Site Upgrade (IPS 4.1)

[NoGi]

Summary: Site will be upgraded to the latest version of the forum software Description:

Test site: http://shrimpkeepersforum.com.au/forum/

username/password is skf

Big upgrade coming up in October/November:

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Key Changes

Changes and New Features Include:

• New menu structure and drag-and-drop menu manager
  • Ability to have two menu levels
  • Preview before publishing
• Discovery system that allows for both admin and user created Activity Streams
  • Admin-defined streams always visible to users. Users can edit and save admin streams to create their own, custom copy.
  • The main show-all stream automatically tells you when there is new activity
  • Users can create custom streams
  • User streams can be shared but viewer will only see content based on their permissions
  • Filter options include:
    • All content or specific apps. Some apps support further refinement into categories or content-type.
    • Unread content
    • Ownership
      • Content I posted in
      • Content I started
      • Content by specific members (user can create a list)
    • Content I follow
      • Areas I follow
      • Specific content I follow
      • Posted by members I follow
    •  Time Period
      • Any time
      • Since my last visit
      • Specified number of days
      • Specific date range
  • Activity Streams that reference features not available to Guests such as unread tracking and follow system will auto-hide
• Selective quoting to highlight a bit of a post and quote just that
• Pages application enhancements
  • Pages
    • Larger editor box when editing/creating pages
    • More tags in sidebar when editing/creating pages
  • Fields
    • Simple relational field added
    • Ability to place fields above or below record content
    • Simple Name: Value display format added
• Gallery application enhancements
  • New upload image process
  • Images and movies are submitted to the same upload field
  • Image reviews
• Editor updates
  • Uses div-mode which is much faster and more reliable. Clicking into the editor is now pretty much instant.
  • Auto-linking and member mentions to use new APIs for better reliability
  • Quotes, code boxes, and spoilers can be dragged and moved and there is no more "red line"
  • When cmd/ctrl right-clicking: options to remove or break-out of quotes, edit links and edit image properties
  • Pasting asks if you want to convert to plain text
  • Editor is responsive, and ability to have small editor show in areas with less space
  • Member @mentions in posts can now be selected by tab key
• Design and interface enhancements
  • Improve typography for titles
  • Better contrast for user-entered text (posts/comments/etc)
  • Brighten background colors
  • Pre-select text in when share popup is opened
  • Make positive/negative colors consistent across all uses
  • Better hover highlighting of 'blended' links
  • Better styling of mentions in posts (both the username, and the menu to select a user)
  • Better contrast for ipsAreaBackground
  • Flatten the default photo image
  • Checkbox/radio buttons now use custom styling, giving themers more control of their style
  • Improve popular/selected post styles
  • Change popular post icon to heart for consistency with likes
  • Make date a permalink for sharing
  • Improve sidebar contrast and block styles
  • Remove tab bar 'stretch' option and use CSS approach
  • Improve attachments dialog
  • Add more IDs to the user bar template for hook use
  • Add X to close mobile nav menu
  • Upgrade FontAwesome to 4.4
  • Select messages for multiple deleting in messenger
  • Make leaving a conversation clearer
  • Improve warning panel in user profiles
  • Move content status icons (pinned, hidden etc.) to start of row
  • Improve cover photo so it automatically puts it into position mode after uploading
  • Android title bar inherits theme header color
  • Added date uploaded to Downloads version dropdown
• Browser notifications for completed actions (such as large file uploads)
• Search
  • The main search box defaults to the app you are currently browsing unless you are on home page where it searches all
  • New default interface
  • Results now highlight and skip to search term in preview
• Retina emoticons
• Instant Notifications
  • Receive notifications via your Browser Notifications of new Personal Messages and anything in the notifications menu
  • Intelligent auto-polling that only polls when needed to reduce server traffic
  • Browser local storage used, to allow for cross-communication if you have multiple tabs open to further reduce resource use

 

No Longer Included

• Areas such as View New Content, My Content, My Followed Content, Status page and so on are replaced by the new Activity Streams

Some teaser screenshots and info from the developers

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New Menu Structure

Our new menu structure is designed to highlight the two ways people go about interacting with a community: general browsing of specific discovery. 

The Browse tab looks just like the current, default menu does in IPS Community Suite with your list of apps. The new Activity menu is designed for discovery features like our new Activity Streams and the search functions.

This is just the default menu and gives new communities an idea of the different concepts. When upgrading from 4.0 to 4.1 your existing menu items will be placed in this format with any menu items created under the Pages app moved to a location in the new menu. You will want to adjust things to best fit your community.

 

Activty Streams

The new Activity Streams are a discovery feature that takes the concept of the old View New Content, Activity, Followed Items, etc. and merges them into a unified system to allow for both admin and member-defined streams of content based on their preferences. The system is very powerful and allows for countless different ways for your members to discover content or for you to more easily expose content you want to highlight.

Front end interface member created streams

Streams that admins create are always visible to all members. Members can simply view those admin streams, create their own, or copy an admin stream as a base. Guests also have access to view all admin streams excluding those that reference unread or followed content as Guests do not have access to those features. Always available to all members is the All activity stream that shows a list of activity in order by date. The admin can define what shows in the All activity stream.

Members can share the link to the streams they create to other members. There is no need for privacy here as all they are sharing are their various filter settings - the actual stream data returned changes based on what member is actually viewing the stream.

Use cases for Activity Streams are endless. Some examples might be:

• The current View New Content type of result.
• A Stream of all content from members you follow.
• Show a list of unread items from a specific list of members (perhaps members of staff).
• Maybe you are a prolific Gallery contributor and you want to see a feed of all unread comments on images that you posted.
• Rather than following every item you reply to, you can choose to create a feed of all content you have ever participated in.
• Get really fine-tuned and create a Stream showing unread comments in Blog only from members you follow.

The Activity Streams feature is very flexibly and you can get really imaginative with its uses. It is a really big addition to IPS Community Suite 4 and we think you will enjoy it. We already do!

 

Updated Editor

We have updated our WYSIWYG editor in 4.1 to the latest version of CKEditor and we have also switched from iframe to div mode in the editor. That is basically technical speak to say that the new editor will be much, much faster and specifically behave much better on mobile devices.

Many of the custom systems we wrote for 4.0 have been replaced with native editor functionality in 4.1 to allow for both speed and greater reliability. This does mean some things work a bit differently but you will quickly see the very small learning changes are worth the editor being so responsive.

You can now move quote boxes with your mouse to embed them or move them above/below existing text. Another great feature is the new cmd/ctrl right-click menu that allow for contextual options. For example, cmd/ctrl right-click on an embedded image attachment yields:

When pasting in rich text from an external source the editor will now prompt you asking if you want to keep that formatting:

 

A small, but useful improvements is allowing @member mentions to be selectable by keyboard. Just do @member and use the arrows and tab key on your keyboard to select the member. The editor also now recognizes its area size not only based on your browser window (to distinguish mobile, tablet, or desktop) but also where it is embedded. An example of this is the new status update widget:

A really useful feature is the ability to select and text in any post and get an option to quote just that text.

The new editor is a total rework and we hope you enjoy the new speed, stability, and options. Using the editor is the core function of any community so getting it right is very important.

 

Gallery Enhancements

There are two changes to Gallery that may seem small at a glance but actually make using Gallery much easier and more flexible. There is now a new upload process which makes adding images or videos much easier to understand. You can more easily see the category, album, or album creation options on the screen.

Once you actually upload your image you can more easily add descriptions and other data to your images either individually or all at once.

This direct change to how your members add images should result in a much more pleasant experience when adding images to Gallery.

We also now support reviews on Gallery images in addition to comments.

 

Updated Search Interface

We have given our search interface a revamp to more effectively use space and be easier to use (especially on mobile):

As well as simplifying the way filters appear, we have separated member searching from content searching. This made sense given that the filters available for finding members are entirely different to those you see when finding content, so this visual separation should make that more apparent to users. This new approach to filters also becomes the new Advanced Search view, with results loading dynamically below when submitted.

Another change we have made is to adjust the text snippet to show you the context of the result hit. For example, if you search ‘lorem', the results will now show you the text surrounding the first match. This small improvement can greatly improve the perceived quality of results:

Finally, another small change has been made to the contextual search box shown in the header on every page. We now default the context to the app you’re currently using, unless you’re on the homepage in which case it’ll search all content. In our testing, we have found this aligns much better with user expectations.

Notifications

We have introduced two new notification features: instant notifications and HTML5 browser notifications. Both work together to provide a great boost to engagement in IPS 4.1.

HTML5 Browser Notifications

We have built in support for browser notifications where they are supported (right now, this includes desktop versions of Firefox, Chrome, Safari and Opera, but not IE, and mobile browser support is patchy). This allows IPS 4.1 to let you know when important things have happened even if you aren’t active in that window at the time.

We have enabled browser notifications in three areas. When you upload files using any attachment area, you will be notified when your files have finished uploading; when there are new replies to a topic you have currently viewing; and for instant notifications (more about that below).

Instant Notifications

Instant notifications has been a long-requested feature, and we are pleased to say they are included in IPS 4.1. We have worked hard to build an approach that is as light on resources as possible.

If you are active in the window, instant notifications will show as a standard flash message at the bottom of your screen; if you are not active, and your browser supports them, you will get a desktop notification instead, and a chime will sound to alert you. Clicking the notification box will take you to the new item (or open the notification menu if alert is telling you about multiple items).

Ability to limit the number of emails received

In IPS 4.1, you can optionally choose to receive just one email notification per content item until you revisit the community, rather than a separate email for each new reply. This is an option that was previously available in IPB 3.x that we have reintroduced based on feedback.

 

Retina Emoticons

Our well-loved emoticons have had a facelift (pun intended) and now look great on high-resolution retina screens and dark backgrounds:

 

 

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