As many have noticed CoffeeDaze.com has been going through some major changes this past week or so. In an attempt to make the site faster, cleaner, and more enjoyable for everyone I have worked on several key features and upgrades. I have been posting articles on there about some of the changes over the past few days but I wanted to take a moment to give a summary of what has changed. There are still a few minor bugs to be worked out but for the most part the conversion is complete. Here’s some of the new features and upgrades:
New Design - The most obvious change is the new design and look of the site. I wanted to update the look to something a little more modern and sleek. While I greatly enjoyed our old design this one is a little more complete and fluid across the entire site. I feel the contrast and deeper colors make it a little more interesting as well. The new design feels like we moved from a light latte to a dark espresso.
New Forum - We used SMF (Simple Machines Forum) for our old forum. Joomla (The engine behind our site) and SMF had a falling out a while ago over licensing and it has been a nightmare ever since for web developers. Our site was held together with “bridges” and hordes of database tricks. All these hacks made our site slow, hard to upgrade, and a headache to maintain. Our new forum is called FireBoard ad was designed specifically for Joomla powered sites. There is no need for hacks and bridges to make it work and it leaves us plenty of room for upgrades and improvements. What all this means to our members is that the site can grow and run faster than ever before and truly be the complete community site we all desired. The new forum comes with a bunch of fun new features like support for many video and media formats as well so it makes conversations easier and more enjoyable for all.
Messaging System - It’s nice to be able to send private messages to other members and now we have it easy. Our new messaging system allows members to contact each other and read their own messages in various ways. You can contact a person through the toolbar on the menu of each screen, through the messaging tab, by clicking the “PM” button under avatars in the forum, or through a member’s profile page. Members receive a notification of new messages at the top of each screen right away so it’s easy to stay in touch. You can also set different settings such as whether or not to receive email when you get a message.
New Profiles - A few new features have been added to our member profiles. Members now have the ability to add YouTube and Google videos to their profile with a very easy tab system. You can also send quick messages to other members through their profile and check your message inbox in your own profile. Forum settings can be changed with the profiles as well as invite people to come join CoffeeDaze.com with ease.
There are more features to come in the future but I hope these changes make the experience all the better. If you haven’t joined yet please take the time to register and join the fun. Everything is free and ready for you!
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