I just did an inspect element on nairaland and realized seun still uses tables for his layout.....
Nobody uses tables for layout in 2019, why not flexbox or grid, even floats would be better...

While not completely related, it made me realize since seun built nairaland, there has been no overhaul, especially on the interface, he probably just does maintenance and mostly backend related at that.
Maybe its the cost to hire developers ( i seriously doubt),
i think he's more afraid of downtime issues (time is money, ads bring money and users are the reason for ads),
skeptical of newer technology (maybe it will introduce new bugs, maybe nairaland will load slower),
or simply just very comfortable where he is (not ready to take any risks, since everything seemingly works fine)
or maybe its just a good business decision( nairaland doesn't just load fast, it loads properly across all browsers and even older browsers, especially that troublesome I.E) i accessed nairaland on one itel palasa before (like palasa, palasa, like chinko palasa palasa chinko palasa.., like...,, you get the point (i'm sure it used a very old opera version or its own dedicated browser, it was symbian i think) and i was surprised it loaded properly

Whatever it is, seun should consider an overhaul, especially as regards design and ui and leverage on newer front-end technologies like react or angular (which would help as regards overall performance) (maybe leave this version of nairaland as an option for users with slower connection)

This wouldn't be for fun as it has the capacity to attract a wider userbase especially those twitter and instagram junkies that feel nairaland is classless, a larger userbase means more money

long story short, move with the times

or does seun intend to carry this 2002 themed interface through the next 10yrs?

Seeing females talking jargons like this � humbles me.
Back to the topic, it seems Seun is comfortable with the way things are. He doesn't want to tow the path of Nairabet that lost their user base after a major update whose downtime reached about a week

Did he build Nairaland himself?
Thought it was a CMS called SMF or something like that he used.

Tables are still cool as long as there are folks still using old browsers out there. Some people use browsers as old as IE 6 and even opera of 5 years ago.

CodeTemplar:
Did he build Nairaland himself?
Thought it was a CMS called SMF or something like that he used.

Tables are still cool as long as there are folks still using old browsers out there. Some people use browsers as old as IE 6 and even opera of 5 years ago.

A CMS?, wow, I naively always thought he built it from scratch...makes a lot of sense sense now

@bolded
just as i imagined

Lol at any Nairalander thinking OP is female.
Who cares why the guy doesn’t want to upgrade.
He bought the platform and is using it to the best of his ability.
If he chooses to upgrade I believe the forum will face a complete overhaul which, honestly, he knows will inconvenience members so bad they’ll move to alternatives.
Nobody dares to take risks with their source of livelihood.
I don’t blame him.

Ok, tomorrow someone else would come to tell us the font he uses.

okwabayi:
Lol at any Nairalander thinking OP is female.
Who cares why the guy doesn’t want to upgrade.
He bought the platform and is using it to the best of his ability.
If he chooses to upgrade I believe the forum will face a complete overhaul which, honestly, he knows will inconvenience members so bad they’ll move to alternatives.
Nobody dares to take risks with their source of livelihood.
I don’t blame him.

The current theme has its advantages and I don't blame the owner if he doesn't change it to a more modern looking one.
Nairaland is a site with huge traffic and any attempt to upgrade to newer themes will significantly increase the page size which when multiplied by average monthly traffic will lead to higher bandwidth ( uplink ) cost. The site uses content from other media houses quite often and may find AdSense or the likes difficult to comply with so sticks to the in-house advert system whereby traffic figure is what matters.

CodeTemplar:
The current theme has its advantages and I don't blame the owner if he doesn't change it to a more modern looking one.
Nairaland is a site with huge traffic and any attempt to upgrade to newer themes will significantly increase the page size which when multiplied by average monthly traffic will lead to higher bandwidth ( uplink ) cost. The site uses content from other media houses quite often and may find AdSense or the likes difficult to comply with so sticks to the in-house advert system whereby traffic figure is what matters.

The mystery I can’t find an answer to is how he still gets advertisers when he never leaves his bedroom.
The people who use the platform normally prefer to troll discussion threads with their adverts than pay through the formal protocol.
How he makes money despite these baffle the ever living senses I possess.

Op Trolla

I understand your point totally. I was not too surprised when I saw that nairaland still uses Tables. Nairaland ought to be a standard startup and should be operated like a full blown company, spend more money to make more money.

However, talking about itel and opera mini, those platforms are indeed quite good with nairaland. I accessed nairaland via opera mini from 2015 till last year so I know what I'm saying. It displays well across all devices.

React and many of these js frameworks would not work well on Opera Mini and I really think flex and Grid should be incorporated if it's going to work across a vast range of browsers.

What programmers expect is "move" with the trend. Machine learning is in vogue now and I see no way Nairaland is using any of that, it can be used to detect those spam images and delete them. Mr Owner is just scared or stingy to spend more money on the platform bringing in money. What saddens me is the fact that he refuses to comment on these suggestions and why he sticks with the current technologies and UI.

As someone on another thread said "if it works, don't touch it"

okwabayi:

The mystery I can’t find an answer to is how he still gets advertisers when he never leaves his bedroom.
The people who use the platform normally prefer to troll discussions threads with their adverts than pay through the formal protocol.
How he makes money despite these baffle the ever living senses I possess.

That's simple logic now.
The advertisers know the traffic NairaLand pulls and their profile ( tech savy youths ) and so know what they get in return. As for the earning of the owner just open each section page ( politics, sport, celebrities, health etc ) once a week and see the number of adverts appearing there a week or week in week out on average and then do a estimate by checking the weekly advert rate.

It can still pull enough earnings to keep the owner happy and going.

Nairaland is adapted for Nigerians because internet speed and cost in Africa generally and note that Africa isn't ready for a such advanced feature as some of us are demanding from Seun.

Trolla:
I just did an inspect element on nairaland and realized seun still uses tables for his layout.....
Nobody uses tables for layout in 2019, why not flexbox or grid, even floats would be better...

While not completely related, it made me realize since seun built nairaland, there has been no overhaul, especially on the interface, he probably just does maintenance and mostly backend related at that.
Maybe its the cost to hire developers ( i seriously doubt),
i think he's more afraid of downtime issues (time is money, ads bring money and users are the reason for ads),
skeptical of newer technology (maybe it will introduce new bugs, maybe nairaland will load slower),
or simply just very comfortable where he is (not ready to take any risks, since everything seemingly works fine)
or maybe its just a good business decision( nairaland doesn't just load fast, it loads properly across all browsers and even older browsers, especially that troublesome I.E) i accessed nairaland on one itel palasa before (like palasa, palasa, like chinko palasa palasa chinko palasa.., like...,, you get the point (i'm sure it used a very old opera version or its own dedicated browser, it was symbian i think) and i was surprised it loaded properly

Whatever it is, seun should consider an overhaul, especially as regards design and ui and leverage on newer front-end technologies like react or angular (which would help as regards overall performance) (maybe leave this version of nairaland as an option for users with slower connection)

This wouldn't be for fun as it has the capacity to attract a wider userbase especially those twitter and instagram junkies that feel nairaland is classless, a larger userbase means more money

long story short, move with the times

or does seun intend to carry this 2002 themed interface through the next 10yrs?

if it is not broken, don't fix it

Trolla:
I just did an inspect element on nairaland and realized seun still uses tables for his layout.....
Nobody uses tables for layout in 2019, why not flexbox or grid, even floats would be better...

While not completely related, it made me realize since seun built nairaland, there has been no overhaul, especially on the interface, he probably just does maintenance and mostly backend related at that.
Maybe its the cost to hire developers ( i seriously doubt),
i think he's more afraid of downtime issues (time is money, ads bring money and users are the reason for ads),
skeptical of newer technology (maybe it will introduce new bugs, maybe nairaland will load slower),
or simply just very comfortable where he is (not ready to take any risks, since everything seemingly works fine)
or maybe its just a good business decision( nairaland doesn't just load fast, it loads properly across all browsers and even older browsers, especially that troublesome I.E) i accessed nairaland on one itel palasa before (like palasa, palasa, like chinko palasa palasa chinko palasa.., like...,, you get the point (i'm sure it used a very old opera version or its own dedicated browser, it was symbian i think) and i was surprised it loaded properly

Whatever it is, seun should consider an overhaul, especially as regards design and ui and leverage on newer front-end technologies like react or angular (which would help as regards overall performance) (maybe leave this version of nairaland as an option for users with slower connection)

This wouldn't be for fun as it has the capacity to attract a wider userbase especially those twitter and instagram junkies that feel nairaland is classless, a larger userbase means more money

long story short, move with the times

or does seun intend to carry this 2002 themed interface through the next 10yrs?

What strategic advantage does react offer over the status quo? At d end of d day, it's all Dom manipulation? Does using react/angular save time of labourer? Does it save cost for user?
As for going with d times, the rave many always b right. Google rethought search, wen competitors thought searching was uncool. Jquery was d rave years ago, some have discouraged using it.

CodeTemplar:
That's simple logic now.
The advertisers know the traffic NairaLand pulls and their profile ( tech savy youths ) and so know what they get in return. As for the earning of the owner just open each section page ( politics, sport, celebrities, health etc ) once a week and see the number of adverts appearing there a week or week in week out on average and then do a estimate by checking the weekly advert rate.

It can still pull enough earnings to keep the owner happy and going.

Nairaland is adapted for Nigerians because internet speed and cost in Africa generally and note that Africa isn't ready for a such advanced feature as some of us are demanding from Seun.

A dislike button and in-browser IM feature is too advanced for Africans?
We have enjoyed these on Facebook since 2011 and 2005 respectively.
We also need a feature to embed videos from social media sources so one doesn’t need to follow external links.
Most blogs already possess the feature talk less of a forum which sources its news from blogs and news websites.

okwabayi:

A dislike button and in-browser IM feature is too advanced for Africans?
We have enjoyed these on Facebook since 2011 and 2005 respectively.
We also need a feature to embed videos from social media sources so one doesn’t need to follow external links.
Most blogs already possess the feature talk less of a forum which sources its news from blogs and news websites.

seun don't need to host it videos, it is completely unnecessary, it best YouTube do that.
Seun need to modify things like smiles, add gravatars, and small avatars
Basically seun needs to organize the contents further I just know nairaland isn't properly arranged.

asalimpo:

What strategic advantage does react offer over the status quo? At d end of d day, it's all Dom manipulation? Does using react/angular save time of labourer? Does it save cost for user?
As for going with d times, the rave many always b right. Google rethought search, wen competitors thought searching was uncool. Jquery was d rave years ago, some have discouraged using it.

Dont mind those indomie programmers jare. Just because they know one new technology tbey feel they should rush and apply it.

okwabayi:

A dislike button and in-browser IM feature is too advanced for Africans?
We have enjoyed these on Facebook since 2011 and 2005 respectively.
We also need a feature to embed videos from social media sources so one doesn’t need to follow external links.
Most blogs already possess the feature talk less of a forum which sources its news from blogs and news websites.

ask yourself the impact of what you wrote on each page size and then multiply it by the traffic volume of NL. You get an economic answer to why Seun may not adopt these things.

CodeTemplar:
ask yourself the impact of what you wrote on each page size and then multiply it by the traffic volume of NL. You get an economic answer to why Seun may not adopt these things.

Other websites which employed those have flourished.
Why is his own different?
He should open a thread admitting his powerlessness concerning the situation.
Oh, I forgot, he’s Nigerian.
Our people love the illusion of being seen as demigods.
They will never admit weakness, even when dying during a fight.

okwabayi:

Other websites which employed those have flourished.
Why is his own different?
He should open a thread admitting his powerlessness concerning the situation.
Oh, I forgot, he’s Nigerian.
Our people love the illusion of being seen as demigods.
They will never admit weakness, even when dying during a fight.

Nairaland isnt other sites. show me one of the other sites with the traffic Nairaland pulls and will understand better.

CodeTemplar:
Nairaland is other sites. show me one of the other sites with the traffic Nairaland pulls and will understand better.

Mtonews, Lindaikejisblog, sherdogforums and the almighty Facebook.
Just put (dot)com at the end of those to see the sites.
Reddit and Quora are not good enough examples?

okwabayi:

Mtonews, Lindaikejisblog, sherdogforums and the almighty Facebook.
Just put (dot)com at the end of those to see the sites.
Reddit and Quora are not good enough examples?

You are delusional and out for blood clearly. Table layout can be created by using non table tags such as divs, span etc to create a layout and then be styled by table based CSS. Many top and modern themes still fallback to the table CSS for help so Nairaland is not backwards in anyway whatsoever.
You have nothing real against it. believe me.

CodeTemplar:
You are delusional and out for blood clearly. Table layout can be created by using non table tags such as divs, span etc to create a layout and then be styled by table based CSS. Many top and modern themes still fallback to the table CSS for help so Nairaland is not backwards in anyway whatsoever.
You have nothing real against it. believe me.

I knew you’ll try to poke holes in my logic.
I waited patiently knowing you’ll reply.
What concerns me with tables and CSS?
What do I know concerning those?
If you check my comments I kept mentioning dislikes as well as embed features.
The sites I posted have all those, at worst they have similar or more users than this forum.

All of you should just calm down, someone said machine learning on a forum lol

What if he actually built this forum from scratch and didn't comment his codes, lmao, he can't modify shii

Y'all should just visit the forum in peace and mind your business, pikin whey no fine, seun like am like that.

On the other hand, some of you saying if its not broken bla bla bla, have you all seen the new messenger app? Compare it with the old one, was the old one broken?

Because its working doesn't mean it can't be improved...

Buh right now, y'all have no control over the affairs of nairaland, you're not even share holders, or board members, you're just registered members lolzzzzzz

but actually in the world of scaling applications and Ci it very easy to upgrade and update if only he choose to and will not affect the user

asalimpo:

What strategic advantage does react offer over the status quo? At d end of d day, it's all Dom manipulation? Does using react/angular save time of labourer? Does it save cost for user?
As for going with d times, the rave many always b right. Google rethought search, wen competitors thought searching was uncool. Jquery was d rave years ago, some have discouraged using it.

actually i they do, you would need more code in vanilla js to implement the same thing using react but its major advantages are about code re-usability and the virtual dom.
you're right about jquery anyways but it still has its uses anyway, for example i wouldn't use vanilla js to implement smooth scrolling for a single page site, jquery would be the obvious choice.

These newer technologies aren't always necessary a burden as you've made it seem, and although many of them weren't around when nairaland started, i believe they've stayed around long enough to be called mature. I believe that means they're doing something right.

On a lighter note, are you really comfortable with nairalands current ui?, in some other environments, this would be referred to as nairaland classic or nairaland vintage, google has something like this for gmail(for users with slower connection, html google i think), for africa's largest indigenous internet forum, i believe seun could do some more if he wanted to, this is more or less nigeria's reddit

SilverG33k:
All of you should just calm down, someone said machine learning on a forum lol

What if he actually built this forum from scratch and didn't comment his codes, lmao, he can't modify shii

Y'all should just visit the forum in peace and mind your business, pikin whey no fine, seun like am like that.

On the other hand, some of you saying if its not broken bla bla bla, have you all seen the new messenger app? Compare it with the old one, was the old one broken?

Because its working doesn't mean it can't be improved...

Buh right now, y'all have no control over the affairs of nairaland, you're not even share holders, or board members, you're just registered members lolzzzzzz

SilverG33k:
All of you should just calm down, someone said machine learning on a forum lol

What if he actually built this forum from scratch and didn't comment his codes, lmao, he can't modify shii

Y'all should just visit the forum in peace and mind your business, pikin whey no fine, seun like am like that.

On the other hand, some of you saying if its not broken bla bla bla, have you all seen the new messenger app? Compare it with the old one, was the old one broken?

Because its working doesn't mean it can't be improved...

Buh right now, y'all have no control over the affairs of nairaland, you're not even share holders, or board members, you're just registered members lolzzzzzz

I see you find the fact that using machine learning on nairaland funny. I was actually the one who made the comment. If someone had told Facebook Facebook to use machine learning in 2005, you probably could have just laughed this same way.

Can you tell me what you find amusing about using machine learning on nairaland?

Did you actually read the "use" of machine learning that I stated?

Olalekank:

I see you find the fact that using machine learning on nairaland funny. I was actually the one who made the comment. If someone had told Facebook Facebook to use machine learning in 2005, you probably could have just laughed this same way.

Can you tell me what you find amusing about using machine learning on nairaland?

Did you actually read the "use" of machine learning that I stated?

To be honest, I've always thought of your suggestion of identifying those stupid betnaija conmen using machine learning as the way to go to take care of that menace. I don't know why the person you quoted finds it funny.

Trolla:


actually i they do, you would need more code in vanilla js to implement the same thing using react but its major advantages are about code re-usability and the virtual dom.
you're right about jquery anyways but it still has its uses anyway, for example i wouldn't use vanilla js to implement smooth scrolling for a single page site, jquery would be the obvious choice.

These newer technologies aren't always necessary a burden as you've made it seem, and although many of them weren't around when nairaland started, i believe they've stayed around long enough to be called mature. I believe that means they're doing something right.

On a lighter note, are you really comfortable with nairalands current ui?, in some other environments, this would be referred to as nairaland classic or nairaland vintage, google has something like this for gmail(for users with slower connection, html google i think), for africa's largest indigenous internet forum, i believe seun could do some more if he wanted to, this is more or less nigeria's reddit

I wasn't taking sides but rather, questioning the call for added cost based on the pros and cons: I.e cost vs benefits. From nairaland's management standpoint ,tht's d issue. I won't comment on their management style, a lot has been said about that already.

Olalekank:

I see you find the fact that using machine learning on nairaland funny. I was actually the one who made the comment. If someone had told Facebook Facebook to use machine learning in 2005, you probably could have just laughed this same way.

Can you tell me what you find amusing about using machine learning on nairaland?

Did you actually read the "use" of machine learning that I stated?

you will be shocked he doesn't know what machine learning is all about.
For me though I don't think nairaland could handle such sophisticated and the additional cost it brings, also sometimes we Nigeria don't like such spending to drive home a concept or and idea.
Nairaland needs restructuring elements on its website and improve responiveness to modern platforms.

stanliwise:
you will be shocked he doesn't know what machine learning is all about.
For me though I don't think nairaland could handle such sophisticated and the additional cost it brings, also sometimes we Nigeria don't like such spending to drive home a concept or and idea.
Nairaland needs restructuring elements on its website and improve responiveness to modern platforms.

Lol, he doesn't know what ML is. I'd be shocked truly

If there's one thing I respect nairaland for, it'd have to be the speed and the fact that it adjusts to every screen size.

Nairaland handling such features should have been made easier across the years, by active development just like it is done on larger apps like Facebook, uber. At least Spotify uses ML, they'd have had to structure their codebase such that new features can be added easily without compromising quality. As funny as it seems, try do a 10 year challenge for Facebook and Nairaland that started almost together.

I really think there are developers in Nigeria who can handle these things but the problem is actually spending money and the decision to make this changes. Spending money would keep bringing money for you. Imagine someone who's a potential long term user on nairaland seeing all the spam images here and there, it'd reduce the chances of him visiting next time which is the goal. The goal is to generate traffic and bring in money.

Spend extra money, make extra money. What does these companies who receive series of funding do with the cash if not to better the product and make more cash?

Olalekank:

Lol, he doesn't know what ML is. I'd be shocked truly

If there's one thing I respect nairaland for, it'd have to be the speed and the fact that it adjusts to every screen size.

Nairaland handling such features should have been made easier across the years, by active development just like it is done on larger apps like Facebook, uber. At least Spotify uses ML, they'd have had to structure their codebase such that new features can be added easily without compromising quality. As funny as it seems, try do a 10 year challenge for Facebook and Nairaland that started almost together.

I really think there are developers in Nigeria who can handle these things but the problem is actually spending money and the decision to make this changes. Spending money would keep bringing money for you. Imagine someone who's a potential long term user on nairaland seeing all the spam images here and there, it'd reduce the chances of him visiting next time which is the goal. The goal is to generate traffic and bring in money.

Spend extra money, make extra money. What does these companies who receive series of funding do with the cash if not to better the product and make more cash?

You're very right. The actual truth is just that seun don't have a competitor here in Nigeria, the problem with monopoly is that they are the sole dictator of how things get developed.
And for that part you say nairaland fits to any screen is not so right. Nairaland it quite simple and majorly text-based. I dont think you have taken time to see how picture uploaded by user fly around in un-arranged margins.
Also nairaland emojis are just too few, more emoji's are needed. Nairaland cannot be connected to facebook account nor twitter account.
Nairaland don't have an api just only feeds.
Nairaland should start supporting gravatar/avatar, it wouldn't harm the network speed. as he could automatically lightened the load.
Nairaland don't have amazing chat platform on the forum. many things which wouldn't reduce speed are just missing.

stanliwise:
You're very right. The actual truth is just that seun don't have a competitor here in Nigeria, the problem with monopoly is that they are the sole dictator of how things get developed.
And for that part you say nairaland fits to any screen is not so right. Nairaland it quite simple and majorly text-based. I dont think you have taken time to see how picture uploaded by user fly around in un-arranged margins.
Also nairaland emojis are just too few, more emoji's are needed. Nairaland cannot be connected to facebook account nor twitter account.
Nairaland don't have an api just only feeds.
Nairaland should start supporting gravatar/avatar, it wouldn't harm the network speed. as he could automatically lightened the load.
Nairaland don't have amazing chat platform on the forum. many things which wouldn't reduce speed are just missing.

Exactly! Exactly!
My thoughts were that it can fit into any screen size but I was wrong.

The only advantage he has is just the traffic he has been able to pull, which I commend him for. Asides that, give us new content!