Test Site Access

TeaLeaf · February 20, 2010, 09:07:12 AM

The test site details are below. Once you have logged in your can then log in to the forum using your usual forum details.

URL: http://www.deadmen.co.uk/testvb/index.php
Username dmwtest
Password h34kd78c

Have a look around, read the feature articles about what it can do and let's start pulling some ideas together please and developing the plan of action.

Benny · February 20, 2010, 11:57:31 AM

Like it. I'll start writing some junk and see where we go. As for layout, that's the hard bit, where do you start!!!

Great job guys, looking really clean and really good. Wise choice.

delankster · February 21, 2010, 12:26:26 PM

Looking good

right gonna start producing some artwork for the site.

is there anywhere that you would like me to start or should i start turning stuff out and you can pick what you like.

was thinking of a new banner, inplace of the "vbullitin" bit maybe something around the lines of this

and maybe a image for each supported game?

let me know if i'm aiming in the right direction ?

TeaLeaf · February 21, 2010, 07:09:38 PM

An excellent start.

Smilo leads the discussion here so I do not want to tread on feet, but the way I see it is we have an initial question which is how do we want our home page to look. That should guide us to the rest. A lot of the suggestions revolved around having a simpler part of the homepage that allows you to click the game you are interested in and that takes you directly to that section. You could simplify it to almost a homepage with nothing but graphics of games (all clickable) that then linked to vB, but I think a happy medium might be to implement those graphics somewhere in the homepage from the vB software - a sort of hybrid approach so it is still obvious how to get to the section you want to see. That's the type of question to be discussed and then the design aspect, artwork, any coding etc sorted out so that the Content people can then fill the blanks.

smilodon · February 22, 2010, 12:48:20 AM

Quote from: Benny;304333Like it. I'll start writing some junk and see where we go. As for layout, that's the hard bit, where do you start!!!

Great job guys, looking really clean and really good. Wise choice.

Sorry I've not been on much but I'm away with work and using a netbook tethered to a mobile phone for internet access.

The standard way to style a VBulletin site is through themes. While we can and will use our own graphics (nice work Delankster) the basic format will come through an installable theme. There are plenty to check out on the official web site. We could write our own from scratch (I have no idea how to do that myself) but we might save some time by at least using an existing theme as a start point?

The theme will to some degree dictate the layout. However the 'static information' we already have over on the left panel is a good starting point. I'm assuming the content folk may want to review all the existing data and get some of it re-written by section heads etc before it goes live. I imagine using the existing stuff will do for the test site.

TeaLeaf · February 22, 2010, 08:36:23 AM

T-bag pointed out that he did not have permission to post or reply to anything in this section. There seems to have been an error when we set the group permissions up for the Web Development section, but hopefully this has now been corrected. Can you please check that you can post/reply etc in this section and if you cannot please let me know.

Thank you.

TeaLeaf · March 13, 2010, 08:25:43 AM

Those on the team (with the badge) have full access to the test site ACP, so it would be great to see this section starting to motor along now, so let's get on with things please!

Zootoxin · March 22, 2010, 10:13:35 AM

Had a go at putting together a mockup for our new site.
Have a look

TeaLeaf · March 22, 2010, 11:29:28 AM

Nice, work. I'll be honest and say I'm not a huge fan of the colour. Why not set it up on the test site so it can be played wth?

smilodon · March 22, 2010, 05:46:40 PM

Many appologies for a complete lack of input up to now. I've been away working for the best part of two months and have had little or no free time infront of a PC.

While I agree the colour is not my favorite, the basic layout is. I love the neat, simple menu system on the left and the overall clean layout. This was my idea of how the site might look.

I also thought about having a consistent style running through the whole site but to colour code each game section. So L4D could be one colour and CoD4 another while they both keep a common style and layout design. The white text panel with black text is excellent and the section colours could be more pale. Imagine the site as shown in the image but with a softer green for ArmaII and a light Sand colour for coD4 etc etc (just examples). This style is often used as a navigation aid on large sites with a number of clear and defined sections as we have on our own site.

Also the dMw logo at the top could be a bit tighter. At the moment the stencil effect is a little blocky and it doesn't read that well.

Otherwise as said, it's a great attempt and very close to how I saw the site myself (obviously what I planned is no more than one persons view and should be seen only as such)

Zootoxin · March 23, 2010, 09:08:51 AM

Thanks for the comments it was just an idea I put down into images.
I like the idea of having a consistent theme with colour changes for each game.
Don't worry about the banner that was more of a space filler than anything I have many ideas for a banner to follow.

I think the way to move forward would be to decide on the best layout the site can have with the software, download a stock template and then shape it to our vision.

TeaLeaf · March 23, 2010, 10:25:22 AM

We can shape the way the page looks in the ACP, it's up to us.

Gaara · April 03, 2010, 12:41:49 PM

Sorry for being unable to join in on the progres so far, I've had a few very busy weeks lately.

I'd like to give redesigning the whole front page a look, but before I atempt a design I'd like to know if a design has been chosen yet or if I can go crazy in photoshop to whip something up

TeaLeaf · April 03, 2010, 01:58:14 PM

There is no chosen design as yet, but whatever we choose has to allow us to work within the vB4 framework. I have already posted up ways of customising the look/style of vB4 in the hope someone with greater knowledge than me will step forward! If that's you then I'm delighted!

Gaara · April 03, 2010, 05:52:32 PM

Basically if we can edit the html and css we can pretty much make it look like whatever we want