Image Viewer - A Sin?

[Blinky the Shark]

This site uses both embedded music and frames. Please ignore those
issues for my question, if you will, because my question isn't about
those things, which I, too, dislike. (It's especially hateful on my
dialup. <g>)

http://www.crystalbernard.com/Cphotos/

Scroll top frame so you can select "Other Photos", and do so.

Is the use of a form to make this little image viewer a horrible thing,
as I suspect -- use of something for X that's intended for Y? I'm not
hip to forms, and my impression of them is that they're for user's
submission of data. But this little "slide viewer" isn't code heavy
and it does work nicely (once the images are loaded).

 

[tm]

This site uses both embedded music and frames. Please ignore those
issues for my question, if you will, because my question isn't about
those things, which I, too, dislike. (It's especially hateful on my
dialup. <g>)

http://www.crystalbernard.com/Cphotos/

Interesting website. What was your question again?

Scroll top frame so you can select "Other Photos", and do so.

That's somewhere east of 'whitelace'? Wait...

Is the use of a form to make this little image viewer a horrible thing,
as I suspect -- use of something for X that's intended for Y? I'm not
hip to forms, and my impression of them is that they're for user's
submission of data. But this little "slide viewer" isn't code heavy
and it does work nicely (once the images are loaded).

Who cares, it works, right? Why get caught up in html technicalities?

 

[Blinky the Shark]

Interesting website. What was your question again?

That's somewhere east of 'whitelace'? Wait...

Who cares, it works, right? Why get caught up in html technicalities?

I do. That's why I asked. Muggings work, too, but that doesn't mean
they're a good thing. Oh, that's a technicality, right?

 

[Roy Schestowitz]

*LOL* What are you doing to us? We are trying to get some work done...

I do. That's why I asked. Muggings work, too, but that doesn't mean
they're a good thing. Oh, that's a technicality, right?

Regarding technicalities, forms will consume more resources so they are not
the ideal way of handling this task. Certain borwsers/devices(platforms)
might not support them either, so it is a loss.

When I first entered the site I did not realise it was implemented using
forms. I actually had my mind focused on something else so don't worry
about "view source". Since you don't deliver 'techie' news here (and
considering the nature of the site), it will probably have 90%+ IE6 users.
So, I wouldn't worry.

Roy

 

[Blinky the Shark]

Blinky the Shark wrote:

*LOL* What are you doing to us? We are trying to get some work done...

I always like that actress on a particular sitcom, and discovered,
today, that she also had a singing career. Investigating that, I found
that site. My favorite images were 11 and 20, because together they
nicely show two quite contrasting sides.

Regarding technicalities, forms will consume more resources so they
are not the ideal way of handling this task. Certain
borwsers/devices(platforms) might not support them either, so it is a
loss.

When I first entered the site I did not realise it was implemented
using forms. I actually had my mind focused on something else so don't
worry about "view source". Since you don't deliver 'techie' news here
(and considering the nature of the site), it will probably have 90%+
IE6 users. So, I wouldn't worry.

Thanks for the input, and for that input being more than a simplistic
knee-jerk reaction. I've not an immediate need for such; this was just
- good or bad - something that caught my eye. The code, I mean.

 

[tm]

I do. That's why I asked. Muggings work, too, but that doesn't mean
they're a good thing. Oh, that's a technicality, right?

Don't you have photoshopped sharkteeth to clean? Like you expect to
get a serious answer from me.

 

[Blinky the Shark]

Blinky the Shark wrote:

Don't you have photoshopped sharkteeth to clean? Like you expect to
get a serious answer from me.

While I'm familiar with the capabilities and posting styles of many of
the regulars here, I'm not familiar with yours.

 

[tm]

While I'm familiar with the capabilities and posting styles of many of
the regulars here, I'm not familiar with yours.

Fer gods sake, a regular here? Eeew, cooties! Hey, I just lurk in
alt.html Blink, learnin' something now and then. But i see you around
in ac sometimes. Figured you'd recognize me as that ruggedly handsome
poster with the perpetually sarcastic smirk.
Dammit, nobody ever recognizes me as the ruggedly handsome poster with
the... perpetually... sarcastic...
oh nevermind.

 

[Steve Pugh]

This site uses both embedded music and frames. Please ignore those
issues for my question, if you will, because my question isn't about
those things, which I, too, dislike. (It's especially hateful on my
dialup. <g>)

http://www.crystalbernard.com/Cphotos/

Scroll top frame so you can select "Other Photos", and do so.

That's the first problem. There are seven galleries on that site. Six
use one interface and one uses a different interface.

Is the use of a form to make this little image viewer a horrible thing,
as I suspect -- use of something for X that's intended for Y?

There are three different sets of controls here.
The start/stop button.
The first/previous/next/last buttons.
The drop down menu.

The stop/start button is fine as it is. Starting or stopping a slide
show is a functional process and a button is appropriate.

The first/previous/next/last buttons are dual featured - they serve as
link substitutes when the slideshow is off and as rewind/fastforward
controls for when the slideshow is on. If this slide show had a
non-JavaScript fallback then they could then be text links to
different pages and could have different colours for univisted/visited
states thus helping the user to locate themselves.

The drop down menu is just bad. Why should anyone pick number 2 over
number 7? Having short descriptions of each image would be much
better. Again, if there was a non-JavaScript fallback then ordinary
text links with distinct colours would be helpful. A list if links has
the advantage that the user can see all of them at once - a select
element has a browser/OS imposed limit on how many items it shows at
once (Opera and Firefox on WinXp only show 20 items; IE6 shows all 24;
I'm sure that older versions of Windows had a limit of 11).

I'm not
hip to forms, and my impression of them is that they're for user's
submission of data.

That's their primary purpose.

But this little "slide viewer" isn't code heavy
and it does work nicely (once the images are loaded).

I would have approached it differently. I would have started with an
index page that offered the user to option of the slideshow or of
browsing the images normally (so the page would show the first image,
a list of descriptive links to all the other images and a
call-to-action offering the slideshow feature - throw a designer at it
to make it look pretty and visually balanced). In the slideshow I
would use buttons as control, in the normal pages I would use text
links. I wouldn't use the drop down menu in either.

Steve

 

[Blinky the Shark]

That's the first problem. There are seven galleries on that site. Six
use one interface and one uses a different interface.

There are three different sets of controls here.
The start/stop button.
The first/previous/next/last buttons.
The drop down menu.

The stop/start button is fine as it is. Starting or stopping a slide
show is a functional process and a button is appropriate.

The first/previous/next/last buttons are dual featured - they serve as
link substitutes when the slideshow is off and as rewind/fastforward
controls for when the slideshow is on. If this slide show had a
non-JavaScript fallback then they could then be text links to
different pages and could have different colours for univisted/visited
states thus helping the user to locate themselves.

The drop down menu is just bad. Why should anyone pick number 2 over
number 7? Having short descriptions of each image would be much
better. Again, if there was a non-JavaScript fallback then ordinary
text links with distinct colours would be helpful. A list if links has
the advantage that the user can see all of them at once - a select
element has a browser/OS imposed limit on how many items it shows at
once (Opera and Firefox on WinXp only show 20 items; IE6 shows all 24;
I'm sure that older versions of Windows had a limit of 11).

Datapoint: in FF Linux and Opera Linux I see all 24.

That's their primary purpose.

I would have approached it differently. I would have started with an
index page that offered the user to option of the slideshow or of
browsing the images normally (so the page would show the first image,
a list of descriptive links to all the other images and a
call-to-action offering the slideshow feature - throw a designer at it
to make it look pretty and visually balanced). In the slideshow I
would use buttons as control, in the normal pages I would use text
links. I wouldn't use the drop down menu in either.

Thanks, Steve.

 

[nice.guy.nige]

While the city slept, Blinky the Shark ([email protected]) feverishly
typed...

This site uses both embedded music and frames. Please ignore those
issues for my question, if you will, because my question isn't about
those things, which I, too, dislike. (It's especially hateful on my
dialup. <g>)

http://www.crystalbernard.com/Cphotos/

Arrrghhhh! Not only frames and an unstoppable background song (and a pretty
dreadful one at that!), but it also resizes my browser! nnnnnnnnnnnnnnghhhh!
;-)

Cheers,
Nige

 

[Blinky the Shark]

While the city slept, Blinky the Shark ([email protected])
feverishly typed...

Arrrghhhh! Not only frames and an unstoppable background song (and a
pretty dreadful one at that!), but it also resizes my browser!
nnnnnnnnnnnnnnghhhh! ;-)

Didn't know they'd done that (didn't resize here).

Firefox: http://www.blinkynet.net/stuff/comp/no_resize.gif