Some things that just ain't floating my boat:
- I don't like seeing profile/avatar information to the right of the text. Sure, there's a name above the the text, but I often use the person's avatar to identify the poster, even if it is just inside the same thread. As English is read left-to-right, it's easier to see the profile and avatar on the left, rather than the right, as that's where we begin reading.
- The board colors are way too low contrast. I'm not asking for old-man-eyes color schemes, but many of the color choices such as the gray-on-beige, and orange-on-beige are hard to read. The worst, of course, is the white-on-beige that can be seen in the "Advanced search" on top. I realize that there is a certain motif the board wants to retain, but there are more contrasty colors that "pop" while maintaining the same motif, making it far easier to read. For example, changing the orange link color from its normal #D75601 to #cb290b, as seen here:
- Regular link color
- 2011-06-29_005000.png (54.24 KiB) Viewed 3796 times
vs
- Higher contrast link color
- 2011-06-29_005005.png (54.26 KiB) Viewed 3796 times
In some ways, I actually prefer the hover color (#670404) more than either of the above.
- Another color problem comes from the visited link color. For example, if a reader has visited the Feature Requests page, and the link to it is set to the "visited" state, which is a light grey (#898989). A visited link should indicate that it has been visited, but not drastically change the appearance of the link; for example, changing the hue of the color, but not the perceived brightness. The light grey blends into the background too easily, and the dramatic change from its link state makes a visited link look like plain text, rather than something to click.
- While on the subject of text colors, the user's name in the avatar/profile information section uses the same light grey color for all its states, which makes it even a lighter color than the text information below it. The person's nickname should be the most prominent fixture of the profile/avatar, at least more stand-out than the text below it. I found color #333333 made it more visually identifiable than the current #898989, while not being overly black.
