This is actually some useful feedback. And just for the record, I am not on the “The new forum is fine” wagon. Just no problems so far on my end. But then, I barely use the forums. Just nothing to do on vacation so might as well browse the forum. 
They may have worked (although I have no proof to back this up) but were they fully-functional and compatible with all devices? Don’t think so.
Isnt there analytics tool to see what resolutions and what browsers people use? But isnt it that these forums are tested only on few resolutions and browsers because they are the most common? How do you test it?
@Matthias_Ancaladron & @Austneal I’m going to need a little more information in order to reproduce the issue. Could you provide me with the name of your mobile device, operating system, and browser?
For some reason you seem to be receiving the desktop UI instead of the mobile UI which others, who have posted here, appear to be receiving correctly.
@Rivr_Luzade Thank you for the detailed feedback. Like the other two, you seem to be receiving the desktop version as well. The “Dev Posts” in the top navigation should only be available on desktop.
I tried reproducing the the Desktop instead of mobile UI issue unsuccessfully with…
- A Lumia 925 (sadly I don’t have access to a 920)
- Internet Explorer Mobile 11
- Windows Phone 8.1
- Google Chrome Developer tools
- Using 768 x 1280 resolution (following Lumia 920 spec)
- First with user-agent:
Mozilla/5.0 (compatible; MSIE10.0; Windows Phone 8.0; Trident/6.0; IEMobile/10.0; ARM; Touch; NOKIA; Lumia 920)source of string - Then with user-agent:
Mozilla/5.0 (compatible; MSIE 10.0; Windows Phone 8.0; Trident/6.0; IEMobile/10.0; ARM; Touch; NOKIA; Lumia 920)source of string
Just out of curiosity, why are you using the user-agent to determine what CSS to load? I haven’t checked, but are you loading a totally different page, or just the stylesheet?
Would it not be simpler to just use a more responsive design? I mean, if your design falls apart >800px (or whatever is the case here), then fix the issue there instead of trying to add more user-agent strings to your detection. Just because someone has a narrow resolution doesn’t mean they’re on a smartphone. Not to mention, using user-agent strings for much of anything like this is generally considered a bad idea (for reasons that are becoming apparent here).
Discourse handle the logic shift between mobile and desktop styles.
I have not dived into their code to reproduce the issue but instead tried replicating the issue, by simulating the only device that I have received details on, to the best of my capabilities as I do not have access to that exact device model.
As you have pointed out yourself, this is an issue with a few mobile devices. I’m trying to reproduce the issue so I can forward it to the people that could fix it.
And so at the risk of sounding like a broken record; can you tell me the name of your device, operating system, and browser?
If you feel better about it, feel free to EVE mail the info to me, assuming of course you wish to try and help identify this issue.
Did you set the correct headers to receive mobile version in your “professional” tests? 
No, I didn’t because I shouldn’t have to. Using the user-agent like this creates problems, as has been stated (and shown to be problematic) previously.
1 Like
it is an alcatel 40600, screen resolution seems to be 854x480, browser is chrome, android version is 6.0.1 which i believe is marshmallow.
but the issue is the new forums are designed terribly and the old forums worked for everything across the board.
Thanks for coming back to me with information about your device. Earlier today I filed a bug report with Discourse after successfully reproducing the issue with help from Rivr Luzade.
I have updated my report to Discourse to include information about your device as well.
1 Like
Are you gonna add a zoomed out organized mode?
You see this is default zoom in my device. I can see most all categories and sub cats, no jumble no mess, minor scrolling. Screenshot_20170802-072532|281x500
Now look at what my main page is now. 2 categories. No subcats. Just zoom. Screenshot_20170802-072723|281x500
Notice how far I have to zoom in on the old forums to isolate just two categories to match the new forum layout. Screenshot_20170802-072742|281x500
You would not believe the amount of scrolling required to reach the bottom and the amount of work it is to find anything.
I brought this up almost a month or two ago with nearly the same pics and it’s still true. Its just a giant leap backwards functionality wise.
There are no plans to offer a “zoomed out” version of the forums. What you have shown in the first screenshot is a web that is not mobile friendly at all. I.e. it just shows you the entire page and expects you to zoom in to be able to read anything.
Yes, we do realize that there is more scrolling involved on these forums, but we have no plans on emulating website behavior from 10 years ago on mobile devices.
We can however look into other things for mobile versions, such as what information is being displayed, and how they’re styled.
If it’s not mobile friendly at all.how come it works perfectly fine and translate the literal webpage experience to my hand. I don’t want a “mobile” ui. I just want the desktop version.
The pictures I posted showed everything straight up. I double tap and go right to where I want. It’s much more mobile friendly than having to scroll down indefinitely through text alligned in vertical columns rather than conventional left to right reading and having to infinitely load each page the further I scroll down rather than being able to simply select which page I want to go to.
In your efforts to create a mobile optimized experience youve actually created something overly complicated that doesn’t work at all.
When I go to a forum I expect a list of topics arranged by category. Not a jumbled mess arranged vertically as far zoomed in as possible and having to scroll down a thousand lines to get to the area i want to be in.
The entirety of the categories and subcategories need to be completely restructured with a format that isn’t zoomed in like I’m looking through a microscope at a jigsaw puzzle.
1 Like
I think the problem was relatred to have a foum rnning in SQL server , and that give the hurdle. They migrate to a new solution dont tested, giving us some reasons to do so but that reasons dont resist the BASIC evidence and STRICT reasoning of us.
As professional developer, i can say u normally some times the feedback of the users are not evaluated, dont matter, because the directives, CEO, CIO give us as developers dumb orers we need to do. Our responsability as developers is do so, but the CEO / CIO pissed us and the users many times, and brands, website, business die for these types of decisions.
But, i think the people dealing here as ISD are not developers or middle magnament, are trained support people who cant spoke freely, the work of them is in risk if they do so. They and some of us know this is a stupid move, but they are forced to smile and say all the false reasons to make the change.
They and we know this change have no sense in usanility / functionability terms, but they are forced to smile and say is a marvelous thing, knowing all this forum software is worst, ■■■■ but mandated.
@Austneal I still don’t know what sort of device you have, but could you check if you have a “request desktop site” setting enabled? If it is enabled you will have to use the hamburger menu to request mobile version of the forums, or disable the setting.
@Matthias_Ancaladron could you check if you too have this enabled in your device? And if so, you will have to disable it or request mobile version from the hamburger menu.
Android: Chrome > Settings menu > Request desktop site [toggle this off, if enabled]
Windows phone: Internet Explorer > More > Settings > Website preference > [Mobile version]
iOS: If you requested desktop version, use hamburger menu to reset to mobile view
I already have it disabled, I can switch freely between mobile and desktop I just always use desktop versions of sites.