make the subforums. The current setup is just what I thought would be good to get started, things may change down the road by moving posts around. Also I figure as the board begins to get more posts categories will define themselves. Take the casting section for example, once there are a few pages of posts in there it might make sense to make subforums for aluminum, brass/bronze and iron. These subforums could be made and the existing posts sorted into them.

Also about people posting in the wrong spot because they had not noticed a forum more appropriate. These posts will be moved most likely to the forum where they would make a better fit.

Down the road I figure there will be a few people here willing to help out with this sort of thing.