15 replies to this topic

[wimg]

Dearest Members & Visitors to the little Fountain Pen Nut house on the digital prairie,

 

New Search Engine
As many of you are probably aware, the search engine of FPN is not the most powerful of all, essentially because it makes use of resources on our somewhat limited server only.

 

You will be pleased to hear that you now can use an integrated version of Google Search here on FPN, which has been set up as the standard search engine, within the FPN Search facility. The normal search engine is still available too, you just need to click on any of the other options available. You will notice that searching is much faster, and will also allow searching on small words and character combinations which weren't possible at all before .

 

In short, Google with all its power right here on FPN .

 

Small Changes to Forum Layout

The premium Accounts options have proved to be a great success, as we can now fully pay for hosting, licenses and support from donations received and Premium Accounts revenues. This is great news indeed. 

 

Having said this, the however follows immediately after, of course . As you also may have noticed, the board is really slow these days. We have a lot of simultaneous visitors, which is good, but it does mean our server is running on its toes all the time.

 

In order to get any better response time, faster page load speeds and such, we need to upgrade. Therefore, we wanted to bring The Mall, the forum specifically dedicated to our Premium Account holders, to the fore, to encourage its use and to encourage the use of Ruby, Emerald and Diamond memberships.

 

We have taken bringing The Mall to the fore literally, by moving up the forum to first spot in the Marketing & Sales category, and by moving up the entire category to its new place, right underneath the General Pen Topics Category. Please keep on frequenting it, it has grown quite a bit since its inception, take out a Premium Account yourself , or even both . The more Premium Account holders, the merrier, and it will also make it possible to improve the service for our Community, such as a much needed upgrade of our hosting package.

 

We have also removed one of the two Classifieds links, as only one is really needed after all, and we moved one no longer active forum to History - it served its purposes (FPN LE Pens).

 

Donations

We have also found a solution for some of the problems we encountered with a new donation option, namely that of the Iridium Supporter, which was discussed in Community Feedback. So over the next few days, or possibly even sooner, we will enable this option too. Effectively it means one can donate and make that visible, by a new Group logo, a special badge on each post, and an Iridium background to one's Member ID (user name) in the list(s) of browsing users. Furthermore, PM box will be twice its normal size for the group of supporters as a thank you for supporting us. The extra indicators and the increased size of the PM box will stay for a period of 6 months after the donation. It will still be possible to donate the normal way too, for those who want to stay anonymous. Those of you who donated in the last 6 months and want to make use of this option too, may contact me so I can activate these extras for you too. 

 

Do note that the Iridium Donation option will only be available for Gold Members due to restrictions in the software.

 

Anyway, so far these updates. Enjoy!

Warmest regards, Wim

On behalf of 
The FPN Admin and Moderator Team

 

[RMN]

Well, look who has been busy....

 

I am still not sure if I want to walk around with a badge "DONATER", but I would like the extra PMs

 

What happens after 6 months with the PMs???

 

 

Search facility is nice.

 

Any news on a new decoration to the library?

 

 

D.ick

[RMN]

Search is not working properly. I get a pop-up window, only showing the top two listings without possibility to access the lower listings.

The window is stuck and window navigation does not work properly.

 

D.ick

[wimg]

Search is not working properly. I get a pop-up window, only showing the top two listings without possibility to access the lower listings.

The window is stuck and window navigation does not work properly.

 

D.ick

Hi D.ick,

 

I'd suggest a clearing of browser cache etc. It works fine for moderators and admins with any browser on any device .

 

Warm regards, Wim

[wimg]

Well, look who has been busy....

 

I am still not sure if I want to walk around with a badge "DONATER", but I would like the extra PMs

 

What happens after 6 months with the PMs???

 

 

Search facility is nice.

 

Any news on a new decoration to the library?

 

 

D.ick

 

As to the Library, its status is as follows.

 

Board Index: done.

Forum Views: done.

Topic Views: done.

Quick and Full Editors: done.

 

Lots of new stuff and additions and lot of other stuff partly done (Blog, Calendar, Members, etc.), and work is currently being carried out on all the different hover pop-ups.

 

It appears to be a pain to do considering the changes to the entire structure and code...

 

Do note that earlier only the Board Index was done .

 

Warm regards, Wim

[RMN]

Hi D.ick,

 

I'd suggest a clearing of browser cache etc. It works fine for moderators and admins with any browser on any device .

 

Warm regards, Wim

Works now.

 

The bottom line with the numbers to the next pages was off the screen.

It's visible now.

 

D.ick

[wimg]

Works now.

 

The bottom line with the numbers to the next pages was off the screen.

It's visible now.

 

D.ick

Sounds like a browser problem, which it then cleared itself - that's good.

 

It happens sometimes . I tend to press F5 and/or Ctrl-F5 a couple of times when things like this happen - that usually clears the wrongly displayed window, and that on any website, BTW.

 

Warm regards, Wim

[RMN]

Sounds like a browser problem, which it then cleared itself - that's good.

 

It happens sometimes . I tend to press F5 and/or Ctrl-F5 a couple of times when things like this happen - that usually clears the wrongly displayed window, and that on any website, BTW.

 

Warm regards, Wim

Probably has to do with the relatively narrow (height) screen, together with a 120% magnification setting... the poor eyes, you know...

 

But perhaps you could change the start-of point of the pop-up window a bit higher on the screen?  Now there's a lot of space up top, and non below??

 

 

D.ick  

[wimg]

Probably has to do with the relatively narrow (height) screen, together with a 120% magnification setting... the poor eyes, you know...

 

But perhaps you could change the start-of point of the pop-up window a bit higher on the screen?  Now there's a lot of space up top, and non below??

 

 

D.ick  

I'll check that - need to do that on Google, I think; no settings for this on FPN.

 

Warm regards, Wim

[kpyeoman]

Looks great -- thanks, guys!

[OleOle]

I'm trying to find out more about the Premium Account options but when I click the red-green-blue button at the top of the page, it asks me to check back soon.

 

I'm happy to check back later but was also wondering if this information was collated elsewhere please?

 

Thanks very much!

[pakmanpony]

Went right to it for me just now. May want to try again.

[OleOle]

Thanks very much for checking Perry, much appreciated.

 

I'm not exactly sure why I cannot view the Premium Accounts content, I've cleared my cache manually and used CCleaner to clear it systematically and tried to view it on Firefox and Opera browsers. Could it be that because I'm a new member I don't somehow have authorisation to visit that page?

 

Anyway, I don't want to cause any work for you at all, quite the contrary, so I'll just keep checking over the next few weeks and perhaps things will be different after thirty days and I'm no longer a Bronze member?

 

Just thought I should let you know and provide some detail as I wouldn't want you missing out on any potential sales.

 

Thanks again for checking Perry and no need to 'do anything', I'll check back again later when I'm not so fresh on the forum, that might magically fix my problem.

 

All the best,

 

OleOle

[wimg]

I'm trying to find out more about the Premium Account options but when I click the red-green-blue button at the top of the page, it asks me to check back soon.

 

I'm happy to check back later but was also wondering if this information was collated elsewhere please?

 

Thanks very much!

Actually, you need to be a Silver member to be able to check out the premium accounts. This means you have to be registered for 30 days here, progress is automatic .

 

I hope you don't mind waiting too much, and if you do after all, contact me backchannel, and I can provide you with some information.

 

HTH, warm regards, Wim 

[OleOle]

Ahh, that makes sense, I thought it would be a situation like that. Thanks very much for letting me know.

 

I'm happy to wait three or four weeks for Silver Membership to kick in. Time flies when you're having fun and I haven't received the three pens I have on order yet to replace my lost Parker... it was the quest for information on possible replacements that led me to this forum, so it seems sensible to wait until I receive them at the very least. I feel it would be more appropriate, rather than 'joining a cycling club without a bicycle', I'll wait until I have pens-in-hand, if only to provide some semblance of justification

 

Thanks very much indeed for the clarification, it is gratefully appreciated.

[wimg]

It's a pleasure, OleOle, and thank you for your understanding and your sense of humour!

 

Warmest regards, Wim