Develop Bugs

Development and Hacking needs sub sections!

Hi Mods,
Am I the only one who find "Development and Hacking" hard to browse?
Is it perhaps possible to create sub sections in this thread? Like all those
WM 6.5 and later Wm 7.x topics? Only of interest if you use those OSes.
Perhaps also sections for Today Plugins by type: manilla etc etc.
Just my two cents.
Cheers

I would make subforums for: Games, Apps, UIs etc. Most of the apps for 6.1 are compatible with 6.5 and vice versa, so imo there's no need for making such sections

Kamill said:
I would make subforums for: Games, Apps, UIs etc. Most of the apps for 6.1 are compatible with 6.5 and vice versa, so imo there's no need for making such sections
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
agreed, especially skins...they sometimes crowd the first page and hide the interesting stuff back a dozen pages.
but it would also be benificial if you could toggle on or off certain topics at the top of the board

This was mentioned on the blackstone forum - I commented there that it would be good to see sub-categories for resolutions so questions specific to WVGA (for example) would more likely be found by another WVGA user and hopefully answered (titanium apps are a good example of this).
There is a lot of us on here these days with a lot of different models which is what makes this community so great but some more granularity would surely assist us in looking for help and where possible, help others.

I voted yes but "no" and "fine as it is" are the same answer are they not????

Yep you are very right My fault. Did it a bit too quick. But cannot change it anymore.

Yeah I agree with the Games/Skins/Apps/Drivers.../Ideas/ etc.. Its hard to find what you need when the good stuff can be pushed back 4 or 5+ pages by skins/themes or stuff you already have.

by reolution..
unowho said:
This was mentioned on the blackstone forum - I commented there that it would be good to see sub-categories for resolutions so questions specific to WVGA (for example) would more likely be found by another WVGA user and hopefully answered (titanium apps are a good example of this).
There is a lot of us on here these days with a lot of different models which is what makes this community so great but some more granularity would surely assist us in looking for help and where possible, help others.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I agree...
the best way would be..
1.WVGA
2.VGA
3.QVGA
4. all resolutions..
5. and so on....
i think games and apps and wat not might get muddled...
resolutions is the way to go

Thread Moved to : About xda-developers.com Forum

please yes. that section is an absolute mess. organizing by resolution or better yet, type of software would be fantastic.

"No" and "Fine as it is" is the same answer
And I also say "no" , because it's a development Forum - and it's a need to think outside the box. If we would have sections for Apps, Games or for Systems like 6.5 or Resolutions - some people never would look into and would know, which new Technologies or Ideas are available.
And for Developers (they are used to a search function) there are ideas at all the most important issue.
And have a look on other sides, where you see the "high gloss brochures" - which shows the free apps for WinMo with categories - in manner of AppStore from Apple - at the end you will find a link to xda-devs, to download or know more about the Apps
It's logical, that this poll will have as result, that there should be sub-categories for xda-devs - it's good for downloaders.
But for developers: They would oversee new ideas on other plattforms, the would get a tunnel vision on their own system.
And not so much ideas... would result in fewer Apps & Dwnloads. And so the people would have a nice overview (perhaps), but not so much cool ideas at all.
There are more than enough sides, which categorizes the Developers Apps here. But please leave us our "development environment" here - to see, with which people we could work together, to provide new Apps& Ideas... for everybody of us. What's up, if we would only develop for one resolution? And then we have to switch everything if we make multi-res? Senseless additional work for Developers... and especially too much work for the Mods.
It's better to work with Prefixes like "[App]" that makes a better overview. And Recommendations in the Sections of each device here.
And also to have as Downloader a possibility to think outside the box.
Micha

I have to disagree with you on at least one point.
This is from our home page...
But as our site grew we realised that lots of ordinary users were also suffering from a lack of support. They started using the xda-developers forum to communicate and before long the forum was as much a user forum as it was a developer forum.
The poll is certainly backing this up.

Now 281 reads but only 55 votes. Seems that a lot of visitors don't care.
@mods, can you please make it a sticky in Development and Hacking until the end of the poll?
Cheers

XDA Portal (Front Page): What Would You Like to See Improved?

As you might know, the last couple of months, a lot of changes have taken place to the XDA Portal (also known as the "Front Page"). We have re-vamped the Portal with a new, modern look. We added the vote-to-front page system, the star system, a steady stream of news, plus a lot more. We have been brainstorming on how to improve the Portal to make it even better for XDA users. And while we came up with some nice ideas -- which will be added soon -- we figured it would be great to have your opinion about the Portal!
As the end-user, you can probably tell us exactly what you like, and what you dislike about the Portal. Maybe you get annoyed at certain articles, or certain technical weaknesses of the site.
Or maybe you have ideas on how to improve the content to make the Portal more interesting for you. No matter what, every comment is really appreciated! And please be creative!
We'll consolidate your ideas and have a discussion with our developer and the News Writer team on what is possible and what makes sense to make the Portal more valuable.
- News Writers Team
orb3000 said:
This Thread is Specially to talk about Front Page/Portal
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
List of Ideas
This is a list of all ideas and suggestions, including credits to members. It could be possible that we misunderstood something - don't hesitate to post corrections here or PM me. We will keep this post updated as discussion continues.
Updated August 3d, 2010
'Blog-Style' Portal: Not only news from XDA, but also from the Android/WM World (keridel, hubie)
Colours are a bit dull (Alex530) (some other members disagree)
More posts (20) per Page (corn13read)
Pagination Buttons bigger (corn13read)
Option to Bookmark/Flag Certain Posts for Later Review (corn13read, JVH3)
A more general forum/portal/wiki design (ThaDeanesta)
An Excerpt of the Latest Articles in One Banner (orb3000)
Dropdown Menu with all phones, leads to phone-specific news, ROMs and other software (hansmrtn)
A system where developers can add a page for his/her project, and keep members updated with the latest progression (N!njaDuck) [more ideas about this here, by dor_neue]
Filter RSS to specific OS (gilamran)
An enhanced mobile version of the Portal -- after all, it's a website centered around smartphones (creesch, timmywa)
Rating and Review system per Phone model (hubie)
Phone comparison (hubie)
Latest comments/most commented/most popular articles (hubie)
Directly link without going into the article (Systrs)
A Web 2.0/Flash Top News view (Dany0)
Central Software Database: All software uploaded on the site gathered in a searchable database.(flyboyovyick)
Online communication system that allows to ask questions to people that have general knowledge of WM/Android so newbies will get their answers solved quickly.
There have been some suggestions for the forums also; however we would like to keep the forums out of discussion.

Okey man!
I'm a bit new to the site as you can see but i've managed to notice some "not so beautiful" things in the site; and since I liked it a lot I’ll list some:
1-The threads should be far far more categorized and managed in a professional way; so i suggest creating sub-folders and even sub-sub-folders etc... if necessary in each folder;
for example "HD2 general discussion" is a very vague folder; you can find in there questions/problems/suggestions/ anything about anything (the screen, the messaging, the call quality, software, etc… thousands of types of posts); so why not create sub folders for each primary kind of post such “messaging”, “power and battery”, “calling”, “applications” or even “messaging problems”, “applications not running” etc… I guess you got my point.
In this matter you will get things more clear. You will lose nothing, in the other hand you will gain a lot!
2-There should be some kind of detailed gallery or library for applications; themes; games…(I don’t know if there is ); for example I wanted to install android on the HD2 but I’m very confused; till now I don’t know which version is the last version or which one is the best one; things are a bit messed up and unordered and I don’t want to kill my phone!
3-Maybe some kind of live chat would be gr8! (I know that there’s private messaging but it’s not so practical) Imagine open public channels and other channels discussing a certain matter for example. It would be so nice because ideas will be transferred much faster!
If i remembered anything else, i'll tell you! Cheers!

Welcome to forums
ElCondor is referring to the XDA Portal and not to the forums section
Some points regarding your suggestions:
1: Threads are created exactly as you mention, all you have to do is to look into proper section and all sub forums will appear
2: Once you get used to the forum you´ll see how easy is to identify newest as every developer always includes info regarding supported devices, resolution, latest version of any app/theme/skin, etc. As long as you fully read and follow instructions you won´t mess up your device
3: There is in fact an IRC XDA Channel, again, all you have to do is read and search!
Read, Search, Respect and Enjoy!

ok so more on topic what about a blog style portal as well?
for example i follow you guys on twitter but dont ever get any news about things happening in the world of android or winmo unless it already has appeared on a thread.
lets make xda the one stop shop for all things android and winmo!

the colors are a bit dull imo

Alex530 said:
the colors are a bit dull imo
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Never mind......

More posts
I want to be able to see more posts say 20 / page.
Also make the pagination buttons bigger.
Also a bookmark post would be a great thing to have.

I would like to see the portal better integrated into the Forum... Keep the forum header, and making "tabs" which wou would click the portal tab, and it takes you to the portal, (with the forum header, and the tab darkened) and the same goes for the new wiki..

Some nice ideas already! Keep them coming guys

keridel said:
ok so more on topic what about a blog style portal as well?
for example i follow you guys on twitter but dont ever get any news about things happening in the world of android or winmo unless it already has appeared on a thread.
lets make xda the one stop shop for all things android and winmo!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Totally agreed. I would like to see more general news about smartphone world (with android and winmo), and not only about the develops of the forums. This would generate more feedback from readers, since they virtually don't comment on the portal posts.

I would like to see a kind of rotative news on the forums, a speacial banner like where the latest posts were circulating all the time, hope my explanation is good

I think we should have a dropdown menu with all the phones, and you select yours and it gives you specific news, roms, and suggestions for that selected phone

Software tracker
I find that it is somewhat difficult to follow the status of all of the development projects that I am interested in efficiently.
I am not sure how you would do this, but it would be great to have a registry for each develpment project where the author could note updates (versions) so that people could get a dashboard style view of what they are interested in tracking.
PM me if you need more explaination.
{
"lightbox_close": "Close",
"lightbox_next": "Next",
"lightbox_previous": "Previous",
"lightbox_error": "The requested content cannot be loaded. Please try again later.",
"lightbox_start_slideshow": "Start slideshow",
"lightbox_stop_slideshow": "Stop slideshow",
"lightbox_full_screen": "Full screen",
"lightbox_thumbnails": "Thumbnails",
"lightbox_download": "Download",
"lightbox_share": "Share",
"lightbox_zoom": "Zoom",
"lightbox_new_window": "New window",
"lightbox_toggle_sidebar": "Toggle sidebar"
}

Hide/Show forums
I would like to be able to hide forums on the site and in the android app. If there is already a way, i apologize, I didn't see it when i tried the app and on the site i haven't looked to see if it can be done.

I like the concept of reputation tha PPCGeeks has.
I like the thank feature that PPCGeeks has, but I think it would also be nice to be able to visibly thank a post, so you could thank it where your user_id could be seen, or you could thank it anonoumously.
That way we don't see a ton of posts thanking a piece and you can really see if what you posted was useful.
It would show as this post has been thanked 49 times, and you could expand it to show those that visibly thanked it.
Recieving Thanks from a person with a high reputation is more meaningful to the poster than the 1 post wonder.
I would also like a disapprove button. Same thing anonomous and visible. I think there are alot of people that post that do not realize how many are truly disapproving of their post. (posting before: searching, reading the first posts of thread, reading the recent posts of a thread, etc)
Having thanks and disapprove would get rid of alot of the flame wars and keep the posts more amount actual information and questions.
---------------
When viewing all attachments to a thread, to have a link to the post where it is attached, along with the user_id and reputation of poster visible.

Alex530 said:
the colors are a bit dull imo
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
these colors are just fine...most of us spend hours on the site... so simple and plain is always better with clear text....soothing to the eye....

Portal (front page)
Again, guys!
OP is referring to the front Page (portal) not to the forums
JVH3 said:
I like the concept of reputation tha PPCGeeks has.
I like the thank feature that PPCGeeks has, but I think it would also be nice to be able to visibly thank a post, so you could thank it where your user_id could be seen, or you could thank it anonoumously.
That way we don't see a ton of posts thanking a piece and you can really see if what you posted was useful.
It would show as this post has been thanked 49 times, and you could expand it to show those that visibly thanked it.
Recieving Thanks from a person with a high reputation is more meaningful to the poster than the 1 post wonder.
I would also like a disapprove button. Same thing anonomous and visible. I think there are alot of people that post that do not realize how many are truly disapproving of their post. (posting before: searching, reading the first posts of thread, reading the recent posts of a thread, etc)
Having thanks and disapprove would get rid of alot of the flame wars and keep the posts more amount actual information and questions.
---------------
When viewing all attachments to a thread, to have a link to the post where it is attached, along with the user_id and reputation of poster visible.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse

1. the new design is much preferred
2. use less real estate in the header section (esp. twitter, fb, rules & rss buttons not in 2x2 grid but integrated into header)
3. improved mobile view

orb3000 said:
Again, guys!
OP is referring to the front Page (portal) not to the forums
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Sorry.
Portal section has improved greatly. Before, I used to just skip it and go straight to the forums.
Now there are actually interesting articles with links to threads that otherwise could potentially not be seen.
I think a feature to flag a portal article for later review, so you could see summary of articles that you have personally flagged, so you can go back to it later.
The articles have been coming so fast that I may remember seeing something cool on a Monday while at work, but not enough time to really investigate. Then it's buried by the end of the week.

RSS feeds
I would love to filter the RSS feeds to be specific to my device!
I don't own a WM device and never will... I'd love to filter by Android devices.
Thanks

[Q] Members Online Tool...

Well,i see on the end of the page,the members who are online at that particular moment...cant we make it forum specific???i mean this would help members to see who is online in their respective forum and thus,if there are questions,we can PM that without wasting much of a time...this would also help the forums be more friendly and helpful....the Members Online tool is a good idea,but it doesnt really reveal as to which forum the member belongs to...also,hunting for a green spot along side the names in the threads becomes tedious and time consuming...

I'm guessing it would add a performance overhead to the page load times. Not many people visit the index.
It's up to the admins whether or not this get's changed though.
Dave

DaveShaw said:
I'm guessing it would add a performance overhead to the page load times. Not many people visit the index.
It's up to the admins whether or not this get's changed though.
Dave
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanks...but it will really make work easy...still,i hope moderators and owners do something about it...thanks again...

DaveShaw said:
I'm guessing it would add a performance overhead to the page load times. Not many people visit the index.
It's up to the admins whether or not this get's changed though.
Dave
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Well it could always be made an option that is disabled by default. That way only users who really would like the ability would see it (it could be coded in such a way that there would be no wasted resources used if disabled). Personally I would like to see this and some donation-users only features. I think it would be a great way to add services while covering overhead prices.

$Not many people visit the index.$
when you mark all forums as read your go to index..
please hide this featuare.. ..online user.. for my an normal user is unusable.

shreyas18 said:
Well,i see on the end of the page,the members who are online at that particular moment...cant we make it forum specific???i mean this would help members to see who is online in their respective forum and thus,if there are questions,we can PM that without wasting much of a time...this would also help the forums be more friendly and helpful....the Members Online tool is a good idea,but it doesnt really reveal as to which forum the member belongs to...also,hunting for a green spot along side the names in the threads becomes tedious and time consuming...
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I was just thinking of a sort of buzzer (with a chat option) to get someone attention, for now if you have a conversation with another member you always have to refresh your page to see if you have an pm.
Regards,

Rataplan said:
I was just thinking of a sort of buzzer (with a chat option) to get someone attention, for now if you have a conversation with another member you always have to refresh your page to see if you have an pm.
Regards,
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
yeah,but still a enable/disable option for forum online members is also a good idea!!!

Whats Up with The Portal?

Everyday, I used to make it a point to log on to xda and read the portal post, which explains new ideas, announcements, new apps, new features, reviews etc. The post explaned everything and that was an excellent source of knowledge, probably around two articles a day. But since the past 2 days, I am seeing like hourly articles, which takes me to a different website. No article, Only link. No explanation, why I should use the app, etc. I feel angry now, as xda was my only tech read.

Would you please link me to a news posting that fits your description? I have not seen any like you have described in all my time here on XDA.

ИΘΘK¡€ said:
Would you please link me to a news posting that fits your description? I have not seen any like you have described in all my time here on XDA.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Evolution of Android APIs

Read this for an explanation: http://www.xda-developers.com/welcome-to-the-new-xda-homepage/
If you want to list just one category:
XDA News: http://www.xda-developers.com/articles/
Articles on dev work: http://www.xda-developers.com/forum-links/

the_scotsman said:
Read this for an explanation: http://www.xda-developers.com/welcome-to-the-new-xda-homepage/
If you want to list just one category:
XDA News: http://www.xda-developers.com/articles/
Articles on dev work: http://www.xda-developers.com/forum-links/
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Got it. Thanks!

What about RSS?
I have the same problem, too many news. I don't need apk/theme "news" for example, I just like XDA News http://www.xda-developers.com/articles/
How can I do that? Thanks

6+ theme posts a day is ludicrous. Posts should probably be categorized and filterable. How do I weed the crap out of my RSS feed? It looks like I can subscribe to a combined feed with everything in it, a Comments feed, and an External Links feed, none of which are particularly useful since this update.

I miss being able to open the portal post to see comments and read the whole post. Is there any way to that anymore? It just directs you to whatever is linked. All the posts are cut off as well. You can clearly see the author has written something, but you can't read it, and when you click it you just get another website. Look at the attached pics.

Diaphragma said:
I miss being able to open the portal post to see comments and read the whole post. Is there any way to that anymore? It just directs you to whatever is linked. All the posts are cut off as well. You can clearly see the author has written something, but you can't read it, and when you click it you just get another website. Look at the attached pics.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Mobile view seems to truncate the text. On a desktop browser, you can see the rest of the sentence.
This listing confirms many of the leaks we have seen so far including: Snapdragon 810, 3Gb of RAM and a 5" 1080p screen.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
The website you are being taken to is the article. This isn't an XDA article, it's just one we've linked to.

Thanks for the clearification. Is this also seen as mobile view? It's taken from a tablet with request desktop site on.

Diaphragma said:
Thanks for the clearification. Is this also seen as mobile view? It's taken from a tablet with request desktop site on.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
The website dynamically changes depending on device and screen size i think. So it's going to be slightly different again for tablets I think.

Inline Screenshots and Thumbnails...

TNSMANI said:
I also request all the users to use thumbnails instead if inline screenshots, if possible. Where it is required or unavoidable, you may use the inline images. You see, for those who use the mobile to view the threads, it is very tedious to scroll through such screenshots and most of the times important messages in posts also will be scrolled past.
So please understand and cooperate.
Thanks and cheers!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Doing it here to avoid detailing a non-related thread.
Thanks for removing posts that had nothing to do with the purpose of the thread in question. I would appreciate if you could also address the following queries:
1. Please explain the following:
"Where it is required or unavoidable, you may use the inline images."
WHAT determines whether it is required or unavoidable. And WHO determines whether it is required or unavoidable.
If the answer to the above isn't clear, please remove the inline screenshot feature itself, to remove conflicts/ confusion/ useless arguments over personal preference, OR let the poster choose how he wants to write his post, even if that means some of the members may choose to skip reading it.
2. You didn't address the more important issue of being impolite and using cuss words in the forum. Clearly, these are violations of forum rules, and rules apply to EVERYONE.
I do appreciate that people should co-operate with each other and make forum usage a pleasant experience to gain/ share knowledge, solve problems and help each other out, among others that are development related and focuses on the purpose of every thread.
Where people have a difference of opinion, for example, like how one wants to present an idea/ view (obviously in a respectful and dignified way), someone person's preference shouldn't override that of another. We should just leave that to the poster.
It is just a preference, and it should stay that way AS LONG AS IT DOESN'T VIOLATE ANY OF THE FORUM RULES.

Replied via PM.

TheMystic said:
Doing it here to avoid detailing a non-related thread.
Thanks for removing posts that had nothing to do with the purpose of the thread in question. I would appreciate if you could also address the following queries:
1. Please explain the following:
"Where it is required or unavoidable, you may use the inline images."
WHAT determines whether it is required or unavoidable. And WHO determines whether it is required or unavoidable.
If the answer to the above isn't clear, please remove the inline screenshot feature itself, to remove conflicts/ confusion/ useless arguments over personal preference, OR let the poster choose how he wants to write his post, even if that means some of the members may choose to skip reading it.
2. You didn't address the more important issue of being impolite and using cuss words in the forum. Clearly, these are violations of forum rules, and rules apply to EVERYONE.
I do appreciate that people should co-operate with each other and make forum usage a pleasant experience to gain/ share knowledge, solve problems and help each other out, among others that are development related and focuses on the purpose of every thread.
Where people have a difference of opinion, for example, like how one wants to present an idea/ view (obviously in a respectful and dignified way), someone person's preference shouldn't override that of another. We should just leave that to the poster.
It is just a preference, and it should stay that way AS LONG AS IT DOESN'T VIOLATE ANY OF THE FORUM RULES.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Hello sir, I just wanted to inform you in-line images are absolutely ok and we apologize for the misunderstanding. That’s our fault but will make sure the proper information is known to everyone on the moderation staff.
I’m not gonna respond to your second issue as that is something that is purely subjective in nature. But I can say we strive to be as impartial as possible and we absolutely do extend the forum rules to everyone. Just because it may not be publicly visible that doesn’t mean it wasn’t handled privately.
However, sometimes things get missed so the best thing to do is report whatever posts you think need to be reviewed. It’s a very large forum and we rely on members to point us in the direction of moderation needs.
If you have any other questions or concerns please feel free to PM me. I am happy to have a discussion with you about anything. I am gonna close this thread though as that the primary reason for it being opened has been addressed.