Forum on smartphone site

Bad is being polite.

I really like the articles on roads, but the forum is absolutely sh... garbage.  Most people use forums on mobiles and tablets on the run.  PCs are heading out.

A simple forum like 2008 STW would do it.  Now STW is garbage.  

Good simple forums attracts traffic and boosts advertising income hopefully.

Really bad on my smartphone also!

Let's be fair though, it's still absolute light-years better than a certain other Weekly Cycling website.

Yep the smartphone layer is rubbish

Just to answer the question posed by the forum topic, you can now access the forum from the smartphone site - it's in the hamburger menu at the side of the page. 

As for the GDPR popups - the one on the classic version of the site (the non-smartphone mobile site) still doesn't work as it should - popping up on every page load. They thought they'd fixed it last week, but they hadn't and they're still working on trying to fix it. It's exactly the same popup as used on the desktop site (because the classic version is the desktop re-sized) which works exactly as it should there. If it's not fixed very soon it will be turned off. 

We're keeping an eye on the smartphone popup - at the moment it seems to be working the way it should. That is, you should hardly ever see it.

The smartphone setting is bad enough but the bug with the 'Adverts help us run this site' stupidity is really annoying. The site has had weeks to fix the first issue and over a week to fix the second.

Sure, it's your site to crap up with whatever poor design choices you wish to make but it does not result in a good user experience.

Don't forget the EVER ANNOYING "Ads help us run this site", which even if you press continue to site, still continue to pop up talking half a screen.

It may well get better, they are trying by the sound of it. I was just hoping we wouldn't have a similar CF to the previous re-write which was painful and we lost some useful functionality * in the forum/comments areas. Ah well....

* including really esoteric stuff like, when you click a link to a comment from the front page, it actually goes to that comment..

Unless there’s some tie to the web developer with the publication, I cannot believe Road.cc continue to go through this and think it’ll get any better. 

It’s awful on IOS.  I have to scroll all the way down to the bottom of the page past numerous adverts (ummm) just to click on ‘classic version’.  It will then often revert back to the mobile version straight away but certainly when I return to the site despite never clearing cookies. 

I don't come here as often as I might, mainly because:

• Comments don't load on mobile, just a constantly spinning wheel. I have to select "Desktop site" on Chrome's own menu (Android) to view comments, and then mess about zooming about the page;
• Having to accept cookie preferences on multiple pages within the same browsing session;
• Smartphone button sometimes appears, sometime not;
• Open a page, switch to another application, come back to the page and the url has defaulted to road.cc, instead of road.cc/ content / interesting_review_you_were_reading. The article is still there, but the url suffix has disappeared. Makes copying urls to share with people tricky.

A frustrating experience on mobile.

Since the recent https/cookie change I'm prompted to accept the cookie/ad preferences on every.single.page.

Android OnePlus 6, in Chrome.

The smartphone site is a mess, it lacks features required to access the forum and the comments section underneath articles is still hit and miss to the point where I more than often just give up. It also redirects from the normal site back to the smartphone version hence all your extra “hits”. If I managed your publication, I’d be demanding any money spent on this upgrade back and getting a proper web design company to design the new format.  

"Mobile traffic gone up"

Due to aggressive pre-loading, accidental swipes and the likes?

The mobile layer is practically unusable on my mid range phone, Xiaomi mi a1. It keeps on loading crap and content keeps on jumping.  People who like it must be the ones with very powerful phones, but many cannot or won't spend that much.

In the meanwhile it's rather putting me off using the site as to avoid accidentally re enabling the layer, I'm having to force desktop mode. 

"Mobile traffic gone up"

Due to aggressive pre-loading, accidental swipes and the likes?

The mobile layer is practically unusable on my mid range phone, Xiaomi mi a1. It keeps on loading crap and content keeps on jumping.  People who like it must be the ones with very powerful phones, but many cannot or won't spend that much.

In the meanwhile it's rather putting me off using the site as to avoid accidentally re enabling the layer, I'm having to force desktop mode. 

Technically both versions of the site on mobile are smartphone versions in that site itself is fully responsive to the device it's being viewed on and load speed is quick in the classic version too. The 'smartphone' version is actually a layer on top of the site that makes it easier to view more content on the homepage and from inside an article by swiping sideways.

From our PoV it's not currently working the way we would like, or indeed expected it to on deployment, but we're giving the company that supplies it the chance to get it to work the way that was intended* before we take a final view on its success or otherwise. We certainly want it to have the ability for people to log-in, comment, and use the forum.

The main reason we are persisting with it though is that lots of people do seem to like it, mobile traffic has gone up since we rolled this out – in terms of users, page views and time on site.

*although our patience isn't limitless on that one.

Do we know whether the smart-phone version is supposed to be considered release quality - rather than alpha/beta phase - yet ? I mean, it's obviously not - but wondered if anyone had heard one way or another..

Try viewing in classic mode (should be an option at bottom of page)