Channel 9 Update Planning | The Coffeehouse

jeffsand
Inch by Inch

Hi Everyone,

We're in the process of planning out our next major update to Channel 9. We're starting this with this post thread here in the Coffeehouse.

As many of you have noticed we've been doing a fair amount of work building out the recently launched 10 site. We have another update planned for 10 that should launch in the next couple of weeks. When that update is complete we plan to move back onto Channel 9.

Long time Niners know that Channel 9 is built on a mutation of the ASP.NET Forums (the predecessor to community server) and it has become difficult to update. With the launch of 10 we set off to build a new codebase that we could grow into for all of the sites that our team is asked to create. With 10, bit by bit we're getting the base infrastructure required for Channel 9. In fact if you look closely at the site, you'll notice the recent additions of a media library and soon there will be forums.

Our dream is to have one code base across our sites, but preserve the tone, style and integrity that is 9.

Our curent thinking is to do two updates to Channel 9. The first would include a homepage redesign to simplify and also to improve visibility to the large amount of content being created on Channel 9. In this release we'll also perform a number of bug fixes and minor feature updates. These will be completed in the short term and our hope is have it released somewhere around the end of June.

Once this is complete we'll move onto a bigger project that will get 9 running on the same "core base" as 10. We promise never to take away from the soul of Channel 9. We are deeply aware that the sites have different audiences Smiley

, but we do need to get on one codebase for the sites. Some things will only be present in C9 and others will get shared across the site. For example we want to update Sandbox and revamp the Wiki this year, most likely those features won't get pushed over to 10.

We'll use this thread to keep you up to date, share screenshots of the hompage redesign and include further updates on the C9 V3 project.

Let us know what you think. Niners made C9 what it is, we need your help to make it better.

The Channel 9 Team...

Sven Groot
My name has 9 letters. Coincidence? I think not...

Please give me a webservice because I don't feel like updating C9Music to work with another C9 redesign. Smiley

jamie

sounds great... couple of things

1. this update will not effect the 2 yr running c9 DB that currently exists and user access to it (like we have now) ?

2. the Slashdot effect: say what you like about it - but it is plain and simple - consistant and uncluttered. Hopefully the coffeehouse will remain uncluttered by extra announcements, media clips, ajax frills etc

edit - although it would be great to let us choose to run c9 gadgets on the right -empty- side so long as we can make our own - and or use yours (like the current featured box)

die-Sel

I for one would like some MS based news, such as BETA Releases maybe dtaes for just C9ers.

but anyway, good luck with the re-work, I cant wait untill it pops out.

jeffsand
Inch by Inch

jamie wrote:
sounds great... couple of things

1. this update will not effect the 2 yr running c9 DB that currently exists and user access to it (like we have now) ?

2. the Slashdot effect: say what you like about it - but it is plain and simple - consistant and uncluttered. Hopefully the coffeehouse will remain uncluttered by extra announcements, media clips, ajax frills etc

edit - although it would be great to let us choose to run c9 gadgets on the right -empty- side so long as we can make our own - and or use yours (like the current featured box)

1. We will preserver all data and URLs. We'll probably create a URL handler though to redirect them to more friendly URLs.

2. Yes. This is definitely on our minds, I want to keep Coffeehouse as is. We will not introduce more announcements, clips, etc.

We are interested in more Ajax in the forums though to eliminate refreshes. Thoughts?

die-Sel

Less re-freshing, sounds good Smiley

jeffsand
Inch by Inch

Sven Groot wrote:
Please give me a webservice because I don't feel like updating C9Music to work with another C9 redesign.

This is one of the advantages of the 10 base, it has a web service API at its core.

What methods/data would you need? We hope that we can enable all sorts of C9 Mashups when the update is complete.

Please keep the feedback coming.

-Jeff

Sven Groot
My name has 9 letters. Coincidence? I think not...

jeffsand wrote:
What methods/data would you need? We hope that we can enable all sorts of C9 Mashups when the update is complete.

In order to support C9IAC and C9Music, I need to be able to change the avatar and the avatar caption, that's all.

jamie

sorry - one last thing: international fields and times
Profile - name / city / country = jamie toronto canada

so on everything i post or create it would say:

"Posted to C9 at 7pm ( Your time 10pm)" ...or something that shows the same thing

other posts would show:

"Posted to C9 at 7pm ( by _user_ at _timezone of country_)"

edit - it would be so great to see:
a) where everyone is from
b) if im talking to someone at 4pm here and its 2am there

jamie

..um ok... FEATURES =

- inline polling ( if clicked on by thread creator)
- upload image from local drive (under 5 megs)
- PM's = Private Message - so i could let minh no if i updated a post on the c9park blog or whomever
- themes and the ability for us to make them

and last - an extra request to adam - is there anyway i could get the real C9guy file? Illustrator? ai ? corel? wmf? (vector) front / side views? i tried making it - but its not the same

edit - actually - publicly posted so we could all have it - just like downloading a Microsoft Windows logo eps - there should be a whole new section - c9guy psds and vectors! Wink

HumanCompiler
Compiling humans...and code

Sven Groot wrote:
jeffsand wrote:What methods/data would you need? We hope that we can enable all sorts of C9 Mashups when the update is complete.

In order to support C9IAC and C9Music, I need to be able to change the avatar and the avatar caption, that's all.

We already have this in 10, so that will just be there once we move the code base over. Cool

HumanCompiler
Compiling humans...and code

jamie wrote:
sorry - one last thing: international fields and times
Profile - name / city / country = jamie toronto canada

so on everything i post or create it would say:

"Posted to C9 at 7pm ( Your time 10pm)" ...or something that shows the same thing

other posts would show:

"Posted to C9 at 7pm ( by _user_ at _timezone of country_)"

edit - it would be so great to see:
a) where everyone is from
b) if im talking to someone at 4pm here and its 2am there

We have 90% of this already in 10, which will of course come through to C9. We'll discuss showing a translated time for the person who posted the comment. It will take no time at all to code since the capability is already there, but we want to make sure we don't get too much information in your face. We'll discuss it.

jamie

so that's...

- inline polling (very important)
- upload image (important)
- Private Messages (back burner)
- themes (back burner)
- international times (important) (edit - addressed below [y])

what are the chances of any of the above happening?

HumanCompiler
Compiling humans...and code

jamie wrote:
so that's...

- inline polling
- upload image
- Private Messages
- themes
- international times

what are the chances of any of the above happening?

Polls - We'll have this, but I'm not 100% sure what you mean by inline...explain...
Upload Image - I can't give an answer at this point, but we'll discuss it.
Private Messages - This is one I've been pushing on and off since we started doing 10 (and therefore would get into C9), but we just haven't had time yet and I can't promise anything for the second timeframe Jeff is talking about.
Themes - This would be super interesting to let people make C9 look like how they want it. I'm not sure about sharing those themes though. We'd have to discuss all the possible implications and again, time will probably be a factor. Good idea for down the road.
International Times - Definitely doable. Right now you'll see everything local to your selected time zone. We'll see if it makes sense to show a translated time for the person who did the posting. Easy as pie to code.

HumanCompiler
Compiling humans...and code

jamie, we'll be able to do this with a new feature (I'm working on it right now actually) that will show up in 10 in a couple weeks. It might not be 100% the way you want it, but I believe the ability you're looking for will be there in the second release Jeff talked about. Smiley

ZippyV
Fired Up

I only visited on10 twice. It doesn't interest me.

Time for a new poll: Have you visited 10 in the past month?

jamie

a: No

i went once but the layout was wacky - like that new Architect site ;p ..and as for the Hive ...club.. they can bzzz off Wink

Manip

The best implementation of themes I've seen works like this:

Each user has a CSS link / URL in their personal profiles... When C9 renders the page it just places whatever the user has chosen in the rel="stylesheet" link... If nothing is selected it uses the default. That way the themes are ever-expandable.

So for example 9ers would be able to design their own themes and share them around... People just change the location in their profiles to the *.css file and get a new look and feel.

As I said I've seen this implemented top to bottom and it works great... Users have a lot of fun finding different themes that others have created.

HumanCompiler
Compiling humans...and code

As Jeff mentioned...we're not turning Channel 9 into 10. We know the target is quite different. 10 won't interest everyone, just like Channel 9 won't either.

So with that is there anything that you really don't want to see come over from 10? Again, we're only bringing over functionality from 10 but is there anything that scares you that we can put your mind to rest about? Big Smile

jamie

re- manip:
id make some (epecially if provided with the real c9guy vectors)

re on10: the layout. Whats here is good. just need to utalise big red bar (go nuts with whatever you want) and the right column (give that to us in the form of interchangeable/buildable gadgets
* perhaps user polls, pm alerts, c9park watch;) could go on right
and you could move "Featured" to the 3 elements in the big red bar like: Current contest l Interview with Billg ver 3 l All about teched

HumanCompiler
Compiling humans...and code

agreed...jamie...the look of 10 is not coming here. You may see a few tweaks with the homepage redesign, but bringing over the 10 functionality will not change the look of 10.

jamie

great!

http://www.gnuarts.com/c9_themes/

theres some css themes i did 2 yrs ago for c9

all images/colurs/fonts in the css - but tables on master page called them
(its all one page - index.html - with a different css ref)
(works super fast in FF/ie7 - ie6 loads slow)
*just for an idea

Scott Bryen

How about online/offline status thing for each user when looking through a topic? Also a spell checker when creating new topics and reply to topics.

I would also like to see a quick reply option at the bottom of a topic. There just a few things i would like to see Smiley . Cant wait for the update.

jamie

AMAZING!

by inline i mean i could start a thread called:

"Should msn images search have sort by size?" (like i made today) and add a poll to the thread

each user when replying to the thread would be presented with a vote box in the reply windows (well above it..whereever)

then we could really gage what the heck we're all going on about Wink

edit - ideally we could sort user generated polls by most votes / yes wins / no wins

edit 2 - all polls "yes - no - maybe" only (for users) - so they are sortable later

HumanCompiler
Compiling humans...and code

Scott Bryen,

Online/Offline - It's something we've been talking about. We'll continue the discussion about it. I can't make any promises on it yet though.
Spell Checking - Done, just have to figure out the best way to show it in our UI.
Quick Reply - Have you tried out 10? We have a quick-reply type thing in there already. We're modifying it a bit in a couple weeks, but for the better. Let us know what you think. We sort of combined everything so quick reply is the only way to reply. Everyone wants to be quick, right?

Thanks, jamie! My name is Erik, btw...if you'd like something easier to type. Wink