Just put up a new cover/front page! opinions please

corkie

This is a work in progress!
Looking for comments and advice on the content more than the design.

The current design is based on free CSS templates that I have tweaked a little to suit my needs, in doing so I have broken some of the strict xhtml validation, and temporary removed some of the functioning of the wordpress template to get same menu and header across the pages.
Not to worry this is just a temporary design for the next two months, while I develop a better layout and integrate more of the separate parts of the site.

Same with the logo, it's temporary, and a quick design.

Content I want opinions on is my front page and my about page. Any other feedback is also welcome.

Please note my background is computer programing and coding, and my html,css skills are rusty haven't been designing for a few years.

Thanks in advance,
Regards,
John O Connell.

Gordon

I like it a lot, just think the logo is a bit retro, unless you are going for that. I know you mention the temp logo.

The maintext colour may be a bit dark for some viewers with less than 20:20 vision though.

seanybiker

Looks grand to me boss. As gordon said the main text is a tad dark but other than that its grand

corkie

I changed the CSS style sheet a small bit so that the content text is on a black background. Now the site looks a small bit blocky.

Thanks for the positive feedback, I was expecting a bit more negative feedback that boards members usually give.

Regards,
J.

P.S. Thanks "daymobrew", I changed the font to white. I had removed the search/rss part of the site in the WP template, because it was messing up the layout. I put it back in with menu and forgot to edit css to fix that. I will be integrating the customized google search from here and removing that search.

daymobrew

The search box (on top right of page) is very difficult to see. And the text in it is black on black.
A light/white border on the search box and similar for the font would probably sort that out.

STBR

Holy crap it's like the buggiest thing ever.

In every browser except FireFox.

The rollover of the Navigation Bar is bugged badly in Chrome, Internet Explorer, Safari, Opera, and I think Flock.

And since IE has the most users you should really fix it.

Lucky I'm not a Firefox user or you'd still think it was fine.

I guess that's what happens when you use a pre-made template.

corkie

...... I knew I had broken the Menu sytem but i did realise it was that bad. Until you pointed it out. I'll need to fix that on the static front page. Having the content moving on rollover was not intended.

It proves the point expressed on her about using free templates.

Regards,
John.
P.S. Made a change to the CSS to prevent the rollover effect. IE8 in W7RC threw up this prompt?

Compatibility View
Internet Explorer 8 is a new release and some websites may not yet be ready for Internet Explorer 8. Click the Compatibility View toolbar button to display the website as viewed in Internet Explorer 7, which will correct display problems like misaligned text, images, or text boxes. This option is on a per site basis and all other sites will continue to display with Internet Explorer 8 functionality. To go back to browsing with Internet Explorer 8 functionality on that site, simply click the Compatibility View button again.

STBR

corkie wrote: »

...... I knew I had broken the Menu sytem but i did realise it was that bad. Until you pointed it out. I'll need to fix that on the static front page. Having the content moving on rollover was not intended.

It proves the point expressed on her about using free templates.

Regards,
John.

Yeah well, you know what the say - If you want something done right; do it yourself!


Good news is that it only seems to be happening on the "Home" page.

So maybe if you copied the CSS from the "About" page it's be alright.

Well some of the CSS anyway.

Or maybe the problem is with the JavaScript - Way too tired to look properly, have a big test in the morning and it's 2:30, night.

Webmonkey

www.browsershots.org if ya like to see screen shot across all.

Not bad Corkie

corkie

SirDarren wrote: »

Good news is that it only seems to be happening on the "Home" page.

So maybe if you copied the CSS from the "About" page it's be alright.

I think I fixed the moving content, in editing the document I may have dropped a closing div.

Also instead of having two different CSS referenced I am now just using the one from the WP template.

Regards,
John O Connell
P.S. Thank you again for pointing that out. Anyone else see any more bugs!

daymobrew

corkie wrote: »

in editing the document I may have dropped a closing div.

I recommend running each file through the W3C HTML Validator as it will find issues like this.

corkie

There is only one static file, the front cover index.html page.
The rest of the pages are php created!
I ran the validator and fixed some things it was reporting, only for it to generate more than i started with, even reduced the document from strict to Transitional.

*************************************
In Firefox when you zoom in are out (ctrl + [+/-/0]) the contents will stay in middle (getting bigger or smaller) . (Zoom text only not selected).
But in MS it zoom's but the content grows out to the right or shrinks to the left.

corkie

Just wondering what people think of this logo/avatar/favicon?


Regards,
John.

P.S. to Trojan: How would you reduce or simplify but keep the theme of it?

Trojan

It's a big complex - simple tends to be better, for logos and especially for favicons.

tricky D

Keep the logo simple, very simple. It'll be more memorable and recognisable.

To me the logo almost makes itself given your biz name. Make up a cloud graphic like the weather icons. Leave it as an outline or fill it in. Use a strong colour. Put the word cloud in the cloud and books to the right using a simple font with no effects (drop shadows etc). Pop the dot org at the end. Play around with sizes, colours and positions a bit. Keep it to 2 colours only. Get feedback from a few people and make your choice. The favicon is the cloud. It's no stunning piece of art, but it's effective.

corkie

Hows is that for a more simple, not over complicated logo?
Now up on the website, so you can judge the colours.

Thanks to everyone here who is assisting me in this retraining of some skills, i left drop over the years.

Any good site's out there for HTML5 standards and guides?

Regards,
John O Connell