Journals Exist! Go and Have a Look at Them 😎 3 3

[Get Marwood & I]

Hello 

Further to my 'Galleries' tub thumping thread a while back...

https://boards.cgccomics.com/topic/455423-galleries-go-looky/#comments

....I thought I'd bang the drum again for the members who are currently making use of the Journals forum.

The Journals software is a bit of a clunky disaster, is littered with formatting and configuration issues, and is hidden away from the main forums list. But there is some great content hiding in there. 

I wasn't surprised to read the other day that one member didn't even know the Journals existed, as he only accessed the boards from his mobile phone and had never scrolled down that far! There are no visible links at the top of the page on a mobile.....

....and you have to scroll about a mile to be presented with any evidence that the journals exist, so it's easy to see why mobile only users might miss them.

We can't have that, can we!

On a desk top, the Journals are visible / accessible here, via the broken 'My Journals' access link:

 

...and here, via the tab to the right of the main forum page if you scroll down:

 

If you click on the main Journals access link at the top of the forum page, both of the two available options ('Journals' and 'All Journals') will take you to one of two landing page options as follows. One looks like this....

 

...and is a list of the journals in reverse order of creation. You'll see there is no option to filter them to see the latest posts within them.

If you select the 'Organize by Author' option as shown below....

 

...you are presented with a second, different layout of the same order of journals but this time with some filtering options ('Sort By' and 'Filter By'):

 

Alas, neither of these filter options allows you to actually order the journals in order of the most recent posts. They include options which do not apply, such as 'Rating' but annoyingly no option for latest posts. 

Consequently, there is no way that I am aware of to access the latest journal entries other than by observing the 'Recent Journal Activity' to the right of the screen in the above screenshots. On a mobile device, that tab is hidden eight miles at the bottom of the page or via the hidden menu tab.

I'm trying to get CGC to do something about this as I suspect what it means is that people aren't visiting the journals area as they have no idea they exist or, if they do, no idea how to navigate them. When we view the main comic forums, it's easy to see the latest post in each of them, and decide which you want to click on and read. You just click on each forum and then are presented with all the latest thread posts, in order. There is no such way of doing this with the journals.

So the purpose of this thread is to remind everyone that the journals exist in the first instance and, if they have not already done so, encourage them to visit them using the 'Recent Journal Activity' tabs that exist on the right hand side of the main forum landing page (titled just 'Journals')....

 

...and on the Journals page once selected (Recent Journal Activity):

 

I spent some time this morning reading part of @Hibou's Digital Staples journal entry, and was amazed to see no reactions or comments throughout despite some really interesting thoughts and content!

 

Please, go and have a look at it, and all the other journals that our members have created since the ill-fated migration from standard forum software. There's some really cool content to be found.

I'll keep working on CGC to get some greater visibility for the journals - and galleries - in the meantime.

Cheers 

 

[Get Marwood & I]

.....and for those that didn't already know, you can access a member's journal from their profile page, like so:

https://boards.cgccomics.com/profile/46697-iconic1s/?tab=node_blog_blog

 

https://boards.cgccomics.com/profile/20763-sauce-dog/?tab=node_blog_blog

[Shazbot]

Never knew about those, thanks. Unfortunately none of the dropdown links in that Navigation group work for me. The galleries and calendar links work but the dropdowns are dead to my iPhone.☠️

[troydivision1]

Journals!

[Get Marwood & I]

On 9/12/2022 at 1:25 PM, Shazbot said:

Never knew about those, thanks. Unfortunately none of the dropdown links in that Navigation group work for me. The galleries and calendar links work but the dropdowns are dead to my iPhone.☠️

That's a shame - there are a lot of glitches unfortunately. I'll add that to the list, if CGC Mike manages to get his meeting of the ground. In the meantime, jump on a desktop, Shaz, and have a search about when you next can. 

[Get Marwood & I]

On 9/12/2022 at 1:31 PM, Troy.Division said:

Journals!

Shmernals! 

 

[Sigur Ros]

On 9/12/2022 at 8:25 AM, Shazbot said:

Never knew about those, thanks. Unfortunately none of the dropdown links in that Navigation group work for me. The galleries and calendar links work but the dropdowns are dead to my iPhone.☠️

Yea.  Never noticed them but they don't work anyway.  Which is fine.

[Get Marwood & I]

On 9/12/2022 at 1:57 PM, Sigur Ros said:

Yea.  Never noticed them but they don't work anyway.  Which is fine.

You're the third to mention not noticing them, so the thread is serving a purpose. They work after a fashion, and are well worth a visit Sigur. Don't let the fact that they're hiding, and have cranky software limitations, put you off 

[Get Marwood & I]

We've hit that magic seven post figure and are now 'Popular Now' 

[Sigur Ros]

On 9/12/2022 at 9:01 AM, Get Marwood & I said:

You're the third to mention not noticing them, so the thread is serving a purpose. They work after a fashion, and are well worth a visit Sigur. Don't let the fact that they're hiding, and have cranky software limitations, put you off 

Yea, I didn't mean to knock your thread. It definitely succeeded and will bring this to the attention of many others too. 👍

But I'm not sure what they are. I'm assuming they are basically just blogs from some members here.  

I'll look if they fix the link. 👌

In any case, it's nice being immortalized in your first image ;)

Edited September 12, 2022 by Sigur Ros

[Get Marwood & I]

On 9/12/2022 at 2:04 PM, Sigur Ros said:

Yea, I didn't mean to knock your thread. It definitely succeeded and will bring this to the attention of many others too. 👍

No worries, I didn't take it that way.

On 9/12/2022 at 2:04 PM, Sigur Ros said:

But I'm not sure what they are. I'm assuming they are basically just blogs from some members here.  

Yes, exactly that - personal blogs that members can create and share anything they want within forum guidelines. I use mine as a repository of key information relating to variants. Notwithstanding the navigation issues, the software has some really cool features.

On 9/12/2022 at 2:04 PM, Sigur Ros said:

I'll look if they fix the link. 👌

Then you'll likely never look 

[Get Marwood & I]

On 9/12/2022 at 2:04 PM, Sigur Ros said:

In any case, it's nice being immortalized in your first image ;)

You'll laugh, hopefully, but I always thought that was a bear piddling in the snow 

The old eyes aint that great, I'm afraid 

[Get Marwood & I]

If anyone is interested in the history of what used to be referred to as the 'new' journals, but which are now four years old and very much our old / current journals, have a read of this thread below from our old, much missed Administrator, Scott (now there was a guy who knew how to communicate with the members - "At Your Service"):

A word of caution - Don't rely on any of the navigation tips within it though, as many aspects are now out of date. What tends to happen over time, alas, is that Invision (the site software owners) make changes and they are not communicated to our CGC technical staff. The onus is on us usually therefore, to note what has changed, flag it to Admin and to try to do something about it. It's not a perfect world, is it....

 

[Hibou]

Thank you for the kind words!

 

[Get Marwood & I]

On 9/12/2022 at 2:25 PM, Hibou said:

Thank you for the kind words!

 

You're welcome, Hibou. There's some cool stuff in your journals - if we can get a few more eyes on them, all the better. Bowie fans take note!

[troydivision1]

Thanks for posting the link to mine.
It has been therapeutic to sit down and write each week and recall the experiences that shaped my personal collection a book at a time.

There is going to be a length write up in about two months or so that details how acquiring my *unicorn* grail resulted in a complete lack of interest in comics (and not being able to be excited about events in real life) for quite some time.
Honestly, I'm not even sure any comic related item could bring me joy anymore...
That post will stray in to these topics that some other collectors may feel or have felt.

Edited September 12, 2022 by Troy.Division

[Get Marwood & I]

On 9/12/2022 at 5:23 PM, Troy.Division said:

Thanks for posting the link to mine.
It has been therapeutic to sit down and write each week and recall the experiences that shaped my personal collection a book at a time.

There is going to be a length write up in about two months or so that details how acquiring my *unicorn* grail resulted in a complete lack of interest in comics (and not being able to be excited about events in real life) for quite some time.
Honestly, I'm not even sure any comic related item could bring me joy anymore...
That post will stray in to these topics that some other collectors may feel or have felt.

Sounds intriguing, Troy. Give us a nod when it lands....

[MattTheDuck]

I've been probably an above average visitor to the Journals and would echo the OP's praise for them, if not the formatting, etc.  It seems to me that they could be a real value to the site if some time and effort could be spent to make them more usable.  

[universal soldier]

I haven't looked at Journals in years, thanks for the reminder that they are there.

[CGC Mike]

I would like to see the journals put back to the same format that regular thread are.  That is the way they used to be.  I am not sure that is doable but, will ask when I have a meeting with Dena.