Website Review and Suggestions

**dansgalaxy** · 01-06-2007, 10:02 AM

Hi,

I have decided to re-do a local charity's website becasue frankly i thought it was crap.

most of the content has been taken from the orginal site, and the colors etc...

THE LOGOS ARE GOING TO BE EDITED AND MADE BETTER PLEASE DONT MOAN HOW CRAP THEY LOOK.

the orginal site it http://calmcharity.org

and my version is http://calm.dansgalaxy.co.uk

i would like to know how i can improve it, what need changing adding. etc basically please look at it tell me whats bad whats good etc.

thansk very much.
dan

**twiggy** · 01-06-2007, 01:13 PM

Is this the one you have re-done? If so change it back because I don't think It can be much worse than that. A few pointers.

Very poor colour scheme,
The scroll across the screen is dated and a bit cheesy,
Very little style to text.

You have a style sheet in head but then use tables for the layout? Why? Use only CSS.

Think a complete re-think about this site is needed.

**travelagent** · 01-06-2007, 02:03 PM

I suggest strongly that you not use frames, as the SE's have great difficulty with indexing those -- make your site using a 2-column page, and as was already mentioned, if you're using CSS, why have tables?

**dansgalaxy** · 01-06-2007, 02:22 PM

Ok firstly just to make clear the version I have done it calm.dansgalaxy.co.uk just incase...
I HAVE NOT USED FRAMES IN MY VERSION! i have only used php includes. NO FRAMES AT ALL!
one of the main reason i chose to re-do the orginial site was because of the frames.

The colour scheme is based off the charity's itsself colour scheme (green)
and i chose one color of yellow which was a paler yellow because i belived it was much better than brighter yellow which is was being used on the orginal site.

With regards to styled text, it is suposed to be resonable simple it is for a local charity so simple i think would be better, also unlike the orginal i have used the same colour for virtually all the text.

I have a style sheet in the header and once the pages are finished i will change the styles to class="whatever" and have the styling in the head. it is only like that becasue it is easier for me to edit and modify when doing it.

with tables i am more confident using table instead of css for this. thats the only reason.

Please feel free to respond to this... i would like to hear from you.

And everone else! please feel free to critisies and tell me whats wrong and right. i would like to know how i can improve it and make it as good as possible but still simple.

Thanks,
Dan

**travelagent** · 01-06-2007, 02:45 PM

Easy, Dan -- take a chill pill ...

... I was referring to the frames you used in your old site.

It's better that you learn how to do tableless design using CSS.

For the changed site, you do have a few errors that should be addressed:

Code:

line 36 column 1 - Warning: <marquee> is not approved by W3C
line 62 column 77 - Warning: entity "&amp" doesn't end in ';'
line 24 column 1 - Warning: <table> proprietary attribute "height"
line 29 column 1 - Warning: <td> attribute "width" has invalid value "*"
line 35 column 1 - Warning: <hr> proprietary attribute "color"
line 37 column 1 - Warning: <hr> proprietary attribute "color"
line 39 column 1 - Warning: <table> proprietary attribute "height"
line 40 column 1 - Warning: <tr> proprietary attribute "height"
line 55 column 245 - Warning: <img> lacks "alt" attribute
line 58 column 1 - Warning: <td> attribute "width" has invalid value "*"

**lunchbox170** · 01-06-2007, 03:07 PM

I think it looks better then the old one, but it still looks like a sight from 1995.

this is 2007, use bright colors.

**dansgalaxy** · 01-06-2007, 04:47 PM

okay, i am just saying... i did not do the old site okay... please! it so... so... WYSIWYG!!! god it even has a generater frontpage 4.0 meta lmao anyway.

How do yoou veiw the errors you speek of i get none?...

please tell...
with regards to the errors i just looked at them... and i know marquee isnt allowed...
for some reason dreamweaver always puts a ; at the end of things like &amp and &nbsp dunno why i assumed it was suposed to be...

what does it mean * is invaild that means set it al what ever is like left over from the other variabls.. or has it been taken out?...

img i would add missing alts etc when i validate at the end when i have it look like i and everone else likes.

thanks please keep commenting. it all can help.

dan

**TheHegemon** · 01-06-2007, 05:26 PM

it looks kinda plain and a lot of yellow
I think you should add some pics of the famlies you help

**dansgalaxy** · 01-06-2007, 06:24 PM

i should make this clear i am not connected to the charity in that sense i am the brother of someone who had luekiemia, and im bored of their site.

anyway to put pics on you have to get wrtitten premission from everone in the picture...
and im not in tthe position to ask.
i really would if i could.

i think what i will do is eventually get the space above the marquee as a banner so a solid banner with the word calm and the logo etc...
and make the navi colour full or somin

dan..

if anyone would liek to help contact me...

**twiggy** · 01-07-2007, 01:15 PM

The errors he/she is talking about you can find here http://validator.w3.org/

Just simply checks your code to see if its write or wrong.

'criticise' I'm not really criticising more constructive help from an outside view.

If you really what to improve there site I highly recommend that you talk with them about changing the colour scheme, pastel colours do work in certain circumstances but in this case (and many others) they do not, brighten it up.

2ndly if you are using Dreamweaver to build your site, please read over the code afterwards, because its very messy, or just simply write the code your self in dreamweaver, using code view, the WYSIWYG turns out poorly coded sites. (far better).

About &amp?

Im guessing you no nothing about HTML here? &amp simply means &, do a search for HTML Entities and leanr HTML while searching.

**travelagent** · 01-07-2007, 01:29 PM

Actually, I don't use the "W3C Validator" -- I use HTML Tidy to see the errors on websites ... as for the ampersand ( & ) -- the correct HTML standard is to write it like this ... &

As for the error attribute "width" has invalid value "*" it's telling you to place a width between the italics.

**dansgalaxy** · 01-07-2007, 02:40 PM

okay... i know html (wuite well actually) and i code in dream weaver i will never use wysiwyg becasue you can never have as much control over the document as with hand coding.

with regards to the &amp i know it just does & i was just wondering about & becase someone told me i shouldnt put a ; at the end which i ahve always dont i was only cheacking!

with the * thing im assumeing it is not in xhtml now...

and i know w3c validator which is why i asked because i didnt reconise the format.

Thank you travlagent for explaing it a bit.

with the colour scheme quite a few peopel have said this so i will be changing the colours. i just dont want to make it to bright i think it needs to be a more casual site more for refrence if you know what i mean... with regards to the logo colours (green) that must stay... lol

so anyideas for the background colour?... [if pos plz post colour code too so i can do it with out look u lol..]

thanks again all for your help.

Dan.

Again i say, If anyone would be interested in participating in any capacity with this charity site please contact me eith via pm or
email : dan@dansgalaxy.co.uk
Msn : dansgalaxy@hotmail.co.uk
Thanks.

**jellybabys** · 01-07-2007, 02:59 PM

A softer yellow would help, you have errors on most of your links, i know you are a charity but if i just came across your site i would not trust it, sry..

Regards

**travelagent** · 01-07-2007, 03:33 PM

Dan - like you, I've been hand-coding for over 12 years ... as for a different color background, I'll strongly recommend what I use -- when the site comes up, just click the color name on the left; it will show you what the background will look like, then just copy/paste the HTML color code on the right -- Hype's Color Specifier

**LadynRed** · 01-07-2007, 05:29 PM

Ok. first thing I see on the new site is the horribly pixelated graphics in the heading section. The width and height is all wrong and in my 1280x1024 resolution they get blown out... specify a proper width and height and forget the percentages on a graphic.

That marquee has to go.. a static heading (a proper H1-h6) would be much better.

I don't find the yellow objectionable, but some contrasting colors and a real design would go a long way to improving the site.

**dansgalaxy** · 01-08-2007, 04:42 PM

Okay firstly travle agent i ahve a similar thing i use for refrence
http://dansgalaxy.co.uk/htmlcolor.htm
okay most of the link errors a prob becasue i put the links in and not made the pages yet.

secondly what would make a local charity site be trustable (if thats a word...)

Ladynred : as i ahve mentioned above the banner graphic will be delt with (eventually.) im just not that good so im sorta puttting it off til last lol,

if you look at it now i have made a basic button image http://calm.dansgalaxy.co.uk/ u will see in the navi (okay they arnt aligned or anything, i will tablealise (another made up word) them so the match up and look gdish lol i jsut did it to see what it looks like.

okay why is everyone against marqees? i know the have been taken out of xhtml, but why so bad? i would have thought it would be the best way of aheving short updates... is there a similar alternative which would be more preferable?

thanks again aall.
dan

**yaajer** · 01-08-2007, 04:54 PM

I like the color scheme. Yellow and Green is not bad. I think the Logo in the top left is a bit large. Have you thought of making it smaller?

Also, check your links too. I'm not sure if it's still a dead (calm logo), but those need to be set..but I'm sure you'll get to them eventually.

Besides fixing the left menu to match up with your links and filling in some space, the site works well for the Non-profit business. I do like the text and font on the original better. The left position on the text is nice also on the old page.

**jellybabys** · 07:03 PM

Hi Dan,

The first sites i look at in google was

http://www.cafonline.org/Default.aspx

http://www.leonard-cheshire.org/?gcl...FUuHMAod519y0g

and i could show a lot more.

When i go to a charity ( what i do ) i want to trust the site with the money i will donate, as you can see the sites are clean looking, great graphics and well written.

Im not having a dig but just trying to help, i know its takes a lot of time and effort to make a site look trustworthy but it would need to be, and you did ask for the advice.

Cheers

**dansgalaxy** · 01-09-2007, 12:16 PM

okay, i would point out that the charities are willing to (and looks like they have) paid out for a pro site.

and could i ask if the current calm site had a paypal link would you trust them http://calmcharity.org have a look thats what im working from. lol.
And please do remember that this is only a LOCAL charity (if you look at Calm Area on either versions of the site you will see the small sort of area that they cover, also when i looked it up, their gross income for 2005 was something like £50,000 and those charities mentioned probally would be over 100,000 im just saying although i completly agree u have to understand why...)

i can see your point completely and frankly i agree, but my biggest problem is the graphic im just plain CRAP at it lmao, hopefully i have found someone which is good at graphic which can compensate for my downfalls and vica versa.

Thanks all for your advice.

Also: Would anyone be willing do something like link exchange or similar, so maybe a supporters thing like soin so Supports CALM with a link to your site and maybe the same thing on yours or you donate soemthing to the charity to have your link placed in the supporters page?

what do people think? yes no maybe? and more importantly would anyone be interested?
Or would anyone be interested in paying small amount or what ever to have a ad on the site?

I think if when i "present" the site to the chairty if i could say that this site would produce X amount form the ads a month, and that they could now recieve donations via paypal etc it wou;d seem more appealing if you know what i mean.

any ideas all are very much welcome.

Thanks again, also anyone good a php which is willing to lend skills if needed?

Dan

**jellybabys** · 01-09-2007, 03:42 PM

Sorry ian im going to have to disagree with you again, my mother ran a charity for lung disease and i made here site from a basic template that i got free from a host, it took me three days to build and i used images that goes with the problem, i had my mother and friends email the content.

It was blue and white and nothing flash but it did look good with clean images not silly animation ones and trustworthy.

I submitted it to yahoo directory and the DMOZ.org within a few weeks both listed it and many followed, so you can easily get links.

In total it cost me one years hosting say £70? and about 24 man hours to learn about header tags and so on, once you get the basic design then you can spend as much or little time you like improving it.

If you still find this hard PM me and we can talk, i already give to 4 children charities but im will be willing to offer a bit of time and experience( the little i have : ).

Regards