Community Homepage Updates: Coming Soon!
Hi everyone,
We have another exciting update launching soon - hopefully next week! Our community homepage is getting revamped on the web version and will now replace the /home and /forum pages.
Some other key updates to look out for include:
- Easier exploration and discoveries of communities - which will be expanding soon during our forum restructuring process currently underway!
- The ability to view threads on the same page, as well as heart and comment from that page including an expanded view of content.
@SoulfullyAButterfly
Thank you so much for letting us know about this!
Backend update is way more needed than afront end one , I can't see a lot of messeages unless I refresh the page mid conversation , in the app or the site its the same ,it really effects my listening experience
Hi ❤️ @IsayUncle @AffyAvo @Sunisshiningandsoareyou
Thank you for all the feedback and suggestions!
- The Moving Forward & Milestones sub-forum is now named Goals & Accomplishments. I hope this is useful! Tagging @VerseArt too to notify them of all of the changes. You can also explore more in other subcommunities mentioned or otherwise such as Healthy Living and General Support.
- I know the terminologies can be very confusing, especially as a newbie. We'll do away with all of that, externally and internally between leaders as well, in the coming forum restructure updates and hopefully make it all simpler!
- That form needs updation. As for now, we have got really a lot to focus on with the restructuring. And there are a numbered active volunteers to keep it all running. As the post mentions, we hope to have — Easier exploration and discoveries of communities - which will be expanding soon during our forum restructuring process currently underway! So this means better organization, expansion and more leaders. We'll then analyse the functionality and take in all the suggestions and feedback. Stay tuned haha!
Hope this helps. 🙂
@theriverissinging
I had a busy day yesterday and didn't get back to you and Affy. That was amazing River, Thank you so much for taking the inititiave. I was going to messege you but decided to wait, and them BAM! Here it is. Big thanks to you Affy, Sun and all involved.😜🎉
@IsayUncle
oops ... and thanks to soulfullyAbutterfly too.
@IsayUncle @VerseArt
I moved goal threads that were under Getting Unstuck to Accomplishments and Goals. I'm going to see if there's a SMART Goals thread with good information to pin over there now.
@AffyAvo
Thanks soooo much Affy, I will definitly follow up on these this weekend. Have an awesome day!🌸
Hello @theriverissinging ❤️
Thank you for letting me know! This was very helpful. I'm looking forward to all the updates. 😊
@theriverissinging
I like that crisp and concise update list, River, thanks for letting us know. Looking forward to these definitely. Feel free to poke whenever, if y'all need another hand (or two lol), happy to! ❤
@SoulfullyAButterfly
I just saw the new page. I love the access to the Sub-Communities quickly. It is labeled as "Explore Communities" Are those Sub-Communities or Communities? It makes a big difference for Newbies when they are told by elders to go check out this or that "Sub-Communites" If those are considered Sub-Communities I think the title shhould say "Explore Sub-Communites" I'm just saying, BUT the page looks awesome and I'm looking forward to delving into it further! It looks like it's going to be super easy to navigate. Have'nt seen much yet but it looks like it's a big WIN!👏👍🍰🎉
@IsayUncle If a newbie hovers their mouse pointer of one of the little circles, the popup says "Join/leave this community". If they click on the name they see a big button labelled "Join this Community". If they click on Leaders they see the list of Community Leaders, often with a Community Mentor Leader at the top. And so on.
So it seems to me that the terminology built in to the website is pretty consistent in avoiding the use of "sub".
Charlie
@RarelyCharlie
Thanks for pointing out the obstacle to changing the title to "Sub-Communities". To change the title is a simple edit change BUT... BUT... To change the pop-ups from the hovering mouse is a MAJOR HTML CODING SCRIPT CHANGE and huge headache if done for each sub community. I agree with that. I personally don't think most people would notice the inconsistency with the pop up. You are 100% correct though. It would be inconsistent.
Back to my concern about not having the sub communities labeled as such. I almost left 7-cups because of this but I am so glad I did not. I want others not to fall before starting too. As a newbie the site is massive and confusing. When elders and veterans tried to help me find my way they often suggeseted this sub-community or another. The first place I looked was for tabs on top the pages that said "sub communities". I couldnt find them there so I went to the communities section and saw the forums and thought those must be the "sub communitues" and so all those compounded, HOW on earth was I going to find the sub community that was suggested. to help me. i then made it a missin to find the sub-communities because if we do not understand how something work, we cannot use it properly. I never was able to find any sub communit but luckily I found a place that helped out and so I no longer worried about finding sub communities. BUT I almost left the site because I couldn't find what was being suggested to help me.
Just have a tab somewhere on the page that says "Sub-Communities" And let the content of that tab explain the confusion and interchageability of communities and sub communities. This is a brand new home page. Nip the confusion in the bud here. (If we use the word sub-community we should have sub communities or at the least an explanation why they cant be found.
AFFY gave me a great explanation. I'll copy and paste it on the next reply.
@IsayUncle
Affy's helpful insight.
To start with explaining the terms - It totally makes sense you are confused! many of us are far from consistent and use unofficial terms.
Technically 7 Cups as a whole is a community of people. So things like Anxiety Support, Depression Support, General Support are subcommunities. Many of us get lazy and drop the 'sub'.
Then to add to the confusion, technically a subcommunity encompasses everything for that topic. So Anxiety Support has a teen chatroom, and adult chatroom, forums, a Q&A page, resources, etc. But when many people refer to a subcommunity they specifically are referring to the forums, as if you go to the anxiety subcommunity main page the forums are what that page seems to be about.
A group of forum threads in a subcommunity is technically called a category. So Getting Unstuck is a category in the General Support Subcommunity. Many of us use words interchangeably. Off the top of my head I use category, subforum, section, subsection, etc.
Subcommunities didn't always exist on 7cups, we used to have forums that were just the forums, and there was no subcommunity page where someone could easily see resources, leaders, etc. The subcommunities were introduced gradually. For quite a while we had a number of forum categories (and 1 level above that, for example, the Anxiety forums overall) that didn't belong to a subcommunity. From what I remember this was the case for the goals forums. Eventually, all forums were placed into a subcommunity, sometimes that meant having a new one and other times it meant doing things like moving Goals to the General Support Subcommunity. Some of these more broad subcommunities then looked at all of the categories they had - it seemed like too many, so they removed some and moved threads around to the categories that remained.
To Charlie
THANK YOU SO MUCH FOR YOUR RESPONSE AND AWARENESS. It's great.
@IsayUncle Hi Isay, with the forum restructuring taking place changes will continue to take place and so for now those spaces can be seen as individual communities if that is easier! Glad you find the updates helpful already.
@SoulfullyAButterfly
it's not about being easier for me. I get it now, it's for the newbies that might get confused. please read my reply to charlie. you guys are awesome! thanks so much.
@IsayUncle I think there's a good chance we're going to drop "subcommunities" and go to communities instead. If that happens it will take some time to update wording in other places of the site to be consistent. Hopefully things won't be too confusing for long!
@AffyAvo @SoulfullyAButterfly
I think I did what I wanted to do. Bring the subject up in a strong manner while this new homepage was still new so it could be considered while working out the wrinkles, and I'm confident it'll get worked out. Everyone involved puts so much heart and effort into makeing this the best site possible! AND it shows. Thx.❤️
@SoulfullyAButterfly please bring back the forum search
@TortueDesBois It still exists on every thread page but I hope we get it on the community page too!
@TortueDesBois @AffyAvo thank you for this request, we are looking into it.
@SoulfullyAButterfly
The new front end to the SubCommunities is much better than the previous one.
I particularly appreciate that the SubCommunities are grouped by classes, like "Topics" and "7 Cups", while before they were all in a very long list
Just by clicking these classes, all SubComs are seen at once, making it much more transparent than before (navigating a long list until reaching for example Trauma Support, where very important issues are included).
Also, the list of threads is much more functional and appealing.
It might seem a detail, but the aesthetics of the Community front end is crucial to make it more engaging for newcomers.
And involving as many members as possible in the SubCommunities is fundamental for strengthening 7 Cups as a Community and not just a chat support app.
A suggestion: an alphabetical list of mental health conditions (categories?) linking to the respective forums or to their SubCommunity.
For example
AHDH -> Support Plus
Attachment issues -> Trauma SubCom
Etc...
The SubCommunities where some mental health issues are located are not obvious, like those above.
Moreover, most recent members don't even know that their condition has a specific Forum and activities within a SubCommunity. So a list of those pointing to where they are would promote they join their specific SubCommunity.
Congratulations for a wonderful work, with so many improvements!
I am sure it will help much to enliven the SubCommunities, so important for bonding the 7 Cups members into a thriving Community.
@HealingTalk I have a searchable list of the forums here: Find a forum (although it tends to get out of date). You can use it to search for attachment or ADHD, for example.
I think it's unfortunate if we make it look like you need to have a diagnosis in order to benefit from 7 Cups. It also encourages members to self-diagnose.
If you search for worry, for example, you don't find any forum at all. If you search for the medical term, anxiety, you find a lot. Yet worry is a normal part of everyday life. I think people who have worries deserve our support without being encouraged to think of themselves as having a medical condition. But I know this is a difficult problem with no easy solution.
Charlie
@RarelyCharlie
Oh, that's a beautiful work and seems very useful to me. I have bookmarked it.
Regarding the "diagnosis language", many emotional states and mental health issues have a "natural language" meaning, that doesn't require a professional diagnosis.
In common parlance, someone would say that they feel anxious or they experience anxiety, or they feel depressed. They know what they mean, and people understand it, so it's a correct use of the word. The meaning doesn't include that they went to a psychiatrist and got such a diagnosis.
So in my humble opinion, it's great if someone feels anxious and goes to "Anxiety Support" subcom, for example.
I think that once in a Forum, if their condition is severe, that requires a mental health professional, experienced members might provide guidance on that. as I have seen in many forum dialogues. In this sense, I think participating in the Forums promotes that they go see a professional. As I see it, forums don't promote self-diagnosis or substituting professional support.
Regarding the example of "worry", I think that someone that is much worried once won't stick within a SubCommunity because of that. A 1-2-1 chat would be enough for them.
But if they worry a lot, all the time, to the point that it interferes with their lives, they might benefit from joining Anxiety Support.
Other issues don't require further comments, like Domestic Violence, Sexual Assault, Grief, Chronic Pain, etc.
It seems to me it would be great if a person needing help with one of these could see them on a list linking to the respective SubCommunity.
Most people I had chats with, including members older than a year in 7 Cups, didn't know their issue is dealt with in a SubCommunity, and were happy to know that.
It would be great, I think, to make it easier for members to know at a glance all the "mental health issues" contents of the SubCommunities. Even promote it. Then would be up to them to decide to join or not. But it's sad that they don't join just because of ignorance.
@SoulfullyAButterfly
Subject: Notification Bell, showing how many notifications we have. I lkie it when they don't delete themselves when I just want to open that notification to read it. I like to review things sometimes without haveing the time to comment. I'd like to have the notification stay there until I am done with it and choose to delete it myself. I've noticed it goes back and forth both ways (wierd). Sometimes they stay and sometimes they self delete. This morning, they all self deleted but the "Quote Page" notification is staying. Hmmm?😜
@IsayUncle the forum notifications of a post upvote, tag and new post to thread are gone when you open them. if i am correct, all other notifications are 'timed' depending on their relevance.
@theriverissinging . Thanks.
I wish the "New Post" would stay there so I could come back to them to respond when my time allowed. Then I could delete them. Kind of a to do list until done. I like looking at them quickly but don't have time to respond usually at that time, then I lose them.
@IsayUncle makes a lot of sense. ❤️
I usually subscribe to the thread that I got tagged in, etc. if I can't respond right away. And then go to here (My Forum Threads in the menu under your profile picture) to check everything that has had activity in the past whatever timeline I am to check. Good luck with your own system!
@theriverissinging
Yea, I found that. thanks, it is really helpful. Have a great day today!🌸😃
@theriverissinging
Just lost the "Quotes Page" notification that stayed there before. But when I clicked on your notification it also left. I think I understand, that was probably a timed one. I think I also understand your explanation too. On my page I may have 5 notifications but the entire system probably has thousands that never get addressed and they have to be removed automattically to keep the system clear.
I'll have to come up with my own follow up system. I got this.
@IsayUncle the Quote of the Day Alert is still up but it might be that you crossed it out which for now also removes it from your main feed/dashboard. I also have been trying not to delete/cross off certain alerts (usually red, orange and blue) just to keep the content up on my feed! Tags/forum replies usually are in green in case this helps too.