I've been refraining from actually asking this question publicly, but I honestly don't know the answer and figure if I don't, there's probably others that don't know too so here goes-

Where are the wikis? I've read through the posts about creating one and I have no idea how I would even do that on this new site. I see "shared document" where we had wikis from the old site, but even when posting I haven't noticed something clickable to "create a shared document."

What am I missing?

I know Barb had mentioned this previously, but I think it's really important that terminology used on the new site be consistent. For example, in the villages instead of saying "Create a new step" it says "create a new project." To me, create a new project meant-"create a new village" until I played with it and actually saw it was a step.

I honestly really hate not having step titles or at least the ability to sort tasks under a topic versus a numbered step. I'd rather have the ability to add a topic title and remove the step numbers altogether.

I just tried to create a Newsletter for the Gamauli village and it appeared that it ended up posting to the village site rather than emailing the Newsletter to our volunteers. Is this intended? I think that emails are very helpful in bringing people back to the village who haven't logged in for awhile. I would hate to get rid of that feature.

Jennifer

Hi guys,

I guess we all agreed by now that the website is way too complicated and needs lots of improvements.

For now, I myself don't have many complaints in general, but I got very negative feedback from some of my neighbours. They just think it is horrible - complicated and not at all user friendly :(((( Which made me afraid that nabuur might lose a lot of neighbours.

Let me quote Manuel:
"My suggestion is to return to simplicity, and to the community values (not tasks) that brought it to the great number of volunteers that signed up in the past."

The website is not a goal itself, it should be a tool for us, the neighbours, to do our work easier.
I welcome all the good new things that this website brought, but I sincerely think that there are many things that only add to the confusion, and are not at all necessary. Maybe some things are not bad to have, but if they bring more troubles than the benefit, maybe you should just eliminate them? Or try to decrease their complexity?

I notice that the technical people sometimes like to add the functionalities to a product, no matter if the customers want/need them or not. Your product(website) is as good as your customers perceive it to be - no more, no less. Doesn't matter how many astonishing things it can do :). (Sorry, professional deformation ;)))))

Guys, I really believe that this website will gradually become very good and I appreciate a lot the work you all are doing on it.

Take care,
Sonja

Hi again everyone,

Is it not possible to keep some things from the old website that worked well?

For example, I think that the order of postings was perfect - you get the last one, and if you want to start from the beginning of the discussion, just go to the page number 1 - and that's it!

I think new postings were better sorted on the old website - grouped in villages.

Also, I agree that the village search was better on the old website - all on one page and with a sentence explaining the project. A picture of a village can be attractive for someone, but it tells me nothing about whether the project is interesting to me or not. Neither does its name, much less the name of its Local representative.

I agree about neighbours search. That also was better on the old website.
The number of posts a neighbour made in a village is great, but I think we also need a total number of posts on the neighbour's profile, together with the vilages he/she is active in (just like on old website(s)). I noticed that some of the info dissapeared from the neighbours' profiles.
I don't like that we can't see anymore when they were last online...

I understood that our facilitator tools are not yet in place but should be sometime soon? Or I misunderstood something?

Besides, I believe that all the editing functions (for all the neighbours) should be on one place, with a visible button(s) telling what exactly it is for.

Btw, I like the new ranking postings function. Not sure how much we really really need it, but I like the possibility to search the postings according to the rankings or just to pay attention to it if it's marked with many stars :)))

Why do you allow the people who are not neighbours of a particular village to post messages in the village and then do not allow the messages to be visible while we are logged out? Sometimes I like to check discussions without logging in. Is that allowed ;-PP?

Sonja

(Did I just say in the previous post that I don't have many complaints???? uhmmmmmmmm :-S)

Just one thing to add:

Are you sure that everyone can have the possibility to edit/delete any other posting?
I find it strange that anyone can enter any of my postings and write there whatever... or simply delete it.
Would I at least be informed that something happened to my posting? I guess not...

I'm not saying that anyone would do it, but I just find it very strange

I created a post today in the Gamauli village and it did not show up as a new post in My Nabuur. This concerns me a lot because if I can't tell I posted without going into the village, people may be logging in that are part of that village-looking at My Nabuur, seeing no new posts listed and thinking nothing is going on in the village.

I've noticed at random times new messages that other people post show and some days they do not. For example today, when Sonja posted in the website development group, initially I saw all 3 of her posts listed on the My Nabuur screen. I read the first and went back to access the other two and they were gone. I had to go into the main thread to find them again.

Is there a way to make posts stop showing as "new" if you open the entire threaded discussion? or to choose "mark all as read"-it is really confusing to me to have multiple pages of new messages showing in particular on that screen. On the old site, that page used to be what I relied on for navigating around where I wanted to go and finding everything I needed to make sure I wasn't missing posts.

I am really very concerned that to my knowledge I have not had a single new person join any of my 3 villages since the new Nabuur site went up. I am equally as concerned that if someone did join, I may have missed it because I have not been notified in order to welcome them.

My suggestions to improve the My Nabuur page are:

1. Add a "mark all as read" so that we can all start fresh with the newest messages instead of having to work our way through every message posted.
2. Show new messages under headings of the village or group they were posted in-not at the side so that it is one long list.
3. Move the "inbox" to the top right corner so you don't have to scroll down to see it.
4. Add a "who's online" section like the old site had so that you can easily see everyone logged into Nabuur-not just people on your friends list.

Personally, I also feel like having a list of the latest posts from people on my friends list redundant. Those things show up or should show up where new posts do-it's not necessary to have them in both places. I do realize "friends" may not always be in the same village, but when I log in, I really am here to work on the things that I've chosen to be a part of. That may or may not include the work that people on my friends list are doing.

I hope this is helpful.

jennifer

Jennifer and Sonja,

Excellent points! I would like to add that the villages before were sorted alphabetically, now the sorting is rather bizarre and some villages get more pictures and more room that others ( Ex.villages in Asia-http://www.nabuur.com/en/village/results/taxonomy%3A9 )

-Tanja

Sonja, I can edit and delete my own posts but I don't have (don't want!) the ability to edit or delete other people's, so suspect its a facilitator thing (I am not a facilitator). I would think you should only be able to do it in the villages you facilitate.

Jennifer, I completely agree about the My Nabuur screen - its driving me crazy. Things disappear as soon as you read them. For me, it would be great if it worked like the Private Messages screen where you can see everything, unread ones are marked as New, you see the date it was sent. And you can mark things as Read/Unread.

Mary

Thanks Mary,

Maybe it would be ok for facilitators to be able to delete postings in their own village (in the case someone writes sth non appropriate or so...), but I wanted to see how it works and entered a Jennifer's posting in this discussion, and I saw that I can write there... I don't know if it would allow me to save the changes but I guess it would.
I shouldn't be allowed to change postings here or in other villages I guess. Is that a bug? I also tried in some other villages and it allowes me to enter postings everywhere.
Don't you guys think it's strange?

Sonja, I notice the same thing-as a facilitator I can enter any village and change information (not something I would do or want to do), but I believe that things like background information and village set-up info is a little different than other people's actual posts. I too am very uncomfortable with making a post and knowing that someone can get into it and change what I've written. I do like being able to access this for the villages I facilitate to correct English of the LR when necessary-but I've found even with that-sometimes I have access and sometimes I don't.

I also like having the ability to delete posts if someone double posts the same information and doesn't catch that they've done it. I know I've ended up doing that before a couple of times and have been able to catch it in time to fix it myself. I spent a lot of time yesterday in in the Gamauli village and did some editing to the Background Page-but for example with Min's post that says "Well come" I am not able to log directly into that post to fix the spelling-which again I would like to be able to do.

Hey Jennifer!

you're right, I didn't notice that before, but we can edit even the background of all the villages!!!

Guys!? Can you put this as urgent? I mean, I don't believe that any of the facs would change anything in the other's villages, but someone could click something accidently...

This is for sure not an option that should exist

Dear all,

There is an old project kicking around my village. Does anybody knows what I should do to delete it?

This is the description of the project:

"Help provide computer training for young women

Tasks

* Finished"
I tried to list is as a bug in the appropriate Nabuur discussion forum but I got a message that I am not authorized to post there. Oh, well...

-Tanja

Hi Tanja,

Thanks for highlighting this problem. I've just taken a look at Koliyonkulam and must admit the old project showing up doesn't make things prettier.

Upon taking a closer look I also found out that the tasks/discussions of the old project aren't shown, while the old project used to have many discussions & closed tasks.

Personally I wouldn't be in favour of deleting the old project... that way the history of the village will be lost (and what is deleted can't be brought back). I'll 'hide' the loose ends for now and will get in touch via email to discuss the way old/closed/finished projects can be presented. I'll also investigate where the content of the old project went.

Hope this helps,

Pelle

Hi Moses,

SOrry to hear that there's content you can't find.
Could you specify what you're missing? Which village did you post the info in?
And do you remember if it was an 'ordinary' discussion or a wiki that you posted the information in?

Pelle