SummitPost.org

I'm sorry, but let's cut to the chase. This may not be nice to say, but the new SP and new editor are both incredibly frustrating and not user friendly in any way, shape, or form. I don't think it's going to be fixed. Creating a page is an absolute nightmare. Adding photos and attaching them to the page is awful. The old editor no longer works properly and is a jumbled mess.

Photos get all jumbled up together in the new editor. You can't use the old editor to add photos, because it doesn't work. You have to adjust the entire photo spacing every time you want to make one tiny edit to a page.

It takes at least 10 times longer to create a page now. The the "updates" completely killed this website as far as adding new pages go. It's awful. Viewing them is also a lot more tedious, especially on a phone (but on all other screens as well, especially if you want to view photos).

Perhaps it's either time to fix SP or kill it completely.

I’m totally with you Scott. I can’t even view SP with my old 27” iMac any more. I have to use my wife’s computer, use my iPad or my phone. I have no problem viewing Mountain Project or Super Topo with my old computer. For a number of reasons I can not upgrade or buy a new computer.
The other day I had two private messages from two prominent SP members asking me why I had given 1 out of 10 score for one of their photos. I had go through a bunch of their photos to find the photos in question. I am sure I had given 10 /10. Now. I’m afraid of voting because my vote can change without my knowledge! Never mind the fact that everything is much harder to do.
I’m still trying to figure out why we had to go with a new format. The old one was working just fine for me.

Scott wrote: Creating a page is an absolute nightmare. Adding photos and attaching them to the page is awful. You have to adjust the entire photo spacing every time you want to make one tiny edit to a page. It takes at least 10 times longer to create a page now.

I have not yet made new pages because I preferred to fix some of my existing ones that were badly formatted in the new format.
I find it very easy to create a table and insert photos inside it. I had some unformatted pages and I arranged them optimally with the new editor inserting the photos in a table with 2, 3, 6, 9 images, as i wish, rather than put those free as I did before. At the point where you want to insert photos, you can create a table and insert your photos inside the table. It's very fast and the photos stay in place where you want them instead of wandering in the page.

I have adjusted my approach - I upload fewer images than before. I have also discovered that the editor (n my case) won't allow me to enter a hyphen, or use the arrow keys. I'm old school and tend to write it all in html anyway, getting around this top layer.

I "get" that most people have mobiles, which means things need to be mobile friendly, but at the cost of layout and practicality. The featured image on a computer is usually distorted.

It's not difficult to create html code that converts most pages into mobile-friendly pages. The tags could be automatic so that things look good on a computer, then "scrunch" cleanly on a mobile device.

There are bugs to be worked out. I am being patient. At least there aren't 60 ads emerging from between words of my pages, like parasitic worms.

I "get" that most people have mobiles, which means things need to be mobile friendly, but at the cost of layout and practicality.

The new format is way less mobile friendly than the old one. The old one wasn't perfect on the mobile, but the new format is impossible to use on a mobile.

I have to agree. The couple times I tried access this on my phone the layout was not correct... could not even access some menu items or navigate correctly. So I just stopped trying.

Scott, I read all of your bug reports and always make note of them and try to fix them. If I can re-create a problem, I will fix it.

The problem is that often the bug reports are not detailed enough for me to be able to figure out what you're experiencing and thus I can't figure out how to repeat it.

When reporting a bug, please post detailed information including a link to the page where you're experiencing the problem and, if it is complicated to describe, post a screen shot. Screen shots can be taken by holding down the "Alt" key and hitting the "PrtScn SysRq" key. It would also be very valuable to know what operating system and browser you are using. Some old, out-of-date browsers will not work well with the new editor software.

Scott wrote:Photos get all jumbled up together in the new editor. You can't use the old editor to add photos, because it doesn't work. You have to adjust the entire photo spacing every time you want to make one tiny edit to a page.

I have spent a lot of time using the new editor, creating pages with lots of photos and have been able to recreate (and fix) some of the problems you report. However, I cannot seem to recreate most of the problems you report.

surgent wrote:I "get" that most people have mobiles, which means things need to be mobile friendly, but at the cost of layout and practicality. The featured image on a computer is usually distorted.

Yes, that is on the short list of things to fix. You'd think it would be easy, but it's not. It will get fixed though.

surgent wrote:It's not difficult to create html code that converts most pages into mobile-friendly pages. The tags could be automatic so that things look good on a computer, then "scrunch" cleanly on a mobile device.

That's what's already happening. If it doesn't "scrunch" cleanly, then please post a link and I'll look into it and fix it.

Scott wrote:The new format is way less mobile friendly than the old one. The old one wasn't perfect on the mobile, but the new format is impossible to use on a mobile.

Just an FYI, this is blatantly false. I don't think that you understand the definition of "mobile friendly" based on that statement.

mrchad9 wrote:I have to agree. The couple times I tried access this on my phone the layout was not correct... could not even access some menu items or navigate correctly. So I just stopped trying.

Please post links and screenshots to any page where there is an issue and I will investigate and fix it. I've been on the site a bit with my phone and tablet and haven't experienced any serious problems. But I haven't spent a ton of time browsing on my mobile devices.

This recent change a month ago was a huge (and much needed) change for SummitPost. It is vital for the future of this site to be responsive and display well on mobile devices (as measured by search engines such as Google). Not everything is perfect right now and there will be quite a few things to fix, but overall the site scores very well for mobile pages since the big switch. In fact, Google reports 0 pages with mobile usability issues now. Before the switch, it was 102,000+ pages that had issues.

It is vital for the future of this site to be responsive and display well on mobile devices (as measured by search engines such as Google). Not everything is perfect right now and there will be quite a few things to fix, but overall the site scores very well for mobile pages since the big switch. In fact, Google reports 0 pages with mobile usability issues now. Before the switch, it was 102,000+ pages that had issues.

Pages can be viewed, but not really edited. Besides viewing some pages though, I have never gotten anything to work.

I my own profile, nothing displays on my profile below my photos.

Messages Relevant to Me = error message
Messages I Posted/Editable = error message
Objects I can Edit = blank
Reviews I've Posted = error message
Objects others have attached to my objects = blank

And so on.

They will never load no matter how long I leave the phone on my profile page.

I can't be the only one?

Page edits don't work and trying to add photos on the mobile is a nightmare. I can't be the only one?

Scott wrote:Photos get all jumbled up together in the new editor. You can't use the old editor to add photos, because it doesn't work. You have to adjust the entire photo spacing every time you want to make one tiny edit to a page.

I have spent a lot of time using the new editor, creating pages with lots of photos and have been able to recreate (and fix) some of the problems you report. However, I cannot seem to recreate most of the problems you report.

Here is a screenshot. To demonstrated this, I made one tiny edit to the below page and here's what happens to all of the photos:



This happens every time to the entire page, even if I want to make one tiny edit not related to photos at all.

Old editor in old format (very simple and fast):



New format, old editor (extremely complicated and time consuming):

Scott wrote:Pages can be viewed, but not really edited. Besides viewing some pages though, I have never gotten anything to work.

Is this on mobile or desktop? I've just checked with my phone and I can view AND edit pages without any problems.

Scott wrote:I my own profile, nothing displays on my profile below my photos.

Messages Relevant to Me = error message
Messages I Posted/Editable = error message
Objects I can Edit = blank
Reviews I've Posted = error message
Objects others have attached to my objects = blank

And so on.

They will never load no matter how long I leave the phone on my profile page.

I just looked on my phone (Samsung Galaxy S8+ running Google Chrome) and that content loads on my phone when I click on the "Show Messages/Objects/Reviews" button. However, the content doesn't actually hide when I click on the "Hide Messages/Objects/Reviews" button. I'll get that fixed.

Scott wrote:Page edits don't work and trying to add photos on the mobile is a nightmare.

"trying to add photos on the mobile is a nightmare" really doesn't give me any useful information to begin addressing and potential issue that exists. Can you please elaborate and explain, along with posting a screenshot to show the problem? I just added a photo to an existing page via my phone and it wasn't an issue.

Scott wrote:Here is a screenshot. To demonstrated this, I made one tiny edit to the below page and here's what happened to all of the photos:

So in that screenshot, you have a bunch of photos all stacked on top of each other in sequence, but you want some white space between each photo? And the editor keeps removing it when you save? Can you post a link to the page (or an example page you create for testing)?

And your'e saying that the "Insert Image" doesn't work in the old editor, correct? I haven't tried fixing that but I am guessing it's lack of a javascript file being included. I can investigate and fix. It should be a fairly easy fix.

Is this on mobile or desktop?

Mobile. Editing a page seems to be a nightmare, especially when photos are involved, but it's hard to explain. I'll try and figure out how to screen shot all this.

So in that screenshot, you have a bunch of photos all stacked on top of each other in sequence, but you want some white space between each photo? And the editor keeps removing it when you save? Can you post a link to the page (or an example page you create for testing)?

Yes, that is correct. It is the page I just created which prompted this thread.

Here you go:

https://www.summitpost.org/the-bluffs/1016566

The spacing is OK now since I had to change it all when making a small change.

See what happens when you make one tiny edit (any edit, even just a period). It shows up in Editor Mode fine, but not after submit.

Let me know if it replicates when you do it.

"trying to add photos on the mobile is a nightmare" really doesn't give me any useful information to begin addressing and potential issue that exists. Can you please elaborate and explain, along with posting a screenshot to show the problem? I just added a photo to an existing page via my phone and it wasn't an issue.

More specifically, adding photos either by link or adding directly is a nightmare in mobile. I can add a phantom photo, as long as it is not attached to anything fine. I will try to find a way to explain this better.

Scott wrote:Here you go:

https://www.summitpost.org/the-bluffs/1016566

The spacing is OK now since I had to change it all when making a small change.

See what happens when you make one tiny edit (any edit, even just a period). It shows up in Editor Mode fine, but not after submit.

Let me know if it replicates when you do it.

Replicated it! I can get that fixed. The developer I've been working with on this project has been offline for quite a while. As soon as he's back online, I'll get him to fix that. Shouldn't be hard to do because the photos don't stack up on top of each other like that in the editor, only when displaying on the live page. So we just need to change the live page to match the editor.

Replicated it! I can get that fixed. The developer I've been working with on this project has been offline for quite a while. As soon as he's back online, I'll get him to fix that. Shouldn't be hard to do because the photos don't stack up on top of each other like that in the editor, only when displaying on the live page. So we just need to change the live page to match the editor.

OK thanks. Does the rest of what I said make sense?

I was serious when I said that a page takes me about 10 times the amount of time to create now. Some of it may be getting used to the new format while much of it was definitely not.

Most of the problems (not only the above) have to do with getting the photos displayed properly on the page, editing and adding captions to photos while in editor, and spacing. Most of it is all related to photos. Adding a photo to SP is easy. Trying to get the photos and captions displayed how you want them is not so easy.

Scott wrote:Most of the problems (not only the above) have to do with getting the photos displayed properly on the page, editing and adding captions to photos while in editor, and spacing. Most of it is all related to photos. Adding a photo to SP is easy. Trying to get the photos and captions displayed how you want them is not so easy.

OK, I'll work on streamlining that process. It seems pretty easy to me right now, but I haven't done anything too complex. As you find things that are annoying or challenging to achieve, please post here, with a link and details about the problem, and I'll try to improve any cumbersome processes.