Topic: New Site

hi there =)
once again, i redesigned my site, www.thespacebetweenus.com
any opinions? comments? improvements? (i know that not everything validates yet, i am quite busy these days). about the colors: these are pretty much oriented on what i see when i look out of the window. some blue sky, a few mountains and green hills. i know many of you will complain about the slim design i dont know why it turned out this way

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I like it very much. I probably wouldn't go with something that narrow, but for just a small personal site it's no big deal.

How am I supposed to navigate?

I don't mind the slim design. In fact, I like it. It reminds me of what I tried to accomplish with Liminality (except you've gone way slim). It has character. Not too sure about the choice of color (the green background on the right), but that's ultimately personal preference. Have you considered offering different style sheets?

What I don't like is the title font. Especially in the menu, it's a bit hard to read. At first I thought "me" said "the," and I wasn't sure what "stuff" was. It took a moment or two to figure it out (I had to rollover to figure out "me"). In my eyes, that's not good design. I shouldn't have to guess.

Then, of course, there's the age old gripe about having recursive links (a link to the home page on the home page, for example).

On the contact page you say, "If you are looking for a way to contact me, please scroll down a bit." Why not just put a link there called "contact information" (or something) that links to an anchor in the text where the actual information is? My that was a tortured sentence. But you get my point, right? Why make the user scroll when you can take them right to the info they're looking for?

Ah, I see on the board (which is really a guestbook... I was expecting a message board, and I was wondering how you were going to work that into the slim design) that you mentioned the possibility of offering different style sheets. In that case, I would like to suggest a color for the background: orange. I know it may sound wacky, but orange and blue make a very nice couple, and I just happen to really like orange (and yet I still have no orange scheme on Liminality... this will have to change soon).

I'm not sure about having the comments in italics. Italics are just not very screen friendly, and to see all that text in italics is quite discouraging.

Stuff: So far, this seems to be a links page. Maybe you should just call it links? At the least, a more informative title would be nice, as stuff could mean anything from dissertations on French rap music to tentacle porn. And we really don't want to go there, do we?



One final gripe: use of vertical space. Your title graphic takes up quite a bit of vertical space, and then below that you have a brief description of the section in very generously leaded, large italics (eek!). On the work, me, and stuff pages you have very large header graphics below that. The result is that, in my browser (which has very little vertical chrome, by the way), maximized at 1024 x 768, the content on those three pages starts "below the fold" (that is, off screen). Even without the header graphics (on the home and board pages), the content starts at least two-thirds of the way down the page. In the long run, we're going to be doing a lot of scrolling anyway, but there seems to be too much non-content at the top.

Overall, I like. Despite the ranting, I feel that there are just a few glitches that make the experience less than it could be.

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Suho: www.liminality.org | Cell 270 | Sig Rotator | the Fellowship of Sup

none of that really bothers me - especially not the blue/green

anyways - do change the icon

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reisio said:

none of that really bothers me - especially not the blue/green

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That's why you've got your opinion and I've got mine.

thanks for the input, guys - i really appreciate that!
suho, to answer a few things: yes, i am planning to create multiple stylesheets, also stylesheets with a completely different lay out. the contact thing will be improved, as well as the stuff page. right now there are just links, i know. but i will add some more things to the page as soon as i have time. about the veritcal space and the graphics: its because i just like that i know surfer with 768 have a lil bit much to scroll . however, you are right with the font though. this one wasnt probably the best choice.
however, i am in a hurry now, i will try to make a few changes as soon as possible! THANKS AGAIN for the constructive feedback. thats cool

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I don't know if you noticed my comment, mas, so I repeat: How am I supposed to navigate when the navigation "links" doesn't have any text?

No problem, mas. Looking forward to the improvements.

HZR: What exactly do you mean? Are you referring to the fac that the menu items have no associated text (like an alt and/or title attribute)? That would be a good idea, to have a text alternative...

___________________________
Suho: www.liminality.org | Cell 270 | Sig Rotator | the Fellowship of Sup

No, I'm referring to the fact that the a elements in the navigation doesn't have any content as in:

<a rel="nofollow" href="index.php"></a>

text alternative is comming too...all that stuff (please note that my old site had all this, i just hadnt any time to implement certain important things yet).
however, HZR sorry for missing your post. which browser are you using? it works fine for me in IE Moz Opera. (didnt try the old IE yet though)

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Green... and Blue... you've been smoking something that's not in a box right!!

Ok here goes... *gasp* your headings are evil, your entries don't have any permanent links, your headings are evil, your navigation seems to dissapear once you look down, your headings are evil, your "WORK" page has weird looking boxes that're giving me a headache and your headings are still evil *GASP*!!

There... I liked your last site better, more content and more vibrant, this is well... blue and green!

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HZR said:

No, I'm referring to the fact that the a elements in the navigation doesn't have any content

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Ah, right, that.

> which browser are you using?

It doesn't really matter, but as long as CSS is turned off (no, I don't normally browse with CSS turned off), navigating the site is, to put it mildly, impossible, unless you view soure and find out the right path.
The real problem is with e.g. cellphones or other "mini-browsers" where CSS might not even be supported at all. Here, view source might not even be an option, so people will have to guess (or more likely -- give up).

(Edited by HZR on 05-28-2005 13:01)

I just wanted to put in that I think the design rocks. And I don't say that often.

Dan @ Code Town

thanks a lot WarMage very nice! alrighty then, now i'm off to fix that nav so that it works in mobile phone browsers too