I was always a bit confused by the forums header links: one points to the forum, but has the exact same logo as OGS (the pre-pro-Ukraine version, where the “O” is a half white, half black stone), the other is a textual link that writes out “Online-go.com” and brings to the main playing site.
At least, this is how it looks on my machine in May 2025:
Fully conscious it might be disregarded/rejected/downvoted to hell, my humble suggestion would be to have a “clearer” banner logo (the current “OGS” in the top left) that makes it unequivocal that if you click it, you are going to be sent to the Forums home, not to OGS.
It could be: an image like the current one, but with a small “FORUM” overlayed or to the right, or inscribed in the white stone, or whatever more graphically orientated folks might come up with, or who knows, something entirely else.
Maybe this is because there is a clearly written link to the main site in small letters that I never got confused by the bigger logo. But I won’t be against adding something more explicit like “forum” anyway.
“FOGS” (Forums of OGS) - I like that even reading only the first letter/symbol, my lazy brain would know “oh this is the Forums”
“OGF” (Online Go Forums) - would take up the same space as the current logo.
“OGS” / current logo, with an added uppercase F inset within the half white stone - again good for having visually the difference right at the outset, not at the end, which computationally takes up more time. (Since the F would be always against white background, would save the headache of thinking of a colour that works across a range of light/dark modes, …)
I used to know how to put an outline on the text (which would make it compatible with a dark theme), but I haven’t done that in ages and the software changed and I seem to have forgotten how to do it. I’ll look it up and see where they moved the option to, this time.
I also think there’s no need to rush into this. What about a site-wide contest for the best idea? To get everyone, or failing that, the majority, or failing that, an active minority, on board.
I am 29k at image editing, so I do not think that my image will be used at all. I am just trying to provide a visual example of what people might like, so that someone with some real skills can take it from there and deliver the final product
I’ll come out and say that not only did it confuse me at first, I still get it wrong more than half of the time (clicking here meaning to leave the forums).
My mental model is that the forums is a subpage on the general online-go website, so I’m expecting that clicking on the logo brings me to the main page.
It’s not a big deal, but if anything, I would expect the role of the two links to be swapped.
This seems like a good idea. I honestly never realised there was even a link to the main site from here. I didn’t register Online-go.com as being a clickable thing. I knew that the logo doesn’t take you to the site and that the forum software is completely separate so always worked on the basis that there was no way back.
I have only ever opened a browser window and typed “o” to get to OGS proper!
