Unions: Version 2 (Let's keep discussion on topic) - page 2 - Bug Reporting & Feedback

Sentinelrv · 2006-08-02 05:21:50

Unions: Version 2: (Thread Created 8/2/06)NOTE: I'm not updating this thread anymore, because The HeadCrab Union has moved off of GameSpot because of a loss of hope that this project will ever see the light of day. It's up to you what you want to do with your union, but think before you act.Just to give people some back story, The HeadCrab Union was going to move off of GameSpot, but I was contacted by Greg Kasavin (Read the conversation here) asking us not to leave, and to give the union system one more chance. He told me to provide him with a list of things I thought unions should have, so I took a couple weeks and brainstormed ideas, and tried to put them all together. All my ideas can be found below.The Inside of a Union:The first half of this large site enhancement deals with the insides of a union. Everything from what is displayed to how the staff manages their union's content can be found here. I'll start by showing off a concept image of what my vision is for the new union system, and then I'll explain every feature in detail. I'll be using The HeadCrab Union in every example.Affiliates Bar:We should have the ability to show off our affiliated sites and unions in a highly visible location, and the best spot for this is the affiliates bar at the top of GameSpot. Affiliating with other sites or unions gains us permanent advertisements on the other end, but we need to be able to display these affiliates in a visible location on our union, or it isn't really worth it for other sites or unions to affiliate with us. There would be a section in the admin tab that allows us to input two pieces of info, the affiliate's name and link for that affiliate. If a union has so many affiliates that they can't include all the names on the bar, then they could input the name 'More,' and then link it to an article or thread within the union that displays the rest of the info.Customizable Double Navigation System:The customizable double navigation system is one of the most important features in this thread. It's the very thing that connects a viewer with the rest of the union. Content driven unions would find this extremely useful. This feature would allow a union to replace GameSpot's navigation system with their own content, allowing visitors a great way to find information on the union, and union leaders the ability to show off their content easily. When you click on a section in the top navigation bar, the bottom navigation bar expands on what you selected with more options. Don't worry about getting back to GameSpot's features, since they'll still all be linked at the bottom of any page on the union.We'd be able to do other things too, such as arranging the navigation buttons in the order we want them to appear, or separating sets of buttons. For example, the gray buttons in the example image are union pages, and the dark gray buttons are game pages that we could create.The biggest reason why this is so essential to union leaders is because it takes a massive amount of time to build a navigation system of our own. Take The HeadCrab Union's current navigation system for example. It took me about three months working on it before it was complete. The entire nav system consists of hundreds of images, and replicates GameSpot's nav system. Why not create a system where a union's nav system doesn't have to be created manually with images of all things. Why not take three days to set everything up instead of three months?Content Pages:Content pages are exactly what the name implies. They're pages that hold content, whether they're news articles, game guides, previews, interviews, videos, downloads, forums, etc... Content pages can be created the current quick way using the Publish page. I say the quick way, because in this version of the union system, the publish page is a shortcut to creating content pages. The more official way of doing it in Unions: Version 2 would be by using the content page management system in the admin tab. With this content page management system, you'll be able to create content pages, and then take advantage of the new double bar navigation system by naming the page, and putting it somewhere in the navigation system. You can either make it a main content page on the top bar, a sub-content page that goes on the bottom bar, or maybe something even lower, such as an article.The point here is that this is where you create content pages and choose where they'll go in the navigation system.When you first start a union, you'll have to setup your navigation system, and that starts with creating content pages and arranging them onto the nav bars. You'll be able to create main content pages such as a Features page (In the example image above) that holds the union's features, and any others that you want. Once you create these main pages, name them and anything else you have to do to them, you can link them onto the top navigation bar. After your main content pages are all setup, you can work on creating the sub-content pages. These will appear in the bottom navigation bar under any of the main content pages that you select. For example, a path that we chose in the HCU's navigation system is Features/Game Guides/ Half-Life 2: Episode One Game Guide. The leader will need to set this whole navigation system up the way they want it.After we create the content pages and organize them into the navigation system the way we want, we'll need to arrange the content page setups using something I call the widget system. This allows you to alter any content page to make it appear however you want it. I'll explain this widget system in great detail ...

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