Prepare yourselves, the old skins are going bye bye!

[~ Rogue ~]

When is IPB3 hitting?

Sometime before June.

What is the main benefit for using 3.0 instead of 2.3? From the looks of 3.0 I'm not that impressed yet.

It's a complete re-write of the original code base. It's faster, cleaner, and way more user friendly. Plugs a lot of security holes and is just a better piece of software. Trust me ... once it's here on Neowin and properly configured/skinned, you'll love it.

The default theme on the 3.0 doesn't do it justice.

[Simon Veteran]

IPB3 is in no way perfect, but it's an improvement. The templates are cleaned up, code is (presumably) cleaner (but they haven't allowed us to actually *view* the code yet), and it's faster. All of these things are major problems we have with IPB2.

[DirtyLarry Veteran]

Sure, I can PM him. Do you have an actual .PSD layered?

I've done some design work in the past for the staffers and stuff, and I could be wrong, but I do not think there is a layered version of the logo. Just flattened already. When I needed to make it a different color, which I did quite a bit as I made the businsess cards for everyone, I made it greyscale, played with the levels a bit to get a nice contrast, then put a solid color over it on another layer and change that layer to color or multiply depending on the color itself.

[~ Rogue ~]

I've done some design work in the past for the staffers and stuff, and I could be wrong, but I do not think there is a layered version of the logo. Just flattened already. When I needed to make it a different color, which I did quite a bit as I made the businsess cards for everyone, I made it greyscale, played with the levels a bit to get a nice contrast, then put a solid color over it on another layer and change that layer to color or multiply depending on the color itself.

I'll probably end up doing that then, if no .PSD exists. If the original .PSD was lost, then that was an epic fail though. ;)

Either I'll do something very similar or I'll re-design the entire damn logo. Well now ... now that I think about that ... that might not be a bad idea. Hm.

[i_was_here]

I hope theres a fluid (wide) theme. I dont like having a bunch of empty space on the sides.

[John S. Veteran]

No, not Shift Graphite!

I :wub: this theme :(

yeah same here...calm and cool and it doesn't make my eyes bleed :laugh:

[dead.cell]

You are not prepared! - Johnny Bravo

[ViperAFK]

I hope theres a fluid (wide) theme. I dont like having a bunch of empty space on the sides.

Yeah I'd like a theme like that as well. Don't like all this wasted space with my widescreen monitor.

[+Warwagon MVC]

maybe someone can port shift refresh to version 3 :)

[pHaez]

Here is the PSD I found while browsing in my Neowin graphics folder. Hope it helps.

neowin4logo.psd.zip

[_neutrino Veteran]

i enjoy finity as well however i would prefer a graphic version but i am completely happy with what we have.

[+Gary7 Subscriber²]

It scares me that you are comparing Finity to Windows ME :(

Well, I loved Finity and thought it was pretty well integrated with the new Neowin, but if you're saying you have something better soon, I'm totally looking forward into it !

I like Finity as well.

[NienorGT]

I hope you guys will bring back old color schemes in this new skin.

I miss Graphite....

[Timan Veteran]

History lesson time :p

Neowin's swift skin started off on vbulletin2, which was then ported over to ipb1. We kept the same look and style of vbulletin with that transition (very small tweaks). Then ipb2 came around, and once again we did slight tweaks, but this time we had shift. Shift was built off of the old swift skin, which still pretty much had the same vbulletin2 look to it. Then Finity what we're using now was built off of shift. We never did start from scratch again, just off of swift (which was completely redone when we upgraded to 2.0).

But now with ipb3, we have to start from scratch, which is a wonderful thing. Means we can use this time to change more than the header/footer and colors/graphics. So even if we port finity over, it'll be different than what we're using now.

As for the other color schemes, no promises. But if someone does the graphics/colors/css should be very simple to add.

[Budious]

I had to switch back to Shift when I visted the forums today, I wondered why then saw this thread. Bad idea, and what's the overhead for maintaining it when you had it around for long and ironed out to perfection just to ditch it. I like it and it's far more suited for my viewing preferences than Finity. Guess I must be the only one to feel this way, but please don't take it away from me. :(

[ATGC]

So, we can make our own custom theme for the forum when you guys add ipb3?

[Electric Jolt]

I like Finity, it was a time when Neowin members changed view points and you saw the number of flame wars reach 0, it was peace between PC and Mac. I can say Finity is nice, but it was done really quickly, it was a minor update. I can tell it was built from Shift and only the look changed, all the icons and everything stayed the same as Shift, it didn't feel different when I switched to it from Shift, it isn't as mindblowing as the switch from Swift Refresh to Shift.

I dislike the colors of the themes, why are they always as shameful as Gnome? Look at Windows Live Wave 3, it is full of *glossy* colors, they look beautiful. The only good looking color is the default blue, and sometimes that looks somewhat dismal too.

Which brings me to why Neowin loves blue like Microsoft does, this is Neowin, it should look unique. It looks unique already, but it holds a color that Microsoft adores. The next theme should be built from scratch with the concept of unique, a simple color is not unique. Aqua has metal, and makes it stand out unique as Mac OS X Aqua. Blue was just Microsoft's way of being lazy, they started Aero Glass, they still use blue sometimes, but it isn't blue everywhere. Neowin should have a theme that is unique, and if you insist on using a color, blue isn't smart, Finity reminds me of MSN Hotmail's dismal blue, equals depressing.

I still wonder why this place is called Neowin when we have *daily* news about the iPhone, call it Neomin. Neomin could be a symbol for MinWin (the effort to make Windows cleaner and smaller), Mac (the m could be for Mac, who knows...), Windows (the in could be for Windows, who knows...), Min (you could combine Windows and Mac together to represent a community that speaks PC and Mac together in a happy community).

I feel that Finity was a chance to refresh Shift, but it looks the same, the 'Add Reply' button below this post I'm typing is tinted blue, and has blue font. So ugly... Now the Finity color blue is glossy, it reminds me of Windows 7 somewhat, looks nice. The graphite and green theme are both ugly with this ugly Shift feeling, Finity has this blue that is one of the only noticable changes really, and is actually glossy, it stands out as Finity. Neowin should go ahead and create a theme that looks neat and built from the ground up, I think Finity was just a Shift Refresh, even Neobond's sig contains an image that symbolizes the Swift Refresh theme.

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When you look at what I said, it might contain a lot, but it shows what Neowin should become and what it looks like right now, it looks like a refresh of Shift. What it should become is a rebranded community opened to PC and Mac users equally, that includes the name and skin. Plus, Neowin reminds me of those programs called Win..., the only program I use today that is called that is WinRAR, other-than that, it sounds kind of ghettoish and reminds of Windows 98/2000.

[Wannes]

Wait a minute, I'm afraid I can't follow the flow.

I just read and replied to a topic stating that Neowin ran the skin tool forcing everyone to use the Finity skin unless they change it manually. However, upon reading this topic we're going to lose Finity and have another theme again? Sorry but Finity is great and I'd bother upgrading it for IPB 3.0 instead of designing a new template. Don't kill the new, save the concepts for later.

Or am I misreading some information?

[Andrew Lyle Global Moderator]

In my opinion, it's about time.

I did enjoy the past themes, but making all themes work with bugs and updates seems like a burden on our coders

[Wannes]

Finity was designed to be a transition skin. Were on to much better things after Finity.

I will not question that there will be better. The fact that this skin, which is pretty good, disappears so fast is what bothers me. For once, I 'm hoping on a release delay. ;)

[Alladaskill17]

Aw, but I like this theme alot, especially the frontpage.

[DanManIt]

Uh oh haha

[~ Rogue ~]

Here is the PSD I found while browsing in my Neowin graphics folder. Hope it helps.

neowin4logo.psd.zip

Many thanks!

I'll be watching for IPB3 and I'll be in contact with you guys after it's released. I got a nice idea for a darkish theme. Darker blues with lighter blues, and the like. I even have something nifty planned for the logo. So stay tuned. ;)

[Snowl]

Once IPB3 hits, we are gong to do a major overhaul of the site, we will spend time making a new theme for it but it will be the only choice once we have upgraded.

The old skins simply are too much work to maintain and Finity is a stop-gap (kinda like Windows ME) :p

So, the next theme will blow our minds out? :)

[Piggy]

Can I keep the neowin shift theme? I need the drop down menus here. :(