Few Sites.... your opinions?

[DomainDog]

Hey everyone! Man, I'm SO glad we are back online! :-)

Following along with our tradition, I'm posting a few "unconventional" sites I'm working on. Your opinions are welcome.

All are 100% hand coded, to the customers spec, and are generally non-conventional. I also hand coded the FLASH and many of the gif animations as well. They're not slick, but the customers are VERY happy!

ElectionAnalysis.com
AllLyrics.net
DaileyInsurance.com
SelahRecording.com

Thanks for looking!
DomainDog=====>Woof!

[DomainDog]

Hmmmm.... lot's of views but no comments?

Does that mean no one liked the sites? Truly, even bad comments are better than nothing, LOL!

Anyone?

[KyleC]

i will be honest with you.
they are basic and sometimes lean on amaturish.

I rate them:
1)ElectionAnalysis.com
2)daileyinsurance.com
3)alllyrics.net
4)selahrecording.com

i liked the top two sites

I was struggleing to pin point why i though they were 'amaturish' and i relized its the animated Gifs on some of the sites.

the intro on daileyinsurance.com should have a text link at the bottom to skip the intro, some peoples browsers may not forward them after 5 seconds.

I usually dont like to review peoples work, I hope you appreciate my honesty and keep working hard!!

[LeftBrainStudio]

Thought I was going to be the first to respond but Kyle beat me to it. I'm not a fan of critiquing work of people I don't know. But since you're asking...

The sites, visually, are a bit amaturish. You're learning how to code by hand so I'll give you a thumbs-up for that.

ElectionAnalysis
The bottom portion of this page is actually well formatted and the colors work well. You just have too much "blinky-blink" going on at the top of the page.

Some random thoughts on the other sites:
1. Busy backgrounds make reading text difficult
2. Basic table borders are best left for data specific tables
3. If you're going to have a splash screen, let it have a purpose. And the design should fit in with the rest of the theme.

I hope that's a bit constructive and you keep working at it.

[DomainDog]

Guys, I really appreciate your input!

I figured it like this: By starting out doing all the coding by hand, THEN switching to a wysiwyg editor means I can understand exactly what the generated code is doing, and I can also tweak it that much better!

I'm also learning php, javascript and FLASH at the same time. For example, I saw many FLASH pic scrollers available on the net, but instead of just downloading one, I created my own!

Also, on the SelahRecording site the customer needed a custom form-mail, so rather than "borrowing" or buying a script, I created one from scratch using php. That was fun!

So..... no apologies necessary. I truly appreciate your input, and thank you for your comments. This dog is only beginning to bark!

DomainDog

PS- by the way, the Selah customer wanted animated gifs for navigation, LOL!

[nefadol]

I suggest when using an image, resize it to the size you're going to display it as. Also, when linking with an image use border="0", you'll get rid of the blue line. Try some css also, it helps with the professionalism. Try and keep your layouts a max width of 780 to avoid side scrolling 800 x 600.

[Frank Hagan]

If you're serious about coding HTML properly, and have thick skin, check out the http://validator.w3.org/ site and run your sites through the validator.

They also have a lot of info at http://www.w3.org/MarkUp that helps you code for cross-browser compatibility, accessibility for the handicapped, etc.

[DomainDog]

I suggest when using an image, resize it to the size you're going to display it as. Also, when linking with an image use border="0", you'll get rid of the blue line. Try some css also, it helps with the professionalism. Try and keep your layouts a max width of 780 to avoid side scrolling 800 x 600.

Excellent suggestions nefadol!

The image thing is really a time isse mixed with a bit of laziness. I'm member at several royalty free image sites, and I own photoshop, but it take a lot more time to downsize every image.

As to the resolution thing, since I cruise at 1024 x 786, sometimes I forget to check things out at lower resolutions. I wonder.... is there any data about the "average" resolution most users surf at??

Thanks for your comments!

[LeftBrainStudio]

Excellent suggestions nefadol!

As to the resolution thing, since I cruise at 1024 x 786, sometimes I forget to check things out at lower resolutions. I wonder.... is there any data about the "average" resolution most users surf at??

I believe most design for the 800x600 rez right now. Unless you have an older target audience, which would be the 640x480 (ugh) rez. Whatever it is, don't forget to take window chrome, menu bars, etc. into account (ie design at ~760x560).

[-Oz-]

And for backwards compatibility you don't want to pass 744px since in the odler browsers the menu bars are larger and netscape has that "thing" on the left side.

Even if everyone switches to 1024x768 or higher they don't always run with the windows maximized so 800x600 will remain the standard for awhile.

[nefadol]

It is best to take account of other visitors. I'd say 1024 x 786 is gradually becoming the norm, but quite a few still use 800 x 600. I personally switch between both resolutions. My best advice for designs is to keep it clean and uncluttered. Have your content straight forward and navigation hassle free. You'll keep more visitors that way. You want the frustration level to be at a minimum.

[DomainDog]

Urgh!

I'm looking at this right now at 800 x 600, and it looks HUGE!

I guess it has a lot to do with what a person gets used to. But I AM going to go back to the sites listed above, and check them all out at this resolution. I can read it from across the room, LOL!

I can't begin to tell you guys how much this discussion is helping me!

DomainDog

(confidential to FrankHagen): now I'm afraid to submit my code to the wc3 validator! I hate getting slapped.