Yesterday marked the day a massive upgrade was issued to Feminem.com's Forum. The update came courtesy of at least 2 months of hard work by your very own webmaster, Essix. This upgrade came in response to what is hoped to be the most well-defined stance of this website from which all new content will be founded upon. Regardless of the reasoning (just scroll down in a different posting), the forum has received major sectional and visual upgrades.

(We'll get to this in a second.)

Among these upgrades are the built-in pop-up informational windows. Unless you have installed software on your computer that prevents user-initiated pop-up windows, you are now able to click a bold grey word on the index page of the forum and view a definition of that word. Similar results will happen when clicking the "Purpose," "Misconceptions," "The Prime Example," "Rules & Regulations," and "Disclaimers" in the top menu of the forum. Core elements of Feminem.com have been integrated with the forum to better define this website through the forum itself. Of these sections, "Rules & Regulations" has not yet been completed, but it is my hope that you'll know what you can and can't do by the end of the month.

The actual forum sections themselves have received major upgrades, primarily in the descriptions and titles. Where there was once 5 forums with 24 sections, there are now 6 forums with 29 sections. And for you Crusties that think it's all about Eminem... only 3½ of those sections have to do with him. A quick trip to the Misconceptions section (don't forget your dictionary) should clear things up. For everyone else, the forum was expanded in the areas of general discussion and the community as a whole, as the entire forum is not just a discussion board any longer, but a community. All sections have been re-sorted by myself, Echolette, and Murderous Joe, who have both been an asset in organizing the forum. Sticky and Announcement topics have also been upgraded to coincide with the updates.

Something more noticeable that has been changed are the ranks. Ranks are determined by the number of messages a user has posted, or his or her administrational status/lack of status with the forum. This icon appears on every post the user has made. An example of one of these ranks can be found here:



No one has had any complaints about the new ranking system, although it has completely diverted from anything relating from Eminem, and the Femi-Fans in general. With luck, this system will not have to be updated again for a long time, as it took quite a while to complete.

The layout and appearance has changed on the forum as well, primarily on the index page, the topic view page, and the post view page. With my higher level of knowledge concerning more advanced scripting languages, I intergraded my graphic skills into the forum to essentially begin the 3rd version of Feminem.com forum appearances. And as with any upgrades, there will be bugs. Browsers outside of Internet Explorer have experienced difficulties, but most of those have been cleared up, except a few with the pop-up windows. The rest of the bugs will be worked on as time goes on, but for most viewing purpose, you'll take in the full flavor of the new appearance.

Other functionality updates have also happened at the forum. But on that note, it's time for you to check out the Forum yourself. Current Feminem.com projects now focus on fixing the forum bugs, writing the rules & regulations, and eventually starting the "Dictionary" section on the core website, as it has already started thanks to the forum. Keep coming back. More flavor is happening all 2005.