Eww! What have you done to the layout?

Agreed! Not only is the greyness fugly, but the icons are now driving on the wrong side of the posts!

<-- I am very unhappy and wish to express my discontent.

If it aint broke....

Why have icons been moved to a tab in the post comment box?

I am very unhappy and wish to express my discontent. ----------------------------------------------->

Distracting :(

I'll bet its done to get more attention to the user forums ;)

Honestly, I've been a regular poster here for quite some time (I personally enjoy El Reg better than Slashdot), but I think this is the first time I was looking for a non-article thread like this ;)

I do like the way they now show the most favoured posts right below the article. I think that change makes sense. The new greyish look.. It's different, I can't say I'm enthusiastic about it, but I also don't dislike it.

The icons however are distracting. It's stupid. There is a good reason why most fora (SMF, PhpBB, vBulletin, etc.) default to showing the name and optional avatar of a writer to the left; because we read from left to right.

So skimming the posts would immediately give me a good idea as to what someone would say. A Microsoft article I liked or agreed with? Then I'd usually ignore the 'Fail' icons, easily spotted.

But now?

Is El Reg by any chance running the latest SharePoint or such, and are now inclined to using Microsoft's currently favoured "bare looks"?

Edit: I guess we'll know for sure once they remove all the colour from the icons ;)

Mobile?

It has the look of something designed for mobile devices. Is El Reg following the Microsoft approach?

I notice Paris is now batting for the other side in terms of forums posts - I cannot say I am at all surprised but it may take a little getting used to!

User Interface

I like lines around things. It makes it obvious what's a button or a single element, and what isn't. So for example, my imagination still paints the line you've taken away around the upvote/downvote buttons. I go to click on them, and the mouse pointer doesn't change to a button-pressing-pointy-finger, because I'm actually hovering over the number, which is now no longer part of the button. Fair enough, other than making it a smaller target it's no problem. But I just don't understand why? The old buttons were perfectly fine.

You've also taken away your red branding, and everything's going grey. Well your choice obviously. I don't personally go for it, but it's no skin off my rosy nose - and makes the forum no better or worse.

Putting the icons away on the right is just silly though. They should be the first thing you see. It's already difficult enough getting the hard-of-thinking to realise you're making a joke sometimes. But how come I have to press a button to get the icons when I'm posting?

Finally, small white writing on grey background? Really? Bold white on black yes please, but not thin white on grey. Please give us visual contrast. It makes stuff easier to find. Sod the designers, sod pretty, go for obvious. This site is aimed at techies who generally prefer function over form. But if you want design, you can't sacrifice function for form, it's either both, or if you must lose one, lose form.

Finally to play my trump card. The disabled card for me please. I'm visually impaired. I like big, bold and contrasty. It costs me less concentration and mental effort to sort it out. That's true for average sighted people too, so no bad thing. My reading glasses use 5x magnification, and so have to be focused in on a couple of words at a time. So I get positional cues from peripheral vision. To a lesser extent that's true of everyone, who use centre vision for detail.

For example, If you're going to use a line to separate posts, don't use the thinnest grudging line the designers can get away with, because they're all sulking as users complained when they took the old one away in the last re-design. Put the old thick one back. It makes the page look no uglier. But it does make it clearer. And clarity is a good thing. You seem to be moving your forums gradually to just a bunch of information floating in white space. Devoid of any structure holding it together. I don't understand why. That structure should guide the eye to where it's supposed to be. In summary, lines are good (as that nice Columbian man told me last night).

Come back Eadon all is forgiven.

Should we presume that a TIFKAM, tiles interface is just around the corner.

Have to agree with some of the others, the interface is not quite as readable.

* Icons on the Right - just feels all wrong - As mentioned above - we read from Left to Right. The icons are a visual clue as to what to begin reading and what to ignore.

* Icons -- have to click on a tab to select an icon - As Eadon would say - FAIL. The old system was far more ergonomic.

* Icons -- Once wou have selected an icon and return to the text you can no longer see whiohc icon you have selected before clicking preview or submit.

* The title "Sort Comments by " - looks like a "Tab" but it is not..

* "Sort Comments by " - can we have "Most Commented" option in the list please.

* Upvote / Downvote arrows should be on the right. - This is where we naturally terminate reading.

* Grey and White colour scheme is "bland" - I am being polite here.

* Strange I just began replying to a recent post and the icon selection was at the bottom as per normal - Is El Reg doing a bit of live editing by any chance ?

I dont mind if the interface changes just as long as it doesn't replicate TIFKAM or that horrible flat windows look.

Completely agree, I hate the new colour scheme & layout, much preferred the old one... and having to click a tab to then choose an icon.. well my icon says it all...

Indeed, I thought all the icons had vanished entirely for a good few seconds before realising they'd moved to the right.

Really don't like the separate button to add an icon - please put it back under the text box!

Hate the new format...

Haku, I second what everyone else has said and add the following flame bait.

The new forum designs have begun to look like they were designed by a Taliban Supporting, Ginger Haired, Dyslexic, French, Left Hander who just got fired from Microsoft previously having had a hand in designing the Metro interface before Ball-More beat him/her with chair causing great mental disability.

The light grey lines are too light, who was the odlid that decided to add a tab you had to click on to add an icon? That is the very pinnacle of needlessly redundant UI design, thus my nasty comments.

Also, exactly what is the freaking reason to to even write a climate change article (or any article) without enabling direct comments????? Really, even Andrew allowed direct comments and Lewis welcomed them.

Next, I second the visual disability issue and ask that the type face (don't ask me to zoom!) be increased to 12 point please. Next is the link color change... black type does not make clickable links very obvious and they don't change color in (sorry to say it) IE 9 that I'm stuck with.

You could sell ad space on the blank white area to the right of the comments to afford a better design.