Site critique please

Flynn

Hey

Just put up my site please let me know what you think..
I'm actually in the band and not a real web-designer so go easy...
Still dont know what to do regarding the iframe horizontal scroll bar in IE..

Please let me know what broowser your using and if you see a H scroll bar or not.

Thank you!

www.silver-trail.com

aidan_walsh

Firefox 2.0.0.2, only seeing vertical scrolling.

Very nice, very clean. The only thing I would suggest is not relying on a question mark and a popup to relay extra information in the Gigs page, especially what I would think would be important information for fans like the launch venue for a single. A better layout there might be necessary if you want to get everything across.

Goodshape

Looks quite nice.

Couple of things :
I'd reduce the amount of empty space at the top of the page - both inside and outside the content box. It looks like it could all fit on one page, without any vertical scrolling, but it doesn't because there's a gap up top.

No horizontal scroll bars here - using the latest Firefox.

The links in the menu at the bottom are very small. There's plenty of space to make them a bit bigger, and I don't see any reason why they're images and not simple text.

And I agree with aidan_walsh about the question mark on the events page - seems a bit unnecessary.

Looks good otherwise

Liam Byrne

Visual impression is very good.

Horizontal scrollbar in IE7.

Also, using the IFRAME could cause you problems with Google, etc.....if Google indexes your pages, it'll direct people to those pages (e.g. http://www.silver-trail.com/home.htm) and they won't have any navigation.

Check out http://www.ashleybrown.co.uk/nettips/20001026search2.asp for a resolution for this.

PixelTrawler

just wondering whats the flash gallery. Im looking for one for a site and that looks just about perfeect

Seth Brundle

Im getting a H scrollbar on FF 2.0.0.2.
Nothing in gallery - just whiteness
the links page doesn't use the space wisely - maybe have the actual links indented from the category.
Does webmaster need its own link? Also maybe make the email addys hyperlinks.

Check all your page titles!

Not looking at the code Im wondering if the text "Welcome to Silver-trail.com, there are no coincidences..." is shown in too many colours? It looks like three on my screen. Also the comma is white - it should be the same as the words beside it.

axer

Firstly, there is nothing more annoying in my opinion than going onto a website that has a menu with no text until a menu item is hovered over. It means you must go through the links first in order to see what options/pages are available. I know there is a menu at the bottom of the page but I did not notice it at first. Why not put a text menu at the top?

The website itself looks nice and neat.

I don't see the point of the iframe. I would ditch it.

Is the gallery supposed to work? All I see is a white box in the iframe.

Im using Firefox 2.0.0.2 btw and there is a horizontal scrolling bar in the iframe.

Flynn

Ok thanks guys..

No the gallery is not supposed to be white.. It's flash and works fine in some browsers.. but i'm in Internet cafe and using FF and i see white too.. but i didnt in IE...


The reason the bottom nav. bar is images and not test is; i did it in Fireworks and used text but it just exports as an image.. ya text would be better..

Aidan - I'll get rid of the question mark in the gigs page so, thanks. Was a bit tricky anyway.,..

Kbannon - what wud u suggest i do with the links page to use space more wisely? and i think ur right about the colours.. will check that..

Joebloggs - The flash gallery was a template gallery form Photoshop CS2. You can d/load the trial from adobe.com. I must put up more pics but it looks really well... and it's all customizable

Goodshape - there is no V scroll bar on all monitors iv'e checked so far unless your using a low screen res?? maybe 1024x764 ish??

Axer.. If i ditch the iframe what will i use? I'd have to load every page with the menu etc. And if i made changes to menu i'd have to update all pages... Would that work out do you think? Plus i wouldnt be able to have a v. scroll bar and the content would stretch the design and would look crap??

Liam - will check into that, cheers...

axer

Flynn wrote:

Axer.. If i ditch the iframe what will i use? I'd have to load every page with the menu etc. And if i made changes to menu i'd have to update all pages... Would that work out do you think? Plus i wouldnt be able to have a v. scroll bar and the content would stretch the design and would look crap??

You use includes to include the header and footer in each page. You could also either use a variable width design or wrap content within the design.

Gordon

I'm on a 1680x1050 monitor and I'm getting a vertical scroll on the front page. Same firefox as kbannon but on a Mac. Flash isn't loading either, your javascript flash loader is the problem.

Seth Brundle

Flynn wrote:

Kbannon - what wud u suggest i do with the links page to use space more wisely? and i think ur right about the colours.. will check that..

I had been thinking of something like:

link category          link#1
                       link#2

link category          link#1
                       link#2

Flynn wrote:

Axer.. If i ditch the iframe what will i use? I'd have to load every page with the menu etc. And if i made changes to menu i'd have to update all pages... Would that work out do you think? Plus i wouldnt be able to have a v. scroll bar and the content would stretch the design and would look crap??

DIV with css scrollbar?
Can you use include files for the menu?

Flynn

kbannon wrote:

I had been thinking of something like:

link category          link#1
                       link#2

link category          link#1
                       link#2

DIV with css scrollbar?
Can you use include files for the menu?

ya i'll do that with the links...

As for the DIV ive no idea.. i'm not a web designer.. but i'll look into a tutorial...
jodavino.com <- is that a DIV with css or is it flash?

Gordon - javascript flash loader?? How do i solve this?

Sorry for all the questions! But thanks it's great help..

axer - "You use includes to include the header and footer in each page. You could also either use a variable width design or wrap content within the design."

Sorry what exactly do u mean?

Seth Brundle

include files are files that contain code which can be used sitewide - its contents are imported into whatever file calls it at the point where it was called.
At the moment your files are *.htm - I presume if its supported then you will need to change the extension to *.shtm
The code to include it in each of your shtm pages would be as follows:

<!--#include file="top_bit.htm" -->
...main content...
<!--#include file="bottom_menu.htm" -->

see http://www.webcom.com/~webcom/help/inc/include.shtml
and http://www.indiana.edu/~wmhome/tool_guide_info/ssi.shtml

cgarvey

Flynn wrote:

No the gallery is not supposed to be white.. It's flash and works fine in some browsers.. but i'm in Internet cafe and using FF and i see white too.. but i didnt in IE...

That's because your link is wrong .. it's currently

<a href="gallery2\index.htm"...

Flynn

cgarvey wrote:

That's because your link is wrong .. it's currently

<a href="gallery2\index.htm"...

But it works fine in IE... so what shud i change it to?

A server-side include is a coding that you can include within your HTML document that will tell the web server to include other information with the document being served.

So if i change to .shtm the gallery will work in all browsers? Sorry bout the ?'s!

Cr8or

Iframes are bad mkay use divs for on page content..

http://www.netbulge.com/index.php?session=0&action=read&click=open&article=1118302569


Add titles to each page plus meta keywords and discriptions.

http://searchenginewatch.com/showPage.html?page=2167931


Keyword ritch file names/ pages

http://www.dreamweaverresources.com/seo/keywordpages.htm


Alt text for images

http://www.w3schools.com/html/html_images.asp



Im not going to go into the use of dreamweaver javascript.


Design is ok, bit dark. Nav should be placed high on the page.

RasTa

Design here.

It's pretty boring and too dark. The images on the top weren't cut out properly and the glow and feather make it look cheap. Put a stroke around the image on the press section to make it stand out more.

It is ok though

Liam Byrne

But it works fine in IE... so what shud i change it to?

The web standard version.... gallery2/index.htm