DaveLinger Posted July 5, 2006 Share Posted July 5, 2006 just started it out recently, a PC game/software/hardware review site, all but the forums and poll coded by me. Let me know what I can do to make it look more professional...http://www.PCritics.com Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
moberemk Posted July 5, 2006 Share Posted July 5, 2006 Well, for one thing, add some spacing. Everything is really crammed together. In addition to that, your side boxes are just floating, with no border or definition, and also probably to the border of the page itself. As it stands, the site is really disjointed and hard-to-read, and those two weird grey bars you have everywhere really don't add anything. I'll bet that your site is based on your forum skin, right (speaking of which, shouldn't there be some kind of notification outside of the code that said that the theme isn't your design)? Not to mention that your site doesn't resize AT ALL. You can see it fine at 1024*768, but nothing lower (even though there are still plenty of people who prefer the size of 800*600). Your topic images are also fairly ugly. And what's with this?[img]http://www.pcritics.com/images/Dave.jpg[/img]On the code side, you have over [url=http://validator.w3.org/check?verbose=1&uri=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pcritics.com%2F]135 validation errors[/url], half your code is deprecated elements since HTML4.0, and you've got a ton of javascript commands and you've taken a 2px image and stretched it to 936px.In summary, your site is an IPB skin clone that fails to capture the essence of the original, with some fairly inept HTML code, deprecated elements for everything, and a few reviews that aren't organized outside of alphabetically. And once you get more reviews, won't that page get a little long? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DaveLinger Posted July 6, 2006 Author Share Posted July 6, 2006 [quote author=moberemk link=topic=99538.msg392204#msg392204 date=1152134429]Well, for one thing, add some spacing. Everything is really crammed together. In addition to that, your side boxes are just floating, with no border or definition, and also probably to the border of the page itself. As it stands, the site is really disjointed and hard-to-read, and those two weird grey bars you have everywhere really don't add anything. I'll bet that your site is based on your forum skin, right (speaking of which, shouldn't there be some kind of notification outside of the code that said that the theme isn't your design)? Not to mention that your site doesn't resize AT ALL. You can see it fine at 1024*768, but nothing lower (even though there are still plenty of people who prefer the size of 800*600). Your topic images are also fairly ugly. And what's with this?[img]http://www.pcritics.com/images/Dave.jpg[/img]On the code side, you have over [url=http://validator.w3.org/check?verbose=1&uri=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.pcritics.com%2F]135 validation errors[/url], half your code is deprecated elements since HTML4.0, and you've got a ton of javascript commands and you've taken a 2px image and stretched it to 936px.In summary, your site is an IPB skin clone that fails to capture the essence of the original, with some fairly inept HTML code, deprecated elements for everything, and a few reviews that aren't organized outside of alphabetically. And once you get more reviews, won't that page get a little long?[/quote]I really could not care less about validation errors. At all. Google.com is full of errors. Big deal. The 2px image stretched is what fills in next to the banner... how else would I do that? It just takes up whatever is left based on the browser size.How do I "fail to capture the essense of the original"? The IPB skin has the "weird grey bars" too... and the site does resize AT ALL, just 1024x768 and up. 800x600 users should already be used to scrolling around.I agree about the dis-adjointedness and floating boxes. (and borders). Can you explain to me how I'd make my code less "depreciated"? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mr.x Posted July 6, 2006 Share Posted July 6, 2006 I like the concept of the site so I hope you do well. I have to agree about the hope page and how everything seems very crammed.My suggestions include :1) Header for news area2) Table border = 03) Put in some spacing either through cell spacing or in css with padding4) Your google ad also, I don't remember the terms but maybe pushing it to the right bar or moving it below the news (sorry don't remember if your allowed to do that though so if i'm wrong I appologize.)If you'd like help cleaning up your code and making it look better let me know, i'd be glad to help out. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
steviewdr Posted July 6, 2006 Share Posted July 6, 2006 I have to agree with moberemk.Your site looks squashed together with SEVERAL different font sizes.The first link I click ->http://www.pcritics.com/modules/calendar/calendar.phpis broken.NOW thats not Professional.Google may have errors in validation, but that doesnt mean you dont have to. Valid xhtml code means that your website will appear bettter across different browsers, as well as add a professional touch to your website.As for colours and graphics -> they only cut hobby-ish at best, definately not a Business/Professional looking Web2-ish theme/appearance.Your Newest Reviews section is small text squashed in.Your Site Poll and its text is Huge in comparison with other text.You dont have any nice professional a:hover mouser effects.Overall - rigid, dull apperance, old layout and appearance, old html code.-steve Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DaveLinger Posted July 6, 2006 Author Share Posted July 6, 2006 I think you're the only person who thinks that link is broken... it works for everyone else...As for colors and graphics, I'm not a designer or a photoshop wiz, so hobbyish is as good as it can get until I find someone to do me some real images.How would you reccommend I "un squash" the Newest Reviews section?Mr. X - as for the google ad, I'm pretty sure I can put it wherever I want on the page as long as it's visible (I dont make any money unless people click on them anyway). Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
moberemk Posted July 6, 2006 Share Posted July 6, 2006 If you want it to stretch, all you would need to do is make it a CSS background image. However, you don't use CSS, you use HTML. And if you want to have less deprecated code, you should probably get rid of the <center> and <font> tags and instead use CSS for that stuff. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DaveLinger Posted July 6, 2006 Author Share Posted July 6, 2006 couldnt I just use <td backround=""> ? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
moberemk Posted July 6, 2006 Share Posted July 6, 2006 Yes, except that is a deprecated attribute. Your HTML is filled with them, using style attributes where you probably should start switching to CSS. It will work without any changes, but it's obsolete, and generates a lot of extra markup. All those font tags you use could be replaced with a <span> tag with a class, for example. Rather then specifying on a by-tag basis what you want it to look like, use more general CSS classes. It makes life a lot easier. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cmgmyr Posted July 6, 2006 Share Posted July 6, 2006 Dave,Just a few comments. It sounds like you don't want to get too close to CSS and you don't want to use it in your designs. I was the same way a little while ago and thanks to steve i got into css layouts a little bit. But anyways to keep it short I'm working on a site right now for a client that wanted their template re-designed and updated. The bare template was full of center's, font's, align's and all of those old tags, and also with a lot of tables which made the line count to 150 something. After I got done switching it to css, no tables, and 100% validated in xhtml and css the total line count was 54. This made it a LOT faster on a few servers that I tested it on. This made the client happy...and me :-).But anyways...sorry for the ramble.As for your layout: your left nav doesn't line up with your logo on the far left. You have some space on top of your left nav under the logo, and not a space above the right nav under the logo. Your left nav has a space before the main content section and the right side is flush with it.And I can't get that calendar link to work either, all there is, is a blank page.-Chris Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DaveLinger Posted July 6, 2006 Author Share Posted July 6, 2006 I think the reason for some of the spacing issues is because the poll on the right side is in an iframe and the left nav is not. Also... it seems that only people on PHP freaks can't access the calendar... EVERYONE else who've clicked it can describe the calendar to me ??? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
steviewdr Posted July 7, 2006 Share Posted July 7, 2006 When clicking on your calender page -> it turns up blank - BUT - the code is there, its just that you are forgetting to CLOSE a html tag and this is causing the HTML not to render. But it seems you are quite a way off getting valid HTML.As for your CRAMMED Newest Reviews ->Limit the number of items to 3 or 4. Increase the Font size a little. But some ......'s after an item, instead of writing the entire sentence which takes up a load of room.Also - if you used a <ul><li></li></ul> for these items - the text would be correctly aligned and the bullets would remain on their own on the left.We're not telling you to use css for our health -> it has TONS of benefits.1. It gives mouse hover effects WITHOUT Javascript.2. It renders HTML and Background Graphics Quicker than table background=""3. All your CSS code is kept in an EXTERNAL Style Sheet. This means that clients when going through your site have the CSS and Styling Code CACHED on their computer -> so all they have to download is JUST the few <div></div> and html tags. ;D4. If you want to change the colour of then awful standard blue <a href's etc. you can change it in 1 file and the whole site updates :D5. You can tell a background image to repeat in the X or Y direction, or both to form a nice gradient full browser width background.and it goes onand on and on....There are excellent css tutorials on macromedia.comhttp://www.adobe.com/devnet/dreamweaver/articles/css_dreamweaver_07.htmlThere were video tutorials there on using css -> I cant track them down at the moment.Rgds,Steve Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cmgmyr Posted July 7, 2006 Share Posted July 7, 2006 I was trying to work on this with dave yesterday. On the calendar page where the calendar is outputted the the first font tag in the block is in a table cell and the closing font tag is out of the cell. I don't know if this would effect it that much, but I also couldn't spend too much time looking thought the code either.Dave, how did you make out with the information I sent to you?-Chris Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
DaveLinger Posted July 8, 2006 Author Share Posted July 8, 2006 I got it, I'll fix it soon, I've just been extremely busy lately :-[Thanks for the tips stevie, it makes more sense now. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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