review

R

rf

Hi Richard

How can I:

a. get the content to sit in the middle of the page if the page is
taller than the height of the content

By "page" I assume you mean browser canvas area.

Why would you want to? Does your client want this? If so then your client
needs some education on how a web page actually works. Do all of your leters
home to your Mother sit in the very middle of your peice of paper? Nope. You
start at the top and finish wherever you finish.
b. get the page to sit at the top with a vertical scroll bar if the
content is taller than the height of the window

This is the default browser behaviour.
I can do it like this:

<table><tr><td valign="middle" align="center">my content</td></tr></
table>

but I can not achieve exactly the same thing using css.

do you have any suggestions in this area?

Consider that what you want is not part of the media you are writing to?

HTML (and the CSS that style it) is about laying out stuff top to bottom,
left to right, on a canvas, the canvas your viewer allows you to draw in.
Nothing more. You are trying for the *more* and it won't happen easily.
 
J

Jukka K. Korpela

Scripsit windandwaves:

I could, but:
Bear in mind that I still need to do:

a. create a solution for people with small screens (800 x 600)
b. deal with large font / small font sizes

It is obvious that you should redesign the page. After those comments, I
don't need to look at it. You have clearly designed for some particular
"screen" (= canvas) size and font sizes. That's going upside down, and it is
much easier to redesign a page from scratch than to transmogrify a
fixed-screen fixed-font size into something reasonably flexible.
 
B

Bernhard Sturm

windandwaves said:
Hi Folk

Can you please give me some feedback on http://www.sunnysideup.co.nz/clients/corstorphine/

just a couple of things that came to mi mind whilst visiting the above URL:

- Navigational design
*********************
- How do I navigate? The small images do not 'talk' to me... I have to
rely on a mouse over to see that each of the small images refer to a
main item in your navigation. This is one way to chase away customers:
don't tell them what they can find, obscure everything and leave them
alone to discover the treasures of your site. I don't know many
customers who will react in a friendly way to such a proposition :)

- Who on earth told you that German is only spoken in Germany? I am
Swiss, and I can't see my flag, so I have to guess that I am not your
targeting audiance?

- Why should I identify grey colored text on a grey background as a
clickable link? Not very clever for people who might have some eyessight
troubles (and I assume those people are also inculded in your targeting
audiance?)

- What do you mean by placing an arrow in the footer besides your
flag-icons? Are you telling me, that there are more language options
available? I still couldn't find the Swiss-flag, but realised, that you
are trying to introduce a linear navigation with this arrow. This will
not work, as you are not telling your audiance what they might expect.

- No consistence in navigation design: If I click on one of the images
at least two new menus are being introduced: one above the small images,
and one in the footer bar. I can't see which is what, and couldn't
identify any visual and hence semantic hierarchy between those
naviations. Ahhh, and I notice a third menu-structure, when you dive
deeper into the menu-hierarchy... this is very bad. I suggest you
re-think your navigational-design.

- No immediate contact information. For a hotel I would expect this to
be the most important thing. As a future guest I want to know: where and
who can I contact you, as I want to book NOW. As your client I would
have insisted on this.

- What do you mean by introducing a menu item labelled 'Back to
Functions'? Keep your target audiance in mind: they are not geeks, nor
are they webdesigners. They want to be taken smoothly by the hands.
Explain them in a nice manner, that, if they click this link, they will
be taken to the entry page... whatever.. but something meaningful.

- Design
*********************
I like your calm and neutral desing. The color-scheme is well used (if
one leaves the link-colors aside). I think it is quite courageous to
design the site against all 'common' design rules (logo centered, menu
at the bottom (where you would expect it the least), more information o
the top, two columns divided by a big image in the center), and IMHO you
could almost convince me about it :)

- Typography
*********************
Drop any italic. This is not readable, at least not on screen.

- HTML
*********************
XHTML Strict? I don't think this is a good idea (at least if I read the
posts from the pros here in the group). Although your site validates.

your print.css seems to be HTML?

http://www.sunnysideup.co.nz/clients/corstorphine/s/print.css

I haven't looked at it thouroughly, but I can see some akward things
there... Why not using the @media selector?
And, yes: your site will not print. At least on my printer it will print
the entire layout, which will look terrible.

Just my two cents
Bernhard
 
B

Bergamot

windandwaves said:
I am writing a new css especially for smaller screen sizes...

Screen size doesn't matter, viewport size does. Regardless, you
shouldn't have to write anything especially for certain sizes of
anything else. If you design with flexibility in mind from the
beginning, you won't have these problems.

You have to change the way you think about the whole thing, not write
hacky kludges to work around the flaws of an inflexible design.

BTW, I use a smallish window *and* large text. It looks very messy.
 
N

nice.guy.nige

While the city slept, windandwaves ([email protected]) feverishly typed...
Hi Folk

Can you please give me some feedback on
http://www.sunnysideup.co.nz/clients/corstorphine/

Aside from all the other points brought up in the thread, your clock is
wrong. On the contacts page you have a clock that claims to show the current
time in Dunedin, New Zealand. It actually appears to be displaying GMT (1
hour behind me (I am in the UK, but we are in British Summer Time - GMT+1))
which is 12 hours behind what the time should be in NZ.

Cheers,
Nige
 
J

John Hosking

nice.guy.nige said:
While the city slept, windandwaves ([email protected]) feverishly typed...


Aside from all the other points brought up in the thread, your clock is
wrong. On the contacts page you have a clock that claims to show the current
time in Dunedin, New Zealand. It actually appears to be displaying GMT (1
hour behind me (I am in the UK, but we are in British Summer Time - GMT+1))
which is 12 hours behind what the time should be in NZ.

This is actually kind of amusing, if one follows the trail you've
pointed out.

The only possible reason for putting the "current time" on a Web site
for a hotel *on the Contacts page* is because it might be useful to
those attempting to contact the hotel in NZ. And when would knowing the
time be most useful? Why, when *telephoning*, of course.

So prospective guests and visitors (of which there are doubtless a
multitude in this very NG) should feel free to telephone at a reasonable
time. Say, around 3 p.m. (15:00), just before tea. As indicated by the
site's clock, of course. :)
 
D

dorayme

windandwaves said:
I like what you write... sounds poetic. So you still think it is too
short. Here is my thinking.

Those four logos are great selling points. We can not reduce the
logos in size much (otherwise they become ugly and illegible) - so
what shall we do? We dont want to clutter the homepage, so this
seemed like a nice solution. A bit of movement is not too bad - right?

You could... you could... have it repeat only once and stop. You
could have the 4 (if there were there 4, I am working from
memory) go only once with no repeats and final resting place
could be all 4 logos together, a 1/4 the size each in the same
space, as a reminder of what the bigger show showed. Or a
combination of the two suggestions.
 
W

windandwaves

By "page" I assume you mean browser canvas area.

Why would you want to?

Because it looks good - just like Bill Clinton became president of the
US because he talks "good" :)
Does your client want this? If so then your client
needs some education on how a web page actually works. Do all of your leters
home to your Mother sit in the very middle of your peice of paper? Nope. You
start at the top and finish wherever you finish.

I am deliberately breaking conventions - for fun and because it looks
good.
This is the default browser behaviour.





Consider that what you want is not part of the media you are writing to?

HTML (and the CSS that style it) is about laying out stuff top to bottom,
left to right
, on a canvas, the canvas your viewer allows you to draw in.
Nothing more. You are trying for the *more* and it won't happen easily.

No, i admit, it is bloody hard. I can tell you that the feedback from
"jo average" has been really good about the site. They love the way
it looks, so we do not want to loose that!
 
W

windandwaves

just a couple of things that came to mi mind whilst visiting the above URL:

- Navigational design
*********************
- How do I navigate? The small images do not 'talk' to me... I have to
rely on a mouse over to see that each of the small images refer to a
main item in your navigation. This is one way to chase away customers:
don't tell them what they can find, obscure everything and leave them
alone to discover the treasures of your site. I don't know many
customers who will react in a friendly way to such a proposition :)

Good point. We do provide one large photo on each page and we can
obviously not provide eight large images, but we give the customer the
opportunity to see more. I am thinking about a javascript that swaps
the image on each page every minute or so.... That maybe a nice idea.
I will think about that.
- Who on earth told you that German is only spoken in Germany? I am
Swiss, and I can't see my flag, so I have to guess that I am not your
targeting audiance?

Ok, here is my thinking:
1. keep it simple
2. flight attendants wear flags of the languages they speak
3. you could write "click here for german", etc...., but that would
look dull!
4. hotels often use flags to welcome people - no-one assumes that if
you flag aint showing you are not welcome.
5. we can't add every flag, because the languages we use cover
billions of people!

This was my reasoning. How do you suggest we fix it, while keeping
the nice look?

- Why should I identify grey colored text on a grey background as a
clickable link? Not very clever for people who might have some eyessight
troubles (and I assume those people are also inculded in your targeting
audiance?)

True, we dont really want them to click them. they are mainly for
search engine purposes :)
- What do you mean by placing an arrow in the footer besides your
flag-icons? Are you telling me, that there are more language options
available? I still couldn't find the Swiss-flag, but realised, that you
are trying to introduce a linear navigation with this arrow. This will
not work, as you are not telling your audiance what they might expect.

Hmmm, this was a really interesting point. The arrows are for NEXT
and PREVIOUS page. Not sure how we would change it. I personally
really like it as you can cycle through the whole site, or go, for
example, room to room....
- No consistence in navigation design: If I click on one of the images
at least two new menus are being introduced: one above the small images,
and one in the footer bar. I can't see which is what, and couldn't
identify any visual and hence semantic hierarchy between those
naviations.

The ones above the images are the services (accommodation,
restaurant,etc...) , the ones below are for practical matters (e.g.
contact, bookings, etc...) I wonder if it works. You theorise that
it does not, but I would like to put that to the test.
I will see if we can conduct a small field trial with this. A lot of
points made in this newsgroup is because people say:
- you dont do it that way
- that never works
however, few present empirical evidence whether or not things work.
Professionals look at these things very differently from "normal"
people. For example the site discussed here is usually a favourite
with "normal" people, although it breaks a lot of professional rules.
Ahhh, and I notice a third menu-structure, when you dive
deeper into the menu-hierarchy... this is very bad. I suggest you
re-think your navigational-design.

- No immediate contact information. For a hotel I would expect this to
be the most important thing. As a future guest I want to know: where and
who can I contact you, as I want to book NOW. As your client I would
have insisted on this.

Good point. Perhaps we should make the contact link bold or so? What
we have done is to create several links in strategic places directly
to the contact page.
- What do you mean by introducing a menu item labelled 'Back to
Functions'? Keep your target audiance in mind: they are not geeks, nor
are they webdesigners. They want to be taken smoothly by the hands.
Explain them in a nice manner, that, if they click this link, they will
be taken to the entry page... whatever.. but something meaningful.

Totally agree. Will change
- Design
*********************
I like your calm and neutral desing. The color-scheme is well used (if
one leaves the link-colors aside). I think it is quite courageous to
design the site against all 'common' design rules (logo centered, menu
at the bottom (where you would expect it the least), more information o
the top, two columns divided by a big image in the center), and IMHO you
could almost convince me about it :)

- Typography
*********************
Drop any italic. This is not readable, at least not on screen.

Good point! Totally agree
- HTML
*********************
XHTML Strict? I don't think this is a good idea (at least if I read the
posts from the pros here in the group). Although your site validates.

your print.css seems to be HTML?

hmmmm, yes, the "to do " list!

http://www.sunnysideup.co.nz/clients/corstorphine/s/print.css

I haven't looked at it thouroughly, but I can see some akward things
there... Why not using the @media selector?
And, yes: your site will not print. At least on my printer it will print
the entire layout, which will look terrible.

Just my two cents
Bernhard

--www.daszeichen.ch
remove nixspam to reply

Thanks a million for all your comments. That is just fantastic. Much
appreciated. I hope I did not sound too "arrogant" - as Richard would
put it. Thanks again!

Nicolaas
 
W

windandwaves

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



Aside from all the other points brought up in the thread, your clock is
wrong. On the contacts page you have a clock that claims to show the current
time in Dunedin, New Zealand. It actually appears to be displaying GMT (1
hour behind me (I am in the UK, but we are in British Summer Time - GMT+1))
which is 12 hours behind what the time should be in NZ.

Cheers,
Nige

Thanks mate! Not sure what happened there. Much appreciated.
 
B

Bernhard Sturm

windandwaves said:
4. hotels often use flags to welcome people - no-one assumes that if
you flag aint showing you are not welcome.
5. we can't add every flag, because the languages we use cover
billions of people!

This was my reasoning. How do you suggest we fix it, while keeping
the nice look?

I would suggest placing a nice dummy-flag in the footer, and then refer
by text links to the languages, and not to the country: EN | FR | DE |
IT | ES
Native speakers usually know how their mother-tongue is being
internationally abbreviated. Referring to a country as a mean to switch
languages is not wise: in a globalised world a lot of people do no
longer speak their 'official' countries language, and in the case of
Switzerland: we have 4 official languages how would you treat this by
using flags, without forcing us poor Swiss to click on a foreign country
flag? :)

however, few present empirical evidence whether or not things work.
Professionals look at these things very differently from "normal"
people. For example the site discussed here is usually a favourite
with "normal" people, although it breaks a lot of professional rules.

There are empirical works showing, that the normal user is not able to
grasp more than 5-7 different menu items at a time. You can optimise
this a bit by introducing a visual and semantic hierarchy on your
representation of the menus e.g. by using a bigger font size or a set
your typeface in bold... But the rule stays the same: not more than 5-7
main items.
Good point. Perhaps we should make the contact link bold or so? What
we have done is to create several links in strategic places directly
to the contact page.

I would recommend this. If your client wants to make serious money with
the site you should place a contact link on each page. It would be even
better to have the complete address in the footer or so, this indicates
to potential customers 'look, we are here, we do exist, and we want you
to call or contact us!'.

Thanks a million for all your comments. That is just fantastic. Much
appreciated. I hope I did not sound too "arrogant" - as Richard would
put it. Thanks again!
not at all. I can see that you have a very professional attitude towards
your work, and that you are taking any critics serious. That will never
lead to an arrogant position :)

cheers
bernhard
 
W

windandwaves

You could... you could... have it repeat only once and stop. You
could have the 4 (if there were there 4, I am working from
memory) go only once with no repeats and final resting place
could be all 4 logos together, a 1/4 the size each in the same
space, as a reminder of what the bigger show showed. Or a
combination of the two suggestions.

great suggestion! Love your work. Thank you so much!
 
A

Andy Dingley

Can you please give me some feedback onhttp://www.sunnysideup.co.nz/clients/corstorphine/

Looks cheap, which is presumably a bad thing for this client.

It's a "private hotel", so is presumably up-market. This market is
more likely to have powerful computers, big screens and fast
connections. The site you've built looks too much as if it's targeted
at the old and restrictive. I hate glitz, I despise pointless glitz,
but this just looks tawdry. Those tiny, tiny thumbnails in
particular!

a. create a solution for people with small screens (800 x 600)

You've already done that, but at the cost of not looking good for
people with better facilities. The idea is to be _fluid_, not to be
"either" small or large.
b. deal with large font / small font sizes

You've been told any number of times how to do that. So do it. Fluid
design!


If you want to read the source code then I recommend you use firebug.

If you have to "recommend", then I lose interest in making the effort.
You want me to work for free, keep me interested and let me see the
crucial part with little effort on the dross. You want me to work past
artifical barriers, you have to start paying me.
 
A

Andy Dingley

in the case of
Switzerland: we have 4 official languages how would you treat this by
using flags, without forcing us poor Swiss to click on a foreign country
flag? :)

If you're after the "Swiss sympathy vote", then you're going to have a
long wait. You guys already have all the money and most of the
chocolate.
 
B

Bernhard Sturm

Andy said:
If you're after the "Swiss sympathy vote", then you're going to have a
long wait. You guys already have all the money and most of the
chocolate.
And what's far more worse: 'we' won the America's Cup (I just realised
that the site is located in NZ, and I better keep my mouth shut :)

bernhard
 
B

Bergamot

windandwaves said:
I am deliberately breaking conventions - for fun and because it looks
good.

Which usually means that the site will be usability-impaired for some
portion of visitors, perhaps a significant amount and/or for a
significant number. I do hope you have educated the client as to the
drawbacks of such a plan, and they have agreed to it.

IOW, just because you can, doesn't mean you should.
 
N

Neredbojias

Well bust mah britches and call me cheeky, on Tue, 17 Jul 2007 11:30:51 GMT
Andy Dingley scribed:
If you're after the "Swiss sympathy vote", then you're going to have a
long wait. You guys already have all the money and most of the
chocolate.

Yeah, but they compensate with the cheese.
 
T

Toby A Inkster

windandwaves said:
3. you could write "click here for german", etc...., but that would
look dull!

It would also be useless to someone who spoke no English. How about this?
(With square brackets representing linked text.)

[English] [Français] [Deutsch] [Nederlands] [Português]
[Español] [Italiano] [РуÑÑкий] [日本語] [中文] [우리ë§]

--
Toby A Inkster BSc (Hons) ARCS
[Geek of HTML/SQL/Perl/PHP/Python/Apache/Linux]
[OS: Linux 2.6.12-12mdksmp, up 26 days, 20:47.]

demiblog 0.2.0 Released
http://tobyinkster.co.uk/blog/2007/06/28/demiblog-0.2.0/
 

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