Links in the forums

[1992casey]

This idea just came up in a thread on the Major League Forum.

 

Is there a way to CSS the links in the forums to be able to make them be more obvious? Before the excellent upgrade to this site, links used to underline themselves when the user hovered over them. Color would be a nice touch.

[squarepusher]

I've got some CSS work i've been meaning to do in the forums (regarding the search page) anyway... i'll see if I can't knock it out this weekend.

[squarepusher]

fixed......

[colbyjack]

By fixed does that mean every single linkable thing on the forums is now underlined? I'm not sure if I'm the only one seeing this, given my internet problems lately, but I for one am not a big fan of underlining everything, it's very distracting. I don't mean to complain, since I realize you can't please everyone, but I'm curious to learn how other people feel about this. Usually when people provide a hidden link you can always try rolling over the text with your cursor to see if it's a link or not.

[squarepusher]

Unfortunately, links at EZBoard.com don't have styles associated with them, so it's all or nothing regarding their links. To be honest, I like the underlining because it's not always obvious to users what's a link and what's not a link.

[1992casey]

colby,

 

I agree that you're not going to please everyone. For instance, you'll see some out there who advocate underlining all links under all circumstances because that's traditional browser behavior. I'm not in that camp.

 

Given all or nothing, I'd go with all. It's always been obvious that the message lists are links; had there been the choice of leaving those alone, I might have done that. It's the links that users place in the posts themselves that get lost. I think rolling over everything in a message is too much work and user-unfriendly.

 

As Brian mentions, he has to deal with ezBoard and play by its rules. Given that he was to work within a preset group of parameters, I think he made the right choice.

[batman]

I'm sure we could get used to it, but I actually agree with Patrick. There are a couple of other things you could try that might look better:

 

A) Use a different color for links, like the dark blue used in the header/background/images/etc. This could also be used in combination with:

 

B) Use a:hover to add underlines and/or change the color of links when the user scrolls over them.

 

Together, that would look something like this:

 

a:normal, a:visited {

background: transparent;

color: #(whatever the code for that blue is);

text-decoration: none; }

 

a:hover, a:active {

background: transparent;

color: #(either the blue or a lighter blue);

text-decoration: underline; }

 

I think that might look spiffier while still making links apparent.

 

Just my $.02,

~Bill

[colbyjack]

I agree with Bill, in that I would use a different color if possible. It sounds as though the only problem really is the links hidden within text. Are there other links that are difficult to determine whether or not they are indeed a link?

 

I think rolling over everything in a message is too much work and user-unfriendly.

 

I don't expect everyone to run over their screens with their cursor as if they were reading cyber-braille, but as I mentioned, most people will say something like "read think link," with the word "link" linked to a different story/page. I often see people ask "what link?" when such a link is hidden, but to me it's pretty obvious (and not too long ago, it wasn't, as I'm not the most savvy of users).

 

Again, I don't think we should adjust everything because of one small problem, and users could also be more cognizant of this. Then again, I am a visual person, and little things often do disturb what I believe are pleasing aesthetic values.

[MassBrew]

Unfortunately, links at EZBoard.com don't have styles associated with them, so it's all or nothing regarding their links.

 

Here's a vote for nothing.

 

This might actually finally be a constructive reason to offer this up in a poll.

[batman]

I'd actually be down with nothing, too, if that's an option. Savvy ezBoard users can always manually add an underline, bold, or color to their links.

 

~Bill

[squarepusher]

I wish there were some sort of happy compromise. I really don't think our users should have to go out of our way to make links stand out, but having _everything_ underlined is god awful. Is there an alternative color we can use for links? The blue was mentioned, but will that really stand out enough to have an impact?

 

What I don't want is to have to drag my mouse over paragraphs to see if any words are links....

[colbyjack]

Savvy ezBoard users can always manually add an underline, bold, or color to their links.

 

Exactly. And if someone is savvy enough to figure out how to include such a link, we can just encourage them to add an underline.

 

I'm glad the underlining is bugging others as well. They need to go. People that want a hidden link checked out will take the time to bring it to people's attention in one form or another. If changing the color means changing the color of ALL of the linkable items, I would be against doing that as well.

[squarepusher]

Ok, i've made links blue and bold with an underline on the hover.... does that look alright?

[colbyjack]

The bold is less distracting than the underlining, but still pretty annoying. Can you try it just in the navy color it currently is, unbolded? I think with a good monitor, assuming you're not color blind, you'll see enough of a difference.

[squarepusher]

[ I think with a good monitor, assuming you're not color blind, you'll see enough of a difference. ]

 

Well, I have a good monitor, but unfortunately, I have a navy blue / black colorblindness problem. WIthout the links bolded, they look the same as the plain black text ot me....

 

EDIT: How about the maroon color, non-bolded?

[1992casey]

On my end, the way it currently sits, the blue doesn't stand out from the black. I'm assuming the blue is still there but the bold is gone.

 

For lack of another one, I've colored my links with a color approximating the background containing the main links at the top of the page (where it says About Us, Power 50, Link Report, etc.). Maybe that would work.

 

I like the underline on hover, but I'm not always fond of the text turning bold; sometimes that makes lots of stuff jump.

[1992casey]

Brian,

 

I think we cross posted because I didn't see your edit. Maroon might be good.

 

You know, you can put inline styles in link tags. Maybe you want to post a couple different samples. The only thing I wouldn't know how to do is a hover effect; I've never seen that done inline.

[batman]

I like this a lot better. I agree, try maroon (the color in the menu at the top). If neither of those is cool, I still think the hover is better than nothing or all underlines.

 

Thanks for playing around with it, Brian!

 

~Bill

[1992casey]

---

Again, I don't think we should adjust everything because of one small problem, and users could also be more cognizant of this. Then again, I am a visual person, and little things often do disturb what I believe are pleasing aesthetic values.

---

Given that you're responsible for the excellent graphic work on this site, I'm not surprised at all with that being your point of view. If I haven't mentioned it to you before, the way links work outside the forums is excellent, and much of that is due to your neat graphics.

---

I don't expect everyone to run over their screens with their cursor as if they were reading cyber-braille, but as I mentioned, most people will say something like "read think link," with the word "link" linked to a different story/page. I often see people ask "what link?" when such a link is hidden, but to me it's pretty obvious (and not too long ago, it wasn't, as I'm not the most savvy of users).

---

Honestly, I think there are a good chunk of users who find it a major accomplishment to be able to post a link at all. I think the site should show the links so it doesn't matter what kind of verbiage is chosen.

 

I could get really picky about stuff like how we're never supposed to use stuff like "here" and "click here" as link text: it really screws up screen readers. But that's really beyond the scope of this discussion. It's just an example to demonstrate that we need to expect links to be posted in numerous ways: kind of a Murphy's Law thing.

 

Brian makes a great point about color blindness. For standard visual browsers, the links do need to stand out.

[colbyjack]

Sorry Brian, I hope I didn't offend you with my comments.

 

Personally, I don't think this is big enough of an issue to change anything, to be completely honest with you. While it would be nice for links to show up better within posts, to me it doesn't change the content or quality of this site to be able to recognize such links. The above request would be one of those things that I would just chalk up to the users responsibility since ezboard doesn't allow you to decide what links are bold, blue, maroon, etc.

 

However, if you believe this is important enough to make such a change, go for it. If you want to try maroon, go for it. I prefer the way everything was before, but if it needs to be changed, change it in any way you see fit. You know me, the little things disturb just as big as the big things http://forum.brewerfan.net/images/smilies/smile.gif .

[dadofandrew]

I would have suggested this ages ago, but I didn't think you could make edits to EZBoard. The underline is excellent, but maroon would be fine too.

[whizkid]

I'd rank the choices so far 1) underline 2) nothing 3) the blue color. Speaking for the visually challenged, the blue makes the already small font more difficult to read. Maroon may work better. I did really like the underline but then I prefer function over form.

[1992casey]

colby,

 

I don't think anything's been written in this thread that should cause anyone to take offense.

 

whizkid,

 

I prefer function over form, too, but I think there's room in this case to accomodate both. Underline on hover seems to be a nice middle ground.

[1992casey]

I'm not offering an opinion here: I'm just providing something to look at. These are just color samples, not links. I didn't bother with underlining, figuring that it's a separate issue.

 

I made a suggestion to look at the color in the top navigation bar. Here it is (hex #7B0E0B):

Color in top navigation bar

Color in top navigation bar, bold

You can see that it's virtually identical to maroon (hex #800000):

Maroon

Maroon, bold

I don't know if this is what Brian is currently using, but here's Navy (hex #000080):

Navy

Navy, bold

[squarepusher]

[ Sorry Brian, I hope I didn't offend you with my comments. ]

 

Not in the slightest.... the only things that are offended are my rods and cones after changing link styles and colors multiple times yesterday.

 

The navy looks pretty good... the link color I actually have in place is closer to black than the navy color Casey has in his post.... To my eye, it's much easier to see that color than the current dark blue I have in place to signify links.