mobile bogley site?

[stefan]

disclaimer: not really trying to make waves or go over anyone head, just trying to get a sense of what others, especially regulars on bogley, think


i think it's time to reiterate my suggestion (sorry if i sound like a broken record) .... i think with increasing number smart phones/minicomputers with real web browsers, it would be helpful to develop a mobile bogley site, one that is stripped down and zippier downloading for the user and one that doesn't pull so much on the networks. also, with new tablet computers that include 3G chips, having a reduced bogley website could be beneficial and put bogley ahead of the curve.


just curious what others' thoughts are about this:


how often do you use bogley on your smart phone?
would you use it more if it downloaded faster?
would you post more if it were quicker/easier to post?
as a reduced version of the site, what is important to keep?



i think there are lots of things that could improve speed on a phone.

1. simpler formatting/graphics
2. lose the rotating banner (too small anyway),
3. suppress photos automatically but be able to click a text link or something to download and display an individual photo, or click another button to download all photos
4. a stripped down login page that only takes a second to load
5. a stripped down posting page with only the essentials so it doesn't take more than a second to load. emoticons shouldn't come up automatically but should be clicked to appear of one desires to use them.

otherwise bogley's pretty rocking on the iphone.


also, i feel i should say that i realize there is a ton of work that goes into bogley and working on a mobile version would probably be an added headache and time consuming. i sincerely appreciate all the work scott and justin and others put into the software/security/server/content side of all this and don't really want to add to the incredible amount of time they volunteer as it is. a lot of social networking stuff has been done for bogley (i understand), but i think a mobile version of the site is another avenue that would be progressive for the bogley community.

[blueeyes]

i access bogley on the my touch constantly through out the day... pretty much anytime i am sitting with nothing to do... i can find some interesting thread to read

i wish i could upload pics directly from my mytouch to Bogley that would be my one wish, oh and that it was easier to select a page in a thread... the numbers are so tiny on the mytouch i often select the wrong one or a different thread all together

i love the pics, yes sometimes it is a pain loading them on the mytouch

i don't know that i would post more because i find typing on the mytouch to be a horrible experience, fine for texting but not typing out full paragraphs

[Iceaxe]

Before we begin.... I will say that easy to view pictures and video (without the need to click anther link) was one of the main things that made Bogley so popular/successful....

I seldom if ever view anything on the web from my phone.... IMHO.... the web is still to slow and clumsy to be enjoyable.... even on the best of smart phones.

I'm usually on Bogley purely for entertainment value.... Bogley (and other forums) is what I do instead of video games, knitting or gardening.... So to be entertaining I like a full size computer with a big LCD monitor with lots of pretty pictures, video, whistles and bells....

Anyhoo.... that's my 2 cents and gives you an idea of how/why I visit The Bog!

I might suggest the first step for smartphones is being able to subscribe to a section like "canyoneering" and have all the posts emailed to you once each day in TXT (plain text) format. You would not get the pics and video, but you would be able to follow most threats and get the drift of what is happening each day in the sections of Bogley you are subscribed to. My idea is this would be similar to the way the Yahoo forums work if you select digest mode when you sign up.... just food for thought...

[Sombeech]

I might suggest the first step for smartphones is being able to subscribe to a section like "canyoneering" and have all the posts emailed to you once each day in TXT (plain text) format. You would not get the pics and video, but you would be able to follow most threats and get the drift of what is happening each day in the sections of Bogley you are subscribed to. My idea is this would be similar to the way the Yahoo forums work if you select digest mode when you sign up.... just food for thought...

This might be along the lines of subscribing to the RSS feed, the same one that's on the front page, right side.

[Iceaxe]

This might be along the lines of subscribing to the RSS feed, the same one that's on the front page, right side.

I NEVER visit the front page of Bogley... All my bookmarks go straight to the forum, I've been to the front page maybe two or three times.... As i'm sure you know, I'm not a fan of the front page of Bogley....

Anyhoo.... I just went to the front page and I don't see an RSS feed....

[jman]

First of all, I disagree with Shane that the "web is too slow to be enjoyable - even on the best of smartphones." I have Iphone 3GS and I can load up Bogley in less than a second. When I'm on Edge (2G) it takes about 5 seconds for the front page to load and takes a few seconds to navigate to the proper forums. But those few seconds make it far from enjoyable as Shane says. It's great, especially a full-screen browser like the iPhone (and others like My Touch, Droid, etc.)

The RSS feed is there - what browser are you using Shane? BTW, speaking of RSS, there was a thread not too long ago about a iphone app for Bogley. I mentioned in a reply that I have access to the dev and have been messing around with creating a rss app for the iphone. It's very, very, plain but it gets the job done - but its far from finished. So with that said and to answer some of stephan questions, would I use it more often? No, Not necessarily. All it would do, in my opinion, would just make browsing and reading A LOT easier. No scrolling, and pinching the multi-touch to zoom in and out, etc.

If there ever was a mobile version - I would recommend cutting out all the extra graphics out, except for the ones in the post/thread. All you would see is something like this:

So this WYSIWYG on your mobile phone. (BTW - I couldn't put the borders on the right side of this...so just imagine please.)

(The elipsis (...) are there to properly separate the topic from the dates. But normally, you wouldn't see those at all.)
____________________________
|Bogley Outdoor Community
|
|General Chat............01/08/2010
|General Videos.........01/07/2010
|Newbies...................01/05/2010
|Hiking & Camping.....01/03/2010
|Canyoneering...........12/29/2009
|Climbing..................12/25/2009
|ATVing.....................12/23/2009
|and so on...
|and so on...
|
|
|
|
|HOME | LOGIN | MESSAGES
|REPLY | ETC
|__________________________|

You can easily choose here what forum you want, there would be no graphics, except for the background color, and bigger text.

then you would dive into the subforum like so....

____________________________
|Canyoneering Forum
|
|Freezefest pics.........01/08/2010
|Moab - Pleaides........01/07/2010
|Zion/Imlay/Kolo.......01/05/2010
|I'm Awesome!..........01/03/2010
|Dry canyons?...........12/29/2009
|Merry Christma........12/25/2009
|what pack to use......12/23/2009
|and so on...
|and so on...
|
|
|
|
|HOME | LOGIN | MESSAGES
|REPLY | ETC
|__________________________|


____________________________
|Zion - Subway TR 1/08/2010
|
|I sure did freeze my butt off on
|this trip it was soo cold! All the
|pools were frozen (duh,its
|winter!) and made it less fun.
|
|But the scenery was beautiful
|and there was snow everywhere
|including snow that is deep as
|12 feet in some places!
|
|Here's some pics:
| ______________________
| | XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX |
| | XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX | ...........<----it stops loading the picture here until you scroll down more.
|HOME | LOGIN | MESSAGES
|REPLY | ETC
|__________________________|


Well, that's a quick ASCII art of a simple, but yet easy to navigate your way through the forums.

To answer the rest of the questions of stephan,
No, I don't think having a mobile would make it so people come here more often (unless you travel a lot I suppose) - but it would make reading and finding your way, much, much simpler and more fun.

[DiscGo]

I NEVER visit the front page of Bogley... All my bookmarks go straight to the forum, I've been to the front page maybe two or three times....

x2

[Iceaxe]

I'm using Internet Explorer 8 and I can't find no stinkin' RSS feed....

and for what it's worth... I don't even like surfing Bogley on my small 12" laptop. My usual (work) computer has a 26" LCD screen and a $2000 video card... so I'm kinda spoiled with graphics and such....

[blueeyes]

I'm using Internet Explorer 8 and I can't find no stinkin' RSS feed......

X2

I can't see it in IE or Firefox

screen shot and point it out please cuz apparently i am blind

[Iceaxe]

Yeah... what she said.... and a little FYI... it ain't worth crap if folks can't find it.

Which is really my bitch about the front page in general.... it just clutters up the meat and patato's (the forum)...

[moab mark]

I can see the rss feed on my computer. It is usually about 30 minutes behind the actual post.

As far as mobile I probably do 50% of my bogley surfing on my Blackberry. It's kind of tough to post and my punctuation etc at times is whacked but I get by. Is there some way to get emails for all posts from a certain forum, not just the ones you have a post in? Oh I am posting this from my Blackberry. One thing I cannot do on my blackberry is preview. If I click preview I loose my post? So anything to improve moblie use would rock.

Mark

[asdf]

I'm using Internet Explorer 8 and I can't find no stinkin' RSS feed......

screen shot and point it out please cuz apparently i am blind

I am using FireFox 3.5.6
Direct link ....

http://www.bogley.com/feed/atom/

or

http://www.bogley.com/feed/

[IntrepidXJ]

I go to Bogley on my iPhone all the time, as I am not allowed to use the internet at work for personal reasons.

It works fine for me....while a mobile version of the site could be nice, it's perfectly acceptable to me the way things are.

[Sombeech]

http://www.bogley.com/forum/smartfee...x_word_size=15

the previous feed was for home page posts only, the weekly featured trip reports. But this is for forum posts.

Yeah, it's an ugly link, but who cares.

[Sombeech]

btw, we're going to start posting young bikini models on the front page

[Felicia]

I go to Bogley on my iPhone all the time, as I am not allowed to use the internet at work for personal reasons.

It works fine for me....while a mobile version of the site could be nice, it's perfectly acceptable to me the way things are.

Agree - I surf Bogley about 95% of the time from my iPhone.

My biggest problem is the unpredictability of successfully posting. I find it too cumbersome to log in on my iPhone and my posts get doubled posted, or lost. Thus, I seldom post these days. By the time I get home, the conversation has moved on to bigger and better subjects.

If I do post when I get home, I'm usually the last to post - I'm starting to feel a "thread killer".

[Sombeech]

If I do post when I get home, I'm usually the last to post

I'm locking this thread, it's getting too controversial

[Iceaxe]

btw, we're going to start posting young bikini models on the front page

If you want me to visit the front page your bikini models need to be 35 plus y/o.....

And I'm thinking that might be a forum killer....

.

[tanya]

I am always moving around these days.. bogley on my Blackberry would be awesome!

[Udink]

If you want me to visit the front page your bikini models need to be 35 plus y/o.....

And I'm thinking that might be a forum killer....

Where is the "Like" button? Facebook is killing Bogley!