Upcoming Plans for the FreeNAS Forums in 2019

[HoneyBadger]

Speaking of "things broken since the forum update" I'd like to know if the new text editor is exhibiting weird highlight behavior for anyone else.

For example, if I'm in the middle of writing something, or I copy-paste a chunk of text, I'll decide to highlight and edit a large block. So I'll start in the middle, with my cursor at the start of this word here. More will be after it. I'll hit Shift+Up-Arrow, and I'll highlight what looks like a row, up to halfway in the middle of the word "something." But if I try to hit Ctrl+Shift+Left-Arrow to highlight the rest of it, I'll instead lose the highlighting on the word "word."

Screenshots a-comin', thumbnailed so as to not have Forum-Ception.

After hitting Shift+Up:


After hitting Ctrl+Shift+Left:


I know it sounds like a weird flow, but this is just the most easily reproducible example. And as someone who quotes, multi-quotes, copy-and-pastes from terminals, and other things - it's annoying. Just now trying to edit the first line, I went to the end of the line, hit Ctrl+Left a couple times, and when it wrapped around the box to the previous line, instead of continuing to highlight the previous one, it started un-highlighting the one below.

Chrome/FireFox both appear to exhibit this.

 

[JoshDW19]

I hope there is a way of viewing all the unread threads ONLY in the FreeNAS forums?

That was my biggest concern when discussing this with upper management at iX. From my research, I think we'll be able to have the what's new section inside the master nodes so that when you click on "what's new" it will give you what's new for that forum. It may take me a little time to get everything working correctly, but this is high on my radar. The good news is that we'll move the site to the new domain first, I'll work on building out additional infrastructure to make sure that the content is easily navigatable. Then, we can spin up new subforums.

 

[Chris Moore]

Along a related line to @HoneyBadger , it is a chore to edit posts from a cell phone. You may need to get me a new phone with a larger screen.

 

[SecCon]

Having been exposed to companies ditching extensive (millions of posts) unofficial community forums (mostly gaming) it is heartwarming to see a company actually expanding in to these unofficial resources and seeing the value of them, albeit the minor detail of changing their location.

Having said that I am not versed in the current relationship with iXSystems, but from @JoshDW19 badge I assume he has say in this. The only concern I can think of is the possible implementation of new, more strict guidelines in regards to what may or may not be discussed and a lower general tolerance towards critical voices. I have seen it happen and it lead to dwindling communities, despite initial good intentions.

 

[Chris Moore]

The only concern I can think of is the possible implementation of new, more strict guidelines in regards to what may or may not be discussed and a lower general tolerance towards critical voices. I have seen it happen and it lead to dwindling communities, despite initial good intentions.

The moderators appear to be pretty tolerant as long as the discussions are respectful and if nobody points out flaws, how can they get fixed?

 

[Johnny Fartpants]

I think pointing out flaws is exactly what's needed but historically I've seen dudes get flamed on here for little to no reason at all really so that's what the mods need to knuckle down on.

 

[JoshDW19]

Having been exposed to companies ditching extensive (millions of posts) unofficial community forums (mostly gaming) it is heartwarming to see a company actually expanding in to these unofficial resources and seeing the value of them, albeit the minor detail of changing their location.

Having said that I am not versed in the current relationship with iXSystems, but from @JoshDW19 badge I assume he has say in this. The only concern I can think of is the possible implementation of new, more strict guidelines in regards to what may or may not be discussed and a lower general tolerance towards critical voices. I have seen it happen and it lead to dwindling communities, despite initial good intentions.

I've also seen communities dwindle from over-reaching and strict policies and I can tell you that's not going to happen here. There's been no discussion about changing our rules and I would push back on anything that is more strict than what we have now. iX gives me quite a lot of freedom to help lead the direction of this forum with the help and input of our moderation team and there are no signs that any of that is changing. I hope that puts your mind at ease a little bit :).

 

[ThreeDee]

I just hope with the "new" forums .. existing forum members (such as myself) will now qualify for receiving free TrueNAS servers to ...uh ... test! for you guys! :p ..

..and then report back at the "new" forums to say how awesome they are!

 

[SecCon]

I hope that puts your mind at ease a little bit :).

It does, but Legal has always final say in this. All I am saying is that it may be a very different thing to have a free community and to have a corporately owned community. If that even is the case.

 

[Chris Moore]

All I am saying is that it may be a very different thing to have a free community and to have a corporately owned community. If that even is the case.

I hope you will keep an open mind and continue to contribute to the forum. Members make the forum what it is.

 

[Jailer]

All I am saying is that it may be a very different thing to have a free community and to have a corporately owned community.

This community has always been corporately owned. iX is the company that owns FreeNAS, TrueNAS etc and they also own this forum.

 

[VladTepes]

Well I've been away from FreeNAS for quite a while and was confused as all get out when I came across this forum (sure I found it easily enough via google, as I didn't have it bookmarked) but the branding etc confused me and I assumed I was in the wrong place.

Went back to google. Nope nothing else.

Came back here, noticed the FreeNAS section so tried to login to the site. That worked (obviously) so I knew that I was a member and assumed that I was in the right place. Although I still had lingering doubts thinking that I might have been a member of some other non-official FreeNAS forum.

So this thread explains it but geez.

I would strongly suggest a change in forum BANNER.

The logo could be the same size, the word community could be a lot smaller, and the word FreeNAS (along with TrueOS etc I suppose) should feature prominently and clearly.

 

[Tigersharke]

Well I've been away from FreeNAS for quite a while and was confused as all get out when I came across this forum (sure I found it easily enough via google, as I didn't have it bookmarked) but the branding etc confused me and I assumed I was in the wrong place.

Went back to google. Nope nothing else.

Came back here, noticed the FreeNAS section so tried to login to the site. That worked (obviously) so I knew that I was a member and assumed that I was in the right place. Although I still had lingering doubts thinking that I might have been a member of some other non-official FreeNAS forum.

So this thread explains it but geez.

I would strongly suggest a change in forum BANNER.

The logo could be the same size, the word community could be a lot smaller, and the word FreeNAS (along with TrueOS etc I suppose) should feature prominently and clearly.

I believe you speak of the iX logo and 'community' at the top. Do the smaller FreeNAS and TrueOS logos help at all? Perhaps a note at/near the top that indicates the URL migration at least would help?

 

[Tigersharke]

Along a related line to @HoneyBadger , it is a chore to edit posts from a cell phone. You may need to get me a new phone with a larger screen.

Is this due to how the site scales for that viewport size? If any sort of scaling or other adjustments would make things easier, it can definitely be explored. My own viewport tends to be rather large so usually I am unaware of issues for smaller screens/viewports. When I do happen to notice, I make adjustments to my theme as necessary. The most recent was related to the condensing of the top two links menus ("Forums .. " and "New Posts.. etc lines) the overlay button fade was bad and I made the chevron left/right white.

 

[Tigersharke]

Speaking of "things broken since the forum update" I'd like to know if the new text editor is exhibiting weird highlight behavior for anyone else.

For example, if I'm in the middle of writing something, or I copy-paste a chunk of text, I'll decide to highlight and edit a large block. So I'll start in the middle, with my cursor at the start of this word here. More will be after it. I'll hit Shift+Up-Arrow, and I'll highlight what looks like a row, up to halfway in the middle of the word "something." But if I try to hit Ctrl+Shift+Left-Arrow to highlight the rest of it, I'll instead lose the highlighting on the word "word."

Screenshots a-comin', thumbnailed so as to not have Forum-Ception.

After hitting Shift+Up:
View attachment 28328

After hitting Ctrl+Shift+Left:
View attachment 28329

I know it sounds like a weird flow, but this is just the most easily reproducible example. And as someone who quotes, multi-quotes, copy-and-pastes from terminals, and other things - it's annoying. Just now trying to edit the first line, I went to the end of the line, hit Ctrl+Left a couple times, and when it wrapped around the box to the previous line, instead of continuing to highlight the previous one, it started un-highlighting the one below.

Chrome/FireFox both appear to exhibit this.

I have no idea whether this is anything that could be solved by me (ie. CSS or template stuff) but it is a possibly broken feature previously unknown to me since I generally avoid keyboard shortcuts. Mostly I fat-finger something and suddenly my firefox is fullscreen, or other sudden unexpected fat-finger events. These keyboard shortcuts are not anything I have specifically defined, I frequently accidentally bump into them.

 

[VladTepes]

I believe you speak of the iX logo and 'community' at the top. Do the smaller FreeNAS and TrueOS logos help at all? Perhaps a note at/near the top that indicates the URL migration at least would help?

Yes that's what I mean. I cannot see any FreeNAS and TrueOS logos at all.

 

[Tigersharke]

Yes that's what I mean. I cannot see any FreeNAS and TrueOS logos at all.

Ok. Fixed. You have Default theme selected.

Default theme is distinct from the theme configured as default. The theme configured as default is New Style, though it could be defined as any one of those installed, is also set if 'use default theme' is clicked. I usually do very limited, very infrequent adjustments to New Style, and extensive modification on Ganz großes Kino, but rarely touch anything for Default theme. Yes, the issue with 'Default theme' is confusing. I doubt I will ever succeed to explain the situation or manage to have it removed from the theme selector as an option.

 

[Chris Moore]

Is this due to how the site scales for that viewport size?

The automated changes to selection point and scrolling of the window.

 

[Tigersharke]

The automated changes to selection point and scrolling of the window.

Ok. Can you illustrate this somehow? I do not have a 'smart' phone or any small screen device, although I can shrink my Firefox viewport to see some of the small format effects. If necessary, I could even attempt to create a theme for easier interaction than how its designed now, whether by way of CSS or other more extensive adjustments.

 

[HolyK]

@Tigersharke Not sure if this helps but ...