(UPDATED) ANNOUNCEMENT: New Forum Software and what to expect. Old layout will be back June.

easyyy

WRX'ers

In short... We had to switch platforms before we could test and finish look and feel. The old system was crashing. What you see today WILL NOT be the final product. New refined skin in development. It will look close to the original but with MORE not LESS functions. We will update this discussion as much as we can with credible and transparent information. 

The current look is not even close to what we will have for you shortly. Summer of 19 we will update this temp skin to a revised skin/theme that will have the same vibe as the old look but adding better bells and whistles to make it even better. We can tune anything to the pixel. We have the dev team to do it but it does take time to do it right. In the short term we will continue to roll out fixes to both look and function as we can. 

UPDATE 4/15/19:
Continued to push small changes. Larger skin redesign is in process. Functionality enhancements are in process. Will be rolled out ASAP. 


UPDATE 4/9/19 (05:05 pm est):
There will continue to be small skin and functional changes every few days. We hope to see more white space reduction and the "new/pinned/closed" buttons replaced by icons tomorrow. The look and function you see today will be dramatically different in weeks and more so in months from today. We finished up framing a longer term skin change that will have fixed menus, really slick search and notification functionality and much much more. In the meantime we will be rolling out patches to allow our users to enjoy the site more and more. BST feedback is still in development and we will update as we can. My content that shows all discussions you have participated in is coming as well. Thank you for the patience. 

UPDATE 4/5/19 (07:55 pm est):
Skin changes continued today both on mobile and desktop. Advanced members and members were combined inadvertently. Can't reverse right now. Mobile menu short term adds and new nav is staged waiting to be deployed. Read and not read is highlighted by bold and not bold like the old site now. The "new" blue button is leaving any hour. BST feedback and my content still being worked on. Advanced search is now on by default by clicking the magnifying glass. We can search by member and more. Much more to come every day and week. 

UPDATE 4/3/19 (11:45 pm est):
Many skin bugs fixed as a result to the changes made yesterday. Members can edit their posts and also close BST ads. Members can add a custom field under their user name. We will be working on skin and functionality changes daily.

UPDATE 4/2/19 (05:35 pm est): 
Today we added significant skin changes that has brought back some of the original layout. The changes  are for desktop only. Mobile will come later this week. You may experience some instability while we adjust to the new skin. We will make changes as soon as we can. 

UPDATE 4/1/19 (02:15 pm est): 
We have spec'ed a list of changes and the development team is at it now. Some changes are quick and we will push live, while others are core and we will have to validate before you will see them. Desktop changes primarily for the next 2-3 days and mobile later week. You should see changes late today and throughout the week. Could get buggy as we push light skin changes live.

UPDATE 3/31/19 (03:42 pm est): 
Next week we will drop skin changes that will condense the white space on mobile and desktop. We will also be adding the mobile menu and other tweaks to the site on both platforms. 
More importantly we are committed to drive significant changes to the look and feel to make our users feel this is better than anything they have experienced. This process could take months but we hope we will be able to make most of the changes in the next 4 weeks. 
Other important features such as BST feedback, ClubWRX account settings, enhanced notifications/mycontent links and much more will all be reintroduced as soon as we get them tested. The good news is the platform is stable and most of the issues we have are more look and feel. The requests that you all are asking for are doable and we intend to accommodate many to most of them.

Again our mission is the make the user experience tunable and customizable to their likings. To make this the best of the best communities on line. We already have that with our membership now we need to finish building on this stronger than ever foundation you see here now. 

UPDATE 3/27/19 (05:42 pm est): 
We have been tracking the comments and an overwhelming amount of users say too much white space. We will be dropping a skin tweak later tonight in an effort to have more content and less white space. It won't be enough for many but it does get us closer. Mobile will be improved more than desktop.
There are over 136 items we have on the list and over 30% of them have been addressed. We will continue to plow through the open issues.
Good news is the board is stable and content is present. 
Unfortunately the old content we brought over is showing thumbnails (on user added images) vs images expanded and showing double, triple and quad spaces at times making it difficult to enjoy fully. We are looking at possible fixes. Regretfully the iOS and Android APP is dead for now. We will look at the business case to relaunch after the dust settles.

UPDATE 3/24/19 (11:10 pm est): 
Today being Sunday we only pushed out cosmetic and a few functional changes. Editing past an hour changed. This allows changes to the BST threads. Color tweaks to mimic the old site were pushed. Only a few. Couldn't change the blue buttons yet. We made many small visual changes to both mobile and desktop. 

Menu for mobile and many changes to be added tomorrow and through the week. Some are more complex and will take longer while many are easy and we will rip through them ASAP. 

UPDATE 3/23/19 (05:14 est):
We have pushed some of the changes live. Tomorrow and into next week we will be significantly changing the look and feel to mimic the original GolfWRX behavior while doing so to preserve the mobile functionality. Colors will match the front-page (blacks and grey) and the avatar and user data will head back towards the older vibe we are accustom to. 
In the next few days we will have the BST and editing mods updated and much more. From there we will be on a crusade to bring you what you want.

UPDATE 3/20/19:
The bugs are massive but we have made the decision to roll this out as you see it vs have the old site crash. Due to the overwhelming massive size of the community the older IPB software was so unstable we were at risk daily of the site crashing. The move to this more stable open source and scalable platform will allow us to add more widgets, better user interface, ability to easily add social (IG, Twitter, Snap, etc) content, images, multiple images at once, attachments, and much more. Members can format posts with html, markdown, or bbcode. Our advanced editor will allow us to do much more. Images can be dragged and dropped and videos are automatically embedded. Tweets, and Pins are automatically recognized when pasted into a comment. Auto save, improved search, single sign on with the front-page, easier sharing, social sign on. The lightweight mobile theme is optimized to deliver a great user experience on a small screen. Adding images on mobile will move from the dark ages to the modern day.

So... what you see now will NOT be forever. In the next hours, days and weeks we will be adding back menus on the top, classifieds will be back with feedback, recent discussions buttons, reply buttons on each post.

In addition you will start to see some sxxt that will knock your freakin socks off. Yeah... it will knock your socks off!!! How about knowing where the **** everyone is hanging out right now? Heat maps of what is hot and trending. Analytics of trending content by views or replies.

We are not changing for the sake of change. We are changing to make things modern and better for the members here. We would never go to this software if we didn't think that at the end of the day we will be a better WRX. Please support us during these early days and I promise you we will have it buttoned up ASAP.

Richard "easyyy"

gpleonard

Once this is finished it will be great. We all need to have patience. Thanks for what you are doing to make the site better.

Mclancy94

Is there an app version coming as well?

Hot Rod 71

Thanks for the update. I look forward to the new platform.

TheMoneyShot

Looking forward to seeing the final version, great stuff!!

dbdors

This should have been posted and a link to begin with.  Rather than the "bugs"  post first.  Sure people can be patient, but where there's a lack of info, the vacuum will get filled.

mizuno player

Growing pains. It's a good problem to have. 
Thanks 

mneumann

Thanks for all the hard work guys. Trust it will be great in the long run

Eli69

Good things are worth waiting for.  Your golf swing takes time too,

NDGolfer13

Thanks for keeping things going for us.  I know I get a lot of enjoyment from this place and the people I have met.  Is it different......yes.  Can we live with it.......I know I can.  It will be better in thelong run.  Thanks again.  

Lukulos

I feel much better after reading this. For a bit I was thinking you guys were happy with this current product. Can't wait to see the improvements you guys make.

craz-e

Man it was tough not having the website there!
i even had to talk to the misses
that sucked 

SullGolf

Good stuff.  My first reaction was negative, but I can see the improvement and how a few minor cosmetic tweaks over the next week would solve almost all complaints I’ve seen so far.  More communication like this would save you a lot of user griping.

bunta

i understand its for the better inthe long run.. but we are not complaining about the new features or the future features and widgets and etc etc... 
Its the "navigation aspect" of the new forum. Its cumbersome. The "whole look" of it is horrible. It actually tiring to read stuff. Your avatar/profile/rank/post should be on a dedicated column on the left side and your posts/date should be on a dedicated column on the right side. Having your profile and posts all in the same box just makes no sense. It makes it hard to read.

Most of us are here to look for information to READ or to provide experience for others to READ. I believe your priority should be to make the forum a pleasant "reading" experience first and foremost. This layout makes reading irritating. 

And wth is with the avatars on the whole right side ???! you dont really expect us to find someone using their profile pics do you ?lol

wmblake2000

Hey it’s a risky thing ... it just is. But wrx is a great place and I’m definitely on your side as you work it thru!

Jagpilotohio

Right now The whole thing reminds me a lot of that other site’s forum pages (that ends in “spy”) ....which I detest and never use.

Double K

Keep up the good work. It's not completely awful and is going to get better. 

Mitchell

Richard, 
Appreciate all the efforts involved in order to make major changes, seen just a few here over years.😀Hopeful that can get sorted soon as current look and feel is certainly less than ideal and looking forward to opportunities to participate in future.

Konklifer

Thanks for the update. Fingers crossed.

Joker91

I really hope the entire layout changes. It's not good right now.

1s1k

I'm all jacked up on Mountain Dewwwww!!!

portland

For anyone that has ever been on a forum that went through a software upgrade - at first no one likes it, then you use it for a few weeks, forget about the old software and appreciate the new software.  The same will happen here 👍

DonRSD

Please fix / update the iPhone mobile app.

WillyL

Thanks for the efforts. We’re all here because we love this place. Keep up the GREAT work‼️

ivygynonc

it is awful.  thanks for recognizing that and hopefully it will at least be useable once again.  currently it is atrocious and not recognizable.  

MtlJeff

It's really not that bad, people are being tough on you. No one likes change. Everything will be fine. Thanks for the efforts to keep improving

Swisstrader98

Cmon guys! This is 2019... you need an app 

Konklifer

portland said:

For anyone that has ever been on a forum that went through a software upgrade - at first no one likes it, then you use it for a few weeks, forget about the old software and appreciate the new software.  The same will happen here 👍

This is vastly different. This is a woefully unfinished product going live to a membership of hundreds of thousands of users. 

Swisstrader98

Konklifer said:

portland said:

For anyone that has ever been on a forum that went through a software upgrade - at first no one likes it, then you use it for a few weeks, forget about the old software and appreciate the new software.  The same will happen here 👍

This is vastly different. This is a woefully unfinished product going live to a membership of hundreds of thousands of users. 

Not sure if I agree, like or LOL that comment😂 but I’m in agreement. 

philsRHman

I missed this place so much the past couple days. Thanks for investing the time and energy for us. 

radiman

Konklifer said:

portland said: 

For anyone that has ever been on a forum that went through a software upgrade - at first no one likes it, then you use it for a few weeks, forget about the old software and appreciate the new software.  The same will happen here 👍

This is vastly different. This is a woefully unfinished product going live to a membership of hundreds of thousands of users. 

Dude, it's a free site for you to use. This isn't some mega corporation. They just came out and said they're still working on it. It's not the end of the world here.