Opinions Wanted

It doesn't matter if you do all the error checking in the world, or if you have the most beautiful graphics, if your site or application design isn't usable, it's not going to do well. Get input and advice on usability and user interface issues here.

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Bigun
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Opinions Wanted

Post by Bigun »

Ok, I'm finished with about 90% of the site. I'm wanting opinions on it.

Please keep in mind that it's my first PHP creation.

http://www.cybergrunge.com/test

*winces for impact*
Grim...
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Post by Grim... »

Gah, Times New Roman!

/dies
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jayshields
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Post by jayshields »

Keep the navigation bar there across all the pages, and, as Grim said, get rid of the font.
Roja
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Post by Roja »

Invalid HTML, Invalid CSS, ugly font, Black text on grey background can be hard to read for some, no About Us page to help me understand what it is.

Overall, its a start, but has a long way to go.
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RobertGonzalez
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Post by RobertGonzalez »

Extruded borders make it look a little old-school. TNR font has to go. Maybe a smooth sans-serif like Verdana, Arial or the like. Black and gray base colors always make the site look very dark and grim (not a bad thing if that is what you are shooting for). The design doesn't scale to 800X600 without creating horizontal scroll bars.

Nice start, but I think it will require a little more work.
Bigun
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Post by Bigun »

I've gotten those few CSS errors taken care of.

Any suggestions for doctype and encoding for my HTML? I'm not sure what the differences are.

I'll play with fonts in due time. :wink:

*EDIT*

Yes I am going for a dark look...
Roja
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Post by Roja »

Bigun wrote:I've gotten those few CSS errors taken care of.
Congrats!
Bigun wrote:Any suggestions for doctype and encoding for my HTML? I'm not sure what the differences are.
As a general statement, anything older than HTML4 is ancient (over 7 years old), so lets set HTML4 as the baseline for any real development being done today.

With that, the choice is between Transitional and Strict. Transitional allows some inline layout and style changes, and old things like the font tag. It makes things a tad bit easier to write, but (much) harder to parse. It is also less reliable across browsers.

Strict allows a much stronger consistency across browsers, but it does have a cost - you have to be fairly careful in how you code your page. In the case of your page, it is seemingly only about 8 errors, so I wouldn't say thats a heavy burden in exchange for much better parsing.

Beyond HTML is of course XHTML, but even the best advocates for webstandards have little interest in pushing it as a good choice. The reasons are long and complicated, but if you don't already know the differences, you probably don't need to go to XHTML.

As to encoding, use UTF-8. Its one of the best choices for simple, interoperable language encodings, and it allows you to use a variety of different languages on your site, down the road.
Bigun
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Post by Bigun »

Phew... got the doctype declared, now it's striping my ass about not using style sheets correctly and using the font tags, etc, etc, etc.

Looks like I'm going to be forced to sit down and make style-sheets my mantra.
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RobertGonzalez
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Post by RobertGonzalez »

Trust me (and the others that swear by it)... once you get your mind wrapped around the concept of CSS driven HTML, you will wonder how you ever got by without using it before. At least that was my experience.
Bigun
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Post by Bigun »

It keeps complaining that I haven't declared some types of tags:

Code: Select all

Error  Line 59 column 3: element "ET" undefined
But it is clearly defined:

Code: Select all

<style type="text/css">
<!--

a:link {color:white}
a:visited {color:white}
a:hover {color:red}
a:active {color:red}

body
   {
   background-image:
   url('http://www.cybergrunge.com/images/bg3.jpg')
   }

et
   {
   text-align:center;
   color:red;
   font-style:normal;
   }
...
And simple tasks like just <center>'ing I can't seem to accomplish... help?
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jayshields
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Post by jayshields »

You can't just define your own HTML tags!

Change et { in your css to .et { and then you have your own css class. Then you can apply it to a <span> or a <div> like this:

Code: Select all

<span class="et">whatever</span>
.

<center> is old know and has been deprecated (?), what I do is make a center'ing css class. If it's text you want to center, make a class with text-align: center; in it and apply the class to a span which contains the text in question.
Bigun
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Post by Bigun »

I *think* I'm starting to get the hang of this.

Except I can't seem to center text.

Code: Select all

<span class="center">Text</span>

Code: Select all

<style type="text/css">
<!--

a:link {color:white}
a:visited {color:white}
a:hover {color:red}
a:active {color:red}

body {background-image: url('http://www.cybergrunge.com/images/bg3.jpg')}

.titletext {color:red; font-style:normal; font-weight:bold; font-size: 20pt;}

.navigationtext {color:black; font-style:normal; font-size: 10pt;}

.highlight {color:white; font-style:normal; font-size: 10pt;}

.maintable {border-color:black;}

.logotable {border-color:black; background-color:black;}

.datatable {border-color:red; background-color:black;}

.center {text-align:center;}
-->
</style>
Nothing centers using the HMTL above..
Bigun
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Post by Bigun »

Take a look at the source for details, but yeah, I can get the main table to center.
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RobertGonzalez
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Post by RobertGonzalez »

I think you are going to want to use text-align within block level elements (<div>, <p>, etc). Spans are not block level, so the results may be different than what you'd expect. Maybe, maybe not. Also, when centering tables, it is a good idea to use margin-left: auto; and margin-right: auto; to center those as text-align: center; does not work in all browsers with tables,
Bigun
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Post by Bigun »

Everah wrote:I think you are going to want to use text-align within block level elements (<div>, <p>, etc). Spans are not block level, so the results may be different than what you'd expect. Maybe, maybe not. Also, when centering tables, it is a good idea to use margin-left: auto; and margin-right: auto; to center those as text-align: center; does not work in all browsers with tables,
Guh....

I made a new selector called blockcenter using the margin-left/right:center. Used it with a div tag and it still won't center.
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