Good to see a homepage has sprung up on modplug.com. A few questions:
. Is this a manifestation of early parts of the new system or a completely separate, temporary thing?
. Do we really need all those adds & ringtone stuff? May I ask how much money they actually generate? :)
. Are you open to suggestions re. aesthetics? I think many people will feel it could be a lot slicker & more modern.
. The podcast feed is not valid XML, so will break with the more standards-compliant/sensitive RSS parsers. You just need to get rid of the whitespace before the "<?xml...>" tag at the top of the file.
It's definately time for a new design. :)
I was as surprised to see this as you are. This is something MisterX did. I don't really like these adds too, but he wanted that.
does it have to be red and white btw? i have a few ideas that do not involve those colors at all.
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Quote from: "SILOH 3005"Quote from: "residentgrey"does it have to be red and white btw?
Probably not. OpenMPT for example seems to focus more upon light blues mixed with black/white.
To be honest, I feel like I'm in a 50's cafe every time I come here. :) Which can be either a good or a bad thing, depending on your taste...
Can we get some concept art flowing in this thread? Give me a few ideas and I'll write up a PHP template.
Just PLEASE don't follow any internet fads, like current color schemes, excessive flash usage, and whatnot. Just go with what looks good, and is (more importantly) functional
Quote from: "rewbs"Is this a manifestation of early parts of the new system or a completely separate, temporary thing?
It's "I am losing the weight and PageRank that I've spent almost 10 years building by redirecting the site to lpchip.com so I need to put a page back up."
Quote from: "rewbs"Do we really need all those adds & ringtone stuff?
Yes
Quote from: "rewbs"May I ask how much money they actually generate?
You can ask, but I won't tell you. ;)
Quote from: "rewbs"Are you open to suggestions re. aesthetics? I think many people will feel it could be a lot slicker & more modern.
See above - it doesn't matter what is on the site, as long as there was something there that doesn't redirect to another server or I lose a lot of hard work.
Quote from: "rewbs"The podcast feed is not valid XML, so will break with the more standards-compliant/sensitive RSS parsers. You just need to get rid of the whitespace before the "<?xml...>" tag at the top of the file.
I noticed that, but I just put the podcast back to retain the keyword relevance for "podcast". ;)
It's all about SEO, so don't get distracted with the current (old) design, I just had to put the page back on the original server since lpchip.com has nowhere near the "weight" that modplug.com has/had.
Quote from: "SILOH 3005"It's definately time for a new design. :)
Yeah, it's nowhere near as cool as your average MySpace page. :lol:
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Quote from: "SILOH 3005"Well, strictly speaking, I was talking about design (look/layout), not functionality.
Oh, so was I. The design is old, yes, but it is clean and fast-loading, unlike the eyesores that permeate the myspace.com domain, that was my point. :wink:
I say just keep it simple and straight forward. A design in which one can get to where they want to get quickly.
There's no logical reason why a simple design can't have mass appeal.
Color above all, sets mood, plain and simple. I suggest a 2-3 color scheme and 1 typeface/font.
I say, lose the 3D buttons and gradients. Make very little reference to logos, only when needed. Keep the layout logical, orderly and concise.
Try not to clutter the screen with too many options. Be aware of where the most important features are in contrast to composition and line direction. Does the eye lead to important links or to other less important ones?
There's much more than I can cover in one breath to designing a great site. My most important suggestions are to have it well planned out before execution.
Don't worry about pleasing everyone. You'll die before you ever do that. Do something that really captures the essence of where MPT has been and where it's going in the future.
Make it approachable and accountable. So that it says, "trust" and "reliability"
Get creative. Don't concern yourself with what others are doing on their sites. That's the biggest trap there is and ever was.
-Ring tones-
If that's how Mister X pays some bills, than you all will just have to understand that making ends meet is an incrediable task no man should judge.
For those of us here still living under the roof that you don't pay for personally, once you leave the nest, you will quickly come to appreciate what I'm saying here.
I've posted this before on the lost forum, so I do it again, because I think it's an important aspect :
gui_rules.txt (http://www.louigiverona.com/webarchive/samzen/download/gui_rules.txt)
Although I'm not myself like that (so far), the accessibility for the visually impaired is an issue to be considered. So they prefer to have only a few number of used colors, with clear contrasts. And they hate gradients.
Or text on a button as a bitmap. Or frames.
I'm a big an of clear, easy to navigate designs. What I disliked the most about the old modplug system was that the different parts weren't more integrated, and that it was so cluttered. People are lazy, if things aren't obvious they will miss them.
The Modplug site is down @ renoise forum (http://www.renoise.com/board/index.php?act=ST&f=3&t=8004&s=0373ad6587a5201028226b65c6f329a6)
Quote from: "eatme"The Modplug site is down @ renoise forum (http://www.renoise.com/board/index.php?act=ST&f=3&t=8004&s=0373ad6587a5201028226b65c6f329a6)
So nice to see such a tight-knit community, like in the "old days". ::)
There really isn't much that anyone can do except to ask LP if there is any coding or graphical design work or something that can be done.
All I can do is offer my services as a new releases editor when the site comes back. That was a fun job 8)
Progress is going slow, but in a week i should have alot more time to get on coding seriously. I have big plans for the site software im going to make, so it is going to be there, and I will personally asure that it will be good!
Quote from: "LPChip"I have big plans for the site software im going to make, so it is going to be there, and I will personally asure that it will be good!
Sounds good :)
(IMHO the invasive redirects and smart popups that have just appeared on modplug.com are a couple of steps too far.)
Quote from: "rewbs"(IMHO the invasive redirects and smart popups that have just appeared on modplug.com are a couple of steps too far.)
I agree :(
looks like i was qouted from the renoise page :lol:
Quote from: "Squirrel Havoc"Quote from: "rewbs"(IMHO the invasive redirects and smart popups that have just appeared on modplug.com are a couple of steps too far.)
I agree :(
So do I - those are quite annoying. I already started thinking were there some weird things going on on my computer again since few days ago there appeared amigastyle 'guru meditation'-picture on the screen when I tried to shut down the computer :shock:
(EDIT: Later I found out that the guru meditation was some Winamp related thing, although it appeared after closing it - not very nice false alarm :? )
Quote from: "rewbs"(IMHO the invasive redirects and smart popups that have just appeared on modplug.com are a couple of steps too far.)
Fair enough, I'll remove them and allow the people that comment on the frequency of database backups to ponder the connection between the two. ;)
Could you give some numbers to put things in perspective? How much does it cost to backup the DB?
Quote from: "rewbs"Could you give some numbers to put things in perspective? How much does it cost to backup the DB?
Here is the perspective:
I am an independent contractor, selling the services of web design and programming to clients. As such, I have to prioritize my time and the projects that I work on.
I have had modplug.com and castlex.com for almost 10 years now and all this time they have been a "side project", since they have never been able to make enough money on their own to even support their own hosting/bandwidth costs. Luckily, Roncli has been donating his bandwidth and hosting to keep the site online, so lately these costs have been covered and haven't been much of an issue. In the past, though, the costs to run the site have always been out of my pocket. The pocket has just changed, that's all. ;)
Given that there is only so many hours in a day that I am awake, I need to work on the sites that actually pay me to work on them, put food on the table, pay the mortgage, etc., and when I have the time, I can work on the "side projects".
If I don't back up a client's site, I will lose the client and the income that came along with that client. If I don't back up the MPC database, we lose some database posts and some records of broken links to songs.
Where would you put the priority?
Now, before anyone goes off on a rant about me "not caring" about the site or the scene or whatever, ask yourself if I would have turned over the keys to LPChip, or would have worked hours to put something back online after the server crash, pushing my own workload back several hours.
The simple fact of the matter is that it doesn't occur to me during a normal workday of 13-14 hours, working for paying clients, to take the time to backup the MPC databases. Perhaps if I relied on MPC to support myself and my family, things would be different, but MPC remains in the "side project" category.
Perhaps once LP has the new site online, he can perform regular backups on the databases if he has the time, either to do the backups manually or program a script to do it automatically.
Dear MisterX:
Things like your family take priority over the thousands of people that visit ModPlug. You don't have to explain it; this we all understand.
Quote from: "MisterX"Fair enough, I'll remove them and allow the people that comment on the frequency of database backups to ponder the connection between the two. ;)
There is always a line that should not be crossed, and judging by the amount of people that disagreed with the new advertisments and whatnot, that line is, for the first time ever, evident here. We, the community, are not a source of income for anyone, not even you.
I know that sounds harsh, but you have to understand where we are coming from as well. We are people too, with (admittedly busy) lives to live, afterall, and we can't spend the few precious moments a day that we get to access this site, shewing away popups and whatnot. If it's that much of a hassle, perhaps we should just go somewhere else; ModPlug is Open Source afterall, and ModPlug.com has become nothing more than a meme to it's name, especiallly in it's current state.
You can give the whole "it's goes torwards supporting the site" argument, but it is not going to make a difference. There are better ways to go about raising funds for that, and I don't ever recall you attempting to utilize them. I've been lurking around here for a little more than half of the time that you've run the place, and your answer to the problem always seems to be advertising and other somewhat underhanded tactics that make the site (and subsequently, you) look bad.
I'm sorry if I come off as a jerk in this post but that is my stance and I will stick to it.
Quote from: "SILOH 3005"I'm sorry if I come off as a jerk in this post but that is my stance and I will stick to it.
No, that's quite all right, you've explained it well.
Because of the attitude that the community is not a source of income for anyone, "not even you" (whatever that was supposed to mean), MPC remains a side project, a hobby, and as such can only command my free time. Like the rest of you "people too", I have precious little free time and therefore the site suffers as a result.
Back in the day when I worked a regular 9-5, my off-hours were spent happily plugging away at the site. I can no longer afford to do this, which is why I have placed the site in the capable hands of LPChip. My hopes are that his lifestyle allows for the free time required to work on the project.
Of course, if he cannot maintain the site, it will just have to go away so that people can visit SourceForge to get the latest Open Source MPT, but a warning - SourceForge contains advertising. ;)
Apologies for starting an off-topic rant, but the scattered complaints about the lack of a backup irked me. I also apologize for the popups and interstitial advertising, however, I think that we can either complain about ads, or complain about lack of attention to the site, but not both. ;)
Isn't it possible that sourceforge can host this site?
Quote from: "Rakib"Isn't it possible that sourceforge can host this site?
Kind of. Sourceforge only allows 100MB per project and their servers are a bit slow, not sure about max bandwidth usage... might not really be good enough when we get up and running as a fully fledged active community website again.
Right now this is hosted by SF: http://modplug.sourceforge.net/builds/
EDIT: actually, having read their policy (http://sourceforge.net/docman/display_doc.php?docid=4297&group_id=1#acceptable_use), we wouldn't be able to do much at all. Even that little webpage I put up is breaking several of their rules...
Since Sam_Zen has provided some 'backups' of the posts(http://forum.openmpt.org/index.php?topic=189.0) from the old forum and here has been talk about the costs of backupping, it crossed my mind that is there such forum system or would such be reasonable, which would use the users as backuppers, meaning something like that certain forum users would automatically receive some (encrypted) backup packets. In case of need, the system then could be build from those. This of course might not be so reliable, since it might require so many people having the backups etc., but it nevertheless would be practically free, automatic and much better than nothing.
And almost related to this, what is the status of the donation system which appears to be in the modplug's sourceforge site - is it operational and did I get it right that the donation would not go to the OMPT project anyway?
Quote from: "Relabsoluness"Since Sam_Zen has provided some 'backups' of the posts(http://forum.openmpt.org/index.php?topic=189.0) from the old forum and here has been talk about the costs of backupping, it crossed my mind that is there such forum system or would such be reasonable, which would use the users as backuppers, meaning something like that certain forum users would automatically receive some (encrypted) backup packets. In case of need, the system then could be build from those. This of course might not be so reliable, since it might require so many people having the backups etc., but it nevertheless would be practically free, automatic and much better than nothing.
And almost related to this, what is the status of the donation system which appears to be in the modplug's sourceforge site - is it operational and did I get it right that the donation would not go to the OMPT project anyway?
There was a filespace problem to make backups. This however will not form a problem anymore, cus the server has been redesigned to handle big databases.
I have indeed some material saved from the past in ascii-format, but this will take considerable time to reconstruct partially some threads, because I have to do a lot of copy/paste out of a time-serial built thing with all kinds of categories.
Since I recently moved to another location and have to rebuild my studio, there are other priorities at the moment.