Hello all!
It’s been 3 weeks since our last blog post on Furry Network, and we’ve been hard at work! We have been focusing on admin functionality, site layout tweaks and squashing existing bugs. If you’re still waiting for a beta key, have patience – we’ll resume sending them out once we’ve ironed out some issues with the import tool (which is currently broken, but which we expect to be fixed in a day or two).
We are excited for the future, as we’re getting close to being ‘feature complete’ for the general site functionality. Next on our roadmap is content organization, commission management and stories!
Changelog
- Flag Post functionality! You can now report posts for Code of Conduct violations right from the post page. The flag reasons are still placeholders for now – but it’s working!
- Updated language on importer tool for clarity and to communicate security of passwords (we don’t store them, we use them only for import)
- Updated registration form content and layout for improved understanding
- Fixed message inbox layout issues reported by some users
- Fixed errors with following/unfollowing users from artwork pages
- Fixed blacklist redirects that would cause an infinite loop
- Fixed display name not updating in header
- Fixed count displaying for following and followers modal in IE
- Various other bug fixes and improvements to the API
- Users can no longer follow themselves
- Comments can now be deleted when viewing on a mobile device
- It’s now prevented to add the same tag to interest and blacklists
- Homepage and activity feed bugs with displaying the wrong author of comments
- Improvements to the fresh and popular feeds
- Implemented function for thumbnail items to ease up on the CPU usage when scrolling through large sets of images
- Fixed issue with tags longer than 30 characters
- Fixed issues with feeds crashing on certain devices to improve gallery performance
- Fixed issues with follow/following self, adding same tag to interests/blacklists, and posts displaying with wrong author
- Fixed line breaks not appearing in private messages
- Profiles have been updated to allow users to customize with markdown
- Search/filters on feeds stay open to inform users of options to refine results
Admin Functionality
Most of the new features this week are behind the scenes, focusing on our admin functionality and workflows for handling things like reporting users, content and on-site messaging. It’s almost complete – we have built a purpose-designed ticketing system into the site, which makes it easy for our moderation team to keep track of issues and proactively tackle troublemakers as well as make it easy to correct small things (like a mis-tagged image) quickly, without it being a big deal.
As competent, proactive, effective moderation is a key component of any successful site, we know that being able to efficiently handle incidents as they happen is a real benefit to the community. Combined with consistent policies and enforcement, we know that you’ll appreciate the end result and are confident it’ll be worth the wait.
Beta Keys
As Furry Network is a true ‘beta’ – that is, an opportunity for us to get real users in to find bugs and point out flaws, and to try out the site before it’s officially ready, bugs and all – we are taking it slow when it comes to handing out beta keys. We want the site to be ready for everyone when we launch, and for the majority of users to have an excellent experience. We know it can be frustrating waiting and waiting for a key – but we are totally confident that you’ll love it when it’s done!
As mentioned earlier, we will resume sending out beta invites once we have the import tool working properly; we’ve made a lot of improvements to its performance and reliability including auto-cancel of failed imports and tweaks to better handle the peak import loads we typically see when people first join the site. We expect a fix to be ready in the next day or two.
Bug Reports
Thanks to everyone who submitted bug reports via the ‘feedback’ tool on the beta site; they have been invaluable in figuring out which issues are the biggest pain points for users, what things could use improvement, and solving some really weird bugs. You’re all heroes. Keep up the good work reporting bugs and we’ll keep on squishing them!
Thank you!
Thank you everyone for your participation and interest! We cannot wait for the site to be finished, but we also know that it’s only the beginning. Code is only a very small part of a successful community – and we’re committed to giving all aspects the attention and care they need!
Varka and the Furry Network team
Furry Network Blog 