|
 |
|
|
|
05-05-2004, 03:55 PM
|
hemisphere.net
|
Posts: 45
Location: Western New York
|
Hi,
I just completed this site after a couple of months of work and am looking for your input. This is my first complete site from the ground up.
I have worked very hard to keep the code Xhtml compliant and design it with CSS no tables! I have acheived that I believe.
I think the site gets is point across easily and easy to navigate but I guess I am partial. Please take a look and let me know what you think.
Thanks so much.
URL: http://www.hemisphere.net |
|
|
|
|
05-05-2004, 05:41 PM
|
|
Posts: 191
Location: Canary island
|
Its simple, its basic..
Maybe it should be that way.. but personally I think it is to
basic.. Ist doesnt stand out in the crowd..
But a good start is it!
4/10
//MrLeone
|
|
|
|
|
05-05-2004, 06:37 PM
|
|
Posts: 61
Location: Sioux Falls, SD
|
I have to suggest that you use CSS to change the font for everything to a sans-serif font. Examples of a sans-serif font include: Ariel, Tahoma, Verdana, Helvetica.
The paragraphs on most pages are just too wide.
I can click on the headers for the drop down menus and it makes a click, but nothing happens. I am of the mind that even this should send users to a menu page because it helps in usability.
No real logo anywhere, just an animated gif. If that is actually your logo you need to present it as such and use branding throughout your site. If it really is your logo you might rethink that move if it came out of anyone's GIF library. It's not a positive identity, and if it's borrowed it would not suit anyone as a logo (or an excuse for a logo).
Since you are also offering web design & development, I think you need to make significant strides in your current design in order to attract attention.
Since you are also offering search engine optimization, I'd also work hard on getting your site optimized and link propogated so that you have a higher PR.
Perhaps this site is completely new and that's why your numbers are small in PR and traffic? There's nothing wrong with that, but I can tell there is quite a bit to do.
The company has no presence there, no identity or branding.
No shots of freindly people on the phone or operators. No human face.
Sorry, but the intent of the site is completely missed and there is just bad looking text there. The site needs to communicate a message visually and establish branding, warm the potential custiomer up and be an example of the services you offer (which are better or different than other people's with at mininum a fresh approach).
|
|
|
|
|
05-05-2004, 08:59 PM
|
|
Posts: 82
|
some of your pages have headers that are blue and underlined, but aren't links. dont' do that: it confuses people. avoid underlining altogether, and especially underlining when its also a different color.
the header at the top looks horrible because its squished. stretching it like that is clever, but it makes it look bad. i don't know exactly why you are avoiding tables that much. tables sometimes require you to wait till all its contents are loaded before the site shows up, but its a trade off sometimes. making small smart tables can vastly avoid that problem. in your case, i'd make the top a table, and center the picture. that way it will always look good, no matter the screensize.
also you have a lot of text thats pretty much right up with the left side. in fact, all your text seems to just stretch side to side. its easier on the eyes to have thinner columns, not screenwide columns. besides, it just *looks* better to have white space, especially to the left: just a block or whatever. unfortunatly this will require you to put everything in a table, unless you can figure out another way--and puting your entire site in a table is what causes the delayed loading. however, your site is decently small, so i wouldn't sweat it.
overall, i agree with the comments made so far--change the text, etc. i'm quite impressed that you didn't use tables. but it would take an *amazing* design to make a table-less site look really good. where you are right now, your site could look really good with just a little modification. look's like you're goign to have to bite the bullet and use tables though. 
brenton
__________________
no sig.
|
|
|
|
|
05-06-2004, 12:44 AM
|
|
Posts: 29
|
yes, its very basic, it looks like you are a beginner designer. Your pages will stand out more and look better with each iteration and with more experience
|
|
|
|
|
05-06-2004, 06:25 AM
|
|
Posts: 112
|
yarrgh,
I believe the site was designed in pure CSS in an attempt to make it more accessible.
However, the code structure isn't all that clean and is cluttered up by the Javascript menu.
The menu has to go...
Statistics I have read, show that those drop down menues actually LOSE visitors!
Also, I am going to mention the font. It needs changing.
Blelisa --- I think that for a first site, you have done a good job (better than my first attempt). Don't let yourself get down after everything has just said. Take it as creative criticism and try to build on everyone's comments.
It's a good start, just keep going!
|
|
|
|
|
05-06-2004, 08:59 AM
|
|
Posts: 45
|
I agree its a good start even though i am not one to critisize. The menu is a little much, but i belive u had good intentions with it to catch the attention of your viewers. Also the underlining and blue color of headers is not a very good idea as stated above, try doing maybe a Bolded look. And if Blue and White are you main colors for your site, change the links so they arent blue so its less confusing. But its a very good start. Keep up the good work
__________________
Today is the tomorrow we worried about yesterday! =D
|
|
|
|
|
05-06-2004, 04:29 PM
|
Thank You for all of the Input!
|
Posts: 45
Location: Western New York
|
First off thank you all for your input! 
I am impressed with the amount of info I received.
SEbasic....I don't let the comments hurt my feelings. I take it all as constructive critisim, and the few that come off nasty I just chalk it up to people having a hard time writing in a professional manner.
Anyways, here goes with response to all the great comments..
1.) I know everyone has strong opinions regarding the drop down menu, however, it has to stay per preference from higher ups. I have tried to keep it as clean as possible by using an external file for all of the code. Also for SEO purposes I have named the buttons and viewed the bar in lynx and it appears clean. I have viewed my site using Mozilla 1.5, Opera 7.21, Firefox 0.8, and IE6.0 and all worked correctly.
2.)Big oops on my part regarding the font. changed it all to arial, sans-serif and much much better!
3.)SymbioticDesign - You guessed it, lower PR and optimization because site is brand new and linking campaign has just begun. However, I think I have the tags, layout, and such pretty good for SEO. I viewed the site in Lynx and it looks good to me. Any other thoughts would be appreciated!
4.)I have shrunk in the margins on the page so that the text does not go all the way out. If you think it needs to be shrunken more let me know, and I will tally the votes and let majority rule 
5.)I have removed the underline all all text that is not links. Much less confusing.
6.)I have totally revamped and broke apart my banner. I have viewed it in three different page resolutions and think it is much better and more stable. Do you agree?
Again thank you all for your comments, they were very informative and really helped me out. As far as more of a my site less boring and more "stand outish" I will definitley work on that. |
|
|
|
|
05-07-2004, 03:27 AM
|
|
Posts: 82
|
SEbasic--CSS for accesability: i dont' understand. do tables not show up in some types of browsers?
__________________
no sig.
|
|
|
|
|
05-07-2004, 03:59 AM
|
|
Posts: 112
|
If someone is using a text reader on a table based page, the text won't be linear...
Look at at a dreamweaver designed site, and view the source.
It may well be that it uses layers, but if it doesn't, you will probalally find that the copy is dotted all around the code.
With CSS you can arange the copy how you wan't, and control the style seperatley.
If I am making no sense, I can try and look for a few examples.
|
|
|
|
|
05-07-2004, 04:17 AM
|
|
Posts: 82
|
no, that makes sense. i guess i sort of knew that, but assumed that it wouldn't be a problem as long as the main content is all in one cell. thanks basic.
__________________
no sig.
|
|
|
|
|
05-07-2004, 06:19 AM
|
|
Posts: 61
Location: Sioux Falls, SD
|
Hi Yargh...
CSS for accessibility because humans and bots both can access the page quicker, and the spiders don't have to crawl the extra code in the page.
There are other things about tables, aside from what SEbasic pointed out (which are some good points). But more importantly, the CSS can be kept in an external file (like javascript). You can make site wide changes to the style of a site by editing the file. Like the font, or that all H2 tags have a red font color.
This external is also where you can define how all your divs look. Just give them a name (or class) and then the only extra code that you need in the body is the div name (or class).
Freeing up all the extra table code makes the page load quicker (which search engines do like) and takes out the extraneous code.
blelisa...
I am having great difficulty with CSS because IE isn't supporting CSS-P (CSS Positioning or Absolute Positioning). Maybe this is why you went with the top header across? This seems to be the solution everyone is using, but if IE would just support CSS-P right correctly I would have SO many sites done right now.
And without CSS-P, I can't do fluid design (or also called elastic/stretchy/liquid design techniques) with graphic header caps/ends and such.
Have you found any way around this? I think I'm going to have to go out and buy a DHTML book.
Anyways...
Wow, what a difference a font and some formatting make. I would actually squish the text more, if it were me. White space is always good. BUT, I think you will need something on the left side. Maybe like a block of a set of photgraphs that run down the page lengthwise. But it would have to be a real small strip. Pictures of operators on the phone, techs at the NOS, executives handing over the file folder to the secretary, and the like. But, that's just a suggestion, not a neccessity.
Did you clean up the header banner, too? It looks better, now. Unfortunately, I think you are making a crucial mistake with that animated GIF unless that is actually their logo done by commission (or by hire).
So, I still think you should have some menu pages (for the very top menu item), it never hurts to have more pages to spider and more freindliness for people like my Mom who just don't get drop down menus... but you have made great strides.
It really looks like a professional presentation, now. Well, minus the logo. I have a thing about logos. |
|
|
|
|
05-07-2004, 06:38 AM
|
|
Posts: 112
|
Fluid pages are pretty hard to make using CSS.
I have made a couple, but often find that I have to do a bit of a bodge job in order to get it looking good.
Symbiotic,
If you place a link to any fluid deisgns you are working on, I will see if I can fix any problems you might be having.
|
|
|
|
|
05-07-2004, 07:33 AM
|
|
Posts: 61
Location: Sioux Falls, SD
|
Part of the reason I am in the forums messing around tonight is because the studio computer went down. Lost 6 to 9 months of work. 2 sites, 4 logos, 1 seo job.
Oh well. If I see ya around again when I get the new motherboard in and windows installed, I'll hollar at you. Just trying to find the code to marry the top right edge of a graphic to the top right edge of the browser. I can let the graphics below that go until IE starts supporting decent technology.
Thanks... Doug
|
|
|
|
|
05-07-2004, 07:55 AM
|
|
Posts: 112
|
does
top: 0px;
right: 0px;
not work?
|
|
|
|
|
05-07-2004, 08:00 AM
|
|
Posts: 61
Location: Sioux Falls, SD
|
Not in IE 6. Is 7 out?
|
|
|
|
|
05-07-2004, 08:53 AM
|
|
Posts: 45
Location: Western New York
|
Symbiotic,
Thanks for the kind words! Vote one for shrinking in text some more.
As far as IE and CSS-P I know what you mean. That is exactly why I put the banner all the way across. Maybe someday IE will get with the program! Sorry to hear about your PC crash, frustrating!!
|
|
|
|
|
05-07-2004, 10:08 AM
|
|
Posts: 112
|
7 isn't out yet.
I have had this problem before...
I'll try to think of how I fixed it.
|
|
|
|
|
05-07-2004, 10:59 AM
|
|
Posts: 101
Location: Dover, Kent (UK)
|
Nice site. Simple to use.
Perhaps the use of more colours might make the site stand out a bit more. Put the text in colour backgrounds (soft subtle ones, not bright blue for example).
Andrew
|
|
|
|
|
05-07-2004, 11:29 PM
|
Review
|
Posts: 5
|
Hi,
Try to use some images in the top bar behind the title. Don't use blue text. People will think it's a link. The verdana font sets better for the site then arial. Use size 2. In the menu don't use white color for selection, bacause your background color is white.
Regards
|
|
|
|
|
|
« Reply to hemisphere.net
|
|
|
| Thread Tools |
Search this Thread |
|
|
|
Posting Rules
|
You may not post new threads
You may not post replies
You may not post attachments
You may not edit your posts
HTML code is Off
|
|
|
|
