Future Dolphin - from an artistic view
There is no doubt regarding the artistic approach of the Boonex team in developing web scripts. Sites like Boonex Unity really show that they consider content presentation an important factor. But i wonder where does this thing while designing/developing Dolphin???
Why can't the developers of Boonex Unity develop Dolphin of same level. Unity is much better than Dolphin considering factors like design as well as ease of using site features.
For example, the Updates shown on the account page of Unity. Why Boonex is not adding them to Dolphin? I know Extentions and mods are available for everything. But does this mean that Boonex should never add such things to Dolphin??? Andrey have you never used orkut ??? Don't you like the updates on homepage? Don't you like those latest visitors? Upcoming birthdays?
You say that Dolphin is the best Social networking script. But how? it doesn't even have these basic important features. I don't think a social site can work well without them. Extentions/mods are not the solution.
The present Dolphin is all blocky....i mean everything is shown in blocks....why?? (Hey now plz don't tell me that i can customize it with a custom template. I'm talking about raw Dolphin). Why isn't Boonex improving it??? Below are few screenshots from several sites...everyone has seen them....i'm just highliting few...
A profile page from orkut ( i don't know if this design of orkut ever came. just found it somewhere.)
Now please look at this attached image. TRY comparing it with the profile page of our Dolphin. Which one is better??? Do we really need that big block of profile photos? Every site like orkut, hi5 has a small site block. Instead this can be linked to the profile photos page.
The action block needs a lot of work. Do we need those big links? How about a vertical menu like that of orkut? and one big issue - Links like "Befriend" are shown even if the profile visitor is friend of the profile. Everytime i open the profile of a friend, it looks as if we are not friends and forces me to again click on the "Befriend" link. Members of my site find things like this quite annoying. They say this site is not at all user friendly.
* Friends block The friends block should show the latest online friends on top (like orkut). presently the same friends are shown on the profile. So the profiles look quite dead. Showing of Latest online friends on top helps in making more friends. Even i meet new people through my friends beacsue of this feature. This also makes the profile look fresh and new (becasue of changing friends). And one other important thing is that maximum 9 friends are shown on a profile. The there is a link at bottom "view all" to go to friendlist page. Similarly, maximum of 6 communities(groups) are shown. the there is a link "view all"
* Now Dolphin doen't show total number of friends in a profile. Can i just know who gave this idea to Boonex to remove that??? I would recommend Boonex to add a block like this (in orkut)
It shows numbers of items like scraps, photos, videos, fans and all.
* This reminds me of fans. What about adding "fan" feature in orkut? This is the feature which had forced me to make more and more friends in orkut so that they could become my fans. Actually i used to compete with my friends for more fans. So, that means this feature really help in making site members busy ading more n more frnds.
* Better vertical menu (action block) for profiles
Though i've talked about this a little earlier in this post, i think this needs little ellaboration. Below is a screen shot with action block from a Dolphin site profile.
Now please compare it with this from orkut. They have made everything much compact. By default only few action links are shown. Once we click on the link "more", we will get many more links. Isn't it cool? so, wheh is this coming in Dolphin????
Orkut action block:
* Friendlist page
Next comes the friendlist page. If you to the profile of a user and then go to his friendlist page, you will certainly feel that you've lost contact with the profile you were viewing. The reason is that, on the friendlist page, the photo of the user (whose friendlist we are viewing) is not shown. Neither is shown the action block. To perform any action, you'll need to go back to his profile. Here is a screenshot:
Now lets consider the friendlist page from orkut. In this, the photo of the user and action block is still shown(they show them on every page associated to a user). Secondly, there is a search friend option. I bet this option is very necesarry. Thirdly, along with names of the friends, their no. of friends as well as their location is shown. This is also very nice. Lastly, there is also a mutual friends tab. I don't think i should explain on this. Here is the screenshot:
Then if you click on the "mutual friends tab", this is what is shown:
* Add freind
Next comes add freind feature. Now if you click on the "befirend" link, a pop-up appears with message "User was invited to friendlist". You find it interactive? Hopefully not. Why is Boonex not replacing all these pop-ups with ajax loaded windows like the new login window in Dolphin? All actions like "Add friend" work in these kind of ajax windows in Facebook. Why these are not being added to Dolphin? And moreover, why we don't have option to categorize friends as in orkut? In orkut, when we click on "Add as friend", a page opens with certain groups to select from.Like- 'school', 'work', family'. Secondly, there is also an option to send a personalized message along with the friend request. This is very necessary to tell the person who you are. Here is a screenshot:
I would request Boonex to add this system in DOLPHIN too. And moreover, make it load in a ajax window like in Facebook.
There is a lot more to write about...but Boonex is intelligent enough to do some research itself :)
Boonex please don't Develop with your eyes closed. There are a lot of networking sites out there which are really working very well. Try to adopt from them. Things won't be able to continue like this for long. Extentions/mods are not the solution. "Extentions" refers to extendening a functionality, not adding an important functionality. What we get as mods/extentions are complete big addons which i think should be there in the dOLPHIN CORE SCRIPT.
Boonex plz understand us. Most of the sites crash while they are being upgraded to newer versions of Dolphin because of addition of all those mods/extensions. But our sites can't even work without these mods. What should we do? Use the mods and get trapped in a single version of Dolphin? Or use a raw install of Dolphin and never use mods? What should we do???
Boonex plz improve Dolphin at a faster rate. Now this "faster rate" doesn't mean "releasing new versions every 2 months". I mean in every new Dolphin version, more improvements should be brought. Like in 6.1, leaving the new comment system, we have got no big new feauture. There are so many spots in Dolphin which need improvement. But when will you do that? Try improving all of them in a single release.
These are
Categories in Music,Videos, Photos
Improved groups - Groups are not at all interative. Add events, pollls, related groups, group sub-owners, moderators. Improve the design. Add features like polls in such a manner that they don't appear different from it. ( Adopt from orkut). I'm sorry to say the new comment system looks as if it is a different feautre and has been forcefully added to Dolphin. Make it simple in design. Remove all those blocks for comment replies.
*** One more thing, please add a group page like the "Communities" page in orkut which displays names (just name, no group images) of all the communities of which a user is a member. The communities are listed in a order so that communities with recent activities are shown on top. This is really helpful. For example, if i want to see that in which community some activity has taken place, i would simply go to this page. The communities on top would definately have something latest in them. One more thing, it is listed there when one the last activity in the community. Rest you can see yourself.
Guys please provide more ideas.If possible, provide screenshots.
Thanks Boonex.
The new Dolphin solution is powered by UNA Community Management System.
Most important replacing "Greetings" with "Teasers" like in orkut.
Here is what i had said on a post by Sammie ( http://www.boonex.com/unity/blog/entry/Greet_php_is_it_not_time_to_drop_this_ )
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How about replacing it with 'Teasers' of orkut? In orkut, a 'send teaser' option is shown on every profile. When one clicks on it, the teaser page opens up. There either the user can write his own teaser message, or may select one from the see more
why don't members have option to remove comments they write??? I mean this is ridiculous. For profile comments, if i write a comment, i can't remove that. Fine. But neither the person for whom i wrote the comment can remove it. What are you doing boonex????? I'll ask again, have you ever used orkut ?????
In orkut, whatever you write, you'll always have the option to atleast delete it (if u can't edit).
And why Boonex has not included option to approve Profile Comments see more
and not "improve'
boonex do not have the resources of yahoo or google, and it is preposterous to even think that.
i think in the last 12 months boonex have made some remarkable advances and with the limited team and budget they are going well.
what is needed badly is a template system and maybe 5 default templates that can be chosen from i.e. 5 different see more
just tell me....
If someday your car stops running, what will be your first action? Getting it repaired...or buying a new one?
Hope it would be getting it repaired. So why did you tell me to go for orkut clone? What you mean is that if something is developing too slowly, we should just leave that and find someother script. Is that right?
Remember when you had posted regarding no kick option in Ray chat.......how many people told you to go for some other script? Did i say stop using see more
Dolphin isn't an Orkut clone, and trying to command Andrey into implementing Orkuts features are preposterous.
If you dont like dolphin leave.
You are saying that Dolphin can't have those features which are in other Social sites......
That means we can't have Media categories in Dolphin...right? Because site like youtube, flick have them?
...Dear what are you saying....you want to develop something with eyes closed....like if Mercedez has developed car engines which can run on Hydrogen fuel, no other automobile company should develop a similar one.....Good.....I wonder if they would all see more
What I meant is it sounds like your basically commanding boonex to implement a wide range of features. Now alot of people suggest features, but you keep suggesting orkut features, Sammie is right. It sounds like your looking for a Orkut Clone Script rather then a Smart Community Builder.
So gkcgautam, if your trying to look at boonex from an artisitic viewpoint, surley you see they have been around much longer then orkut or Google for see more
Dolphin is the best, but it's not good enough. I am grateful for support and protection of sammie and nuccca, but I have to agree - there's a good deal of things that need to be given some serious remake.
In fact, we're very serious about making Dolphin MUCH better than it is now and right now, as we speak, we're working on it. Your suggestions are right on time.
Finally i can say that dolphin would get much improved now. Sammie and nucca, plz dont take me wrong. Adopting from other scripts doesnt always mean copying...or what we call cloning. Adopting things from others is very necessary for development. Nucca i do respect Boonex. There is no doubt in it. I've a lot more to say, but all that is not at all necessary.
Thanks boonex for reading my post. It took me hours to write this...i still survive on a gprs internet connection :-)
even the calendar-module has to be enhanced.
Imagine you have many events, say 5000 events a year. Who can browse this in the given calendar? No one. So please build up a search for the events, build up a possibility to categorize the events.
Thank you, Carolus.
Cheers!