[RFC|Rejected] Removal of subsilver2

[Arty]

You say the reasons from 2 years ago are no longer valid, but they are and you've shown nothing to show that end-users would be happy with this change. phpBB is not for us developers, its for them.

I'm sure if it was up to end-users, phpBB 1.4 style would be in 3.1 package. Users don't have a clue of what is good for them. They don't know downsides of using subsilver2, and even if they would be told about those downsides, they'd dismiss it because they have no clue of what those downsides actually mean.

When something is removed, there are always users who are against it. What makes you think it would be any different in 3.2? Decision to remove subsilver 2 in 3.2 is just postponing inevitable.

[Arty]

Come up with a valid argument why what happened 2 years ago is not valid please.

That's what I did on page 19. Please read my post that I used to bump this topic with: viewtopic.php?p=244621#p244621

Please stop bringing 2 years old stuff into this discussion. Discussion is about current situation, not about what what going on 2 years ago.

[RMcGirr83]

Come up with a valid argument why what happened 2 years ago is not valid please.

Uhmmm, because it was from 2 years ago and peoples perceptions and attitudes change over time. For example, 2 years ago I said "I will never pay off my mortgage before my youngest child enters college.", it is now scheduled to be paid off mid-2013 and my youngest child will be a sophomore in high school.

[canonknipser]

Users don't have a clue of what is good for them.

That sounds very arrogant

Which type of user do you mean?

• the end-user of a board who is very often "eye-orientated" and says: "this site looks good, i stay"?
• the owner of a board who has to decide which style to use depending on the previous user-decision?
• the style-developer, who designs a style for the owner and / or the phpBB-Community?
• the mod-author, who has to write the code for including in the style?

My personal position:
i am developer and maintaining a board. Years ago, our owner decided to use subsilver2 as the board style (because the previous phpBB2-version of the board used subsilver) and set up a second style, only different in colours and images, not templates. The users can decide to use one of those styles, prosilver was deactivated.
The board and the style have some modifications, including own images for buttons. The style modifications have not been adopted in prosilver from the beginning, so the current source of prosilver in our style-folder is unusable for our board (untestet automatic modifications from automod, missing modifications from manual installed mods etc.). We (better say me) have to do a lot of work to adept all changes including creation of new images.

So, in my eyes the auditorium for a question like above will be style developers and (in lower priority) board owners, not the end user. And i think for those type of users, you can't say Users don't have a clue of what is good for them
Give them good arguments why prosilver is better (not "styles team leader hates to maintain subsilver2")

And, give a good and readable documentation on styling based on prosilver - phpBB lacks of good documentation of internals. From 25 years experience in developing, the best documentation for developers is in-source-documentation, because developers hate manuals.

[Arty]

They don't know what is good for them because they are not familiar with how things work. When it comes to styles, just because style looks good, doesn't mean it is any good. It might be completely broken in some browsers, causing forum owner to lose customers. It might be incompatible with majority of mods, preventing forum owner from installing those mods.

In phpBB 3.1, subsilver2 will be just like that. When installing styles based on subsilver2 users will not be aware that:

• AJAX functions don't work
• Style looks horrible on mobile devices (mobile devices are used more and more often, by time 3.1 is released I think it will be a must to have mobile style)
• Most if not all extensions that use templates will not work

How can we prevent that from happening? Its simple - remove subsilver2.

In my opinion there are 2 reasons why style authors base their styles on subsilver2:

1. They like its layout.
2. CSS is confusing for them, they prefer to deal with tables. Or they are using ancient editor that can't handle CSS.

For #1 category subsilver3 is available.

#2 category should learn to code. Their excuse is similar to excuse people made when their websites were so horribly broken that they worked only with 1 specific browser, usually Internet Explorer. That was very common 5-10 years ago. There are tutorials everywhere on internet, there is support forum with posters willing to help.

Removing subsilver2 will be good for everyone. It will help developers because they won't have to maintain old style. It will help end-users because they will have smaller chance of running into style that doesn't work with many extensions.

[nextgen]

I'd like to bump this old topic in order to persuade developers to reconsider removing subsilver2.

This discussion is almost 2 years old, many things have changed since then. I think keeping subsilver 2 will now only cause problems instead of helping anyone.

Reasons to remove it:

• Subsilver was great style for its time, but web moved forward since then. Tables are no longer used for layout. This style is outdated by 5-10 years.
• Only tiny minority of style authors use subsilver 2 as base style. That is counting real styles, not basic subsilver 2 clones with different header, footer, icons and colors. If someone really needs to use subsilver 2 layout as base for style, there is subsilver 3 style that looks just like subsilver 2, but is tableless.
• Mobile devices used more and more often to access internet. Subsilver 2 is everything that is wrong with web when it comes to mobile browsing. It is impossible to change subsilver to work on mobile devices.
• Since this discussion was opened, extensions were implemented. Almost all 3.0 mods already don't support subsilver2, 3.1 extensions won't support it ether. That means anyone using subsilver 2 will not be able to use most extensions. Keeping it will only cause problems.
• Imagesets. Since imagesets were removed, new function to keep fake imagesets was added to 3.1. That function isn't really needed for anything other than subsilver 2. Removing subsilver 2 will make it possible to remove that fake imagesets function, as well as many useless template variables added on many pages, such as {IMG_UNAPPROVED}.
• Ajax. Ajax was implemented only in prosilver. If subsilver 2 is kept, users will complain about lack of ajax support in it.

Reasons to keep it:

• Some users do like subsilver2 and prefer to use it instead of prosilver. I don't think its a good enough reason, there is subsilver3 style built on prosilver that looks exactly like subsilver2. They can use that style.

I don't see any good reason to keep subsilver 2, not even as separate style. It is outdated and useless.

+1, It is necessary to delete the styles that are based on tables.

[keith10456]

There will always be those that will want to stay with subsilver2 the same way there are admins that still use phpbb v2.x. However, judging from the arguments made in this topic since it has been resurfaced, the reasoning for removing subsilver 2 in 3.1 vastly outweigh the reasoning for keeping it.

If we were talking about keeping subsilver 2 in 3.0.x then I would have to agree that it should stay. But not for 3.1 (considering the core code changes and the direction of phpBB).

There will be some grumbling from some community members... No matter what you do some will always complain. Overall though I believe the vast majority of the community will agree with the removal once the "why" is explained.

[imkingdavid]

Can we please begin a new topic about revisiting the removal of subSilver2 for 3.1? IMO a > 20-page topic is going to discourage any new opinions because people won't want to read through all the other posts.

What needs to be done in the new RFC is to summarize the situation like so:
- (Optional) Add a poll for "yes" or "no" (don't put a "no opinion" or "no vote" option, as those people should just not vote)
- State clearly the original reasons the style was up for removal
- State clearly the eventual arguments that led to retaining the style
- State clearly and specifically what has changed since the previous decision was made that would make this up for discussion again.

[Arty]

Can we please begin a new topic about revisiting the removal of subSilver2 for 3.1? IMO a > 20-page topic is going to discourage any new opinions because people won't want to read through all the other posts.

Sure: viewtopic.php?f=81&t=43369

But I've also added "Other / undecided" option to poll in case if someone has other suggestion or not sure.