Improve My site

Spunog UIE

Hey,
I've been messin bout makin pages for a short while now, mostly takin the **** out of people i know and them out of me.
Which is all entertaing.

Anyhew,
I got two questions or things ya can help me with.

Take a look at my page the Sacred Cow. tell me what ya think and how i can make it better. PLEASE BE GENTLE .

Oh ya, and mmmmmm, can any one tell me any good college courses that would be related to webdesign stuff like that, cos i aint got a clue what i want to do in college. Thats right im not there yet.

Anyyyyyhewwwwwwwwwwwwww,
Thats all,
Gideon2000

SantaHoe

[1]. I found the immediate java prompt annoying... (anyone else hate those?)... but at least you've backed it up with a cookie, so people won't be tormented by it.
That is except for when they click on 'sheepdog'... when they're prompted again... AFAIK, you can share the original cookie with the rest of your sites pages, so you should investigate and tweak that a bit.

[2]. The main site page won't fit in my 1024x768, maximized browser window (I get a horizontal scroll bar)... try using a percent value as the image/cell/table width as opposed to a fixed value... so the page will hug nicely into the window.

[3]. I reckon the navigation area (Contents) would look better if it were aligned towards the top of its parent cell, so you can see it as soon as you arrive on the page.

[4]. The first page has some nice touches, like the random(?) quotes, but it doesn't appear to serve any other purpose... maybe give more of an idea of what the site contains?

[5]. The Enter/Leave option is a pet hate of mine though, but if you want to keep it, I'd suggest picking up a java-script that closes the browser window upon clicking leave... that'd be another nice touch I think.

[6]. If it were my site, I'd lose the horizontal rules <hr> that appear above and below the banner image... and somehow try to join the banner with the rest of the site.
But that's just me.

[7]. I found navigating the site pretty confusing at times... one minute your nav bar is on the left, next its on the top.
Ok, not that confusing... but it'd be nice to have a consistent feel while navigating.
A few times I thought I'd been send to another site... as a whole, the site feels like a number of smaller sites all strung together.... hum, no, actually on closer inspection, some pages just load other peoples pages into a separate frame.
Tut tut.

damnyanks

the java prompt is really annoying no one ever likes them, i dont really care 2 much about the leave link but you just dont put that on your site because well you want them to go there, im sorry but when i clicked enter the load time was very very slow so i just clicked close but for courses nope im in 5th year and want to do it my guidence counceller says that there is no real course based on it only plc's and training centers where they just want ur moola you dont need any course anyway get a portfolio of real sites that should do i have applyed for many jobs off recruitment sites got in easy until they asked for certain details which revealed my age, wow this is long but anyway learn asp and cfm get familiar with database design as well oh yeah im not sure what editer u used looks like dreamweaver but make sure you know html off back to front if you do get more into web design id reccomed getting homesite or studio they are much better than anything else. ok site loaded the grey streak at the side has no real purpose you should get rid of it and the screen size is far to big nothing wrong with scrolling down but people hate to go across.grrr another edit anyway here it is goto www.sitepoint.com it is a amazing site for help the forums are brilliant

[This message has been edited by damnyanks (edited 10-01-2001).]

[This message has been edited by damnyanks (edited 10-01-2001).]

[This message has been edited by damnyanks (edited 10-01-2001).]

Spunog UIE

Hey thanks for the info.
Mmmmmm ya that pop-up does have a cookie so only comes up once. I know that i got to get the sheep dog bit set up. It was just a site that i had done by itsself but just slapped them all together. But im gettin the ider ya don't like it.

OH and the mmmmm percatage setings for the table were set but dan those geocites folk be messin with it. I'll fix it when i get some time.

I just kinda made the site cos i wanted to make something. Mmmmmm i can never get good content, any ideas for that. thinking of trying making some sites for local sports groups stuff like that.

Any sites or that where i can learn bout,
asp and cfm i seen it around but don't really know anything about it.

Oh and how would you set-up an ordering system and credit card verfiing. Is there sites that can host this for you?

Oh what else. Oh ya. I use Ultra Editor to make the pages, its a text editor. Started out with frontpage. Its really crap but gets the basic shape set up for it i think.

Any more info don't be shy!

Cheers,
Gideon2000

damnyanks

a ordering system you could set up in any back end language but it would be long and hard, credit card verifyer you would probaly need some sort of merchant account if its the whole e-buiness thing your going for it will cost a lot of money just to get the proper certs so that you can take transactions over the internet, search www.hostsearch.com for what you need sites i used to learn my stuff are

www.webmonkey.com
www.sitepoint.com
www.hotscripts.com
docs.rinet.ru

Paladin

And the best way to learn most languages is buy a decent book and try making some programmes. Santa was spot on with what he suggested too.

Try and compact the site a bit more - lots of empty space to scroll through, all seems wasted and lots of people hate to have to look too hard. Make the text on top a little smaller, and make the title image take up less room - you dont need all that empty space around it.

Youve got to present the main eye-catching parts of the site in the first thing people see (unless, like you have done, decide to have an opening introduction page, in which case a small clue as to what the site is is always nice).

Also, in general, dont ever steal someone elses web page (as in loading it into a frame). If you must plagerise (generally a no no) then either give credit to the site you are sending people to, or plagerise professionally and put all the material on your own sites server and make your own page for it

Also, best things to learn for web design imho - JavaScript, VB, Java, DHTML, Perl, Cgi in that order roughly - depending on what you want to do. Being a good graphics artist is a big help too.

If you get a computers degree you will find that none of the above are terribly difficult to learn (although I dont know em all, I just plagerise them when I need to )

damnyanks

dont go near perl its old and slow, if you need a backend for *nix server go with php, java isnt needed either vb only works on ie but then again thats all anyone really uses now but if you do learn vb you can use that for asp you dont need any books i didnt get any and i know html,css,js,dhtml(css+js=dhtml)wml,xml,vb,asp,cfml,sql and im not that smart im even in foundation irish and when i do my leaving at the moment the most i could ever get is 520

Spunog UIE

Hey thanks again.

Where could i download 3d Studio Max,
and any chance its a shareware program something like that.

A friend told me about it and i wanna take a look c. I have another 3d editor called Bryce 2. Got it free on a magazine but think it might be a bit limiting.

Cheers
Gideon2000

[This message has been edited by Gideon2000 (edited 13-01-2001).]

Paladin

Prolly right about perl, but VB is dead handy. Its got waay more applications that just internet use. Best part is its easy. And yes, you can learn from websites of course, its just probably easier to just get a book (cause I know my eyes hurt after reading on my pc).

Enygma

Perl may be old but it's a brilliant language for doing CGI. Sure VB is nice and easy but when it comes to parsing text (the stuff the web is made up of) VB is a biotch. And as for Perl being slow, use mod_perl if you're that worried about speed.
Also Perl is a general programming language and comes in handy all the time for writing small little scripts. Once you know Perl, PHP is a doddle. PHP is almost a carbon copy of Perl stuck into a web page.

As for Java, granted applets are the lowest of the low, but JSP rocks! Think PHP on steroids


In the end, Java and Perl will stand to you a LOT more than VB(script) and PHP but if you're that way inclined.....

Definetely get a book too. Also go find some code on the web and play with that. Break it. Fix it. Break it. Fix it etc. etc.

damnyanks

php was intended for web use only perl wasnt but who cares about them cold fusion is the best its soooooo easy

Spunog UIE

Thanks Everyone.
Mmmmmm ill try do some updates to the site, when i get some time(holiers etc).

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Spunog UIE

Hey those script errors aint' my fault geocities is always ****in up the page with their banners and that ille box that comes up at the top right hand cornor! mmmm but they usually sort it out them selves.

Oh by the way, is there any good servers that don't have stupid banners like that or maybe a host that only has one normal banner that you can place on the page yourself something liek that cos geocities has been ****ed up lately. Well for me anyway.

Cheers.

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Enygma

I used to be on www.hypermart.net
You just have to put in a line of code in each page that outputs a banner and you're away with it.
AFAIK I only got 5MB, but you do get CGI (Perl) access so you can start writing your own scripts and installing them.
If you need more space just sign up with xoom.com I think they're giving unlimited space these days.

Oh and I finally got time to look through your site, have to agree with what everyone else said. Need more Heidi Klum tho ;P

And here's a page that's always a good place to go when you start out making webpages.
http://www.tuxedo.org/~esr/html-hell.html

A lot of it's prolly either out of date or really obvious but it's worth a look anyways.

Spunog UIE

ha ha cheers!
Like i said im just trying out **** on that page no serious content which is probally the reason it ain't so good.
Oh one more question oh learned ones!

Is there a way i can load a font type to a persons computer so they can see the font on my page and not there own if ya get me. I think this would be very handy for speeding up download times rather than always using images.?

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Enygma

I suppose you could open a pop-up window to the actual font file and have them download it, but there are a whole number of problems with this.
1) They have to accept the download
2) They have to install the font
3) It would *REALLY* **** me off if I visited a site that did that. Pop ups are bad enough but forced downloads? hehe go **** yourself buddy

Using an image is fine for logos and small navigation icons etc. Just don't overdo it. Don't have people waiting for 84 images to download on one page. Be sensible thats all.

When you're picking fonts go for sans-serif fonts too. They're easier to read on monitors whereas serif fonts are easier to read on paper. Go for fonts like Arial, Helvetica, Verdana, Tahoma but always default to sans-serif.

The font tag is on the way out too so try to use CSS for font styling.

All the best

Enygma

Shiminay

PHP 0wns m3h!!!

Perl is good too - you'll more than likely get more suppor for it from hosting places.

Anyway, I looked at the site and got loads of Java-Script errors so didn't look after the second page.

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All the best,

p

Hey,

Regarding a course to pick.

I think there's a few cert and diplioma course in design and graphics.

I'm doign multimedia in DCU, it's a very 'artistic' course but it's all computer aimed/based. Worth looking into.
http://www.dcu.ie should have an online propectus

There's various Multimedia courses springing up now.

- Kevin