SC4Devotion LEX Updates - Now on HTTPS

[CasperVg]

Oh oops, I thought you meant that the actual bad entry message appeared. I'll fix the title right now

[JoeST]

If you're not logged in and view those pages (in new tabs in Chrome), neither the login button nor the dependencies tab seem to do anything

[whatevermind]

I'm not entirely sold on opening the LEX, but let's give it some time and see how things go. I do like girafe's idea of a semi-open exchange, where those who want uploader rights need merely contact the staff to gain them. It's a very small additional step along the way, but I think it has benefits of maintaining some level of entrance barrier to potential uploaders, without creating any real burden to the staff or uploaders. It's just one idea.

I do have a few questions though. First, is it still possible to get scrutineered, or has the entire system been done away with? I do like the idea of getting that level of review, especially as someone newer to making custom content myself, but I certainly understand if it's simply too hard to staff that level of review anymore.

Also, earlier in the rounds of updates, there was a "LEX Uploader" badge thingy - what impact do the new policies have on that? I'm thinking that it would be reserved for those who are permanently certified (which presumably includes those who previously gained full upload rights), perhaps with a change to "LEX Certified Uploader". It's trivial, I know, but there was a certain prestige to getting certified under the old system, and I think it's still appropriate to honor that achievement.

Finally, I just want to say that I'm thrilled with the general updates the LEX is getting, in layouts, graphics, new features, etc. It badly needed some updates, and it's great to see them happening. I noticed the new lot page doesn't have any links back to the LEX home page, maybe this should be added? It would be particularly useful if you ended up on a lot page from an outside link. And will bigger pictures now be allowed? It looks great though, good job! 

[CasperVg]

JoeST: You're right, there seems to be an issue with it in Chrome. I'll check it out and hopefully fix it soon
Whatevermind: Well, so far "opening up" the LEX hasn't exactly swamped it with uploads - has it? We have had one uncertified upload and at that rate the system in place now seems to work okay. The plan is definitely to change the "LEX Uploader" badge to something along the lines of "LEX Certified" - someone higher up will have to contact it's author and ask if he could edit it. I don't think the scrutineering system has been abolished completely - but don't quote me on that. Again, I'm not qualified to make those calls and it's up to the site staff. As for the linkbacks/navigation stuff, those are definitely planned, but will come as an extra once I've finished redoing most/all of the public pages in terms of layout. Basically I want to get rid of the need for frames first.. But that's still more than a month away.

As for today, I've cleaned up and re-layouted the dependency tracker. It now comes as an "add-on" to the file description, instead of as a seperate page. However, it will only load if you want it to. Basically, when you click the "Dependencies" button in the header, it will load the tracker as a modal window.




TO-DO: add a loading spinner to indicate that it's loading the dependencies. Now it'll just idle for a few seconds while it loads

[JoeST]

The report box should probably be a textarea rather than an text input box

[CasperVg]

More updates today.. I'm gradually working on removing the ugly, 90's-era frames for the top- and sidebar. Once all the pages have been updated, they will be removed in favour of the new system. Currently it's active on the lot descriptions, but eventually it'll be on every page.

[RepublicMaster]

I'm liking the new updates! Keep them up.

[JoeST]

The error box when you're not logged in and viewing the lot desc page is a little big (attached)

the login button further down the page still doesn't do anything

the login link in that picture currently links to your testing FTP

otherwise awesome, the old school UI was seriously dated, I can't wait to see how it looks.

it would be cool if you could get it to auto-forward from the './Default.html' or './' page to the frontpage if you're already logged in...

[CasperVg]

* Error in the navbar: Oops, that's not supposed to happen. Will fix asap
* Login link: fixed, thanks
* Autoforward: next on my list

EDIT:
-> Error in the navbar is fixed, will now display "Guest" in case user is not logged in
-> Autoforward postponed, need to think on a good implementation of this
-> Login button on the lot description page if user is not logged in works for me (redirects to the index page where the user can login)
-> Moved the Enhanced/Power Search form to the new lay-out (with navbar)
-> Fixed some weird glitches with the navbar inside modal dialogs. (thanks ShadowAssassin and jdenm8)
-> Fixed a typo (Extra's -> Extras) (thanks ShadowAssassin and jdenm8)

[JoeST]

no that login button is definitely not working for me (windows 8 chrome) should it not just bring up the same modal dialogue that is on the splash screen? (The href

also, for autofowarding, maybe just remove the splash screen? once you have removed all the frame stuff, the main LEX will probably look different enough that it can be removed. That's my opinion anyway.

if it says guest, maybe it should include login/register buttons in the navbar. also how about log-out?

the 'failed login attempt' form should leave you with the login boxes to try again.

the 'statistics' menu doesn't make much sense. make it open a modal dialogue with stats table? similar with the other exchange info links?

the report box is still a text input rather than a textarea.

I miss the list-view mode for the indexes

[CasperVg]

no that login button is definitely not working for me (windows 8 chrome) should it not just bring up the same modal dialogue that is on the splash screen? (The href

Good idea. Changed that. Clicking the login button will open a modal which will allow you to log in (or register)

also, for autofowarding, maybe just remove the splash screen? once you have removed all the frame stuff, the main LEX will probably look different enough that it can be removed. That's my opinion anyway.

That's a possibility yeah, I'll have to see how the final product ends up

if it says guest, maybe it should include login/register buttons in the navbar. also how about log-out?

Good idea. Changed that. Header will display a "Sign in" button if the user is not logged in. Logout button is a possibility - why would you ever want to leave the amazing LEX though?

the 'failed login attempt' form should leave you with the login boxes to try again.

I know that would be nice, but not really feasible without rewriting a fair bit of the LEX backend. The current system isn't really good with that kind of async/AJAX stuff. In fact, there isn't any. I'll look into it further though.

the 'statistics' menu doesn't make much sense. make it open a modal dialogue with stats table? similar with the other exchange info links?

I considered that, but decided against it for a number of reasons. All those modals would slow down the loading process for the header quite a bit. Since the browser can't (shouldn't) cache the header, it needs to be reloaded on every page load, and thus including lots of bulky modals in it isn't a good idea. Also much of the 'extra info' links are fairly useless anyhow.

the report box is still a text input rather than a textarea.

Yes, the report box as input is a bug with the library I'm using to display the modals. Hopefully they will fix it in an upcoming patch.

I miss the list-view mode for the indexes

Heh, I removed them when I introduced the colour-coded search results. The way the LEX handles search results is very much ugly spaghetti code and deprecating the list views was the only way I felt I would ever get around doing actual work. Maybe I'll re-introduce them later on once the main gist is done.

[memo]

if it says guest, maybe it should include login/register buttons in the navbar. also how about log-out?

Good idea. Changed that. Header will display a "Sign in" button if the user is not logged in. Logout button is a possibility - why would you ever want to leave the amazing LEX though?

Every time I visit the LEX, I find myself looking for the log-out button. I am just used to logging-out wherever I log in, even though it might not be necessary.

Other than that, I like the new Bootstrap design and all the other updates a lot!

[CasperVg]

Every time I visit the LEX, I find myself looking for the log-out button. I am just used to logging-out wherever I log in, even though it might not be necessary.

Hehe, habits are hard to break I guess. You'll be happy to know that I've added a "Sign out" button then (replaces the "User: {username}" section in the header when you're logged in)

EDIT:

the 'failed login attempt' form should leave you with the login boxes to try again.

Got the AJAX code for it working after a rewrite of the serverside login logic. It will now display login failures inside the form instead of in a good/bad-entry page.

[JoeST]

RE the exchange info links being modals, can they not be generated when you click the links? like, when you click it requests the HTML to display in the dialogue?

[sim_link]

Absolutely love the new design of the LEX - a very familiar library. Having used Bootstrap myself I have to say great choice. It's exciting to see all the changes going on to the LEX, it is looking very, very good! All nice and modern, and the dependency tracker is awesome. Look forward to the changes coming down the pipes - keep it up!

[CasperVg]

Hey guys - more changes today

+ Completely rebuilt the Advanced Search system from the ground up (both the front- and the backend)
--> Won't load a new page if it knows your search doesn't have any results (displays error instead)
--> Won't load a new page if you didn't enter any parameters (displays error instead)
--> Pagination system overhauled completely
-----> Shows 15 results by default
-----> Loads 15 more results when you've scrolled down to the bottom of the current result automagically (~ infinite scrolling)
-----> Prints "You've seen it all" when there's no more results
--> Button to "change search parameters" in the results
* Fixed the "Report" text-field not looking good
* Fixed a few small bugs in the navbar

The "Latest/Most Popular/Recent Updates" and "Your Files" pages will be adjusted to the new lay-out eventually - but it takes time.

(*) Note: the stretched banners to indicate the category in search results are temporary (until I figure out something nicer)

[vortext]

-----> Loads 15 more results when you've scrolled down to the bottom of the current result automagically (~ infinite scrolling)

Sweet! Though it doesn't seem to work flawless yet? I only get 15 downloads for SimGoober. .  ::)

Anyway, keep up the good work. I like the modern look! 

Edit: nevermind. My default browser (SRIron) has this hickups sometimes. It does work flawless in firefox. 

[whatevermind]

Good job on the search, works very well! I did notice the item image and description overlap though:

[CasperVg]

@ vortext: Thanks. You might want to try it again in SRIron as I've done some bugfixing which should have improved the infinite loading - and I checked in SRIron now and it seemed to work 
@ whatevermind: Thanks. Oops, having developed it on a pretty large monitor I hadn't considered that. Fixed it - the image will now resize to fit on smaller displays.

[vortext]

Got some stuff I'd like to upload, however, it's not clear to me how to enter the dependencies (just the links? bb code?). The "more information about the required format" link takes one back to the front page. 

Also, if possible an option to preview before actual upload would be rather useful imho.