Mm...let's try to get the main graphics and according color-set sorted first before dealing with forum skins. I agree that visible change in the forum would be fabulous, but just to make sure everything matches (and since the layout progress is really coming along right now) I think we should hold off a little longer.

Eru, I would welcome your help with the skins. I'm hoping to upgrade the forum to phpBB 3 next week if all goes well - do you have experience skinning later versions of phpBB? And are you thinking of keeping the same basic template but shifting colors/images, or trying a new skin entirely?

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I've never skinned any phpBB forums before, but I have skinned plenty of InvisionFrees and ZetaBoards (and made some of them look like phpBB forums). They both required CSS and javascript editing so I'm familiar with that. But either way, I don't think I would have too much trouble doing a phpBB 3. It just takes some getting used to I suppose.

I'm all for a phpBB 3 upgrade. I'm a member of some forums that use it and I think it's awesome.

As for the template, I'm not quite sure. I don't know how well this template would look on phpBB 3. But I don't think I would want to steer off too much as people seem to be quite comfortable with what we've got, especially if we're converting to phpBB 3 which is a huge change in of itself. Regardless of what template I'll go for, I was thinking of at least making new images and buttons to spruce it up a bit. Perhaps make them tie in with JF's head banner.

Here's an inactive forum of mine that I skinned from scratch, to give you an idea of what I like to do with the bars/cells and buttons so that they feel like part of the same set:

http://s1.zetaboards.com/strokeofmidnight/forum/441581/

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.*+I'VE MET ANTIGONE, MONTANABOHEMIAN, RAIVYNN PHOENIX, BERIADANWEN & PIRATEOFTHERINGS+*.

(¯`•¸·´¯`·._.·[TRUE VAMPIRES DON'T SPARKLE]·._.·´¯`·¸•´¯)

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^ By me and my SS *squiggle hugs*

Yes JF, I've been thinking along those lines too. Either a completely different LotR-related symbol (with a dark and a bright version) or use the same but have it light up (even brighter) when new topics have been posted. I never look to the left hand side symbol on forums, I always automatically check the right hand side for the date/time when the last post was made. But I can see how it would be very useful to others!

And thank you for the nice comments about the skin.

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.*+I'VE MET ANTIGONE, MONTANABOHEMIAN, RAIVYNN PHOENIX, BERIADANWEN & PIRATEOFTHERINGS+*.

(¯`•¸·´¯`·._.·[TRUE VAMPIRES DON'T SPARKLE]·._.·´¯`·¸•´¯)

Your forum skin looks nice, Eru, and I agree that if anyone wants to use the brightness/dimness of Nenya as an indication of there being new posts, the contrast needs to be a LOT more noticeable.

As for phpBB 3, I'm not sure how well the current skin will integrate with the changes. I'm sure you know that there are tons and tons and TONS of ready-made skins out there, and I think I chose this one (with selective CSS and image editing, of course) just because it was relatively similar to the ProBoards layout we'd had forever. That doesn't mean that we can't go in a different direction now, though, so if Eru or anyone else wants to take a look at various other skin designs or think about how to build something from scratch (that might be a bit hard, since there's a LOT of coding involved), change could be great. Orrrrr we can just see how well this skin plays with the upgrade and modify things from there.

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^I think that if we (or you, as it were, because I have absolutely no knowledge of these things) agree to go in a different direction with the layout, you should be careful not to take it too far. It should still have the AU feel, if you know what I mean. We've all become accustomed to the look and feel of the forum, and I for one think it'd be unnecessarily stressful to have to get used to a completely new layout. But that's just me

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by Lembas

Yeah I feel it's important to still keep the same kind of feeling and yet make it fresh! It should be familiar yet new and exciting at the same time. If that can be accomplished.

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.*+I'VE MET ANTIGONE, MONTANABOHEMIAN, RAIVYNN PHOENIX, BERIADANWEN & PIRATEOFTHERINGS+*.

(¯`•¸·´¯`·._.·[TRUE VAMPIRES DON'T SPARKLE]·._.·´¯`·¸•´¯)

Sooooo who wants to help me convert the old skin to phpBB 3? Clearly it didn't convert automatically >.< 2:08am now and am calling it a night, but if anyone wants to assist...

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Uh, did the "Life outside LotR" section dissipate?! Or am I missing it...

Woops, it appeared. Neverminds!

Like I said before, I'd be more than happy to help out. But it's not so easy when you can't see admin control panel in front of you. I've never skinned phpBB before so I don't know how different the process is from InvisionFree and ZetaBoards (there you do it all in one CSS style sheet and just upload all the little forum buttons (new topic, reply, msn/icq/aim icons etc) separately on the designated page in the admin control panel).

Just let me know what you need help with and how to go about it.

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.*+I'VE MET ANTIGONE, MONTANABOHEMIAN, RAIVYNN PHOENIX, BERIADANWEN & PIRATEOFTHERINGS+*.

(¯`•¸·´¯`·._.·[TRUE VAMPIRES DON'T SPARKLE]·._.·´¯`·¸•´¯)

Wow... this is soooo weird. And quite an adventure really.

I guess this is not the skin to use my "antiquewhite" font.

EDIT: Those of you who don't like me or never read anything I say, you'll love this layout. Those who want to read my previous posts, will see it always looks like I post nada. I was sooo confused as to where all my posts went and then I realized I needed to highlight them to see. I know there are others who use pale colours when posting, so it's a bit extra work at the moment if you want to read their stuff as well.

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^ By me and my SS *squiggle hugs*

Haha, sorry JF....I'll try to have it back to our normal dark skin soon and you can go back to using antiquewhite aaaaaall you want.

Thanks for the reiterated offer, Eru! phpBB 3 has been confusing the hell out of me, but at least editing the css and images seems straightforward. I think I'm going to need to do some tweaking with the actual code, though, at least to get some of the headers back to what we're used to, but I'll let you know if you can help. Maybe what will work best is if I figure out how things work this go-around and then when everybody's ready to change the forum AND main site layouts, you can take complete control of the forum skin

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Sounds great Arweb! That'll be easier for me because the template will already be there so to speak.

One minor thing I noticed with the phpBB3 upgrade is that there is no longer any BBCode nor HTML code available to center align your signature. It seems like the admin has the option of adding more BBCodes in the control panel and that would be a great one! Either that or make HTML available for posting and sigs.

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.*+I'VE MET ANTIGONE, MONTANABOHEMIAN, RAIVYNN PHOENIX, BERIADANWEN & PIRATEOFTHERINGS+*.

(¯`•¸·´¯`·._.·[TRUE VAMPIRES DON'T SPARKLE]·._.·´¯`·¸•´¯)

Ooh, good catch, I didn't check to see if BBCode automatically included a center option. I did know that they disabled using HTML since apparently it's a "security risk" (what the risk is of using <b> to make your text bold instead of [ b ], I'm not really sure ). Will add that option right away.

How about now?

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Wow, I don't think I've ever really appreciated before all the things you did Arwen to make this forum your own. I really can't wait until AU is back to how it was, although I am liking being able to see people's locations in their profile.

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^ By me and my SS *squiggle hugs*

YAY cheers Arweb!

And yeah I agree JF, seeing people's locations underneath their username and avatar is great! On the ZetaBoards forum that I skinned (the one that I linked to before), I even added the option of having a wee country flag showing which looked really neat.

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.*+I'VE MET ANTIGONE, MONTANABOHEMIAN, RAIVYNN PHOENIX, BERIADANWEN & PIRATEOFTHERINGS+*.

(¯`•¸·´¯`·._.·[TRUE VAMPIRES DON'T SPARKLE]·._.·´¯`·¸•´¯)