- Home
- About Us
- Join/Renew
- Member Benefits
- Member Pages
- Log In
- Help
- Museum Store
After speaking with fellow PAS members at the Gathering it would appear that some of the members do not care for the new website and want to return to a “more simple approach.” With that in mind now is the chance to speak up and share your thoughts, comments, ideas and suggestions. After all, this website is for the benefit of all the members of the PAS that use it. That being the case, we want to make it as simple as possible.
Therefore, we need your suggestions as to what we can do to improve this site. What do you want to see?…what changes can we make to make this site more navigable?… What do you think can make this site flow more smoothly?…Are we missing anything?…
Any, and all suggestions, comments, and ideas are welcome. Please let us know in the comments below.
Thank you.
One of the problems may be getting much feedback since traffic seems to have dropped off so low. Frankly I have been perplexed by the complaints. Before there were lots of complaints about the limitations of the old sight. I am as curmudgeonly as most aging old car F!#*s and don’t like updates, but like all web site changes it takes some effort to learn the new quirks. I think the issues with the old sight have been addressed and the new sight has worked quite well. As I have said before the ability to search and download the PASB bullitens is huge. If you have more features to deal with the website gets more complicated. Just look at the Packard PAC sight. I am hoping any changes are minor navigation tweaks and not another wholesale revamp. Given the reluctance of so many to learn the last revamp it seems it might result in another big drop in traffic. Being the first one to comment on this post after it has been sitting there for two days illustrates the point.
I will be interested to see, if any one responds, just what is so difficult about this site compared to any other site’s navigation? Certainly there is probably room for minor improvement, but everyone should keep in mind that differant isn’t the always the same as better.
Jim,
Thank you for your response.
I put this question to the membership because we cannot fix, nor change, anything on this site if we do not hear from the members as to what they want. If they just continue to stay away from this site, and not use it because they don’t like change, then we will never grow as a club if technology continually changes around us and we remain the same.
We may be looking at a few “tweaks” here and there in the near future, but I do not think another wholesale revamp is needed.
I do have one request, could the web site be set up so that one may continuously be logged in? While logging in each time is not difficult, it is inconvenient.
thanks for considering this.
Hi Kirby,
When you log in, there is a check box to keep you logged in for a couple of weeks. If you change devices, you will have to log in again.
Dave
Thank you Dave, I had not tried that as I believed it only remembered your username. Appreciate the clarification.
Gentlemen & Ladies,
I have never been pleased with the “new and improved” website.
Our previous website, the Paul Morris (PM) version of the website, was far more intuitive and easy to navigate.
Of course, it is no longer available for reviewing its details, so I just go upon my recollection of the countless interesting and happy hours I spent on it.
Apropos of the relatively few minutes per day / hours per week that I now spend upon the PAS website, it is because the New Website IS A DRAG!.
I just do not like the look, feel and navigation demands now required.
It does not feel intuitive, and I also understand that it is very expensive for the PAS to maintain (perhaps, I am incorrect).
Again, I would prefer a miraculous return of the previous PM version, but I do understand that aside from throwing Paul under-the-bus, we need to live with what is available.
That stated, just because we need to live with what we have, it does not mean that we have to like it, or frequent it.
This is likely the most time I have spent on this website since it changed.
Curtiss, thank you for raising the issue for discussion, AND LOOK HOW LONG it has been from the first posting on the matter (7 September) until I got in on the chit-chat (21 September).
Cheers,
Peter
Apparently, I am the designated contrarian on the website topic. Overall, I do like the drop-down menu system, much more than the “ribbon” style used by several current applications for office work. Many years ago, I was involved in several website designs and found the drop-downs easier to create, maintain and update with new colors, descriptors and other features than other navigation methods.
As for my suggestion; separating the member and non-member parts of the site does make sense, we should retain the separation, but make the guest / member sides more obvious. I recommend that one of the “pubic” pages or early in the pubic area, we provide detailed a navigation “map” explaining the Guest boundaries vs the Member areas. One possible way to designate this demarcation would be to use different color topic headers and drop-downs for the private vs public areas. Using color separation plus a detailed “map” of the entire site can be used as a marketing tool. Providing a fairly detained and descriptive list of member ares available to members only will let the prospective members see what they are missing by remaining a Guest. Allowing the guest to pull down the member topics (but with only blank data pages) will show the topics we provide as benefits to members . Certainly the public / private areas need to be separate, but the boundaries and “future features” once the guest joins can be presented more clearly.
OK, will get off my soap box now. Best Regards to all. Herb Tull
Hello Herb,
Sorry for the much delayed reply to this message.
If one looks at the Webpage activity, one sees that the current number of visitors is Much Reduced from the activity common when our Excellent & Esteemed Paul Morris was the Website Grand Master.
It is a Royal Pain to navigate for some of we PAS Gents.
I believe it is like with this post where there seems to be no automatic capitalization, therefore it takes MUCH LONGER to post anything because one needs to Spellcheck for Caps on each outing to post a website comment.
oh well!
see what I mean!
no automatic caps at the beginning of a sentence
ugh!
cheers,
peter
One of the problems with this website is that most people simply do not like change. You get used to something for so long, suddenly it changes, and you have to learn some things all over again. Is it a pain in the ass?, yes it is, but it is a pain we need to endure if we want to stay ahead of the game and learn.
While the old website may have been easier for some folks, it was outdated after only a few years. Technology is changing so fast these days that even new computers are outdated after only a years time. While this new site may seem overly complicated to some, think of it as buying another Pierce-Arrow, you are not going to learn everything about it unless you take some time looking it over and seeing the things that need your attention.
I am noting the posts here, and I will take these matters into suggestion at our next website meeting.
Thank you all for your input.
Curtiss
Maybe there is a setting problem on Peters device? As I start to type this response it is doing automatic spell check including caps at the start of sentences and when I type “I”. Just now because the term Startix has been used before it incorrectly corrected “start” to “Startix” and I had to go back and fix it. I think it illustrates how impossible it is to make these sites work to all the time to everyone’s personal druthers. If I knew how I would disable spell check entirely on my phone for all applications, as I spend more time forcing it to use the,words I intend rather than what it “thinks” I should use. It has a really hard time with “babbitt”, insisting it should be capitalized. But that is just me and my phone.
!
cheers
peter
Folks,
I am a bit late to the party here. As I joined the PAS after the current site was launched I have no basis for comparison to the retired version. While I am not a fan of cascading menus, I don’t find the site cumbersome to use, because after a few visits I learned where I need to go for what I want to see. Even if I haven’t seen the site for some months, I can quickly get to the right section.
Perhaps a way to alleviate the concerns that some folks have with site navigation is to have a top level menu category “My Favorites” with the ability for the User to tag a page, and even designate a name for a favorite. In this way, each logged-in user could have a short picklist to permit speedy navigation. For guest users, perhaps a top level menu or even a different page version of the site areas that are guest-accessible? It’s a sub-optimal user experience to choose a menu option only to learn that a login is required to see it.
Another thought is to have the ‘member login’ button clearly highlighted on the home page. With a second button that denotes something like “Guest Login” which isn’t actually a login but displays only pages that are guest accessible, with samples of the pages that are member-only.
I am keen to help kick around ideas to tweak the site, if a small committee is formed.
Thank you all for your input.
The website committee will be meeting after the holidays and will review your ideas and suggestions.
If anyone else has any ideas or suggestions, please let us know.
Thank you.
Hi All,
My main issues with the new website are in the Forum area: (1) It is too sterile, and (2) The list of recent topics is cluttered with “Days, Voices, Replies”, and not just a chronological list of topics:
(1) The window is all white with categories and topics typeset in boring fonts. There is no indication that we are on an “old car” page or an income tax website. Some color pictures or background would make it more appealing.
(2) The list of recent topics could be just a list of subjects in large type, without the competing “Days, Voices, Replies” grabbing your attention. Perhaps a simple date in smaller type after the Topic would suffice. My point is that what you first read should not be the technical details of the message. The spacing of the “Days, Voices, Replies”, category, and the topics is equal, making it hard at first glance to scan for topics. There should be a greater spacing between topics than between topics and technical details. The red color for topics is a good start, but the font of the topic itself should be the larger of all associated detail fonts. Also, the old website allowed scrolling back to all previous topics greater than a week ago without having to think “Gee, is what I’m looking for in “General”, or “Body” or “What did I do…”
My 2 cents. Happy Holidays!
The Cadillac-LaSalle website is much easier for me to use, all elements of each category are visible. Use is very high, moreover non members are allowed to use pretty much all elements of the site (I don’t agree with this). Go to this site, share your opinion. Peter was the webmaster there at one time, also.
I agree with Bob’s commments. get rid of Categories and keep everything chronological but allow seach by topic.
The website committee has had a brief meeting and discussed some of the issues put forth here.
We are in the process of sorting through some ideas and putting them together for the website. We have noted the suggestions here and would welcome any further input on the members part that would help us in streamlining the website and making it a little bit more user friendly.
Remember, if you don’t speak up, your voice will never be heard.