THE NEW CHYOO (with link)! Also, what features should be part of an updated CHYOO?

[GreenBanana]

Woot! Congrats! Good job to those involved in the work! My login works fine and everything!

In terms of synchronization, Chyoo3 won't port over blocked content from Chyoo2, will it? What about content from users banned from Chyoo3?

Some things still appear a bit unintuitive to me, but it's pretty amazing to see the site up, even considering that it's only in beta. It's a lot easier to think of suggestions now that I can actually interact with the site on some level. Again, congrats to those involved!

I'm already porting over my stories from Writing.com. =^w^=

 

[Friedman]

In terms of synchronization, Chyoo3 won't port over blocked content from Chyoo2, will it? What about content from users banned from Chyoo3?

I'm glad you like it so far. The new Chyoo only synchronizes approved threads. So there shouldn't be problems with synchronizing the content. Threads from banned users won't be synchronized.

 

[GreenBanana]

I'm glad you like it so far. The new Chyoo only synchronizes approved threads. So there shouldn't be problems with synchronizing the content.

I'm a little worried about needling you with a bunch of things when you deserve a break, but I've got a lot of questions. Would it be preferable if I simply made a list of things to ask if I'm uncertain that they'd fall under "Report a Problem," and then post them here?

In the meantime, it's really fun practicing using tags! I wasn't able to find them on the front page, but I feel honored this suggestion was considered.

 

[Friedman]

I'm a little worried about needling you with a bunch of things when you deserve a break, but I've got a lot of questions. Would it be preferable if I simply made a list of things to ask if I'm uncertain that they'd fall under "Report a Problem," and then post them here?

That's fine. There may also be other users which are interested in the same questions.

 

[GreenBanana]

I classified things I noticed either as "issues" (or bugs), or else as features I still hope to see put in given time, as I'm sure the site says "Beta" for a reason. I swear, I'm just eager, not impatient! ^^ Actually, yeah, I admit, I'm kind of impatient, but that doesn't mean I can't wait patiently! Basically, I just don't want you to think I'm bellyaching, because I genuinely do appreciate the work your team has done. Thank you so much for modernizing the site!

Any issues I reported using "Report a Problem".

As for features, my concern is mostly whether they're considered finished or still in beta:
Will customizing visual themes be enabled for Firefox in future?
Will it be possible to customize the font size and text width?
Would it help to place an edit button on a thread's page if you are the author of that thread?
Will there be a feature to make type-able fields a bit more apparent apart from hovering the mouse over them?
Will it be possible to view quantified tags on a story's title page?
Will it be possible to showcase a random story (or some random stories) on the front page, or is "Select a Random Story" the only such option?
Will there be other sorting categories for stories displayed on the front page?
Tags are usually useful for identifying entries by theme because they're quick-shot and readily accessible, as on image gallery websites. Is it possible to make them more visible to increase their practicality?
Stories can be "Public" or "Private," but will there be an option for stories which can be publicly read, but only edited by the creator and editors?
Will it be possible to sort entries in "Manage Stories" by criteria such as the story the thread is in, in future?

 

[Nilth]

Hi Friedman. Really great work, It's ages ahead of the previous site.
I've just started exploring it and I'll give my full feedback on the next days, but if I can and if it's possible I'd really like to add an option on the search engine for the perspective (person, gender).
It seems like a little thing but I think it can make a huge difference in finding what you're looking for.

kudos to you

 

[Murakami]

I'm just going to jump in here and answer a few questions to take some load off of Friedman.

The site only has 1 way sync. That is, it syncs from the old Chyoo to the new one. This is unfortunately needed due to a security problem; the only way we can figure so far for going the other way would require storing the passwords in plain text, which is the same as hanging a big sign up that says "fuck up my site and users". It's a result of how bad the old Chyoo's coding was handled. Please let us know if this is a major problem, although whether we will be able to do anything about it is still unknown.

Due to the way the sync worked, every thread on the new site thinks it was created today. Please give it a bit and the recent lists should begin working correctly. This is a 1 time issue and should not recur. Some things may also not show up in the search for a while, due to the site having to index everything at once. If this is still causing problems by Tuesday, please report it then; until then, please bare with us.

The color scheme issue was only picked up just before release (Firedman doesn't use Firefox, I do). Rather than hold up the whole site over such a minor issue, we went ahead with the release. It has a beta tag for a reason

 

[Nilth]

I'll make a list of the first issues I've encountered here...I'll be able to show them in a clearer way in my opinion. I'll also link this post on the "report a problem" function, to be sure.

First of all, I'm with firefox and windows 7 pro 64 bit.

1) I see the story map of new stories correctly. I've tried with old ones I contributed to and I get this:
http://i.imgur.com/Jbw76LD.jpg

2) Text. I get this:
- http://i.imgur.com/sTwLzFL.jpg
- http://i.imgur.com/elLDiGN.jpg
Instead of this:
- http://i.imgur.com/Vrb8fXh.jpg
- http://i.imgur.com/mUYgcuL.jpg

3) Another example of issues on text..notice also the effect of borders here:
- http://i.imgur.com/PjGYejf.jpg

 

[GreenBanana]

Thanks, Murakami. ^^ Perfectly understandable that it says Beta. :3

Here's a funny thought, though: What if the "Report a Problem" feature didn't function right? ^^ Just to be sure, I've already mentioned a couple of issues, including the missing quotation marks and apostraphes. This occurred on some stories, but not others. I'm not sure if it's significant, but it occurred on a thread that was four pages down in someone else's story, but not on threads that were the first page of stories I had started.

I didn't want to flood the feature suggestion thread with a bunch of bug reports or anything. I just wanted to consider the "Report a Problem" issue. :3 Sorry for my going off topic for this post!

 

[Friedman]

What if the "Report a Problem" feature didn't function right?

We have received your comments. Thanks!

 

[Xorph]

Yes! This is excellent! Now to start writing...

 

[Hvast]

Maybe it would be better to divide sci-fi and fantasy in two categories? Or even sci-fi, fantasy, supernatural

 

[moonblack]

Maybe it would be better to divide sci-fi and fantasy in two categories? Or even sci-fi, fantasy, supernatural

While I agree about dividing sci-fi and Fantasy I don't think there's any easy way to do it apart from manually checking each story.


One bad thing about synchronizing the new and old sites is that any issues with the old one transfer over to the new one. Example:
The story " An Evil Witch in the Modern Age" by Holvard is missing all of its threads.

 

[Murakami]

If the treads are missing on the old site, they are missing. We can't perform magic and make blank threads have text in them.

 

[Hvast]

While I agree about dividing sci-fi and Fantasy I don't think there's any easy way to do it apart from manually checking each story.


One bad thing about synchronizing the new and old sites is that any issues with the old one transfer over to the new one. Example:

Well, the old category can remain with a (dated) label . Editors of active stories will move them to the new ones. Dead ones may remain there

 

[GreenBanana]

Maybe it would be better to divide sci-fi and fantasy in two categories? Or even sci-fi, fantasy, supernatural

This is why I felt tags would be more useful than categories. I still feel as though the categories aren't quite thorough nor mutually exclusive in nature, and therefore cannot encompass the entirety a single story might convey. With tags, I was hoping we could identify a story by multiple criteria at once. A story about being abducted by overly inquisitive aliens and summarily probed would use the "science fiction" tag among others. Following a dragon-laying knight on a saucy expedition would use the "fantasy" tag.

For further elaboration on my vision for tags, I'll use these examples.

Being abducted by aliens would involve tags such as "abduction," "aliens," "probing," and "science fiction". Being on a quest to convince a dragon to cease hostilities with sexy shenanigans along the way would include tags such as "medieval," "fantasy," "adventure," and "dragon".

Identifying these tags as they're appropriate to each thread would help readers see how much of a theme is present in a story (at that moment). You could identify all the threads in a story that were "exposition" or included "sex" in order to find a story that was paced to your liking. A story that a user tagged with with "exposition" (2) and "sex" (13) would have two threads centering on exposition, and thirteen threads detailing sexual activity.

 

[Nilth]

This is why I felt tags would be more useful than categories. I still feel as though the categories aren't quite thorough nor mutually exclusive in nature, and therefore cannot encompass the entirety a single story might convey. With tags, I was hoping we could identify a story by multiple criteria at once.

Totally agree.

 

[TAMS]

I'm glad you like it so far. The new Chyoo only synchronizes approved threads. So there shouldn't be problems with synchronizing the content. Threads from banned users won't be synchronized.

It's going to be a week or so before I can really get into the weeds with the new site, but it looks lovely on first flirt. The story map alone makes me want to hug you while tears of joy run down my face.

 

[Chouken]

It's going to be a week or so before I can really get into the weeds with the new site, but it looks lovely on first flirt. The story map alone makes me want to hug you while tears of joy run down my face.

Same. I won't be able to give a more substantive opinion than 'this is fantastic' until a little later in the week.

 

[Nilth]

Another bugs report, again I'll link this post on the "report a problem" window as soon as I publish here.

Search engine.

1) Blank searches: the only thing that works is a blank search in the default form. Everything else (ordered by latest, recently updated, deepest thread, rating, view) give a blank page or a "internal server error". Entering a word seems to work properly.
2) This is probably the same as n.1: clicking on "latest stories" or "recently updated stories" and so on in the main menu gives the same blank page.
3) Searching by a keyword (the story title) and choosing "show results as threads" and "search only in title" give no results.
4) Tried several searches (using a keywork) and choosing "show as threads"..you get black pages very often, I didn't find a cmmon denominator here.

Also:

3) Pls pretty please add a "perspective" field (person, gender), it's really important

 

[ChaosMuramasa]

I sent this in through the site's Report a problem feature, but I figured I might as well add it again here: em-dashes (Alt-Code 0151, —) aren't showing up. They come up as either a mish-mash of symbols or as a question mark, leading to question marks in the middle of sentences that used them.

I figure this is a relatively easy problem to fix with encoding text or something like that, so I hope it's not too much trouble to patch up, but seeing question marks everywhere in stories that use them can really throw someone off.

 

[sammy_sludge]

A few questions

It's awesome to have the site 'back' again, so to speak.

I assume we have to re-populate our bookmarks and that there's no way that can happen automatically?

Stories I didn't create but which later had their ownership transferred to me are not showing as my stories. Do I have to re-petition for these to be transferred?

Stories I was trusted on no longer have me as trusted. Presumably this is like the bookmarks where it needs to be re-done?

I don't see a way to view contributors to stories or - if you're the editor - to change their status on your story.

Will there be an option to change your user-name?

I don't know how chyoa is hosted, but if it isn't being hosted out of the goodness of someone's throbbing loins will there be donations?

 

[Kaitou1412]

Great to see this is finally up. I'm adding a new sticky topic to each CHYOO forum since this is a fairly big deal and I wish to ensure no one from the old CHYOO misses it.

That said, there's some things I've noticed:

1.) The date for the latest update to a story only appears on the cover page of the site, and only as a month, day, and year. This makes navigation through the updated list less focused, and I'd rather not bookmark every story just to simplify my searches through potential stories. Simply adding this update date would be most helpful, but restoring CHYOO's time stamp would simplify this even further.

2.) Further complicating this is that stories bump up to the top of the updated list when a thread is edited. This one leaves me slightly torn, given that an edit can be a big deal, but it also bumps up simple typo changes. Perhaps the site could borrow from Deviant Art and include an option at the bottom of the edit page to signify a minor edit - if ticked, the edit goes through, but bookmarks and the fresh list aren't notified?

3.) Perhaps I'm missing something, but there doesn't seem to be a means of allowing an editor to edit others' additions to their own stories.

 

[Friedman]

Thanks for the feedback so far! I'm currently going through the issues and will get back to you with an update and more details.

 

[GreenBanana]

2.) Further complicating this is that stories bump up to the top of the updated list when a thread is edited. This one leaves me slightly torn, given that an edit can be a big deal, but it also bumps up simple typo changes. Perhaps the site could borrow from Deviant Art and include an option at the bottom of the edit page to signify a minor edit - if ticked, the edit goes through, but bookmarks and the fresh list aren't notified?

I was concerned about this at first as well, especially since my approach is to think about a thread I posted, and then a day or two later, update it after proofreading. Small details like that get the better of me, and the approach to working on something a little at a time can be just the right pacing for some people. However, I feel that this can be easily overlooked--it's not as if a story appears more than once in the "Recent updates," and I feel the rate at which stories will be updated and posted will keep things clipping along nicely. Enforcing something as simple as toggling whether an update is a "minor change" or not could lapse into the realm of nitpicking minutiae, and oftentimes this toggle can be an afterthought.

As for Chyoa, I hope the moderators' functions are clipping along nicely. A lot of the demand for a modern site appears to stem from their needs in conjunction with ours.