h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

I'm sure most (if not all) of you will have seen the Beta Version of the new h2g2.

Although I think the new h2g2 Front Page looks great, I can't say this goes for the Post FP as well.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/h2g2/beta/entry/thepost

I guess we'll have to work on a new layout, but naturally, we'll have to wait until the new h2g2 version goes live.

Then again, I'm not sure if it's worth going on in the first place.

The plan is, to have a link to the Post on the FP ONCE per week.

If you see that Ask H2G2 has a very dominant position, and that, by the looks of it, the Useless Facts Thread may have a permanent link (and is very prominent, too), both of which are conversation threads where nobody puts in a minute of work, whereas a lot of people put in hours each week to produce the Post, this is extremely frustrating.

I am very pleased, that so far various people have required to have a permanent link to the Post on the new Front Page. If you'd like to support the cause, you can do so here:

F77636?thread=7874056&latest=1

Thank you.


Bel

It might look better once all the GuideML tags work - if we are indeed meant to keep using them instead of HTML or similar.

ALIGN="CENTER" doesn't seem to work at the moment.

GB.


Bel

Ti, that's why I said we'll have to wait until everything works. Pullquotes don't seem to be supported any more, and the formatting is not the only thing that looks bad atm, but the whole page is too pale, if you know what I mean.

No idea what you mean, but that's probably because I use Plain skin - everything looks pale in it!

I mean that it is white page on a white background, and the first part which has a right-hand border isn't oo bad, but you have to scroll down endlessly, and where the side bar ends, there is not contrast at all.

White page on white background, like in Alabaster?
<./>thepost?skin=alabaster</.>

Worse, because they now only use half of the screen, and you have to scroll down for ages. Apparently, it is not planned to fix the layout for even a normal screen. It's probably nice on mobile phones, though.

Every time you find a tag that doesn't work, please report it by opening a new conversation on the Beta Feedback page. That way, it won't get forgotten.

I've already reported , , and the special characters codes such as &frac; &aacute; etc.

ALIGN and PULLQUOTE reported.

I had a quick look, and it is funny I wouldn't know where to find 'Ask the h2g2 community' here, but I couldn't find The Post over there...

I don't mind the look of the beta site - more like the Beeb homepage - but it definitely has a different flavour to it in terms of the relationship to the content.

There's a specific Post thread on the Read only Beta page, so any requests are probably best posted there as it's focussed:

F19283566?thread=7875680

It makes sense putting the focus on Ask. It's an open community for newbies, and not as "intimidating" as the Post.

Now I need to explain intimidating.

When I was a newbie, The Post seemed like something for more established, "important" researchers. I know that's not the case, but I'm talking first impressions. Hell, even when I wrote for the post, it was three or four years before I had a column of my own that I'd not inherited. Ask's different. It's the natural first port of call for newbies, and the main community area. It makes sense that it's put front and centre.

With the new layout, I'd expect to see the Post get star billing on a Monday - a big "advert", right in that central box. The prime real estate on the page.

Sure, I'd like to see a permanent link through, but I can see why it's been omitted.

Oddly, I just did that - before I came here and read your suggestion

Thank you.

Psycorp, I didn't object to Ask having a permanent link, I object to the Post having none.

I know, but space on that front page is limited - I can see why they've used Ask as the main community link as opposed to The Post.

They could add it under the 'From the Editors' box without a problem, I dare say.

Here's what the eds just posted on the beta feedback thread:

>>Hi lil and all. Please don't worry about the absence of The Post on the new front page. We've earmarked a spot on the Main Promo Box to promote the latest issue. We've said 'at least once a week' for now but the likelihood is that it will be there a lot more often.

The Main Promo Box is incredibly flexible to manage - it's been designed that way - and what you see at the moment is static simply because we can't devote the time to changing it while we prepare the full version of the site. Nothing has been set in stone about it, we'll see how it works in practice when we're using it more. But in reality The Post will end up having a far greater prominance on the front page than it ever has before, when it features on the promo box. Traffic from the link as it currently stands on the front page is very low - the new promo should hopefully boost that (we've also had some natty branding designed for it, to go with our new designs.)

Hope that allays your fears somewhat. cheerup <<

So, in light of the eds having always been very supportive, we'll just have to trust them in this, I guess.

Those who need a link could maybe post one on your PS once the guide ml for the new version will be fixed? That is, if you don't have a Post reporter Badge anyway, cause that one will always bring you directly to the latest issue (well, it does now).

I never realised how bad we look in Alabaster.

As long as people can find , I imagine we can figure out the new form of markup language and get on with it.