As you have all seen there is a new Halo CE Maps website. I took some time out of my vacation period and spent it on something for you guys. There were two major objectives in the redesign: 1) to clean up and redo hastily written code from 4 years ago and 2) place the troubleshooting tips in a more prominent position.

As far as the first objective: the entire back end code, HTML and styles were redone. The new system better facilitates the User rating system and also the Download counters. You will notice that the counter does not increment after each download but instead updates from the archive each night. Downloads are posted 1 day behind. As more detailed download data is accumulated we will be able to display popular files by week and month.

The user rating system now requires a true average that requires a minimum number of ratings to be used. The rating averages are used to make suggestions on each file detail page. The matching algorithm looks at all the people who rated this map and finds the other high rated maps they rated as well. So your rating is used to help others. In the case of no matches a selection of top picks are shown based on user ratings. So Take some time and go back and rate some of the older maps to better improve the suggestions.

The support section is now displayed on the home page so people can better find answers to their support questions. People in the forum can now more easily direct people to the support section instead of giving them a hard time. I hope this will reduce the number of emails we receive for help, but I doubt it.

The new layout is much more flexible and will allow me to more easily add new features in the future. I am sure some will not like it, sorry I just couldn’t do a dark background and feel right about it, and since this is a high traffic site the design has been optimized for bandwidth using a minimal number of image files.

Let me know what you think, I may not do anything about your concerns but I will listen nonetheless. Also look for more changes to the Halo Maps family of websites in the near future.

Dennis
Webmaster

I have been wanting a new look for the halo ce maps page for quite some time actually. The old layout was okay but lacked something. It just felt old or something. I am totally pleased with the new look.

the rateing system actually works correctly, the site looks really clean and professional. The text also stands out more. And i love how you put all the article links there. this should help some.

I kinda liked the old look..... Its probably cuz I'm so used to it though....

White backround and font are my only things. Other than that, its nice. Font seems changed, if its the same, then its just that completely white backround.... Some shade of color would be nice, even if it wasn't much...
Edited by Caboose117 on Dec 20, 2007 at 06:27 PM

Its the missing the side menu with the newest files (your picture new map system doesnt look like it will work with any uploaded files other than maps, so what if someone uploads scripts?..) the font also seems to give it a odd feel..

hmm..make the picture quality for the previews better...its really hard to make out some things and its really blury...it strains my eyes

that's why you click on the picture. the new system takes less time to load.

the white background is also my only complaint. its just so bland.

In the forums index, the "read before posting" section discription has "Will"
speeled wrong.

This forum contains the rules and regulations for using this forum. It also wil answer most of the commonly asked questions. Before posting read the messages here

It drives me crazy..

like you "speeled" that word wrong? sorry, i couldn't resist

Edited by SiMuLaCrUm on Dec 20, 2007 at 08:53 PM

In order to keep the display boxes the same size I had to limit the character length of the titles. Some titles get cut off.
I hope it does. I am entering my busy season and will not have as much time to help people. My thought was that if the answers are on the home page…. Only time will tell.
A place holder image will be displayed if there isn’t one for it.
I am still working on the balancing act of image sizes. The better/larger the image the more bandwidth it consumes and bandwidth equals cost. The original design was going to do away with the popup 800px images and just have the 120px and 200px images. I am still considering it as an option. I will wait and see how many people use the pop-up compared to before.
The most popular by month list will show the current month and the previous month on the home page. Since this is the first month I am tracking the dates on downloads the list shows the most popular of all time because the download counts were imported this month. Next month the current month will display properly. It will take until February before it all works out.
Thanks I never noticed that. Fixed.
The letter filter is gone for the moment and the size filter is now in the main menu. I hadn’t enabled it in the DB until a little while ago. I will consider adding the letter filter back as or in its place a “jump to page” option.

It's nice that there's a pic for the new additions, that should save having to click thorugh each one only to find bloodgulch mods ;)

Are you going to bring all the banners into line? (the order of links is different from halomaps home, to hce.halomaps.org, to the forums).

otherwise, it looks nice (though a slightly paler white would have been less glary on hce.halomaps, it looks a tad unprofessional in my eyes).