The Editorial Team and I am thrilled to share some exciting news with you! After a decade of serving our incredible AppleVis community, we are embarking on a significant journey of improvement and transformation for our website.
A decade ago, I created AppleVis with little more than a vision and a dream. Never did I imagine that it would evolve into the vibrant and valuable resource it has become, all thanks to the incredible support and engagement of our community.
Over the past decade, our content management system has served us well. But it's begun to limit what we can do on the site. I want AppleVis to keep growing and improving to better serve your needs. So for the past few months, I've been working hard on a total rebuild of AppleVis from the ground up.
My primary goal throughout this process has been to maintain the user experience you love while introducing essential accessibility and usability enhancements. I especially aimed to enhance the experience for users with low vision, particularly on mobile devices.
While I've made every effort to ensure compatibility with the previous site, I anticipate some initial hiccups. There may be overlooked issues that only come to light now that the new site is live, or aspects I couldn't address until this moment. Additionally, I've made some required changes to some features and functionality due to the significant nature of this upgrade.
In the past, our routine site maintenance and upgrades mainly involved behind-the-scenes improvements. However, this time, due to the absence of an 'in-place' upgrade path, the process has been considerably more involved, necessitating certain alterations.
Although I've successfully carried over much of the old website's functionality to the new platform, some features couldn't make the transition due to technical limitations of the available tools. One such feature is the auto-posting of new content to our Twitter accounts. I understand the value these posts hold for many in our community, and I'm actively exploring alternative methods to automate this process. In the interim, I plan to manually share links to blog posts, podcasts, and trending forum topics on Twitter.
I anticipate ongoing fixes and enhancements in the days, weeks, and months ahead, so I kindly ask for your patience during this transition period.
This month, AppleVis will celebrate its remarkable tenth anniversary. None of this would have been possible without the unwavering support of our users and visitors. With this upgrade, I aim to secure AppleVis on solid technological footing for many more years to come.
Thank you for being a part of our incredible journey. I can't wait to share this exciting new chapter with you!
Comments
Login with email
Hey Ekaj, thanks for the encouraging words about your experience.
For now, the ability to login with your email address is not available.
It's on the list of things that I hope to reinstate, but that's going to be dependent upon finding a stable and reliable alternative to what I used before.
So, keep watching this space 😊
Login issues
And, yes, I did just add an emoji to my display name 😊
It probably won't be a keeper, but it did give me an opportunity to check that this is now something people can do.
But, now back to resolving some of the bigger issues.
I am aware that some people are still experiencing login issues. This is proving to be a hard one to pin down. If this is something that you are experiencing, do please clear your browser cache again. Yes, even if you have tried this before please, as I am making changes at this end which *might* have fixed things since you last did this.
And, again, my apologies to those of you who are still unable to login. Believe me, it's the last thing I would want, and I certainly had no idea that it would be an issue (either from my testing before the new site went live or afterwards).
RE: Login issues
Just to confirm with you, David, my log in issues appear to have resolved themselves, after I had cleared out the browser casche. Keep of the great work.
Thanks Roxann
Thanks Roxann, that's great to hear.
Not being able to reproduce the problem here makes it impossible to test for myself whether any changes i'm making are possible fixes or not. So, reports that clearing the cache does resolve the issue for some is encouraging.
Hi Holger, What issues are…
Hi Holger,
What issues are you having with the new website? If you're using the site on Windows, for best results, I recommend maximizing the screen--as this will expand the navigation menu without you having to do so. Besides the navigation menu (a change which we made to make the site easier to use on mobile devices with smaller screens), the core experience should be quite similar to before.
respond
It got fix. Crossing finger. Issue I have is after responding, and saving, I will need to refresh to scape and be able to go to home web page. I do have my edge maximize.
I'm quite surprised there is…
I'm quite surprised there is no "remember me" check box. This is in my humble opinion standard in many websites I've dealt with over the years. Please consider adding this?
The Site Should Remember Your Login Across Sessions
Hi KE7ZUM,
The site should remember your login information across previous sessions, just as it did before the upgrade.
I was looking for some of…
I was looking for some of the beginner podcasts for a review, but I couldn't find them. Are they still being uploaded, or are they being taken down?
Unbelievable and thank you.
This site has and he is continuing to help me so much. There is one thing I would like to see in the new design.
When USA looking at the games that have been added, I would like to see the option to be able to sort from the latest post to the oldest which I have not been able to do previously.
Podcasts
Hey Jo, no podcasts (or any other content) were removed as part of the switch, so everything that was here beforehand should still be here.
When I go to the section on…
When I go to the section on starting with your first iPhone, then set it to podcasts, there aren't any.
Thanks for the heads-up
Hey Jo, thanks for the heads-up.
The podcasts are still on the site, but they weren't being displayed on that list.
So, I'm taking this as an opportunity to review which podcasts should be included on these lists.
I've updated the iOS/iPadOS list already, and the Mac and Apple Watch lists should follow shortly.
Nice update
Congrats to you guys. And happy birthday, AppleVis!
I fully agree
Although I use Google Chrome as the default browser, I was unable to log in with user name and pass word, but Firefox did not cause any problems. In both browsers, I cleared cash, maximized and refreshed the page. I am thrilled with the new layout. Hard work well done.
Thank you
First of all thank you for the great site. Apple this has been my number one and probably only site to look for news. It’s a great help and it is indispensable. I like the site a lot especially the reviews for games and apps and how accessible they are. Keep up the good work. Hope the filtering of the ups comes back.
Cannot donate
Tried to dump dates but after breaking the mound I could not select it and I could not donate therefore
For example at the top there…
For example at the top there's one that says toggle navigation button that I have to expand
thanks fixed it
Maximizing the screen did help, thanks!
Re: making a donation
Hey Blackadder, thank you for wanting to further support us by making a donation.
It's not clear from your message exactly how and where there was a problem.
You said:
The first step on the Club AppleVis page is to use the radio buttons to select whether you wish to make a single or recurring donation.
Next you use the dropdown to select an amount.
You than click or double-tap on the “Donate Now” button, at which point you should be taken to the PayPal website to process the donation.
I've just tested, and everything appears to be working as expected at the moment.
Constructive criticism
First of all, congratulations on being around so long. I'm not really saying anything new here, but this site is an incredibly amazing resource. Here's to 10 years more!
I initially ran into log-in trouble. I thought deleting cookies sorted those out, though when writing this post and opening a new tab I found that I was once again logged out, but after logging in it now seems to keep me logged in even after browsing around... So not sure what happened there.
I was also going to comment how I can't seem to be able to look at anyone's profiles anymore and just see their name in text, except after logging in this seems to work now so never mind. I also love how replies are indicated now, a very logical system. :)
So the other thing I would personally change is cut down on the use of headings, because IMO there's waaay too many compared to the previous site. The #1 candidate for removal I think is the heading indicating the start of breadcrumbs. There's already an aria landmark there, so if someone wants to find those specifically they can just navigate that way. Other potentially unnecessary headings might include the different menu dividers for the site navigation and user menus. Again, they already have aria landmarks, so what's the point? The first thing I usually do when I go on here to read something is just hit H, or if I'm on the phone, flick with the rotor, which used to take 2, 3 presses at most. Now there's 4 headings counting from the top of the page. Now to be fair they are all different levels, so on a computer or if I have a bluetooth keyboard connected on the phone I can just go next level 1 heading and skip all the menus, but on iOS with just the screen you don't have specific heading level jumps unless you're paired to a keyboard or braille display. I would probably also move the main landmark to start after the breadcrumbs, not before because some screen readers like JAWS or Narrator have a hotkey to jump to the main region which in my experience is usually set on the title of the post, not a navigation section.
And finally here's hoping you can get back the ability to keep the Twitter integration going while also preserving the indication of app accessibility ratings in the tweets. It was incredibly useful and how I mainly interact with Applevis. If I saw a tweet about a new, accessible app I'd jump in and look at it, if I saw a forum thread I could potentially contribute to, again, same thing I would just jump in. I don't remember the last time I was on the Applevis frontpage or a specific directory to monitor for something new, so hopefully you can get this sorted out so I don't need to go out of my way to see if people discovered new, cool apps. Someone earlier suggested ifttt with RSS which is a good idea, if you wanted something you could have more control over ifttt also supports webhooks, so if you can get your CMS to fire one when a new entry is created that could also be a potential solution.
Tweets are back
Hey Piotr, thanks for the feedback and suggestions. The automatic tweets are actually already reinstated. And, yes, using an RSS feed to trigger them.
Headings on iOS
Going back to what I said earlier I went on the page using my phone this morning and realised that, the problem I mentioned with there being too many headings especially on iOS isn't actually really there because the menus are hidden behind a button so the first heading you actually get is the start of the post. This if anything is a lot faster than it used to be, so never mind what I said earlier for the most part. I'd still probably ditch the heading on the breadcrumbs and move the main region, but this layout is a lot cleaner on mobile and on the computer I just have to remember to go to the first level 1 heading and you can get around it very quickly
Breadcrumb heading
Hey Piotr, the heading for the breadcrumbs has already gone 😊
Congratulations!
Hi AppleVis team,
Big fan. Congrats on 10 years and may the site continue to grow and prosper!
Quite nice
After a bit of adjustment and retraining myself to use some different headings to navigate, I'm quite happy with how things work now. I love love love that we now know which posts users are replying to and that the forum a topic is in is now at the top of the post. Is there any chance that post numbers might come back? Besides that and a few minor issues logging in, it seems pretty good. Nice work!
Comment numbering
Hey Pepper Fox, thanks for the kind and encouraging words 😊
I *hope* to be able to reinstate comment numbering at some point in the future. But, being frank, it's proving to be quite a struggle, meaning that it's not likely in the immediate future. It's definitely on the list though.
Would it be possible to…
Would it be possible to remove the + sign from the add forum topic link? That way when we pull up the links list with jaws we can just press a like we could in the older version.
Thanks
Can No Longer Use RE when replying to a post
Traditionally, when I respond to someone's post, I will copy their subject line and then place that into my new post subject line and include RE: at the beginning of said post. Today, when I was trying to respond, I did these steps, except the RE: was unable to be added. I couldn't even ad any additional letters to the subject, except for the previously copied subject line material.
I don't know if this is a bug but thought I'd post it here.
Leaving page.
When I put a comment in any question within applevis, and save it, I tended to go up to leave to home page. I am not able to do so unless I refresh the page and them I have to find the home link. It comes and goes. Probably after I save this comment, I will have problem leaving this.
Happy 10th birthday, AppleVis: liking the new site so far!
Hi! I want to wish AppleVis a happy 10th birthday: thanks to everyone who has contributed to this site over the years, with podcasts, tips, news, answers to questions, and so much more. Keep up the good work! Talking of good work, I'm pleased to say that I like the new version of the website so far: I admit I haven't done a huge amount of exploration, but I have noticed several good improvements. These include no longer putting "You are here" on each page, indicating whether comments are replies to other comments, and stating the name of the forum higher on the page. I know some of us need to get used to the changes, but I have seen plenty of good ones so far. Long live AppleVis!
Now changed
Troy, thanks for the suggestion. The display of this button has now been changed.
Thank you
Thank you for all you've done not only in terms of the website but being my number 1 go-to resource for all things Apple. The knowledge on this website has been absolutely invaluable to me since I purchased my first iPod Nano in 2008. I've just bought a Macbook pro and I'm about to ditch sky tV for apple TV too. I do have a possible suggestion but don't know how well if at all it could be implamented. Or, maybe it is and I'm just missing it. Is there a way of ordering search results so that the newest content can be seen at the top? I'd really like to see the most recent forum posts or blog posts on the apple TV product as we are just about to take delivery of one. I have no doubt that the older stuff might be of use to me but it would be really nice to be able to sort stuff by most recent itterations etc.
Site search
Hey Kerry, thank you for the kind words 😊
Sorting search results by date isn't in my opinion typically a good experience, as placing relevance secondary to date can leave you needing to go through what seems like pages of results before you hit one which is truly relevant to your search.
So, what I have implemented for the site search is the ability to filter results by year of posting. This allows you to select only posts from a specific year, with the results still sorted by their relevance to your search.
I hope you agree that this offers close to what you want, but without sacrificing search relevance.
leaving thread
Whenever I comment on a question in any topic, I am not able to leave it. When I use control page up and tab to home, nothing happens. I have to refresh to be able to go to the home page. However if I just check the many comments, I am able to go to the home page without any issues. This only happen when I respond to a comment. Help.
hi
hello @David Goodwin
I had a question :)
I think earlier the previous version of applevis, I guess there was an option to follow a particular blogger of applevis. I'm not too sure but I remember as if there was.
if there was an option like that, can you please bring it back cause I can't find it now. and if it wasn't there, is there any way something like this can be done? where we can subscribe to a particular blogger on applevis via email and we can receive an email notification whenever that person posts?
:)
thank you for reading my comment :)
have a good day xxx
Subjects In Post
Not to mention the fact that people come up with the most irrelivant string of words which means you have to read through the actual post to get a feel for what it is about. Drives me nuts.
Using The First Line Of Subject
which explains why 50+% of subject lines mean I waist time looking for stuff in a post. It would be really helpful if this weren't the case as most people start off with hi. bla bla bla which frankly tells me nothing about the post it pertains to.
Posts By Date
Hi David. Beautiful. Sending both sets of fans home happy. Well done! :-)
Receiving Forum Notifications
Hi. I don't use forums that often but of late, I've had the need to ask a couple of questions regarding my new Apple TV, and it seems that I'm not receiving notifications via email when someone responds. Is this how it's supposed to work? Cheers.
Following users
Hi Khushi,
There was the option in the past to follow specific users, but this was removed some time ago as there were only a couple people actively using it.
I will make a note to revisit it. But, being frank, the past level of usage and what it takes to maintain the functionality make it unlikely that it will return.
I know that this won't be the answer that you want, but each function adds something more to monitor and maintain; something to check still works when making other changes; and something more for people to swipe through. If people aren't using the function, then this overhead is simply too great to justify.
Proglems With Search, or is it me?
Hi all. Again, a little teething problem for me with search, or maybe it's user error. i go to search, type in apple tv, and get all sorts of posts come up, a lot of which have absolutely nothing to do with apple tv whatsoever. Am I using the search incorrectly or is it just throwing anything up with the words apple in it? Thanks.
Email notifications
Hi Kerry,
You need to manually subscribe to any post for which you wish to receive email alerts of new comments.
When creating a new post, there is a checkbox to subscribe. Otherwise, you can click or double tap on the “Subscribe” link located just below the “Options” heading on the post page.
Search results
Hi Kerry,
The search currently has a minimum term length of 3 characters, as anything lower typically degrades the indexing performance.
However, I do appreciate that this isn't ideal when “TV” might be something that people on here might reasonably use as a search term. So, I will check to see if I can address this without a hit on search performance.
hi I certainly get what you…
hi
I certainly get what you are saying. :) thanks for replying :)
hopefully some day there will be more people like myself who'd like to follow certain bloggers from applevis's team of bloggers and then we might see this feature making a comeback, probably in more enhanced way than before.
Tweets are back, but...
I appreciate that the tweets about newly added comments are back, but they only take one to the top of the article, not the new comment that was added. This is only slightly more useful than not having them at all, but having to go search for the new comment(s) is very frustrating. Can you please bring back the links to the new comment in the tweet? Thanks.
Simply open the thread in a…
Simply open the thread in a new browser window. I actually do this for most forums I'm on if able so I can just pick up wherein I left off, not just this one. I can't remember what publication taught me that trick but it works well.
Good tip for search results, but...
If this is a response to my post about ApplevisXL tweets, it doesn't solve the problem. When I follow the link in the tweet, a new browser window does open, but focus is placed at the top of the page, not on the new comment. If there are 40 comments on the page, but only 3 of them are new, that's a lot of comment headings to skip to find the new ones.
The whole point of the ApplevisXL tweets is to direct one to the new comments. If all it does is open a page at the top of the thread, it's not especially useful.
So far, it seems to me that the site was working much better before version 2.0. Don't misunderstand me, I think Applevis is a fabulous resource -- if it wasn't, I wouldn't care so much -- but some of its most useful features got broke in the upgrade and I'm finding it very disappointing.
Links in AppleVis XL Tweets are Comment-Specific
Hi Jeff,
We appreciate your continued feedback.
The links in AppleVis XL tweets are "anchor links," meaning that they are supposed to route users to a specific place on the page. The issue is that various screen readers, depending on which platform and screen reader is in use, do not handle anchor links particularly well. For example, my understanding is that VoiceOver always took users to the top of the page, even when an anchor link is used and even before the site upgrade.
We realize that the upgrade has been a bit frustrating for some, and there were unfortunately some compromises we had to make along the way. With that said, the reality that prompted this whole process is that the version of the platform we were using to power the site was beyond its useful life, and not every tool/script we used would work with the new system. Please do continue to provide feedback, and we'll make improvements and enhancements where we can.
Use Control Home and Refresh the Screen
Hi Holger,
On Windows, the quickest way to get to the top of the page is to press Control Home. If necessary, refresh the screen. (With JAWS, this is accomplished by pressing Insert Escape.)