I primarily read on my Lenova laptop running Windows 10 using the Chrome browser.

I'd echo the other comments about the font sizes, adding while much of the text is too big, other text (for example, the breadcrumbs at the top of the page, in the case of this thread LTH HOME > CHAT > '16 SITE REDESIGN > READABILITY ISSUES - PLEASE POST THEM HERE) is far too small. All caps also decreases legibility, as does the light grey typeface.

The icons adjacent a thread title (for example, jump to first post) are very very small, and a couple times I tried to click on them only to find that my mouse moved slightly and I ended up clicking elsewhere.

Finding a way to decrease the overall size of elements on the page and increase skimmability without excessive scrolling is essential.

Jesus, where to start...

First, the gigantic default text size is uncalled for unless you presume your target audience has 20/100 vision and has no access to corrective lenses.

Second, the default font colors suck. Just make the default font black like the rest of the world does. That way the secondary/shaded colors won't look so washed out like they do now.

Third, ditch all the stuff on the right side of the screen, or reduce its size, or give signed-in readers the option to click-close them for the duration of their session. Of course if the default font size were scaled back down to a sensible level, the intrusion of all that stuff might not seem so... well, intrusive.

Fourth... on a related note, why all the dead space on the left side of each post when you open a thread? What a waste of real estate.

Fifth, I liked being able to quickly scan through the topic list and find the ones I had posted in. Am I missing some way to do that with this new format?

Finally, one shouldn't have to hover over tiny little icons to discover their meaning if they're not already intuitive.

Overall I like the more "professional" look but IMO it could use some formatting changes.

Drover wrote:Jesus, where to start...

But how were the portions?

Drover wrote:Second, the default font colors suck. Just make the default font black like the rest of the world does. That way the secondary/shaded colors won't look so washed out like they do now.

Seriously, though...can you be a bit more specific here?

Nothing looks washed out to me...I'm not doubting you - My concern is that the site looks different on your monitor than my screen.

Are you referring to this navy blue text? If so, you think making it black would help what text/color not looked washed out?

chgoeditor wrote:
I'd echo the other comments about the font sizes, adding while much of the text is too big, other text (for example, the breadcrumbs at the top of the page, in the case of this thread LTH HOME > CHAT > '16 SITE REDESIGN > READABILITY ISSUES - PLEASE POST THEM HERE) is far too small. All caps also decreases legibility, as does the light grey typeface.

The icons adjacent a thread title (for example, jump to first post) are very very small, and a couple times I tried to click on them only to find that my mouse moved slightly and I ended up clicking elsewhere.

Finding a way to decrease the overall size of elements on the page and increase skimmability without excessive scrolling is essential.

After a few visits, I agree with Chgoeditor's comments. There is too much scrolling required and too great a range in font size (way too big or way too small).

Matt-

I appreciate you putting the new posts button back.

BTW, what is the deal with the forest avatar now that you have defected from the bucolic suburbs?

Thanks, Will

WillG wrote:BTW, what is the deal with the forest avatar now that you have defected from the bucolic suburbs?

Good catch...I wanted to use the Chicago flag, but DaBeef took it.

as others have said, the default font sizes are way way way way way way way way too big.

There is also too much wasted space when looking at the full topic list. As it is now, each topic line takes up so much space that only 7 appear on my screen at the same time on my Mac 13" Retina. There is so much wasted space with all the new icons showing how many replies, how many people have viewed, the giant thread title and then the author stacked on top of each other. You could shrink all of that down and get it all on 1 line instead of taking up 8 square inches of my screen. My browser is 1235x688

And ditch all the stuff on the right side or let us hide it if we want. It takes up way too much real estate and wastes like 25% of the screen real estate after you scroll past it.

Sorry, but I think the redesign, while prettier, is terrible from a usability standpoint.

I think the readability on my iPhone is very good.

New issue--mobile--iPhone 5S-all of a sudden when I go to an unread post, I'm unable to view the full post--before it was just the name of the poster that was above the screen view--I could scroll up and see it so no big deal though a bit annoying. But on 2 of the last 4 posts I opened (odd again since it's not all of them) the post is cut off on the right side of the screen and, since you can't maximize or minimize, there's no way to bring it in view.

milz50 wrote:

Drover wrote:Second, the default font colors suck. Just make the default font black like the rest of the world does. That way the secondary/shaded colors won't look so washed out like they do now.

Seriously, though...can you be a bit more specific here?

Nothing looks washed out to me...I'm not doubting you - My concern is that the site looks different on your monitor than my screen.

Are you referring to this navy blue text? If so, you think making it black would help what text/color not looked washed out?

Like I said, all the "secondary" text -- for instance, the stuff underneath people's screen names, the icons above topic thread names, the descriptions below them, the names and dates of last poster/latest post, etc. It's all a light shade of gray. Not cool on a white background.

Per requested previously in thread... Windows 8.suck, Chrome, 1600x799.

Oh yeah, add signatures to the list of faded-gray text that is difficult to read, especially in the smaller fonts. I actually have to highlight the text in someone's signature to be able to read it.

On another note, I'm not getting notifications of new posts in threads I'm active in. I've actually been having this problem for some time now so I don't think it's related to the redesign...

Seriously, though...can you be a bit more specific here?

Nothing looks washed out to me...I'm not doubting you - My concern is that the site looks different on your monitor than my screen.

No, he's right. It looks washed out - and the pale gray ground denoting a thread haveing new posts is pretty much useless. Aesthetics be damned - use a contrasting color.

PS This observation is identical on two discrete platforms - Windows 10/Chrome at home on a Sony laptop, and Windows 7/IE on a 17" work monitor.

On my iPad, opening in a new tab does not work correctly anymore. It opens the post I'm clicking on in both the current and new tab.

I'm on a Mac OS 10.10.5 (Yosemite), Chrome v 47 (chirp).

When I click on the "new posts" I don't get all of them. Not sure how far back it's not going, but I think the last time I visited was Fri the 22nd. Lots of posts from that day are Grey if I look in the topic area, but didn't come up on my "new posts."

I agree that the grey color font on white background is less contrasty than I would like. And for things like the quote from G Wiv that's sitting on the right now, having some indicator that it's clickable before you hover your mouse would be helpful. That one turns red when you hover, but the other grey links (like View the New Fix and Feature Log) do not. I may be a bit biased against, tho, because I'm def. not a fan of hover states (there isn't hover on mobile, is there?).

Finally, it used to be that along with the poster's name there was the name of the thread (topic title?), unless the poster had changed it. When I go to the "new post" for a thread, it doesn't let me know what the topic is unless I scroll to the top or bottom of the page. I tend to open a bunch of new tabs with all the "new post" things that I am interested in. So then I go to one of the 7 tabs I have opened and I have no idea what the topic is.

Thanks much for all your hard work on this, I appreciate it!

Has the thread title font changed in the last couple days? Perhaps I didn't notice it before, but the thin parts of each letter (such as the top and bottom of the letter s or o or e) is so thin it practically disappears on the screen.

chgoeditor wrote:Has the thread title font changed in the last couple days? Perhaps I didn't notice it before, but the thin parts of each letter (such as the top and bottom of the letter s or o or e) is so thin it practically disappears on the screen.

Yes. The thread/forum/article title font was not working properly on launch. Here's when I fixed it. I realize that this is not the most readable font, however like newyorker.com (an inspiration site for the redesign), we feel it is helps us retain the classic/historic feel of the brand without being dated.

As a side note, I do plan on spending time on folks' concerns re scrolling and the contrast of the gray color. I have spent a ton of time on the site in the past two weeks and need to pay the bills this week, so it may be a short bit before I'm able to get to this. I also want people (including me) to spend more time getting used to the drastic change; I don't want to be too reactionary. I didn't want my silence on this thread to be construed as a lack of attention to the comments.

justjoan wrote:the text is enormous. is it just me?

No.

I don't know what size my browser is set to, but it looks perfectly normal (way smaller than current LTH size) on the dozen+ other forums I check out a couple of times a day. I'm thinking those dozen+ sites are the "correct" size, and current LTH is not.

milz50 wrote:I realize that this is not the most readable font, however like newyorker.com (an inspiration site for the redesign), we feel it is helps us retain the classic/historic feel of the brand without being dated.

If you know the font is 'not the most readable', then why would you consider using it ? Also, the 'brand' never used giant serif fonts so what is there to 'retain' ? And even the sans serif font is difficult to read because it's all caps. The front page and other section formatting does look nice but the forums are really hard to read. It would be hard for me to think anyone would consider this:



is more readable than this:



There's just too much white space everywhere. And there's no reason for the giant post submission/editing buttons.



This update is seriously making me avoid coming to a site I've been reading for over 10 years and seems to be a case of form over function in the forum section at least.

On my Mac desktop running Chrome and my iPhone, when I receive a PM and I want to reply to it, there's no way for me to see the original message that was sent to me as a reference while I'm typing the reply.

BR wrote:On my iPad, opening in a new tab does not work correctly anymore. It opens the post I'm clicking on in both the current and new tab.

So am I the only person having this problem? I don't get it, but it's really annoying and it's happening only with LTH and only since the change . . . makes reading LTH on my iPad a chore.

BR wrote:

BR wrote:On my iPad, opening in a new tab does not work correctly anymore. It opens the post I'm clicking on in both the current and new tab.

So am I the only person having this problem? I don't get it, but it's really annoying and it's happening only with LTH and only since the change . . . makes reading LTH on my iPad a chore.

I haven't looked into this yet. I would like to reproduce your behavior - I assume you're using safari and clicking on the topic title from a forum page. Correct?

milz50 wrote:

BR wrote:

BR wrote:On my iPad, opening in a new tab does not work correctly anymore. It opens the post I'm clicking on in both the current and new tab.

So am I the only person having this problem? I don't get it, but it's really annoying and it's happening only with LTH and only since the change . . . makes reading LTH on my iPad a chore.

I haven't looked into this yet. I would like to reproduce your behavior - I assume you're using safari and clicking on the topic title from a forum page. Correct?

Right - clicking from a thread title through Active Topics, and this happens regardless of whether I try to open a new tab by clicking on the thread title or the last post name.

I don't quite understand the point of showing a preview of the first post in a thread if you hover over the thread title.

edit: It seems like the preview comes up after hovering for a few second over any part of the thread title box, not just the title itself, covering up parts that one might be interested in seeing/reading.

tem wrote:I don't quite understand the point of showing a preview of the first post in a thread if you hover over the thread title.

edit: It seems like the preview comes up after hovering for a few second over any part of the thread title box, not just the title itself, covering up parts that one might be interested in seeing/reading.

This functionality was part of the previous site and was initially missing from the new site. It was restored because one of our members requested it. Fulfilling one member's request apparently disappointed another. As this example indicates, making everyone perfectly happy is not as obvious or straightforward as it might seem. That said, we will do our best to make the site as universally functional as we can.

=R=
for the Moderators

Couple of things:
1. The font for the titles of threads is a little off on Windows 10 w/Chrome - in LTH for example, one can barely see the crossing on the H, and a few of the other letters, such as e, are difficult to read.

2. When looking at the list of threads, it's not clear how to jump to the first unread in the thread.

threadkiller wrote:2. When looking at the list of threads, it's not clear how to jump to the first unread in the thread.

If you're logged in, you should be taken there by default when you click on it or tap it.

Thanks, for #1, too. We'll look into it.

=R=
for the Moderators

The text is HUGE and the icons are tiny. I would welcome a little more balance between the two (and this from someone that has to wear reading glasses). I also miss the old way of noting threads that had new posts. I'm adapting to the new method of having the background of the thread shaded but would welcome the option to be able to specify my own background color as there's already so much grey in play it causes me to work harder than I care to. Maybe there is a settings option and I just haven't found it.

Windows 10 Pro (64 bit) with Chrome Version 47.0.2526.111 m.

I'm not a fan of the particular font used for forum headings and for post titles. The body text is fine. But I find the heading and title text very difficult to focus on. There are some extremely thin lines at crucial points on letters (capital R has a very thin top, making it read to me like a K. Lower case e looks like a c. The tail of lower case y is very thin, making it easily confused with a v.

I know this was covered by others, but chiming in as a +1 on that. I also agree that if you know it's not readable, it's ludicrous to use it.

Chrome v 47, Windows 7, screen size 1920x955. 30-something with near-perfect vision.

I find the large body text quite readable (I'm using a desktop). However, contrast could be better. A darker font could be a bit smaller and still easy to read.

Gray subsidiary text needs to be darkened. Again more contrast please.

Overall, I like the new design, but the contrast / readability issue needs to be addressed.

Firefox 43.0.4. Win XP. 1024 x 768. Old fart with prescription glasses.

I have given it a while now, thinking I'd get used to it. I have to agree with some of the complaints above that the text is too large. As a workaround I find myself scaling down the size of my browser window which activates the text to automatically shrink (a nice feature). I'd rather not have to do that, of course, so I have to say, I find the text size annoyingly large. I understand the intention. The threads read more like articles, but on LTH there is more discussion, and less article writing, and the smaller texts puts these conversations spatially closer together which reads better to me... if that makes any sense. Also, it's just not necessary, and makes scrolling through threads more cumbersome. I have brought this up in discussion with a few other LTHers (who are not chiming in here for some reason!) and everyone seems to be in agreement about this.

Chrome, Windows 10,13.3 inch screen - 2560x1440, "text, apps, and other items" scaled to 150%