Bit dead in here innit?

[krysjez]

I seem to have fallen out of the habit of checking ca frequently - but the new site just loads sort of slowly and feels...bulky. sluggish. (still loving the multi upload though). But popped back in and updated my sb after seeing that email about the new gallery subsite.

So how is everyone?

[Nemome]

The site just came back online after 2 weeks downtime due server upgrade.
Right now it's still all buggy and stuff like that, but I'll get sorted out within the next few days.

Th best thing I can suggest is to stay patient and wait til everything works again.
Thanks!

Nemome~

[Black Spot]

We're all spiffing - I'd suggest a naked pillow fight if anyone is up for it.

[Stoat]

Ooohhhh, no. Please. I don't want anyone seeing my naked pillows.

[Candra H]

So are you guys actually back then?

[Nemome]

Yeah, seems like we're actually back again.
Still some weird stuff to fix (avatars, some bold text all over the place, ...), but the overall site is working again.

[Black Spot]

Okay Stoat, I'll let the pillows wear bikinis like beach volleyball - both male and female ones

[Dusty]

I agree with the original post. I don't like how everything seems so much "bigger". It's not just CA, though. It seems like every site has LARGE SQUARES everywhere. It feels like Myspace after they had their revamp. I guess it must be some kind of trend that web designers just love to death, but I prefer the old, normal-sized message board formats.

This feels like I just held down CTRL+Mousewheel and upsized the browser by 2-3 points.

Not only that, but it feels like CA has bee in constant "updates" for awhile now. I remember hearing this "we just got back online - please be patient" thing just last year sometime, too. I won't say I dislike CA.org. I couldn't ever say that, but I do notice that I have completely stopped participating in discussions.

And it's actually not because of the recent drama! It's just because the place feels somewhat alien.
Take that feedback for what it's worth.

[Black Spot]

The boards will stay pretty well as they are. It took a lot to upgrade the old ones to the new, and I know the add-ons are somewhat alien currently, but so pretty. The server failure nearly scuppered everything.

[hitnrun]

The boards will stay pretty well as they are. It took a lot to upgrade the old ones to the new, and I know the add-ons are somewhat alien currently, but so pretty. The server failure nearly scuppered everything.

So I'm the only person who doesn't like that every time I post in a discussion, my avatar appears on it? I don't really want a long line of MY avatar (mostly because it's one REALLY old drawing) because I posted in 10 threads.

I dunno if I like the site the way it is or not. Either way, it doesn't really matter I guess.

One bug I have noticed: Every time I post a reply, the buttons at the bottom, like "edit" "Reply with quote" and the other one seem to overlap with other buttons - making none of them clickable because they're so close together, I cannot distinguish which spot actually clicks what the button I want clicked.

[Vulgar`]

I agree with the original post. I don't like how everything seems so much "bigger". It's not just CA, though. It seems like every site has LARGE SQUARES everywhere. It feels like Myspace after they had their revamp. I guess it must be some kind of trend that web designers just love to death, but I prefer the old, normal-sized message board formats.

This feels like I just held down CTRL+Mousewheel and upsized the browser by 2-3 points.

Not only that, but it feels like CA has bee in constant "updates" for awhile now. I remember hearing this "we just got back online - please be patient" thing just last year sometime, too. I won't say I dislike CA.org. I couldn't ever say that, but I do notice that I have completely stopped participating in discussions.

And it's actually not because of the recent drama! It's just because the place feels somewhat alien.
Take that feedback for what it's worth.

This. We appreciate that you guys are trying, but basically you drop the ball too much.

[chevy28360]

I'm fine with the update personally. The only thing I dislike is that the picture posts are thumbnails now. Now when I want to peruse someones sketchbook or whatnot I have to lean forward and squint to see anything. Having to manually click each picture to see if it's something I want to look at in the first place is pretty aggravating.

[Black Spot]

http://forums.conceptart.org/showthr...21#post3691021

[kamikazel33t]

I am also fine with the update as well. The only issue I have with the new skin is the that I can't see the link text in my profile when I view my posts or friends posts as well as subscriptions in my profile. I think it may be something to do with my monitor since other people I've talked to could see it but barely. It would be pretty easy to change the color of links on the new skin wouldn't it? I've also attached a screenshot of what I mean, for now I am using the older skin until such things have been fixed.

[Ian Barker]

I'm fine with the update personally. The only thing I dislike is that the picture posts are thumbnails now. Now when I want to peruse someones sketchbook or whatnot I have to lean forward and squint to see anything. Having to manually click each picture to see if it's something I want to look at in the first place is pretty aggravating.

Yeah, this is terrible. I'm still not sure why some images show as thumbnails and others don't, but it makes for a very poor experience.

[Nemome]

The image uploader should work again and the images are also being displayed in full size!
No more crappy small icons to click on first.

Next: Getting the avatars back. : )

[chevy28360]

Yay!! Sorry for the earlier post, I thought the thumbnail thing was just how it was now. *whew*

[Candra H]

The image uploader should work again and the images are also being displayed in full size!
No more crappy small icons to click on first.

Next: Getting the avatars back. : )

Heh. Never mind naked pillows, I feel naked without my avatar.

Uploader working fine now for me, and it's good to see you guys back, if a little underdressed. Just hope this is going to be the last big hiccup because it does get annoying after a while, not being able to visit the site and hang out and chat etc.

[triggerpigking]

I thought C.A was still down when ever I went to the site I kept getting to some sorta sample page (thought it was some sorta placeholder while they updated)which then linked me to the workshop, only noticed the forum link on the workshop page now and I feel like an idiot.

[Widdershins]

I only just noticed the forums were up again! just updated Sketchbook and all the attachments are still there, but avatars aren't showing up anywhere :/

[Nemome]

This. We appreciate that you guys are trying, but basically you drop the ball too much.

You can also switch back to the old skin as well - "Child of ConceptArt NEW" at the bottom of the page (drop down menu). ; )
I am currently using the old one as well, but it basically comes down to your taste.

[Dusty]

You can also switch back to the old skin as well - "Child of ConceptArt NEW" at the bottom of the page (drop down menu). ; )
I am currently using the old one as well, but it basically comes down to your taste.

Thank you, that actually does help me out.
It feels a lot better and even seems to load faster.

[mitcooz]

I don't know if anyone's noticed, but more people are actually posting on the FB page than they are here. If you ever notice now there might be 1.5- 2k daily people on the forums, but less than 10% of them are actually registered. I mean its even more dead than before the massive downtimes. I thought this "massive" upgrade was meant to bring people back. I mean wasn't it better to just update the site then relaunch it with all the features ready and working, now its just easier for people to login to FB and post there, and they have absolutely no incentive to even to use this site, when all you have to do is spend 30 secs posting on FB. I used to love this site alot, but with all the massive downtime's, I am just woundering what has really happened to the site?. I think you guys really dropped the ball against Cghub big time, I mean their tools for browsing images on the actual MAIN site, finding artists and just user experience tools they have on the site are pretty damn amazing. A year ago their forums were dead, but now they have even more people using them than ever before.

What the hell happened?

[Black Spot]

While it might be nice to post your stuff on the FB page, you don't get that much critique there. The FB page is mainly for arse pats.

And I don't see a slow down in posts in the sketchbook forum.

[mitcooz]

While it might be nice to post your stuff on the FB page, you don't get that much critique there. The FB page is mainly for arse pats.

And I don't see a slow down in posts in the sketchbook forum.

Well isnt that what the SB section is well, more ass patting, because anything even remotely negative said is shot down, or anything remotely approaching a critique.

I am not even talking about the SB section anyway.

The fact less than 10% of users are logging in, and the majority remain just browsers, or post on FB shows how CA dropped the ball. 1 year ago 12k people. The site feels dead excluding the ass patting, and lets show how cool I am SB section.

There is much much less quality work even being shown in the SB thread than ever before.

What happened to the site and its upgrades?. I am not trying to take the piss or be negative, but lets be brutally honest here.

More people are using cghub now than ever before, and more people are posting as actual industry professionals than ever before on their main site. So I ask again when are the upgrades or any users tools coming like what they have on Cghubs main site?

I am not trying to use this as a cghub v CA discussion, but since all the downtime of this site I have been using Cghub more and more, and if for nothing else its excellent gallery section and the tools associated with finding images, and users etc etc in the image site. A year ago I really couldn't even give a flying toss about cghub because all I ever saw was a dead forum, but then i discovered the discussion and comments were in their image gallery section. Now I am not saying this site needs to turn into that but what I am asking is how is this site going to be getting back to what it once was, or actually just evolving. I don't expect this or any site to have 12k registered users online ever again, but I really would like to know how the site is going to evolve and maybe emerge from its disastrous few months.

[Black Spot]

Yes, we are aware that the down time has harmed CA; the server failure happened probably at the worst time just when numbers were slowly recovering. Having all the discussion off the boards, means that a lot of people miss out on them, which (as you've just discovered them) means that all discussion becomes more insular. I don't know about you, but in the SBs I leave comments that either encourage or make suggestions for further improvement - I don't give ass pats that often and expect the same. We're here to learn, and confining posting to a gallery that doesn't get much traffic can make you hide away and not face what you require to learn.

There are a lot of things coming which I can't tell you about, but they'll blow your socks off. First, the site needs to be stable so people aren't worrying about down time any more. This has been made the first priority.

And there's room for more than one art forum in the www

[mitcooz]

Yes, we are aware that the down time has harmed CA; the server failure happened probably at the worst time just when numbers were slowly recovering. Having all the discussion off the boards, means that a lot of people miss out on them, which (as you've just discovered them) means that all discussion becomes more insular. I don't know about you, but in the SBs I leave comments that either encourage or make suggestions for further improvement - I don't give ass pats that often and expect the same. We're here to learn, and confining posting to a gallery that doesn't get much traffic can make you hide away and not face what you require to learn.

There are a lot of things coming which I can't tell you about, but they'll blow your socks off. First, the site needs to be stable so people aren't worrying about down time any more. This has been made the first priority.

About the gallery thing, yeah I don't expect the site to be like that, was just woundering how the site would evolve and emerge abit like ashes of alar(wow), and since you have just said there are things coming that will blow my socks of. I will defer to your greater knowledge on the matter.

I wait in hope the site comes back better than ever. Thanks

[Jason Manley]

You all are the best.

The updates to the site were to have been completed, including a massive upgrade to the system, but we were sideswiped with two hardware failures on brand new servers over the past weeks (which is not a ball drop but was horrible to deal with I know). I won't even get into the feeling I had coming home to find a tornado had essentially blown down the neighborhood just as I was putting the paint on everyones new houses so they could cut the ribbon and see the dream makeovers. Since then, we have been rebuilding and reconnecting the power and getting the water running again so we can start releasing the new stuff. Thanks for bearing with us. It is happening.

The key to making this place better is to give everyone a lot more reasons to post and to log in, and to make sure that experience is bug free and smooth as silk. It also needs to be things that help artists do the things they need to do to be successful...not just help show off or showcase or promote..or get ass pats. We are doing exactly that. We have programmers on this every day. Progress is being made. That much I am certain. I am watching it daily. We cannot install the new stuff though til we finish fixing all the little bugs that you all hate as much as I do. It is coming though. I work every day and night to see people are getting things fixed up and making life better.

We put up a viral viewer for you to toy with and share work on http://gallery.conceptart.org is the link. We will open it up more once we finish up the basics here and complete beta testing with it. Then comes the tools and features. If you want to help make things better, please do post work so we can watch for error messages and make adjustments too. That includes here on the forums. That would be super helpful.

The best thing folks can do is keep posting and sharing knowledge. When you see what we are working on you will know why. Soon...


Jason

[Jason Manley]

btw..the login issue is in part due to a bug we fixed with logging in. Those numbers will increase as folks log in again.

[Candra H]

The updates to the site were to have been completed, including a massive upgrade to the system, but we were sideswiped with two hardware failures on brand new servers over the past weeks (which is not a ball drop but was horrible to deal with I know). I won't even get into the feeling I had coming home to find a tornado had essentially blown down the neighborhood just as I was putting the paint on everyones new houses so they could cut the ribbon and see the dream makeovers. Since then, we have been rebuilding and reconnecting the power and getting the water running again so we can start releasing the new stuff. Thanks for bearing with us. It is happening.

Haha. Fair enough. Fucking technology, eh?

That gallery thing looks cool by the way. What's it for?