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Yay or nay
I enjoy this idea 25%  25%  [ 1 ]
I really enjoy this idea 0%  0%  [ 0 ]
It's great 0%  0%  [ 0 ]
SUPERB 25%  25%  [ 1 ]
Je deteste 50%  50%  [ 2 ]
Total votes : 4
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 Post subject: RV Landing Page [Idea + Proposal]
PostPosted: March 8th, 2021, 9:20 am 
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Hey guys, I created a landing page for RV. I thought that it would be good to have a simple page the official domain directs to that allows visitors to RuneVillage to find everything they need in one place and allow them to make better choices about their stay based on everything that will be in front of them. Consider it the front of house for RV. To the public facing world, this is what we are about. Landing pages are really useful in that way for making the whole experience of browsing a website more enjoyable and also much less complicated than, say, doing all the manual work of searching through forums, and I'm guessing most people won't and don't do that. People don't want to piece things together these days and you will have to prove to people and build trust in them that they should make effort to fill in the gaps.
If we made RV more accessible to all, perhaps we might see more people coming back who just want it to be as easy as 1, 2, 3 to see what's going on. It leaves the door open anyway.

Here is the proposed website:
http://iwd.great-site.net/rvmemorial/

I don't want to get things twisted. This is not about CHANGING things. It's not about bringing RV back in the capacity it once was. It's about making a mature, sensible and thoughtful decision to put RV back on the map in a way that reflects how things are today. It's both homage to the past and also recognition that times are changing and if we are to all keep up with the distance that time brings, we have to do it in a way that unites everything together. Websites have always been a way to do that, even if it's just reference to certain information that otherwise might be difficult to find elsewhere or perhaps you'd have to do more work to seek out. I don't think relying solely on the forums to stay open forever and for people to instinctively know how or where to find people is a good idea. Maybe that's partly down to why so few remain? Because it's a mine field working out just what RV is anymore and where it's at.

It's about making RV more accessible in a universal way relevant to today's world. It makes sense doing things this way as we cannot expect to remain stuck in the early 00's and for those foundations to guarantee survival even in the most basic sense.

I was compelled both by the advice of still serving staff members (albeit in now a retired/relaxed capacity) and by myself to post this here so that everybody can chime in and get their thoughts across.

It seems perhaps a good idea might be to start discourse on what people expect and what people want and whether seeing RV living in some capacity other than the current reduced state is something they would like to see and in what context. We all have memories of RV and we all have a personal connection to this place, perhaps this could be a way to get everybody on-board, or at least those still around, to help define what RV is today in a way that makes everybody happy they are here to see it still exist.

Just an idea, anyway.


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 Post subject: Re: RV Landing Page [Idea + Proposal]
PostPosted: March 8th, 2021, 9:33 am 
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I do enjoy this idea; the landing page looks very user friendly, and clean looking. The intro also has a warm and inviting feel to it. I see it as a way to maybe welcome old members back to the forums for a bit, even if it is just to pop in and say hi. I like that the discord is also there, for those who wish to check out the discord.

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 Post subject: Re: RV Landing Page [Idea + Proposal]
PostPosted: March 8th, 2021, 4:50 pm 
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Phantomrose wrote:
I do enjoy this idea; the landing page looks very user friendly, and clean looking. The intro also has a warm and inviting feel to it. I see it as a way to maybe welcome old members back to the forums for a bit, even if it is just to pop in and say hi. I like that the discord is also there, for those who wish to check out the discord.


I like that you like it. I think it's what is needed :)


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 Post subject: Re: RV Landing Page [Idea + Proposal]
PostPosted: March 8th, 2021, 7:44 pm 
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I think it looks good and is a good idea - presuming it is not too much work for anyone who has to make it happen or maintain it.

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 Post subject: Re: RV Landing Page [Idea + Proposal]
PostPosted: March 9th, 2021, 12:20 am 
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Thanks for moving the discussion here, Sirangetta. I'll copy over some of my thoughts and replies to your most recent posts on the Discord server. I'd love for this to be possible, but I have a few concerns.

1) There's a big technical roadblock, the one I mentioned about domain redirects. http://www.runevillage.com redirects to http://www.poorshark.com/ThePub/. I just spent about an hour trying to figure out if I can redirect a specific page to a specific page, but Namecheap's UI doesn't seem to allow that. It's the entire domain or nothing. As far as I can tell, what that means is if we changed runevillage.com to redirect to poorshark.com/landingpage.html, it would break all old forum links, the ones that are currently linked to runevillage.com/ThePub, like this one for example: http://www.runevillage.com/ThePub/viewtopic.php?f=12&t=439962. That works because we have the domain redirect, but as I understand it, with the landing page in place it would instead go to poorshark.com/landingpage.html instead of the forum topic it's supposed to be pointing at.

I'm not an experienced web developer (I'm not even an amateur web developer lol) but if you can figure out a way around this, it would help. I'm not willing to break all topics older than 2015 when we could potentially put the same landing page content at the top of the forum index to achieve most of the same effect (but without looking nearly as cool, obvs).

2) I'd personally rather avoid anything that would cause extra hits to the database, such as a Recent Posts widget. I just looked at my server resources and it was something like 65% CPU just idling here with people browsing the forums. There was one time my site almost got shut down entirely because there were too many bots browsing the forums. It's fine for the traffic we get, but I don't want to push my luck.

I also have no idea how to code something like that, and again, not a web dev here, but this is a very old version of phpBB so I'm concerned about the security holes this might introduce as well.

3) What are you intending the Contact Users and Archives buttons to do? We shouldn't put anyone's contact information up here, it'll just get scraped by web bots. The forums and Discord suffice for easy ways to contact Villagers.

4) I brought up on Discord that I was concerned about using the RS map as a background because I thiiiiiink Jagex told us to stop using their stuff (which is why all content was removed from the main site IIRC?) but meh it's probably fine.

Now for a couple of quick replies to your Discord comments:

Sirangetta (via Discord) wrote:
I'll be honest, from the standpoint of web design/development, the current standing of RV in terms of having a clear established identity is pretty shaky. It's broken. Everything is chaotic. You've got the forums which are dying and serve no clear indication of what the current direction RV is going or whether it actually warrants people being interested.
The current direction of RV is "permanently parked". New user creation is disabled because I kept having to remove dozens and dozens of spambots.

Sirangetta (via Discord) wrote:
It took me a while to find the discord server and partly that was because reading through everything without knowing what is old and what is new, what is relevant and what isn't pushed me away.
100% agree. I realized that when you made your post, which is why I made a "We have a RuneVillage Discord server!" global to appear at the top of every page. It's not a perfect solution, but it's a big step forward compared to what it was.

Sirangetta (via Discord) wrote:
It's a bit of a mess and there's no clear indication of what actually exists of RV except from little things here and there. It's my opinion you've got to open up the doors and just face the music. When there's foundations there to provide a solid base for the identity of RV you've got very little left to do
The doors have always been open, that's why it's here. :P But the solid base of RV, as Jackstick partially noted previously, has really always been the forums. We had a main site with guides and we had a chat room, but this is where people spent most of their time, and IMO it's what people remember.

Sirangetta (via Discord) wrote:
The main point of what I'm suggesting is to give RV a recognisable and familiar identity. A landing page or something similar would do that. The effort that goes into that could ensure years of further support for RV just by acting as a front door
I've touched on this a few times but I want to continue to make this clear -- if some wacky server happenstance breaks RV and it goes down tomorrow, and I can't figure out how to fix it (just like that week in July 2020), then that's it and the RV Pub is over. If it lives on for years and years, I would love that, and I really hope it does! (I still need to pass Jackstick in post count!) But I'm not going to imply that the worst can't happen. Phrases like "years of further support" make me feel like I'm misleading those who are still here, and I don't want to set false expectations.

(That being said, if that did happen, I'd just make a page that redirects to the Discord, or use the one you've created here, so people would still have a way to get in contact with each other. It would just be the forum content that's gone.)

~~~

Anyway, all of this is moot unless we can figure out a way past that technical hurdle at the very top. But if all else fails, I'm open to creating a new content box on the forum index page with all of the information you present (ideally without pushing the forum list down very much). Anyone going to http://www.runevillage.com is going to land on that anyway, and your experiences have made it clear that if there's information we want people to see, they need to be able to see it without having to click into a forum and then into a global announcement.

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 Post subject: Re: RV Landing Page [Idea + Proposal]
PostPosted: March 9th, 2021, 7:18 am 
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I just want to say that the only way I could find to even get to ThePub was through discord. So, maybe it would be good to have something just for the sake of familiarity.

I’m down for removing recent posts from the main page to not add extra stress to the server (although I believe it’s just a simple query that shouldn’t add much).

Hell, we could just make the page redirect to the discord channel for all I care. My main interest is in making it easier for old users to find us if they ever get curious and out the link in.

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 Post subject: Re: RV Landing Page [Idea + Proposal]
PostPosted: March 9th, 2021, 11:13 am 
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Pyro3000 wrote:
I just want to say that the only way I could find to even get to ThePub was through discord. So, maybe it would be good to have something just for the sake of familiarity.

I’m down for removing recent posts from the main page to not add extra stress to the server (although I believe it’s just a simple query that shouldn’t add much).

Hell, we could just make the page redirect to the discord channel for all I care. My main interest is in making it easier for old users to find us if they ever get curious and out the link in.


This is the concerning bit, if one of the purposes of maintaining RV is to ensure people who come back can do so and join in with whatever is happening at the time. It doesn't make sense to keep RV open but to leave the social aspect of the site left for people to work out for themselves. Facebook Chat isn't hidden somewhere in the terms and conditions (their shocking privacy policies are though). You don't go to Google to find the search box is hidden under various menus. Ease of access is a big issue. The forum is still here but that's the only portal to the present for anybody interested in actually visiting RV again and when they arrive they will first see the inactivity and then see the changes like the different domain, the lack of an official site, lack of familiar signposting you get on any active site. On first glance, if you weren't accustomed to this place you'd think it was pretty much dead already. That will push away lots of people who otherwise might have at least 5-10 minutes to click a few links, perhaps setup a Discord account, leave a message or just stick around a little bit longer.

Saten Ruiko wrote:
Thanks for moving the discussion here, Sirangetta. I'll copy over some of my thoughts and replies to your most recent posts on the Discord server. I'd love for this to be possible, but I have a few concerns.

1) There's a big technical roadblock, the one I mentioned about domain redirects. http://www.runevillage.com redirects to http://www.poorshark.com/ThePub/. I just spent about an hour trying to figure out if I can redirect a specific page to a specific page, but Namecheap's UI doesn't seem to allow that. It's the entire domain or nothing. As far as I can tell, what that means is if we changed runevillage.com to redirect to poorshark.com/landingpage.html, it would break all old forum links, the ones that are currently linked to runevillage.com/ThePub, like this one for example: http://www.runevillage.com/ThePub/viewtopic.php?f=12&t=439962. That works because we have the domain redirect, but as I understand it, with the landing page in place it would instead go to poorshark.com/landingpage.html instead of the forum topic it's supposed to be pointing at.

I'm not an experienced web developer (I'm not even an amateur web developer lol) but if you can figure out a way around this, it would help. I'm not willing to break all topics older than 2015 when we could potentially put the same landing page content at the top of the forum index to achieve most of the same effect (but without looking nearly as cool, obvs).


I don't think it's that big of a deal. You might be able to contact tech support to ask them that specific question. It seems like the redirection is being applied globally instead of on an individual basis. Couldn't you apply wildcards to redirection in order to make sure particular URLs redirect based on those wildcards?

Saten Ruiko wrote:
2) I'd personally rather avoid anything that would cause extra hits to the database, such as a Recent Posts widget. I just looked at my server resources and it was something like 65% CPU just idling here with people browsing the forums. There was one time my site almost got shut down entirely because there were too many bots browsing the forums. It's fine for the traffic we get, but I don't want to push my luck.

I also have no idea how to code something like that, and again, not a web dev here, but this is a very old version of phpBB so I'm concerned about the security holes this might introduce as well.


The recent posts section could be basic CMS, and have nothing to do with phpBB. Something like couchcms could be useful and run externally but be integrated into the landing page for allowing posts made to the landing page in an uninstrusive and simply way and without needing much knowledge. There are even CMS that do not require databases. Because this project would be small, the smaller implementation possibilities will be feasible. You could also host the CMS external to the server itself seeing as all you would need is the ability to integrate the particular CMS sections themselves and not an entire system.


Saten Ruiko wrote:
3) What are you intending the Contact Users and Archives buttons to do? We shouldn't put anyone's contact information up here, it'll just get scraped by web bots. The forums and Discord suffice for easy ways to contact Villagers.


This was just an idea to get peoples online handles together; gaming accounts, RSN (if they still use Runescape), social media accounts or whatever. I thought it might add a personal touch and allow people to connect with each other beyond RV seeing as realistically theres more chance of people now connecting on other platforms and other stuff they are doing. You could add spam/bot protection with basic JS to redact information.

Saten Ruiko wrote:
4) I brought up on Discord that I was concerned about using the RS map as a background because I thiiiiiink Jagex told us to stop using their stuff (which is why all content was removed from the main site IIRC?) but meh it's probably fine.

I'm not a legal expert and I don't think anybody else is either. What was the extent to which Jagex set out their demands? And what is the likelihood of them taking legal action should in 2021 a fansite that complied with all requests and moreover a fansite that was destroyed by compliance and through the inevitable fallout of the hiker controversy come back and choose to use a public and freely available background on their site? Unless RV was under strict legal requirement and there was official legal proceedings started to prevent RV from impersonating support from Jagex as the creator of the content they built their fansite around, I can't see them today in 2021 deciding to go on an all-out warpath to have a background removed.

It seems to me like at the time of Jagex taking action there was a lot of hysteria and this has been confused for the actual underlying reality of the situation. I guess this is what happens when you leave a community like RV to stay afloat to people who are personally invested but on a professional basis have no idea about the areas and consequential actions they are at the time were forced to accept. You could tell a kid crossing the road is illegal and for a long time throughout their childhood they may genuinely hold a belief that crossing a particular road infers criminal offense. It doesn't mean for all that all the stories they imagined up regarding that one thing they were told is actually the reality.

In all honesty and again, I have no idea beyond what I've been told, Jagex probably wanted to strike fear into the staff here at RV and to scare them into submission for the purpose of preserving their own community, profits and the wider communities surrounding the game. They must have known they weren't dealing with a company offering RV with full-time employees qualified in the areas required to make a business run successfully online. They probably knew it was a case of playing into the severity of the situation and essentially trying their best to crush RV before the situation got bigger than what it could have actually become ie the people responsible for leaking the stories and their evident personalities, attitudes and intentions and their lack of regard for the consequences. The sort of people who would report a headteacher for speeding to dig up dirt and get some satisfaction out of it even if it meant several hundred students couldn't go to school for a while while they got in a new headteacher. I mean, if you're the king of a country you're not going to have an entity like RuneVillage corrupt the way in which things are run and then affect the confidence in them trusting the services you provide. You're going to do whatever you can to silence the issue and make it look like it was dealt with.

In reality, the amount of peados who must use Runescape and the elaborate grooming networks and all that grim stuff will be infinetly worse than one Runescape fansite with one known peado running it, who it seems was not connected to a wider network of sex offenders and it was never proved he ever exploited the community he ran to commit sex acts. The truth is, the entire situation was pretty mild in comparison to what really lurks out there. If you wanted to investigate this kind of stuff, you'll find some pretty dark places that make the community hiker setup look like a joke. You have extremely complex child sex grooming gangs around the world and their modus operandi will be nothing like what RV was like in the times of hiker. Jagex will want to try and create that illusion and then project that onto the community so they themselves feel corrupted and therefore compelled to comply.

So even though the whole situation was painted in a way that made it look like some sick twisted and completely horrifying situation, in reality it actually probably wasn't. All you have to do is say the word peadophile and you've already got a winning ticket to whatever argument it is you're trying to make.

Does that mean you REALLY have a case? No. I could say you're all peadophiles and you should stop using my imagery. If and when it came to court, it would be a done case before it even started and I most definetly would not win based on the spurious allegations alone. You can't tie hiker to RV anymore because he's dead and unless his accomplices are running RV now there is no link and so how Jagex could muster up the audacity to assume they can stick a label on RV that is now 10 years old and completely obsolete and only applies to the admin (who stepped down a long time ago, and now as mentioned above, is dead) would be ridiculous. I mean sure they could try and scare the hell out of you...

but over a background? Based on a story that is now a decade old with the man accused and the main basis of that story long since dead? Don't they think the damage has already been done? Don't they know their is no justification to assume RV back during the 00s is the RV today and that everybody running it are peadophiles? It defies logic, moreover, common sense and anybody with half a brain cell would add it all up together and see that RV is now being run by people who were never directly connected to hiker and who were simply both fans and voluntary staff members of the site who chose to keep it running out of childhood memories they have, and not solely because it's some peadophilic sex dungeon masquerading as a Runescape fansite.



Now for a couple of quick replies to your Discord comments:

Sirangetta (via Discord) wrote:
I'll be honest, from the standpoint of web design/development, the current standing of RV in terms of having a clear established identity is pretty shaky. It's broken. Everything is chaotic. You've got the forums which are dying and serve no clear indication of what the current direction RV is going or whether it actually warrants people being interested.
The current direction of RV is "permanently parked". New user creation is disabled because I kept having to remove dozens and dozens of spambots.

Sirangetta (via Discord) wrote:
It took me a while to find the discord server and partly that was because reading through everything without knowing what is old and what is new, what is relevant and what isn't pushed me away.
100% agree. I realized that when you made your post, which is why I made a "We have a RuneVillage Discord server!" global to appear at the top of every page. It's not a perfect solution, but it's a big step forward compared to what it was.

Sirangetta (via Discord) wrote:
It's a bit of a mess and there's no clear indication of what actually exists of RV except from little things here and there. It's my opinion you've got to open up the doors and just face the music. When there's foundations there to provide a solid base for the identity of RV you've got very little left to do
The doors have always been open, that's why it's here. :P But the solid base of RV, as Jackstick partially noted previously, has really always been the forums. We had a main site with guides and we had a chat room, but this is where people spent most of their time, and IMO it's what people remember.

Saten Ruiko wrote:
I've touched on this a few times but I want to continue to make this clear -- if some wacky server happenstance breaks RV and it goes down tomorrow, and I can't figure out how to fix it (just like that week in July 2020), then that's it and the RV Pub is over. If it lives on for years and years, I would love that, and I really hope it does! (I still need to pass Jackstick in post count!) But I'm not going to imply that the worst can't happen. Phrases like "years of further support" make me feel like I'm misleading those who are still here, and I don't want to set false expectations.

(That being said, if that did happen, I'd just make a page that redirects to the Discord, or use the one you've created here, so people would still have a way to get in contact with each other. It would just be the forum content that's gone.)


What about a backup server? And what about ensuring there are others who you can pass the torch onto? If you stop doing this RV dies in it's original state. It's about how important it is and the risks to rewards I guess. Maybe no-one will want to pick up where you left off or maybe they won't be experienced enough to do so. Isn't that more reason to perhaps have RV hosted on shared hosting and leave all that to a cheap hosting company instead of running everything yourself? Or at least have a mirror service ready? It might take a lot of the stress and pressure off of you so no longer is RV a project of yours just to keep alive. The trouble then is costs and that could be split enabling mutual responsibility among everyone whose stuck around. It doesn't make sense just to keep expecting you to run the site. That's always an issue though because people just expect communities like this to just happen and keep happening and someone somewhere is dealing with everything while you just worry about page loading times and whether you get what you want. It's why platforms now use you as their products because they know users aren't willing to pay for sh*t and want everything given to them for nothing while giving nothing back. You can't blame Zuckerbergs model when it comes to ensuring you DO benefit from the services you provide. Look at him now, hardly a mistake in terms of what he's managed to get for the site he made. RV obviously can't do that unless you start incorporating ads and users explicitly turn off ad blockers or find some incentive for people to contribute without actually handing over money. Again, the dilemma that spans the history of online communities.

I guess it all comes down to how much RV is worth today for people. I really do believe a landing page gives back RV some sense of self worth. It establishes the fact it's still here and then signposts people accordingly based on how things are done right now. And when things change, the landing page can reflect this, ad infinitum.
~~~

Saten Ruiko wrote:
Anyway, all of this is moot unless we can figure out a way past that technical hurdle at the very top. But if all else fails, I'm open to creating a new content box on the forum index page with all of the information you present (ideally without pushing the forum list down very much). Anyone going to http://www.runevillage.com is going to land on that anyway, and your experiences have made it clear that if there's information we want people to see, they need to be able to see it without having to click into a forum and then into a global announcement.


That's a good idea but wouldn't it take away from the seperation of the forum and the main site?

Applequest wrote:
I think it looks good and is a good idea - presuming it is not too much work for anyone who has to make it happen or maintain it.


HTML, CSS, JS and perhaps if using other features like integrating a feature for sharing updates to the site or whatever, PHP. Also if messing around with the board header becomes a reality, PHP also. All that knowledge is already here in various people and it's not super complex :)


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 Post subject: Re: RV Landing Page [Idea + Proposal]
PostPosted: March 10th, 2021, 12:43 am 
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Pyro3000 wrote:
I just want to say that the only way I could find to even get to ThePub was through discord. So, maybe it would be good to have something just for the sake of familiarity.
LOL HOW
The fact that it's runevillage.com has never changed! What...were you looking for?

Sirangetta (on Item #1) wrote:
I don't think it's that big of a deal. You might be able to contact tech support to ask them that specific question. It seems like the redirection is being applied globally instead of on an individual basis. Couldn't you apply wildcards to redirection in order to make sure particular URLs redirect based on those wildcards?
It's definitely a big deal if it blocks the project from working. I trawled through Namecheap documentation ([1], [2], [3]) and StackOverflow topics, but it allows for only whole domains. Which makes complete sense really, because if you're redirecting a domain's traffic, it's because you don't have hosting on that domain anymore, so nitpicking about its directory structure would be silly. There's a wildcard option but it's only for subdomains.

You may be able to find something that I wasn't able to; feel free to give it a search if you can or have any other ideas. Namecheap tech support redirect me to their knowledge base articles, and StackOverflow seemed to agree with my conclusions above.

All that being said, I thought of a completely separate idea earlier today that I might be able to test later this weekend. If it works then there's a possibility we could bypass the problem without needing a domain redirect, but I can't make any promises until I test it.

Sirangetta (on Item #2) wrote:
The recent posts section could be basic CMS, and have nothing to do with phpBB. Something like couchcms could be useful and run externally but be integrated into the landing page for allowing posts made to the landing page in an uninstrusive and simply way and without needing much knowledge. There are even CMS that do not require databases. Because this project would be small, the smaller implementation possibilities will be feasible. You could also host the CMS external to the server itself seeing as all you would need is the ability to integrate the particular CMS sections themselves and not an entire system.
Mmmm, sorry, but I'm not interested in creating any new widget integrations on the server itself. A couple of reasons for that: One is that there are already quite a few (in addition to running phpBB, there's an active WordPress installation here too, for example); two is that that's exactly the type of thing that needs to be updated over time or it starts introducing security holes, and I'm not keen on anything that's going to require upkeep. WordPress and phpBB already slowly degrade themselves into obsolesence as it is, because both have enough plugins that updating them might tip them into instability. :P HTML/HTML5/CSS/JS would be absolutely ideal.

I'm not familiar with CouchCMS (or any CMS systems outside of WordPress or Drupal, really), but you mentioned it can be run externally. If you can make that work on a separate server and have the page query recent posts only on demand (when a user loads the page, not like...perpetually loading and caching results, since the results hardly ever change) then that's potentially a path we could follow.

Sirangetta (on Item #3) wrote:
This was just an idea to get peoples online handles together; gaming accounts, RSN (if they still use Runescape), social media accounts or whatever. I thought it might add a personal touch and allow people to connect with each other beyond RV seeing as realistically theres more chance of people now connecting on other platforms and other stuff they are doing. You could add spam/bot protection with basic JS to redact information.
You might want to see who's interested in this feature first; most of us grew up with the internet so we know anything you put out there is permanently saved by archive.org. :wink: TBH, a good starting point would be making a forum topic for this exact thing, and linking to the forum topic from your landing page button. That way updating the contacts page requires editing a forum post (very easy) rather than pushing new content to the site (requires at least two people, since I'm not giving anyone FTP access to my webcomic).

Sirangetta (on Discord comment replies) wrote:
What about a backup server?
There isn't one. If RV goes down permanently and you want to spend a few hundred dollars on hosting this bit of nostalgia, and also figuring out how to upload and upgrade the database and files into a format that gets it running again, we can have a chat then. But for as much as I caution the possibility, I don't really expect it to go down soon (it seems to be more stable lately than it has been in recent months) so I'm not really considering contingency plans.

Sirangetta wrote:
And what about ensuring there are others who you can pass the torch onto?
I don't intend to pass the torch because I don't intend to step down from this responsibility. Contained within RV's database is every private message anyone's ever sent, every admin-only topic, every mod discussion about a misbehaving user, etc., and someone with database access can read every last bit of it. I don't, because 1) why and 2) that would be a massive invasion of privacy. But if I were to hand that off to someone, and they read people's private messages from 2004 to 2020, the fault lies with me. I know I had some very personal stuff in there somewhere.

All of this is to say, if RV did end up changing hands somehow (which wouldn't happen unless it goes permanently down) then I'd wipe all mod/admin topics and private messages before handing over a database copy for reconstruction. I owe our users at least that much.

Sirangetta wrote:
It doesn't make sense just to keep expecting you to run the site.
I don't mind. I've run enough groups, events, and threads on RV to know that the moment you hand something off is the moment it dies. When I tried stepped down from updating the RVHS and gave it to someone that was interested in running it, they literally had to do two small actions once a month: click a single button, and copy-and-paste the results onto a forum post.

Two different people failed to do this for several consecutive months. With reminders. I was spending more time asking them to do it than I would have been just doing it myself.

It's easy to find people who say they want to do things. It's hard to find people that are willing to make a commitment. At least by doing it myself, I know it gets done, because I hold high value in keeping my word.

Sirangetta wrote:
Saten Ruiko wrote:
Anyway, all of this is moot unless we can figure out a way past that technical hurdle at the very top. But if all else fails, I'm open to creating a new content box on the forum index page with all of the information you present (ideally without pushing the forum list down very much). Anyone going to http://www.runevillage.com is going to land on that anyway, and your experiences have made it clear that if there's information we want people to see, they need to be able to see it without having to click into a forum and then into a global announcement.


That's a good idea but wouldn't it take away from the seperation of the forum and the main site?
It would, yeah. That's why it's a last resort.

Sirangetta wrote:
Applequest wrote:
I think it looks good and is a good idea - presuming it is not too much work for anyone who has to make it happen or maintain it.


HTML, CSS, JS and perhaps if using other features like integrating a feature for sharing updates to the site or whatever, PHP. Also if messing around with the board header becomes a reality, PHP also. All that knowledge is already here in various people and it's not super complex :)
As mentioned above, HTML, CSS, JS are fine. Feature integrations are getting into an area I'd rather avoid -- I'm happy to host your code, but the goal here is to give the site a face without incurring additional upkeep.

Also, on the "various people" bit, if you're expecting coding assistance from others, you might want to start reaching out to them. Most Villagers these days are in full-time jobs or full-time schooling and may not be interested in spending their free time on something like this. Given your mock-up site example though, I'm assuming you already have all the knowledge necessary to make this possible.

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 Post subject: Re: RV Landing Page [Idea + Proposal]
PostPosted: March 13th, 2021, 1:21 am 
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Saten Ruiko wrote:
All that being said, I thought of a completely separate idea earlier today that I might be able to test later this weekend. If it works then there's a possibility we could bypass the problem without needing a domain redirect, but I can't make any promises until I test it.
Good news! I found a way to make a landing page work alongside the forums without needing to modify the domain redirect settings. If you send me your completed content, I can get it hosted.

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 Post subject: Re: RV Landing Page [Idea + Proposal]
PostPosted: March 13th, 2021, 10:37 am 
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Saten Ruiko wrote:
Pyro3000 wrote:
I just want to say that the only way I could find to even get to ThePub was through discord. So, maybe it would be good to have something just for the sake of familiarity.
LOL HOW
The fact that it's runevillage.com has never changed! What...were you looking for?


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 Post subject: Re: RV Landing Page [Idea + Proposal]
PostPosted: March 28th, 2021, 6:04 pm 
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It looks like Sirangetta took their example site down and also deleted their Discord account, so I assume the original idea isn't going to go anywhere.

However, per my previous post, I do want to note that I found a solution around the domain redirect problem. So if anyone else is interested in designing and creating a landing page, feel free, and then get in touch with me and we'll get it uploaded! The goal is to have something that requires no additional upkeep and doesn't put any load on the database, so HTML/CSS/JavaScript would be ideal. I assume links to the forums and the Discord server are the goal, though anything extra is fine as long as it 1) doesn't compromise anyone's privacy and 2) doesn't look half-completed (like a "Stories" page with a single entry).

If not, that's also fine, since I made a Global for the Discord link and the runevillage.com domain lets most people find their way back on their own. But just trying to tie up the loose ends here with a notice that I'm still up for it if someone else wants to spruce up the entryway. Thanks!

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 Post subject: Re: RV Landing Page [Idea + Proposal]
PostPosted: March 28th, 2021, 10:30 pm 
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Saten Ruiko wrote:
It looks like Sirangetta took their example site down and also deleted their Discord account, so I assume the original idea isn't going to go anywhere.

However, per my previous post, I do want to note that I found a solution around the domain redirect problem. So if anyone else is interested in designing and creating a landing page, feel free, and then get in touch with me and we'll get it uploaded! The goal is to have something that requires no additional upkeep and doesn't put any load on the database, so HTML/CSS/JavaScript would be ideal. I assume links to the forums and the Discord server are the goal, though anything extra is fine as long as it 1) doesn't compromise anyone's privacy and 2) doesn't look half-completed (like a "Stories" page with a single entry).

If not, that's also fine, since I made a Global for the Discord link and the runevillage.com domain lets most people find their way back on their own. But just trying to tie up the loose ends here with a notice that I'm still up for it if someone else wants to spruce up the entryway. Thanks!

Well, I'll give it a go. :awesome: Expect a post here in a week or so.

So just to clarify, where do you stand on WordPress/SquareSpace/etc.? If I'm reading correctly, you would not want a page that requires sitebuilders like that, right? I agree that it should just be a simple, informative page (just one page, nothing more) with important links, and doesn't require regular updates/maintenance. The only thing that we don't have archived, that I'd like to see archived in the future, is The Villager. But we could probably give it the same treatment as The Village Library - just a subforum with all the articles.

I've actually just begun learning HTML/CSS several weeks ago, so I know some things but I'm not an expert. JavaScript is included in the learning app, but I haven't gotten that far yet. I will create a mock-up image and post it here - and see what people think - before I try to code anything. Maybe it'll be easy cuz it's just one page. Maybe I'll see if Pyro can help me bring a mock-up to fruition on the coding side, if I get stuck. Or I'll get in touch with Demon if I want to ruin everything.

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 Post subject: Re: RV Landing Page [Idea + Proposal]
PostPosted: March 29th, 2021, 2:44 am 
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Jackstick wrote:
Well, I'll give it a go. :awesome: Expect a post here in a week or so.
Neat!! No rush, but sounds good!

Jackstick wrote:
So just to clarify, where do you stand on WordPress/SquareSpace/etc.? If I'm reading correctly, you would not want a page that requires sitebuilders like that, right? I agree that it should just be a simple, informative page (just one page, nothing more) with important links, and doesn't require regular updates/maintenance.
Yeah, basically. I've never heard of SquareSpace but WordPress is basically a whole content management system that you set up and it handles templates and auto-publishing and that's far too involved for what we actually need.

Jackstick wrote:
The only thing that we don't have archived, that I'd like to see archived in the future, is The Villager. But we could probably give it the same treatment as The Village Library - just a subforum with all the articles.
Actually, I just looked at the backup copy I have that I mentioned a few weeks ago -- I think it has every issue (from April 2004 to October 2008). Clicking around, although some stuff is broken or has outdated external links, and Flash has been abandoned by the internet-at-large, most of the articles seem to work just fine! I could...just throw this whole folder online and then link to each issue's landing page, probably? I'm pretty sure that would work without getting too involved.

Jackstick wrote:
I've actually just begun learning HTML/CSS several weeks ago, so I know some things but I'm not an expert. JavaScript is included in the learning app, but I haven't gotten that far yet. I will create a mock-up image and post it here - and see what people think - before I try to code anything. Maybe it'll be easy cuz it's just one page.
Nice! TBH JavaScript is likely completely unnecessary. Off the top of my head, I can't think of anything you'd particularly want to do that wouldn't be possible with CSS. I'm not an expert either but I've dabbled in HTML/CSS for...god, I guess twenty years now (I made a Pokemon fansite in 2001 lollllllllll)...so I might be able to help, but I can't promise it'd look good either.

Jackstick wrote:
Maybe I'll see if Pyro can help me bring a mock-up to fruition on the coding side, if I get stuck.
*thumbs-up emoji*

Jackstick wrote:
Or I'll get in touch with Demon if I want to ruin everything.
i will kill you

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 Post subject: Re: RV Landing Page [Idea + Proposal]
PostPosted: March 29th, 2021, 11:17 pm 
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Some of the style sheets are broken, the images used Imageshack (RIP), and a couple of the issue links needed fixing, but here are all the Villager issues! Feel free to relink to them in any way you see fit.

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 Post subject: Re: RV Landing Page [Idea + Proposal]
PostPosted: April 11th, 2021, 2:39 am 
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Saten Ruiko wrote:
Some of the style sheets are broken, the images used Imageshack (RIP), and a couple of the issue links needed fixing, but here are all the Villager issues! Feel free to relink to them in any way you see fit.

Yay that's awesome! :awesome: Can't do much about a few broken images, but this is so much better than relying on the dice-roll of archive.org for those who have some nostalgia in The Villager.

So... here's what I have so far, for a mock-up. It is an intentionally simple design - it would serve only a single purpose, after all. I could've designed something more modern and sleek, but in my mind it makes more sense for it to resemble the forums, and the RV of 2008-2010. Simple and modest.

I avoided using any RS imagery, in case Jagex actually forbade us from using their material. I think you're right that they did - it sounds about right, given all the... stuff... that happened. So, all icons and imagery are original designs by me or Goten - nothing is borrowed except for the Discord icon.

This is still just an image, but I will find the time over the next few weeks to practice my HTML/CSS skills and see if I can actually bring this to life.

A few things I'd like some feedback on, from anyone:

- Having "RuneVillage" in the banner instead of "The Village." Renaming our site was a (probably futile) attempt to distance ourselves from hiker, but that is ancient history at this point. I imagine that there are less than 100 people on the planet who would ever still visit our site regularly or in the future, and for them RuneVillage was always our name. If you disagree though, I'm open to the idea of just using the same banner that we use for the forums. I might redesign the banner area entirely if a good idea ever pops into my head (banners are my weakness), but I actually kind of like the simplicity that I ended up with.

- The placement of the links/icons. They could instead be placed horizontally over the "Recent News" post. It would not be a difficult revision. I like having them on the right side because it seems natural to have a sidebar for the extra content, but it does leave a lot of blank space beneath it. I don't know, I'll think about it.

- The actual post itself. I just copied a global announcement and used that for placeholder text, so it will be different in the final product. I'm not a very creative writer, but maybe I'll give it a go. I imagine that whatever we include in that post should be timeless, and it should just be a single post on the page.

- Anything about the design in general. Tell me if there's something that you just hate about the layout, or if you have any suggestions.

- If you just disagree with the idea of a landing/main page entirely. This doesn't have to happen if people don't want it. It's just a fun little project for me.

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let me know if it needs more beige/grey

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 Post subject: Re: RV Landing Page [Idea + Proposal]
PostPosted: April 11th, 2021, 8:09 am 
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Looks good Jack! Definitely RuneVillage, having the links on the right looks fine.

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 Post subject: Re: RV Landing Page [Idea + Proposal]
PostPosted: April 12th, 2021, 1:47 am 
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Dude, it looks awesome!! I love it.

Jackstick wrote:
So... here's what I have so far, for a mock-up. It is an intentionally simple design - it would serve only a single purpose, after all. I could've designed something more modern and sleek, but in my mind it makes more sense for it to resemble the forums, and the RV of 2008-2010. Simple and modest.
Good idea tbh. The moment I looked at it it felt like home, y'know? Nothing aimed at a new era, just what I remember from the good old days.

Jackstick wrote:
- Having "RuneVillage" in the banner instead of "The Village." Renaming our site was a (probably futile) attempt to distance ourselves from hiker, but that is ancient history at this point. I imagine that there are less than 100 people on the planet who would ever still visit our site regularly or in the future, and for them RuneVillage was always our name. If you disagree though, I'm open to the idea of just using the same banner that we use for the forums. I might redesign the banner area entirely if a good idea ever pops into my head (banners are my weakness), but I actually kind of like the simplicity that I ended up with.
Looks good to me!

Jackstick wrote:
- The placement of the links/icons. They could instead be placed horizontally over the "Recent News" post. It would not be a difficult revision. I like having them on the right side because it seems natural to have a sidebar for the extra content, but it does leave a lot of blank space beneath it. I don't know, I'll think about it.
I kind of like them on the right, tbh. Larger space availability and easy to see. Also for some reason when main links are placed horizontally, people tend to skim them.

Jackstick wrote:
- The actual post itself. I just copied a global announcement and used that for placeholder text, so it will be different in the final product. I'm not a very creative writer, but maybe I'll give it a go. I imagine that whatever we include in that post should be timeless, and it should just be a single post on the page.
I'd be happy to help with that if you'd like! I'm sure we can figure something out.

Jackstick wrote:
- Anything about the design in general. Tell me if there's something that you just hate about the layout, or if you have any suggestions.
I think the layout is fine, but I do have some opinions/questions.

1) Should we have a subheading for the banner? It doesn't have to be "Where RuneScapers Escape" because that's a bit dated now. I'm not actually sure what it should be, tbh. Just looks like there should be a tagline of some sort.

2) If the main blurb is going to be a timeless "Hey welcome back to RV, here's how to see what's still around and thanks for being a Villager" then we should probably have a different image than "Recent news". (I know that's a carryover from previous homepage incarnations, but we should consider what it will be replaced with.)

3) I assume the Library button goes to this forum and the Villager button goes to the Villager archive page I posted (we can make that look prettier or something) but what is "Archive" in this context?
EDIT: Oh wait, is it the Village Archive forum? That makes sense in hindsight.

4) I'm still going back and forth on this, but what do you think of the right-side buttons having tiny descriptions of <5 words or so right beneath them? This is completely off the top of my head so don't take these as set in stone. I'm not sure I fully even like all of them lol.

Forums: Making friends since 2002
Library: Villager-written stories
Villager: 39 issues of interviews and more
Archive: (dunno what this is) Gems from the past
Discord: We're still around! Come say hi!

Jackstick wrote:
- If you just disagree with the idea of a landing/main page entirely. This doesn't have to happen if people don't want it. It's just a fun little project for me.
You've got a green light from me! And you have Apple's seal of approval too. :)

Jackstick wrote:
let me know if it needs more beige/grey
just the right amount of beige/grey tbh

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 Post subject: Re: RV Landing Page [Idea + Proposal]
PostPosted: June 21st, 2021, 4:16 pm 
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Saten Ruiko wrote:
Some of the style sheets are broken, the images used Imageshack (RIP), and a couple of the issue links needed fixing, but here are all the Villager issues! Feel free to relink to them in any way you see fit.


Oh my, I'm cringing reading the ramblings of my 12-year-old self in 2004... :oops:

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