Welcome to the new-look TV Tonight
What's new on TV Tonight? Get to know your way around the site here...
- Published by David Knox
- on
- Filed under News, Top Stories
Welcome to the new-look TV Tonight!
As you will have already noticed, the site has some new features and attributes, so let me talk you through some of these….
HOME PAGE
- The site now has a Carousel of 5 in place of the former 2 x Top Stories on the old site. These will continue to include a mix of News, Programming, Pay TV and Reviews, all of which can also be found in their respective verticals. You can click on any of the thumbnails to stop the Carousel on an individual story in order to click through to the Post itself.
- A new Menu has been added with each of the 5 networks plus Foxtel. These offer dropdown lists of profile shows that are on air (or about to air). It will then take you to all the recent stories mentioning the show, using the Tag system. This Menu is designed to help you find stories about your show more easily. Listed shows will fluctuate accordingly. I hope you like it.
- Previous sections Coming Soon and Guides are now a subset of the Programming tab.
- The News section is now much larger. As you can see it also shows the number of comments on each story.
- Two verticals on Pay TV and Programming follow and Reviews are located at the bottom of the front page. All of these feeds can be accessed from the top Menu.
- In the right-hand column you can now see Daily Pick, ICE TV Guide, Ratings and the Poll.
INDIVIDUAL POSTS
- The essentials of each story remain intact. At the end of the post there is a section called “Related.” This will link through to other stories that also mention the same show/s, again using the Tag system. Comments follow thereafter.
- In the right hand column you will find the Tag Cloud and recent Comments, plus a shortcut to recent stories.
- At the left of each story is a floating widget for social media. You can Tweet a story, like it on Facebook, send via email or Google+.
COMMENTS
- In order to Comment you now need to register an ID. You can continue to use the handle you have been using but you need to register through a working email. Note the password you are sent and then you can change it once you are logged in. The site will take you to a standard WordPress profile page and even offers a toolbar that sits across the site if you prefer. When you are logged in you will find the link to bring you back to the site sits at the top left of the toolbar. If it feels a little overwhelming at first, have patience. You’ll get used to it in no time and realise the benefits later I trust. Your cookies should remember you so you don’t have to keep logging in everyday. I believe adding an ID will lift the tone of comments, for the benefit of all.
- Please remember no CAPS, no links and no slagging off other readers. Debate is healthy, abuse is not.
- As we are all adults here you’ll be pleased to know the site will now allow more liberal use of language. I think common sense tells us the words that are still on the naughty list. Otherwise Comments moderation remains as is.
So that’s about it. The site is now in Beta mode during this transition phase, just in case of any teething problems.
There is no change to Twitter, mobile platform, Ratings, breaking news etc. And yes, it’s still just me pedalling madly behind the scenes, but I am grateful for your support.
From Monday the annual Programmer’s Wrap begins, with feature interviews everyday this week. Be sure to register an ID so you can have your say -they do read the Feedback.
My thanks to web designer David McDonald for the rebuild.
Hope you enjoy the new site!
Cheers,
David.
UPDATE: For technical problems please ensure you have:
– latest edition of your Browser.
– javascript enabled.
– any ad-blockers turned off.
124 Responses
Carousel doesn’t display in FF 3.6.26 + adblock+ & flashblock.
Just a spinning wheel ad infinitum like so:
i.imgur.com/WuVI9.jpg
Other than that – looks pretty slick – well done!
I really like the new design. Looks very sleek.
Looks great. I reckon there should be like and possibly dislike buttons on the comments because some of the comments on this site are classic.
Count me as a fan of all the white space – it’s a good design technique, and David McDonald, the designer’s done a terrific job.
Hi David – everything looks good on Firefox vs10…..will fire up the ipad 2 and see how it looks there.
Well done on a very smart and functional site update.
Howdy,Just registered my ID and just saying i like your new look. It won’t be long before everyone gets use to it.
Thanks for the favicon! 🙂
Looking at the site on iPad, the “share” toolbar appears off the screen and you can’t resize or scroll to show it, so the buttons can never be clicked.
Carousel not working on Chrome (v17) with ad-block disabled.
@ David
At the moment I’m using one of the Firefox browsers and the poll doesn’t work when I either try to view it or vote. If I could vote it’s be for Sherlock and second (not possible either way ) for Phryne Fisher. At least those on the list you gave.
Yes David, I agree with all the commenters below, this latest manifestation of TV Tonight is logical and easy to use. I do also agree with a few folks who are blinded by all the white. Somehow the old purple flavour was easier on the eye. But it’s a small price to pay I guess.
Oh also, I’d personally like it if your own comments were all blocked in purple as they used to be, as often the best comments are those that have brought you into the fray 😉
Brilliant – and really easy to register.
Only took me a few minutes.
Thanks David!
Awesome new look David – love it! Very professional. Very modern.
Keep up the great work.
Just an idea to reduce the amount of white on the site. What about having the Reviews section in the third column below the TV Tonight Poll?
I like it, although the network menu is hovering over the text of the articles all the time. For this article I miss the sub heading, the by line and also the first par.
Also Howdy? How about a G’day!!
Hi David, Theres a group of annoying tag boxes labelled “ABC, 7, 9, etc” that are blocking the top left of every page i open so i cannot read the first paragraph of anything. it is also on homescreen but seems hidden behind the moving screen, i have widows xp with internet explorer 7 v7.0
Anyone else think that the tag cloud would have more value on the main page(s) rather than on individual post pages?
Tags are to help me find stuff. I’m much more likely to be looking for stuff from the home page or a category page rather than as a result of reading a specific post.
Perhaps a grey background would be easier on the eye than all this white.
I like your pretty stars David 🙂
Re the issues I was having earlier – no change, including the mobile site being presented at first in IE8 but F5 reload fixes.
I also can’t see how to edit my comments.
@A. – glad you decided to stick around. (I would’ve thought that you would already have at least the default email address provided by your ISP with your internet connection).
@Trix – thanks for your thoughts. I think it will have a minimal effect on my möjö. 🙂
Looks sharp, well done, great resource
I like the refresh, David. Though I agree with one of the earlier posters in that it feels like a lot of white space. Otherwise, great.
Looks great David! I’ll be sure to take my shoes off for at least the first few visits… 🙂
Love the updates David, but can your next improvements be made to the mobile website? Dull as anything, but I guest most of them are.
OK..I finally made it back…..took me since midday to get it sorted…first try at registering did not work…..
It gave me a shock when I came into the site…I mostly like it….clearer to read ….but I am not a fan of the moving picture box….
I can certainly move around the site quicker than before….
Mostly all good….thankyou David 🙂
Paragraphs are back for Comments and you should now be able to edit comments for those typos. There are still some issues to sort through and it often depends on the browser you are using. If you are able to name the browser and version this helps to work out where the problems are. There’s a reason why the site launched in Beta and it may take a while to address some glitches.