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The makers of the forum software Xenforo have announced a new version of the software will be released as beta soon. Judging from past releases, it will probably about 3 months from there to a final release.
Some of the major new features announced so far are:
Search Forums
These are a new way to group topics posted anywhere into virtual forums based on search criteria. This has some interesting implications in allowing one topic to be in multiple sections.
PWA (Progressive Web App)
Allows the site to be added to Android home screen like an app or as an app on your computer's desktop.
New Thread types
New types of thread can be posted : articles, questions, suggestions. These can be posted in general forums with mixed content or you can create specific forums for just articles, questions or suggestions which will enable different ways of viewing the topics based on their type.
Article threads have the first post displayed larger, with bigger limits on word count and image attachments, and are used for substantial, article-like posts. The article remains at the top of each page of the topic as you click though pages. The topic posts become more like comments on the original post. This has some potential.
Question threads are like Quora or StackExchange - you can post a question, people can propose answers, and the thread starter (or an admin) can choose a post as the best answer and mark it as the solution - and it will be placed next to the question as the official answer.
Suggestion threads are for making suggestions which can receive votes from users. Typical usage might be user's requesting new features for a program and then other users upvoting their favorites so developers can prioritise. Probably not obviously useful for this forum,
Editor and Attachment improvements
Some real improvements to the post editor and the handling of attachments, better post previews, and more.
User Profile Banners
Users will be able to upload a profile image of their choice which will make your profile page look nicer.
Users Write Posts Before Registering
This is a way to entice people into joining the forum. Guests can create a post without registering, but when they try to post it, they will be guided into registering. Having already invested time in creating the post should help push them into registering.
There are also a large number of behind the scenes changes which will be really awesome, like much improved mail support which should help with deliverability of forum emails, but these are probably of little interest to users
As soon as the beta is available I'll be upgrading a test copy of the forum and seeing what use (if any) can be made of these new features. I'll be inviting certain members to help me test. When there's something to show, I'll post some screenshots here for discussion.
Some of the major new features announced so far are:
Search Forums
These are a new way to group topics posted anywhere into virtual forums based on search criteria. This has some interesting implications in allowing one topic to be in multiple sections.
PWA (Progressive Web App)
Allows the site to be added to Android home screen like an app or as an app on your computer's desktop.
New Thread types
New types of thread can be posted : articles, questions, suggestions. These can be posted in general forums with mixed content or you can create specific forums for just articles, questions or suggestions which will enable different ways of viewing the topics based on their type.
Article threads have the first post displayed larger, with bigger limits on word count and image attachments, and are used for substantial, article-like posts. The article remains at the top of each page of the topic as you click though pages. The topic posts become more like comments on the original post. This has some potential.
Question threads are like Quora or StackExchange - you can post a question, people can propose answers, and the thread starter (or an admin) can choose a post as the best answer and mark it as the solution - and it will be placed next to the question as the official answer.
Suggestion threads are for making suggestions which can receive votes from users. Typical usage might be user's requesting new features for a program and then other users upvoting their favorites so developers can prioritise. Probably not obviously useful for this forum,
Editor and Attachment improvements
Some real improvements to the post editor and the handling of attachments, better post previews, and more.
User Profile Banners
Users will be able to upload a profile image of their choice which will make your profile page look nicer.
Users Write Posts Before Registering
This is a way to entice people into joining the forum. Guests can create a post without registering, but when they try to post it, they will be guided into registering. Having already invested time in creating the post should help push them into registering.
There are also a large number of behind the scenes changes which will be really awesome, like much improved mail support which should help with deliverability of forum emails, but these are probably of little interest to users
As soon as the beta is available I'll be upgrading a test copy of the forum and seeing what use (if any) can be made of these new features. I'll be inviting certain members to help me test. When there's something to show, I'll post some screenshots here for discussion.
