My first website

donalg1

I have created a website from scratch using html and css tutorials online and have now managed to upload it, it is really just a test website to see what I could do, I have been looking at w3 schools mainly for about 5 or 6 weeks and playing around with it when I get the chance.

Just wondering what you think of the layout and navigation of the site. The content isn't much really it just happens to be a few photos I had on my memory stick one day, and the actually text on the site again is just something I threw in to fill the gaps just wondering what you make of it bearing in mind its my first go and was thrown together in a month or so using notepad++

www.dgdesign.me

Thanks

VMotion

Donal, there's still a lot to learn. The fonts of menu change on mouse over. Not something that is advisable to do.
Keep working on it.

donalg1

Thanks for that and thanks for taking the time to look, it will be a few years before I am any good at them anyway but I can keep messing about with them.
Thanks again

caddy2

not bad donalg, for a first attempt fair play.
iv mentioned it before on these forums,we too put a website together - nothing hectic but better than what we paid a lot of money for before, but we bought a serif web design cd in easons a few months ago for about €13 and there are some templates to choose from and you can completely make it your own. it explains about seo, headings, uploading it to server, gives pictures, logos and some flash banners. theres alsoa forum which we used a lot to get advice and their contributors were very fast and helpful. hope this mite be of interest to you

wobblyknees

donalg1 wrote: »

I have created a website from scratch using html and css tutorials online and have now managed to upload it, it is really just a test website to see what I could do, I have been looking at w3 schools mainly for about 5 or 6 weeks and playing around with it when I get the chance.

Just wondering what you think of the layout and navigation of the site. The content isn't much really it just happens to be a few photos I had on my memory stick one day, and the actually text on the site again is just something I threw in to fill the gaps just wondering what you make of it bearing in mind its my first go and was thrown together in a month or so using notepad++

www.dgdesign.me

Thanks

You are taking the right approach by putting a site together, uploading it and asking for feedback so that you can learn from your mistakes. Agree on the mouseover effects. It's been a while since I put together a site but I do remember getting caught out using IE specific styles for example!

Best piece of advice I could give you is decide what you want to do before attempting it and then figure out how to do it using photoshop/html/css/aspx etc. Most people start to design a page wiithout putting much thought into the design and end up with something that is quite limited as it is based on their current knowledge.

w3 schools is a great site by the way. I've had that as a favourite for years.

Simtech

I would highly recommend that you check out the CMS (Content Management System) "Joomla". I have found that it can be learned in about a week and a professional website can be put together in two. Various templates are available or, as an easy way to design your own template, I have found the program "Artisteer" to be invaluable.
Once the basics are learned, there is no easier way to keep your site updated. Plugins are available for site security, online shopping, etc. and are installed and running in minutes. The system is as extensible as you could want.

donalg1

Simtech wrote: »

I would highly recommend that you check out the CMS (Content Management System) "Joomla". I have found that it can be learned in about a week and a professional website can be put together in two. Various templates are available or, as an easy way to design your own template, I have found the program "Artisteer" to be invaluable.
Once the basics are learned, there is no easier way to keep your site updated. Plugins are available for site security, online shopping, etc. and are installed and running in minutes. The system is as extensible as you could want.

Cool I actually have seen a link to Joomla on my web hoster and think it can be accessed from there so will definitely check this out. Thanks for that Simtech

donalg1

wobblyknees wrote: »

You are taking the right approach by putting a site together, uploading it and asking for feedback so that you can learn from your mistakes. Agree on the mouseover effects. It's been a while since I put together a site but I do remember getting caught out using IE specific styles for example!

Best piece of advice I could give you is decide what you want to do before attempting it and then figure out how to do it using photoshop/html/css/aspx etc. Most people start to design a page wiithout putting much thought into the design and end up with something that is quite limited as it is based on their current knowledge.

w3 schools is a great site by the way. I've had that as a favourite for years.

Yeah I love w3 schools keep referring back to that all the time, its where I learned pretty much everything.

Your advice on deciding what to do before attempting it will be well heeded as I had to go back and change everything three or four times just to get it to its current stage and wish I had sat down and even sketched the layout and links on a piece of paper before bursting on with it. Definitely wont write a single html doc in the future until I have an exact layout in my head.

Have just looked at the mouseover and will remedy that as soon as I can, I actually hadnt even noticed it before!!!

donalg1

caddy2 wrote: »

not bad donalg, for a first attempt fair play.
iv mentioned it before on these forums,we too put a website together - nothing hectic but better than what we paid a lot of money for before, but we bought a serif web design cd in easons a few months ago for about €13 and there are some templates to choose from and you can completely make it your own. it explains about seo, headings, uploading it to server, gives pictures, logos and some flash banners. theres alsoa forum which we used a lot to get advice and their contributors were very fast and helpful. hope this mite be of interest to you

Thanks caddy have been looking at a few books and template pages recently too to see what can be done with these, I was a bit weary of template sites as I felt these were cheating but have since started coming around to the idea of these!!!

But will defo have a look at the cd will actually be in dublin at the weekend so will pop into easons.

tricky D

You only have started the journey, there are many many miles to go. Here's some advice for you to consider from someone who has been in this game since the very early days.

Go back to the w3schools courses and do them properly and fully as you still are making basic errors with the html.
Learn to use development tools: link checkers, validators, FireBug, spellcheckers and a few more.
Check your designs in many browsers. Your pages are broken in FireFox with no styles or images being used with very bad results.
Get someone else to read your content to you, then ask yourself if that achieves the goal of the site/page. Would you get you to design a site?
Read other site reviews here to get ideas of how it works.
Learn the basics before going down routes like Joomla, WordPress, .Net and the like. Keep using NotePad++ for the time being.
Start bookmarking and reading some design advice sites like A List Apart, Smashing Magazine.
Look at other websites/layouts and replicate them as a learning exercise. Keep asking yourself, how is that done and how does that work?

Never stop learning and have fun.

donalg1

tricky D wrote: »

You only have started the journey, there are many many miles to go. Here's some advice for you to consider from someone who has been in this game since the very early days.

Go back to the w3schools courses and do them properly and fully as you still are making basic errors with the html.
Learn to use development tools: link checkers, validators, FireBug, spellcheckers and a few more.
Check your designs in many browsers. Your pages are broken in FireFox with no styles or images being used with very bad results.
Get someone else to read your content to you, then ask yourself if that achieves the goal of the site/page. Would you get you to design a site?
Read other site reviews here to get ideas of how it works.
Learn the basics before going down routes like Joomla, WordPress, .Net and the like. Keep using NotePad++ for the time being.
Start bookmarking and reading some design advice sites like A List Apart, Smashing Magazine.
Look at other websites/layouts and replicate them as a learning exercise. Keep asking yourself, how is that done and how does that work?

Never stop learning and have fun.

Thanks Tricky, I have been going back to w3 schools and starting from scratch again so that I can start pages by memory only and not having to keep referring back to w3. Was meant to check the firefox site as I knew this was all messed up thanks for the reminder that is something I was meant to do ages ago.

Will check out the sites you recommend too and have a good read of them thanks for the great advice.