📢 Announcement: Layout changes

[Scottie Dog]

Likewise I'm happy with the idea, however I have one question and that is who will be able to create and/edit the news items? I've not had a chance to look in depth do accept my apologies if I'm being a little slow!!

 

[Aviador]

I'm still tinkering with the settings, but essentially only moderators will be able to create threads in them but members will be able to reply like in any other part of the forum.

 

[Aviador]

Hi there everyone, if you regularly read these forums I would like your views and opinions regarding the above change. I'm not prepared to roll the above change out throughout all the forums without a wider consensus of opinion.

So basically if you have a look at the Heathrow forum I have moved all the News Articles within the Heathrow forum to their own section. The new section is situated at the top of the Heathrow forum. If this is something you would like to see rolled out into your local airport forum please let me know. If not everything will stay exactly the same with the News Articles appearing within the airport forums. The idea behind this proposed change is to separate the standard forum threads from the News Articles.

Tell us what you think?

View attachment 15615

 

[TheLocalYokel]

I'm not clear about what is regarded as news and what isn't.

For example I would have placed the below latest BRS press release in the BRS forum's Infrastructure, Construction and Development thread - I was just about to actually.

State-of-the-art car rental centre opens at Bristol Airport

A £6.5 million development will open at Bristol Airport on Wednesday 11 December providing an enhanced and improved car rental centre. The new area will be home to all the on-site car rental companies based at the Airport, improving the experience for passengers wishing to rent a car on their...

www.bristolairport.co.uk

To me it's infrastructure news, and if I place it in a BRS news thread there is a danger of infrastructure news becoming fragmented. Do I look in the airport's news thread or in the airport's infrastructure thread if I want to read about the latest infrastructure matters?

What do I do with a press release from, say, easyJet that tells of x number of passengers being carried in period y from BRS? I would automatically put it in the BRS easyJet thread to maintain a comprehensive data base for all things easyJet at BRS, but it's still news about Bristol Airport.

I know there can be be problems when news is published about an airline's general plans, and sometimes someone will put the news release in a specific airport thread relating to that airline to discuss what it means to that airport, when it really ought to go into the airline's general forum. However, I'm not sure that putting the item in a news thread instead will eradicate that practice.

I presume the news threads would be for airports and not airlines (threads about airlines in general, not airlines at a specific airport which already contain specific threads for those airlines).

I'm just not sure that placing news releases in a specific news thread for an airport when there is already an approprate thread in existence in that airport's forum brings anything to the table. Have we not to be careful about doing something just because we can?

Furthermore, does it have to be a formal news item released by an airport or airport partner about that airport, or could it also relate to press articles bearing news about an airport? (Which they probably obtained from an airport or airline press release in the first place but presented it as their own article.)

As always, I'll go with the flow but I do have these reservations.

 

[Aviador]

There's no reason a press release can't continue to be posted within the current threads too. It isn't ideal to post them in two separate threads but it isn't possible to create a homepage article when its posted several pages into a thread, it has to be the opening post. That's been the main problem. What the above idea does is it enables us to separate press releases from the main threads. The Heathow forum was the worst because it issues so many press releases.

 

[Ashley.S.]

Personally, I don't like one big discussion thread, things start to get messy, especially if multiple news stories/press releases are made at once!

One solution could be to post it as a new thread (so it can feature on the homepage) and then in the huge discussion thread, say something like this:

Press Release
More Information: https://forums4airports.com/threads/4501/

 

[Aviador]

That is basically what is suggested. As for what constitutes a news story, well any official press release or something you write yourself that you regard as news worthy for the forum. (It fits within the news categories on the homepage)

The questions regarding this potential change make it seem far more complicated than it actually is. Having all "news" articles bundled together would also make it easier to locate older News items.

Anyway looking through the forum there are only around 5 airport forums which would benefit from the change. Heathrow (trial in progress); Manchester; Stansted; Gatwick and Birmingham.

If the Heathrow trial works well I can roll it out to other forums. Need not fear any changes, they are reversible.

 

[Foxlimayankee]

Personally I'm not a fan of there being a new thread for every news article. I find it clogs up the thread section and makes other threads harder to find down a long list. I would've thought that most news articles would fall under an already created thread or if not, fall under the general thread for that Airport.
That being said, I do also agree that many news articles can clog up a general thread.
I like the idea of an 'Airport news' thread but would it be better placed in the sticky thread section?
If it's at all possible maybe post the news article in the general or specific topic thread, but it links to the news thread rather than the actual article? Then the article can be opened from there and also can be discussed in the news thread?

 

[Aviador]

@Foxlimayankee that is the problem. If we only put News items into the main threads then we lose the homepage. That was my original intention but due limitations of the software it hasn't enabled us to do that.

 

[Aviador]

The feedback on this has been neither positive or negative so I think the only way tell is to try it out. I've now created news pages for Heathrow; Manchester and Gatwick with a view to adding more soon. Your feedback on this is greatly appreciated whether it be positive or negative. The change is fully reversible so nobody need worry if there's an overwhelming negative response.

 

[Aviador]

Hi guys the Portal homepage isn't functioning the way it should so I'm trying to create a new layout with 4 columns. At the moment I can't get them to align.

 

[JENNYJET]

Hoping it does not affect the simplicity of use of the site as I find it to be excellent.

 

[Aviador]

Agreed.

 

[Ashley.S.]

Hi all,

I've agreed in principal a new layout for the homepage with @Aviador. expect to see it in place within the next few days!

 

[Ashley.S.]

The new layout is live, let us know what you think and if you feel any changes may need to be made.

Thanks!

 

[TheLocalYokel]

I like the new layout. I think it's a bit less cluttered than before and provides an easy-to-read visual menu with a the superimposed headline over each visual making scrolling to find something of particular interest to an individual a simple task.

 

[Ashley.S.]

Glad you like it @TheLocalYokel you hit the nail on the head on what I was trying to achieve for @Aviador !

 

[Aviador]

Lovin' the new look. I hope you are too!?

 

[JENNYJET]

To be honest, I cannot see anything of note that is different, to me, a mark of efficiency and no detrimental effect. Great work, whatever it was!?!

 

[Ashley.S.]

To be honest, I cannot see anything of note that is different, to me, a mark of efficiency and no detrimental effect. Great work, whatever it was!?!

The blocks and articles on the homepage (https://forums4airports.com/) have been streamlined to just display the basic image and headline, rather than a mish-mash of text, images and links. No changes have been made to the forum index itself (https://forums4airports.com/forums/)