Having got the new site design built, installed, and pretty much debugged, I finally got to a project that has been on my todo list for ages: a video tour of AAC.
I edited viciously to keep it down to 5 minutes.
It’s mainly targeted at new members and those considering joining, but please have a watch anyway and tell us what you think in a comment.
I’m particularly interested to know if you learned anything new about how to use the site, and if so, what it was.
My thinking is that if you have been a member for a while, but still discover a new feature in the video, it might indicate that said feature is not intuitive enough and needs work.
Here it is:
I think it would be useful if the Table of contents/article list is the first thing you see when you click on a book. (Like a chapter list at the beginning of a real book). Currently if you’re looking for a specific chapter/article you have to click on a random one you don’t want and scroll to the bottom of it in order to access the table of contents.
Notwithstanding that minor inconvenience of an extra click and scroll, your website rocks!
Hi Pete,
That’s interesting since the TOC is exactly what we see when we click on a book cover: https://www.morganscloud.com/category/anchoring-mooring/online-book-anchoring/
So I think what might be the problem here is that said TOC is not succinct enough. This has been brought up before and something I’m thinking on.
In many ways the best solution might be a side bar with the TOC always visible, but the problem with that is that almost 50% of our readers use phones and so would not see the side bar. Anyway, I will think on it.
For now I think I will try adding “Table of Contents” to make it more clear, but I need to think on exactly how to do that too.
Question: Are you reading on a phone? I think that maybe we are not making clear on a small screen device that the first page is in fact a TOC.
Yeah I suppose that is a TOC of sorts. I was thinking about the list of chapters/articles in the big blue box that appears at the bottom of each article, that would be a useful thing to see when you click on the book cover. Sometimes I use a phone, sometimes a computer. The big detailed TOC you have now just takes a bit longer to find the thing you need, less of an issue on a computer than a phone I think.
Hi Pete,
You are right, better on computer. This is an interesting trade off between the needs of longer term members who know their way around, and new members, and prospective members, who want to see what’s available in some detail, particularly before joining. If we go too far in the former direction we won’t get enough new members to stay in business, but on the other hand pleasing those who have paid is vital. Not easy. That said, I have some ideas that I will experiment with on our testing site.
Sounds a bit like boats.. everything is a compromise
Hi John, I found thee audio a little wonky at times: like there was a loop over-dubbed. It was still understandable. Dick
Hi Dick,
Yes, that’s a result of my editing. The problem is that fundamentally I suck at this sort of thing, so I have to edit it with a lot of jump cuts to get rid of all my umms and errs, even though I had a rough script. Hopefully I will get better with practice.
The video was concise and informative. Overall, I appreciate the continuity of formatting throughout all the articles and tips—all are very well edited and have a distinct clean modern format.
I typically view on a mobile phone but sometimes a desktop. Feels seamless going between the two.
I’ve never read the disclaimer at the bottom of the page before today. After reading that, I’m never going to leave port again!
Hi Ben,
I do have a graphic imagination, no question! Thanks for the kind words on the site. Clean and modern, with continuity is exactly the goal here.
John: I receive the weekly digest e-mails. When I click on the link for the article I want to read, the article opens, but to complete reading it, I have to get past the pay wall – perfectly appropriate. However, after logging in, instead of going to the article I was reading I end up on a different page and have to search for the article. Not a huge deal, but irritating. Is it possible to fix this?
Hi Tim,
I know, very irritating, but unfortunately no fix I know or at least none that don’t have even more irritating side effects. That said, I will think about it again, now that we have got the new site design working.
In the mean time, two workarounds:
Hope that helps.
I’m sure this has been mentioned somewhere, but what I have difficulty with is remembering what topics I’ve commented on so I can go back to see the responses. As a new but active member, I often comment on very old threads. When I move on to a new thread (and invariably make a comment), I’ve lost my place. It would be helpful if you could search the site for your name and have all comments pop up.
Hi Jesse,
I have looked at that, and in fact at one point did some coding, but ran into some pretty severe performance issues with the third party plug in code that was supposed to index the comments, so shelved the project, so right now I don’t have a solution. That said, there is a good work around: Just subscribe to all answers to your comments, right after you make them. Look under Subscribe pull down menu on the comment form.