(Hope this is in the right forum and prefix)

 

Kicked off a new XFcloud instance yesterday, and spent part of the day hitting the basic settings.

 

I decided on a niche domain. One I will explain later but is something that I will find fun and entertaining.

 

I used the case study prefix to indicate it is a fresh project posting as-i-go type format.

Nice! Looking forward to read more. Keep us updated, as silly as it may be. :D

Well I dunno about the career part lol.

 

Spent the last couple of days setting up the look n feel layout. Basing the style off of default dark styling. Avoiding all template edits except for extra.less of course. Minimal add-ons hopefully. And setting up forum structure and perms.

 

My goal is to make upgrades and updates as easy as possible, and as user friendly as possible.

 

Aside from base colors, I am going to save putting lipstick and eye candy for later.

Is what the niche is going to be a secret for now?

Is what the niche is going to be a secret for now?

Yes temporarily unfortunately. I have only worked a little on esthetics so far, so it ain't much to look at. Plus it's offline at the moment.

Ok, have the functionality, basic layout, feature set, forum schema, forum/staff/member permissions completely gone through. I cant say everything is perfect, but I have a good baseline of what I want and can go from there.

 

I am still running a stock color dark scheme, minus some alterations, no template edits, minus extral.less.

 

But, my worst skill, getting imagery and eye candy right. This will take some work on my part.

 

Meanwhile building up some content.

But, my worst skill, getting imagery and eye candy right. This will take some work on my part.

Worst part of the journey for me.

Well, not necessarily satisfied, but I needed something up there to give it some sense of a look. So I have a header image now, but I feel it will be replaced soon.

 

I opened it up today to the public, just to help hammer out any bugs and getting a simple load test. Verifying my cloudflare and analytics settings are properly setup and communicating.

OK, all seems to look good short of a real-world shakeout and load test.

 

As I suggested, I finally opted to go with a niche that I find both entertaining and fun. I did not go full open topic as as said, as is a bit overdone and doesn't do it for me. So I went with a couple domain names that I haven't had any real application for since buying them in a basket of names. So, I hope its entertaining at least.

 

I decided to make a base look and feel using the oem style and template layouts. No template edits, some style property edits, and a smattering of addons that help with my objectives. I want to make updates as smooth and easy as possible. I really need a new header image though, the placeholder image right now is just temporary to get some imagery on the site. I want to avoid too much imagery as it seems too busy to look at, so just basic forum icons.

 

I went with a category-less design as I felt it cleaned up some real estate as well as the niche really doesn't need any.

 

Cleaned up and trimmed off a few unnecessaries just to make usability nicer.

 

The only content I have is what I have posted to at least put something everywhere so it isn't completely empty. But hell, the site is only a week online, and content is a lifelong endeavor.

 

So, I am getting there.

I’m looking forward to see the end result. :) I can also understand why you want to keep modifications basic for upgrade purposes.

Almost finished the first rendition.

 

Last layout change I need to figure out is how to get the header background image to display above the action nav bar only while in mobile responsive.

 

Having difficulties deciding If the opaque slow fade in and out of the register button that I added was depreciating to the site. I like it, and I think it looks cheezy.

Almost finished the first rendition.

 

Last layout change I need to figure out is how to get the header background image to display above the action nav bar only while in mobile responsive.

 

Having difficulties deciding If the opaque slow fade in and out of the register button that I added was depreciating to the site. I like it, and I think it looks cheezy.

I too like cheezy things. :P And it makes it noticeable, that's for sure!

I look forward to seeing the end result! This is fun, usually most people will create a forum in secret and maybe tell a few people about it before it's open to the public. Then they share links to these people, they start making posts and then it gets a grand opening. Or they make it, install themes, and promote it to the public.

Thank you.

Although I opened it to the public and have my basic theme and layouts done for the most part. I hesitate to post it publicly such as here for now as I currently have very few pages indexed and on the SERPs and the only other backlink would be from here. So I am waiting a bit to get some more content up and indexed and kinda test everything out first before slinging it out here. I look forward to it.

Is what the niche is going to be a secret for now?

Unfortunatly yes

It is classified:

top secret

I hope to push it out here soon, but there's so much to do and add content.

I decided to show you guys finally. You are peers so you will understand that it's only a month old and has very little content. Spent all month on the mechanics and lipstick and have to take a day or two break. But I am comfortable with the first style rendition and willing to put it forward.

 

Feel free to share your opinions, good or bad.

 

https://classifiedtopsecret.com/

I decided to show you guys finally. You are peers so you will understand that it's only a month old and has very little content. Spent all month on the mechanics and lipstick and have to take a day or two break. But I am comfortable with the first style rendition and willing to put it forward.

 

Feel free to share your opinions, good or bad.

 

https://classifiedtopsecret.com/

 

Great site!

 

The layout is nice and simple, the media gallery is a nice touch and the articles will be great once expanded upon. If I was going to make one criticism, it's that I would've perhaps added a bit more content in terms of more threads for people to want to sign up to reply to. Maybe you'll work on that after your short break. Overall, great job!

Header image is nice on mobile, but I'd sticky the nav bar on mobile*. You lose the ability to navigate easily (and see DMs and alerts) while farther down the page without having to scroll up.

Edited December 18, 2024Dec 18 by frm

Header image is nice on mobile, but I'd sticky the nav bar on mobile*. You lose the ability to navigate easily (and see DMs and alerts) while farther down the page without having to scroll up.

I coulda sworn that the navbar does stay sticky, but the header scrolls up and out.

Great site!

 

The layout is nice and simple, the media gallery is a nice touch and the articles will be great once expanded upon. If I was going to make one criticism, it's that I would've perhaps added a bit more content in terms of more threads for people to want to sign up to reply to. Maybe you'll work on that after your short break. Overall, great job!

Thank you. TBH, I just basically threw some content up to fill spaces and test out. I haven't focused much on that at all, but that's what's next.

The niche is somewhat unique, meaning it's not an everyday niche you venture across. The simplicity of the layout is quite nice and allows you to dive straight into the content. The header image is also quite appealing. For a new forum, I give you an A+!

The niche is somewhat unique, meaning it's not an everyday niche you venture across. The simplicity of the layout is quite nice and allows you to dive straight into the content. The header image is also quite appealing. For a new forum, I give you an A+!

Thank you! Yes it is a niche by all definitions. But that particular group has a great and dedicated following to the subject matter.

 

I designed the home page to direct traffic to their objectives. I don't want to confuse a guest visitor with a thousand links everywhere.

 

The navbar represents all 5 sections, and the home page reflects primarily subject matter subjects and minimal links to subject matter content, with site/member info on the sidebar.

 

Sometimes I feel I overthink things lol.

I have seen this niche tackled before but I think this is the most professional take I've seen yet.

 

The thing that I can't quite wrap my head around, as someone who is deeply, deeply cynical is whether this is more about popularising discussion for the purposes of legitmising or deconstructing what's been posted.

I have seen this niche tackled before but I think this is the most professional take I've seen yet.

 

The thing that I can't quite wrap my head around, as someone who is deeply, deeply cynical is whether this is more about popularising discussion for the purposes of legitmising or deconstructing what's been posted.

Thank you.

 

Obviously persons with no interest would not entertain themselves with visiting let alone joining. Maybe some.

 

I believe the site can cater to both deconstruct of the known and research, but legitimizing (or popularizing) discussion is typical and normal for a site like this. I think that can be said for many forums.

 

 

I don't expect I will be guiding members much in their posting style.

It can absolutely, but the reason I point it out is because I think I remember going to your site when you first posted and I remember seeing something about flat earth. (Correct me if I'm wrong but you seem to have cut that section now)

 

Something like that is an area of discussion my natural instinct is simply to deconstruct with the full weight of my knowledge, because there is no basis to it (much as the moon landing happened, it's beyond dispute), and in my mind no good comes of even giving air time to the debate of those topics unless that air time is deconstruction.