Okay many users just weren't that comfortable with the look and feel of Snitz 2000 default - and even if you love snitz you must admit that although it's a clean look it definitely is a bit basic and old-fashioned compared to these stylish skins you get in dozens for all other forums.
It really took me a while to find something that is usable AND working - the best i found is "My Personalization Mod" - it lets the user choose from several color schemes and brings the handy "My Page" which i used to place already dozens of links, features and tools.
I think this should be included in some future snitz version - it is quite basic, but it's also definitely better than nothing.
I played around a bit with it and added a new parameter "strBackgroundImage" to some themes and added a simple "if strBackGroundImage <> "" then" to display a background image in some themes.
You might be like "wow, big deal [/sarcasm]" - bit this really adds up to the design if you pick some nice images. Really spices up the overall look. I wish i was a bit better in this, i am sure one could also easily modify the header a bit to have a more modern and "cool" look, but i am not yet good at that (I really fail at designing, but at least i spiced up the look a bit).
I still think you could also enhance some "skins" with light patterns as background images, I am very pleased with one theme were i replaced the white background with a very light white marble. Instantly looks like "Luxury" so i called the theme "Luxury".. :)

I am not yet good enough to do the same for the table backgrounds (The actualy background of the posting's text) as i don't know that much about html, but i think for a pro it would be possible to pimp up a forum a lot with just a few KB of code.
If anyone is interested in the code i can post it here (if i get it all together, im also not good in making mod descriptions), but for you pros it's probably very basic, really just a new parameter and an "if then" at the right place so it pumps a background picture into the body tag when its not empty.

If you're going to talk about your design, it be nice to have a link to look at what you're talking about. Just say'n.

also on the note of themes/skins/styles

on 1 hand, they can be good if a certain colour scheme makes text hard to read or what ever, but on the other hand a good colour scheme on a site wont/shouldnt need skins/themes/styles

for example, lets say u took the standard snitz colour scheme and then added a dark blue background and changed the text to red.
to some people (mainly newbies) they might think that it looks good.
now as u know this colour scheme will render text hard to read.
in that situation, a skin/theme/style would be useful.
but this person would have to define the theme/skin/style.
i also liek the snitz simplistic colour schemes.
some of the themes for the likes of php forums may look nice, but thats not what gets peopel to visit your site.

I'd have to agree with the other guys, and I say this having skinned my own forums so I know such as here (http://www.jeffreyjlaw.com/forum.asp?FORUM_ID=1#login - don't focus on the site, just the forums) and here (http://www.thelawposse.com/welcome.asp?sub_nav_id=9). Now that I have skinned as couple I can theme as I like, but, oh man, it took painstaking days/hours to revamp both presentations!
Skins really get into the core of the code. At the least, I'd say you need to focus on being happy with the fact that the code and support is meant to be free (well, for those who can donate financially, please do).
There are things you can do to doctor up the site with the existing color schemes and adjustments. If you do a search on the internet for "Snitz Forums 2000" and just start clicking on the links that lead to other peoples' forums, you will see some very novel approaches to just dealing with the options available.
Sorry that I can't be of much more help.
Cheers,

Etymon

It is always nice to see other snitz forums and get ideas. Even if its not perfect. Please let us see yours, kyodai

Yes, that is a great idea Torborg! Please don't be afraid or ashamed to share your Snitzy site with us. We all here started in the same box!

Originally posted by kyodai
It really took me a while to find something that is usable AND working - the best i found is "My Personalization Mod" - it lets the user choose from several color schemes and brings the handy "My Page" which i used to place already dozens of links, features and tools.
I think this should be included in some future snitz version - it is quite basic, but it's also definitely better than nothing.

That's the mod used on SHN Forums.

OK, my forums are at http://www.hiddenbelow.com

The initial layout when you click the link is standard snitz 2000, but when you register you can choose from some layouts that came with the "My personalization" mod. Choose The Luxury or Space skin for a demo of the background image tag. Yeah like most here i am like "If its a clean readable design it fits all" - just the users don't see it like that. There are some terrible skins included in "my personalization mod" with eye bleeding combinations like blue font on black background.
The joke here is when i introduced the background images i needed a skin to test on and so i took the worst eye bleeder and added a background pic and immediately my Co-Admin was like "WTF what are you doing?" - he really had the eye bleeder as his default skin.
I know - like all of you i personally "don't need" another design, not for my own fortune. But i am just annoyed with all the new users being like "Why dont you use PHPBB? Shall we donate for a VBulletin license?" and other crap. After all the features i added design is the only thing left that really makes a difference between PHPBB/VBulletin and good old snitz. I am well aware that most php based forums (The big players) already reached a state of "Forum 2.0". I am fighting every day to bring new features and gimmicks to at least come "on par" with these, but more and more i realize there is a quite large gap.
I am probably too new to snitz to really judge anything, but it appears we are way too few people and most senior staff has retired. For the last snitz update i was seriously desillusionated - because it mainly did just some security related fixes - and as usual - cant be applied to mine with the crapload of customizations i have. Seriously - if the next "Big version update" doesn't contain a quantum leap of advancement i fear snitz will more or less die out (It practically already has regarding the number of installations). DOnt get me wrong - i do appreciate all the hard work people have put into snitz during their free time, but being a user and staying realistic snitz was already much pain for me.
I think the killer argument here is that it is too hard to apply mods - for some mods i spent like an hour of pure "Search, copy paste edit" and another 2 to find the mistakes. If you have a clean snitz install they usually work fine, but if you already have a dozen of mods applied they are often a nightmare. I have already learned a lot about asp and snitz, but during one of the earlier mods i for example lost my search ability - since then the search function never returns any result. Being a practical man i just replaced it with google search, but honestly - this was one of the many moments when i was a hairline from giving up. My advantage is that i programmed Visual basic 6 and .net before - so besides the SQL statements the syntax was quite familiar to me. I don't even wanna know where a noob without any programming background would have landed, but prolly given up long ago.

I really moved worlds to get my forums where they are today and they still lack dozens of features that are a must-have since years for other forums.
Maybe one of the few remaining staff members who are still working on a new version (We pray there are such people) reads this so i list what is really terrible to lack in a standard installation:

- Avatars: Why on earth is avatar upload still not included, this was my first mod and it costed me so much time back then. - Upload: I dont use it myself due to bandwidth savings - but uploading files is a must
- Polls: Since stone age every forum got polls but i had to use a mod to get some
- Warning/banning: Yeah i have some moderators, but they barely cant do anything. Warn/Ban is available in all other forums
- Mass delete: Yeah its cool when a spambot posted like 1000 times "lol viagra" and you don't just have to hit delete 1000 times but also enter your password 1000 times. This is very annoying, my mods hate me for it. - Points/Reputation: If you have never used it it may sound odd, but it can be a very helpfull tool to bribe/reward members
- Custom groups: I definitely need custom groups like "Programmers" or "Premium members", imma make a mod soon
- Mobile Phone mode: Some users requested this, still on my wishlist. With iphones and wlan everywhere these became popular
- Statistics, ****: users logged in, guests online, Top active people today, overall, latest topics and so on
- Mod Installer: Finally some installer that does these 1-click installations like all other big forums offer it.

But well to get back to topic: I wish there was some easy way to skin the backgrounds of the tables, like the table where username and avatar are in, the table with the post text, the one where the buttons are and so on. i think with some descent pictures as a background these would look much better, but i dont know if its possible.

And sorry again for the ranting, but i think it will help more if i am honest here then just throw the usual "Hooray everythings fine, i love you all" into the air. Don't take my ranting too serious - i will "get through" somehow with Snitz. I am really more concerned of all the poor souls that just installed snitz and expect it to be phpBB for asp - which it clearly isn't, even with all my love. Still as i said before - i can see the much work and love the makers and big programmers here put into snitz, i just fear that if Snitz doesn't soon jump to Snitz 2010 (or snitz 4 if you like) we'll be the last dinosaurs and die out - just like all the others.
The design is just the most obvious point. Yeah I am way too old to realize it on my own, but as my users are mainly teenagers they slammed my face into it quite fast.

just take a look at a current VBulletin installation:

http://www.viperforums.net/forums/forums.php

This looks quite stylish, modern and nice - and know what - it is not that far away from snitz 2000. I think the gap between snitz and these isn't too much regarding the design. My problem here is just that i lack the skills yet to do it on my own.
Maybe i am alone with my oppinion, but i think if we manage to improve the design then it would definitely do good for all future users. And yeah let there be some dropdown box where stubborn old men like me can choose "Classic design" or "diisable additional skins" XD

Custom groups: I definitely need custom groups like "Programmers" or "Premium members", imma make a mod soon

There is a MOD floating around here called "UserGroups" that will do what you want to do.

I'll post a little more detailed reply when I've had a chance to mull over how I want to say it. I also don't want to muck up this thread with an unrelated rant. This is about showing off your work, not the state of Snitz.

I saw your site. Looks really good! Thank you for sharing!
I know that there is not a tried and true standard convention for MOD creators regarding MOD notation. What I do when installing MODs, regardless of the MOD, is I add my own notation convention, and it goes like this:


'#### BEGIN MOD NAME by So_And_So - Edit # - Date ####'
'#### NOTES: If I need to add notes, I put them here ####'

'#### END MOD NAME by So_And_So - Edit # - Date ####'


If it is a Snitz update then, I do this:


'#### BEGIN SNITZ UPDATE # by So_And_So - Edit # - Date ####'
'#### NOTES: If I need to add notes, I put them here ####'

'#### END SNITZ UPDATE # by So_And_So - Edit # - Date ####'


The update number represents the topic # at http://forum.snitz.com/forum/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=# goes here

I understand what you mean about Snitz seeming to fall behind in "out-of-the-box" features. However, Snitz was not ever intended to compete with the mainstream as a commercial product. It was intended to serve as a teaching tool which it does. If we choose, it is our opportunity to help others, as students ourselves, to help others by offering our contributions to a repository like www.SnitzBitz.com for others to share in our accomplishments.
That is perhaps the toughest misunderstanding. The software is free for anyone to download and modify (except for the copyrights), yet the software itself seems to stand still in time not much unlike a student microscope found in a laboratory that is 50 years old and archaic but still does the job it was intended to do. It may not be able to define beyond 50x in magnification, but it can be tooled to do so without infringement. For what it was designed to do, which is to teach, it does not fail in that assignment.
Honestly, I think the guys have done a great job at not running with Snitz in its hey-day and going commercial with it. I mean, most folks would have capitalized on it despite the reason for which it was founded. The reason they don't add more features is partly because it is more upkeep on their part.
They are the guardians of the code so to speak. As it is, they have guarded it well. If they add more to it, that is that much more they have to guard. Doing this work as an act of community interest and not private financial gain and expecting more of them for free just makes it that much harder on them.
This site does have an avenue for donations. Perhaps the donation participation does not warrant the desired effort from the public to continue blossoming the base code.

@AnonJr - at first sorry for ranting, but if it helps to get some people awake and be like "oh we need to do something" it was worth it. And very very much sorry and my deepest apologies if i did insult someone - afterwards some expressions may sound a bit rough i think. But we really need to style up a bit in the future. I remember recently stumbling over some interesting snitz derivate that has already got like a gazillion mods installed - i nearly flipped out when i saw it, it really has everything... Of course no option for me as i already added/edited so much stuff - i already have like 20 custom database fields - absolutely out of question to port my database to another version. XD But i am sure some people know what i mean. I forget the name, but it must be popular due to the ridiculous large amount of mods applied in it, i just cant recall the name.
I did not look too deep at that mod as it doesnt qualify for my site any more, but it might be worth a thought to place this as a possible candidate for snitz 4.0. I think it really would do much good and you guys probably will find and fix the one or another security hole and snitz would be so much more... But well not my decision. Whatever snitz 4.0 will be based on (I really hope we will see a snitz 4.0 any time soon, dont let it be Duke Nukem forever...) if i can i will help contributing to it. Thanks for the info you posted. I will look at the USergroups mod, cool finding!

@Etymon:

I don't agree 100% with what you have said. No not the naming conventions - you're right about that. I didn't even mark all edits i have done over the time, some night with many glasses of vodka and programming until early in the morning (OK most was troubleshooting, editing, trying, troubleshooting...) so i really did some idiot stuff and skipped the one or other mark. I already learned that when i didnt find my own edits... The hard way as some would say...
No i mean about snitz itself. Snitzhas always been "the" asp forum, already back in the early 2000s when i was working for a small company they had snitz as their forum software. being an amateur like me you search for FREE forum software and snitz seems to be the only valid choice. Yeah theres also PunBB and YAF - but know what? I've never heard about them before looking into the topic. I dont know any exact figures, but I'm egocentric enough to just claim snitz is still the most popular asp forum. Yeah regarding number of total forums vs number of total snitz installations snitz does look old as PHP always outweights ASP by far. Still i think SNitz is important and honestly - it has never been a "learning tool", it has always been "Snitz Forums 2000" not "Snitz learning platform 2000" and thats how it was understood and used by about everyone.
I didn't know about "the guardians of the code", but whoever is the guardian is hopefully aware that there IS a community around Snitz and its more people than you, me and Bobby-ray. I also hope these people don't "live from the donatopns" as because if things don't change any time soon they might starve. Yeah thats mean to say, but having run a few websites already i am aware of the quite unsurprising figures of income by donations. If i learned one thing during my time then that you can rely on sales, advertising and bribery, but for sure not on donations. If you really only drive the donations lane and seriously want to make money with it then the only way is to attract loads of people. Best would be MILLIONS - then you can be sure the few that give a donation will make it worth looking at your balance. But throughfalling behind with trends and time you simply lose against the competition you lose fans and supporters jumping onto the attractive trains. What i wanna say is that the donations won't really grow if snitz completely falls behind technically.

There are many great mods that help to get "halfway on par", but i think everyone who still has a bit of realism left will admit many are hard to do, time consuming and due to the nearly pure human interaction subject to offer a great chance of doing something wrong.

It is not much SNitz need to be "on par". I think the "Killer argument" would be some "Easy mod" Installer, some 1 click thing like for the databases to make installing mods easy for idiots like me. That would already be sufficient to let the community be dangerous enough to develop enough "1 click" mods to enhance snitz easily to a state ready to face the PHP competition.
I am in no state of demanding anything here, but i think everyone who really cares about snitz will see this would be the best for you, me and the rest of the community. It could strike that initial spark to get it really burning again, i would label this the only "mission critical " feature as it would have the potential to ignite the rest of the needed development. I would be more than willing to offer my own mods as "1 click versions" and i bet so would be many others.

Don't forget that the treasure that is guarded here is not from solid gold, but rather a wonderfull flower - that will however need water to grow and survive.
Edit: Nearly forgot - to get a bit back on topic: I added a subforum mod today. the one from snitzbitz. At the second try it worked (yay!). Too tired to think of the order and stuff today. I let my staff decide. But i think this is important as by default all categories are extended - which makes the forums like 10 screen pages long if you just have to many categories. I think thats often overlooked in designing - you want a forum quite universal and covering many topics, but it is making it confusing for 1st time visitors getting slammed by that huge load of forums. I believe subforums helps a lot as i dont need 10 forums for "game a cheats, game B cheats, game C cheats", but just having one parent forum for cheats - leading the person interested in cheats to the real list of available cheating forums. Just an example but i have noticed many forums are overloaded (not just snitz!) with categories. I really belive this improves design and loading times (the later hopefully, I'll see).

Hi kyodai,

I really am meaning to come across the table to your ear in such a way that you interpret me as supporting you more than I guess I stated earlier.
To me, Snitz is Itz! Over and over again, I read how the support here is glorious compared to even pay-for-software! I think Snitz has attracted some of the most talented and creative programmers on the Internet whether they are seasoned or within their infancy. It is my hope to some day be in a position to donate financially in return. My hopes are high, and I believe I won't disappoint. [^]
I truly enjoy the primitive approach that Snitz offers. I kind of view it like Pac-Man, Pong, Asteroids, etc. compared to modern 3D gaming. It is simple yet easy enough to jump into the flow while getting exhilarated during the whole ride!
I have no desire whatsoever to move on to any other forum platform.
You hang in there with your coding. I'm not sure about the 1-click MODs, but maybe someday!