nodster Posted May 30, 2007 Share Posted May 30, 2007 Hi guys, Totally self taught (with the help of friendly online tutorials) but this is my first site. Please be gentle http://www.phoenixphysio.co.uk Here is the site. Many thanks Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AndyB Posted June 2, 2007 Share Posted June 2, 2007 The error trapping on your contact form is user-hostile. Tell me why what I entered is invalid. And the script craps out with an invalid email address. Visually, it's uninspiring. The gifs have halos. Resize the logos properly, don't just change the height/width in the img tag. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
nodster Posted June 2, 2007 Author Share Posted June 2, 2007 Thanks for the reply. Yes i agree the script is causing me headaches but i'm still trying to get with grips with PHP. (ie the errors all use an echo statement i'd rather go to a custom error page but whenever i try to use header('location:http://website/errorpage'); it comes back headers already sent. I find that most of the tutorials out there do it for you but don't really show you the why it is done like that, or even how you could improve it yourself. Saying that i have bought a book on PHP, MySQL and apache and it uses databases for everything, i don't intend on storing info in a DB so some of the stuff is lost on me. I don't want to use a CMS layout as the user is only going to the site for info and not to be able to contribute to it. Hence the simple page design. How would you suggest i improve the look, what is it that makes it uninspiring? The colour.....the lack of images..the layout...the nav??? Thanks for the reply anyway and without feedback i'll never be able to improve, so if you could answer my Q's i would be grateful. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
s0c0 Posted June 6, 2007 Share Posted June 6, 2007 For a first site its not bad. My first one was horrible, but then again that was 10 years ago and I was about 12 anyone remember expages? A good idea is too look at other sites in your industry and get ideas from them (thats not that same as ripping em off). This site certainly isn't going to blow any potential customers away though. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
The Little Guy Posted June 6, 2007 Share Posted June 6, 2007 You may want to re-think your colors, or replace certain color locations. 2 blues of almost the exact same color is hard to read. Don't place the bird under the text... its too distracting. There is too much use of the same blue color. Use a light blue for background, and a dark blue for foreground those look good. These sites use the colors blue nicely, in my opinion. http://publicsize.com http://msn.com http://yahoo.com/ http://zwmster.com http://meebo.com/ I also don't really like the way you used the color orange. You also have no way to get back to the home page from the contact form. You have HTML errors too, you may or may not want to fix: http://validator.w3.org/check?uri=http%3A%2F%2Fphoenixphysio.co.uk Good Luck. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
nodster Posted June 7, 2007 Author Share Posted June 7, 2007 SoCo: Thanks for the support, maybe i should have started this when i was 12 i might be a bit better. But then again when i was 12 the programming was very very basic (anyone remember the commodore 64 that was my first computer). The Little Guy, Many thanks for the pointers. Funnily enough the HTML errors are not from my code but from a stat tracking site. However i have since noticed that my host provides stats in their package so i'll remove that code and my HTML will be error free. Initially i had the nav above the bird but wasn't sure how it look hence i moved it to its current position but i know what you mean about it being a distraction. Do you think it would be better if the links were darker (to remain in the same place??). i'll add link to the home page onto the contact form. I like the meebo colouring, that is the sort of colour scheme i was trying to achieve. I'll make the changes and would appreciate it if you could chack back in a couple of days to see if you approve. Thanks again Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
webdesigner Posted June 8, 2007 Share Posted June 8, 2007 Hello nodster, My comments and suggestions.... * Logo - make it smaller - better to place it at top left of the page * Colors and text - put a little more contrast for easy reading * Menu - drop the background image because it makes the text very difficult to read... If it is really important to show that image, place it not as background of the text. - align the items well * Layout - it looks different in Internet Explorer (IE) Cheers! Bryan Regencia Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
nodster Posted June 9, 2007 Author Share Posted June 9, 2007 Ok [move]Edition 2[/move] so taking on board things that people have said here is the amended page. none of the links work so ain't no point in trying them http://www.phoenixphysio.co.uk/test.php Please give opinions on this Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AndyB Posted June 10, 2007 Share Posted June 10, 2007 The placement and 'direction' of the phoenix is sending the visitor's eyes away from the content - never a good idea. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
nodster Posted June 11, 2007 Author Share Posted June 11, 2007 Logo placement and direction changed. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
webdesigner Posted June 11, 2007 Share Posted June 11, 2007 Hi nodster, My comments... *Logo - still, it is so big... better to make it a little more smaller.. *Tagline - "...BRINGING PHYSIOTHERAPY HOME" doesn't have enough contrast, thus, it is no so clear... better to have a little more contrast... *Menu - better to have it in bullet form so that it won't confused the user... align it well... "About Us", all first letter of the words is in uppercase while "About physiotherapy" is not... better to have it uniform... *Welcome - no need to welcome the user... a short statement about the site will already serve as a welcome... no need to put some marketing phrases or zigzag statements... be Straight-forward! Cheers! Bryan Regencia Graphic/Web Designer | Usability | Accessibility | SEO | Web Standards www.bryanregencia.com Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
nodster Posted June 11, 2007 Author Share Posted June 11, 2007 Hi webdesigner Ok the logo is stil a bit big....i'll have a think about reducing it. Could you explain your comment about the tagline. I don't understand how it is still (in your opinion) lacking contrast - do you mean the font face or the color?? The menu is all caps, looking at it in IE and FF the only prob is that About Physio has gone to next line (easily changed). The About Us is actually highlighted and moved left to show to the user which page they are on. I agree about the 'Welcome to ......' Taking it away makes the page (and logo) look better. TIA Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gp177 Posted June 12, 2007 Share Posted June 12, 2007 Yes i agree the script is causing me headaches but i'm still trying to get with grips with PHP. (ie the errors all use an echo statement i'd rather go to a custom error page but whenever i try to use header('location:http://website/errorpage'); it comes back headers already sent. This occurs when you are outputting data from a script before doing the header change. Usually this is because your echo'ing data or writing html somewhere on the script before the header location change. If you have display errors on and a warning/error is caught before the header change this would create a problem as well. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
webdesigner Posted June 13, 2007 Share Posted June 13, 2007 Hello Nodster, About the tagline, the font color doesn't have enough contrast with the background, hence, it is not so visible... * Menu - "ABOUT" and "ABOUT US", these two links are confusing.... better to rephrase it... - all caps is harder to read than small caps.... "ABOUT US" vs "About Us" which one, for you, is better? I vote for the latter... - current page, better to have a "different color" than a "different position" as an active link -- to let users know which page they are in... * Logo - refer to http://www.bryanregencia.com (this is my site) and check the size of the logo and tagline... * Backgroud color - Visibilitywise, I suggest to change it to a plane color... for me, it is better than a gradient... All for now... Cheers! Bryan Regencia Graphic/Web Designer www.bryanregencia.com Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
nodster Posted June 13, 2007 Author Share Posted June 13, 2007 Hi once again Changed the font face so that there is the difference in lettering making it easier to read. Reduced the logo (slightly and also made the tag line white) hope it looks better - i certainly think it does so many thanks for the pointers. Invaluable help, full site will be up and running in a couple of days. http://www.phoenixphysio.co.uk/nf_index.php Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
The Little Guy Posted June 14, 2007 Share Posted June 14, 2007 Take this image: http://www.phoenixphysio.co.uk/images/bkgd.jpg and make the background a dark gray-blue, but lighter than your background color, also try and give it a 1px border. Kind of like my attachment. [attachment deleted by admin] Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
webdesigner Posted June 14, 2007 Share Posted June 14, 2007 wow nodster, your site looks better now... 1 last suggestion: move your menu a little bit to the top... same level with your content.... Good Luck... Bryan Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
nodster Posted June 15, 2007 Author Share Posted June 15, 2007 Managed to solve the headers being sent problem. Thank god for books (solved it using ob_start() )! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
nodster Posted June 17, 2007 Author Share Posted June 17, 2007 Ok Thanks for all the input you have given over the couple of months doing this site. Here is the finished article. http://www.phoenixphysio.co.uk Please have a play and see how it 'feels' Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
steviewdr Posted June 18, 2007 Share Posted June 18, 2007 At a resolution of 1024x768 and on this page: http://www.phoenixphysio.co.uk/pages/techs.php There are 2 scroll bars, with the inner div one hidden. This is far from ideal, as someone may not notice the inside scroll bar and miss some of the content. I prefer having 1 scroll bar and that of the html page itself. Its ok having a scrollable small div area, but not for the entire content. -steve Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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