There were two main points of focus for EVO: community and customization. Steve has already made a post on many of the new community-related features ( http://beta.customize.org/blogs/view/19 ). Here is an overview of the new features that we hope will make the whole customization process a lot more fun, positive, and intuitive:
"I like it" or "I love it!" -- Every submission now features these two choices. Not only will your votes be saved in your Favorites for future reference, they will also determine the Popularity of submissions. As we get more votes into the system, Popularity will play a much larger role in making sure the best submissions get the attention they deserve.
Tags -- Submissions can be tagged by anyone, almost like a wiki. Tags give a great way to find works based on whats in them. A nice tag cloud is already forming at http://beta.customize.org/browse/tags
Colors -- Every image is now indexed with its main colors. This means that you can search for any color and find all submission on the site with that color. See an image with a specific color you want to match? You no longer have to load up Photoshop, just use the "color picker" tool. Colors are added to your "My Palette'. This is something that should really be seen to do justice, so why don't you start with the Color Spy: http://beta.customize.org/browse/color
Screenshot Ingredients and Labelling -- Screenshots have gotten a lot more powerful. Now, they are all networked. Again, this is something you have to see: http://beta.customize.org/screenshots/48496 . Instead of listing whats in the screenshot, you can add "ingredients", which will then show up below the screenshot for easy finding by others. You can then label the screenshot, which is particularly helpful for new users. Even better, if an ingredient such as a wallpaper is featured in a screenshot... that wallpaper's page will let you know! See it in action: http://beta.customize.org/wallpapers/43198
No More ZIP files -- Every submission can handle multiple images. A picture is worth 1000 words... http://beta.customize.org/wallpapers/46676 . Try "zooming in", and then browsing between images.
Those are just the main features. There are really too many to list, but I'll add a few more: comments can be disabled, submissions can be attached to your groups, bundles can handle suites and wallpaper packs, submissions can be made private or set as works in progress.
I hope you enjoy using the new site. Please let us know if you have any feedback.
let me start by saying WOW. well done. good job. no wait, GREAT job. very impressed with how this turned out. all these little features absolutely make the site shine and provide an environment that just keeps you coming back.
one little suggestion i have: (and i apologise if it's in the wrong section) on a submission page of a screenshot or wallpaper, with the little colours underneath it, when you mouse over and the "Find other submissions with this colour" comes up, could you also list the web colour value? i think that would be useful.
I was sceptical, but this really is an incredible job you guys have done. Great implementation of features all around.
I'm still having a wierd problem, where I have to log in twice to be counted as logged in. I've tried it on several computers, so I don't think it's me? Trivial problem at best however...
@kinetx - that is a good idea. In IE it should show the color in the status bar and although it doesn't by default in Firefox, you can allow it to (Options → Content → Enable JavaScript / Advanced → Allow scripts to change status bar text). But most people wouldn't have that set so I will put it in the todo.
@shocks - We decided against (animated) gifs to keep pages clean, especially long discussion threads.
@puer - Is the first login the beta page login, and the second time the "Sign In" link from EVO? Thats how it is suppose to work as the beta login is just temporary.
