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Geek Culture / Is my website any good?

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Omega gamer 89
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Posted: 9th May 2008 20:55 Edited at: 20th May 2008 20:43
Okay, I posted a topic last year about my website. It was, I'll admit, HORRIBLE. Honestly, when I think of how bad it was, I want to vomit with rage.
Since then, I have learned a lot about webdesign. I'm still not that great with CSS, so I had to use some tables to achieve the look I wanted.
The site is MUCH better now, although its still nothing too special.
Anyways, I'd appreciate any comments and/or constructive critisism. Feel free to give me advice on how I could've done this better.

www.threeswordsproductions.com

EDIT: I've long since fixed the screen resize issue. I'm just now remembering to fix this post.

...but I am the ferret king!!!! BWAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!! tremble before my ferret minions!

NeX the Fairly Fast Ferret
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Posted: 9th May 2008 21:19
On my display:
Banner is not centred, so one of the buttons hangs off nothing.
The red does not contrast very well against the stone background.
The stone background looks very flat.
There is a big gap between buttons and text.

I tried laying out a page with CSS once. It redefined hell on Earth; no browser did what I expected, and Internet Exploder put things wherever it damn well pleased.


I fail at life. No, really.
Omega gamer 89
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Posted: 9th May 2008 21:22 Edited at: 9th May 2008 21:23
What is your browser, browser version, and screen resolution? I'll have to check this problem out and see if I can fix it.

I forgot to mention in my first post that i've only tested this in IE. I've yet to get to cross borwser-compatability.

...but I am the ferret king!!!! BWAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!! tremble before my ferret minions!

NeX the Fairly Fast Ferret
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Posted: 9th May 2008 21:36 Edited at: 9th May 2008 21:37
Mozilla Firefox 2.0.0.14
1280x1024

I gave up trying to use CSS. It's supposed to be better than tables, but I really can't see how. There's far less control over things, cross-browser compatibility is nothing short of rubbish, and it doesn't seem to be that advantageous. Tables draw slower? So what? My table-based parody newspaper resizes smoothly on a 500mHz school computer running IE5. (Coded it by hand in Notepad during lunchtimes) I would post an image, but it is packed with obscenities. ^^


I fail at life. No, really.
Omega gamer 89
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Posted: 9th May 2008 21:43
Yeah, I just tried it in Firefox. It displays all wrong. Some of the images disappear altogether! *sigh*... oh, well, back to Dreamweaver!
Try it in another browser if you can, and tell me what you think.
How is it in general?
How do you like the theme?
Is the navigation clear enough?
How do you like the content?
Did you find it amusing? Informative? Entertaining?
What would YOU have done differently?

...but I am the ferret king!!!! BWAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!! tremble before my ferret minions!

dagger24
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Posted: 9th May 2008 23:04
You made that in Dreamweaver? Are you kidding me?
Insert Name Here
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Posted: 10th May 2008 00:06
I get a page which is just a wall of grey bricks. 0 else.

Lee Bamber - Blame Beer
hessiess
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Posted: 10th May 2008 14:51 Edited at: 10th May 2008 15:04
^ same here



my screen is 1440-900, none of the above if statements would be true

CSS works perfectly fine, the problem is old browsers that are not standards compliment. IE6 is the lest standards compliant browser that's in general use. the main advantage of CSS is having one style sheet for the entire website, this makes it very easy to change the overall look of website.

Zappo
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Posted: 10th May 2008 17:37
My screen res is 1680 x 1050 so no chance of seeing anything here.
I am really against doing different versions of your pages for different resolutions - its making so much extra work for yourself when you need to update anything. Plus, not everyone has their browser maximized or has the same toolbars installed or visible so the screen size and the available browser window size will be very different.


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Mr Makealotofsmoke
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Posted: 10th May 2008 17:45
yer i got 1650x1050 and i see nothing.

Maybe just make it a fluid width. Make it % instead of pixels wide


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Omega gamer 89
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Posted: 10th May 2008 22:48
Yeah, I'm working on a better way of adjusting it to the right screen size, but until then, I'm just gonna have to keep making seperate pages for different screens. I also have to make it firefox compatible.

...but I am the ferret king!!!! BWAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!! tremble before my ferret minions!

bitJericho
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Posted: 11th May 2008 01:01 Edited at: 11th May 2008 01:02
Quote: "Yeah, I'm working on a better way of adjusting it to the right screen size, but until then, I'm just gonna have to keep making seperate pages for different screens. I also have to make it firefox compatible."


Why would you "have" to do such a thing? :/ You have nothing on that website that could possibly require a different version for different screen sizes.

Also, your logo looks like a reference to marijuana


Hurray for teh logd!
NeX the Fairly Fast Ferret
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Posted: 11th May 2008 01:07
I thought that too.


I fail at life. No, really.
PresFox
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Posted: 11th May 2008 02:24
just a brick wall here

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ionstream
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Posted: 11th May 2008 02:45
http://www.threeswordsproductions.com/HTML/1280x1024/home.html

You can go there to bypass the screen size checking. The images are way too big, in terms of file size.

Phaelax
DBPro Master
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Posted: 11th May 2008 18:27
Your site needs a lot of work. First of all, I run at 1920x1200, so I just used http://www.threeswordsproductions.com/HTML/1024x768/home.html. Your PNG files don't work in IE6(no alpha, but I have a fix for that). And you REALLY shouldn't be needing to customize the page for each resolution. Your layout could be done with a bit of CSS for all resolutions, or perhaps just used a fixed width(preferred structure for today).


Tom J
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Posted: 12th May 2008 00:31
Everything is out of alignment for me The navigation bar is too far to the right and the text is a long way down the page. (Firefox v2.0.0.14)
flickenmaste
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Posted: 12th May 2008 06:14
works for me

What you know wont hurt you- except me
SunnyKatt
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Posted: 12th May 2008 13:10
On firefox, as they said before, banner is off center.

The Kurgan
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Posted: 12th May 2008 16:59
Running 1280x800 (widescreen laptop) and Opera 9.27, actually works well. Had to use the workaround above though.

Everything seemed centered and stuff, though I agree that the images need smaller filesizes.

"It's better to burn out, than to fade away!" -- The Kurgan
Omega gamer 89
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Posted: 13th May 2008 17:52
@Jerico2day:
1) I don't really HAVE to make it different for different screen sizes. But I would prefer that it adjusted to the users screen resolution because if it doesn't, the content may not lay ou the way i want it to. For example; The shields on the left and right sides of the header are supposed to be one the far left and far right, respectively, regardless of the screen size. If the screen doesn't resize, then the left one may be all the way to the left (as it should be.) but the one on the right may just float directly next to the header, instead of being all the way to the right. Also, the header is supposed to be in the center of the screen, but if the screen doesn't resize, it'll be in the wrong, place most of the time.
2) Wow. You're right, it does look like marijuana. Oops. I'll have to fix that. Thank you for pointing that out.

...but I am the ferret king!!!! BWAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!! tremble before my ferret minions!

Omega gamer 89
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Posted: 13th May 2008 18:08
@ everyone:
I'm definately gonna ditch the different HTML docs for different resolutions. Instead, I'm gonna put everything in tables. The tabel width will be a set percentage of the current screen width, and each image width will be set to 100% of the current tabel cell. That way, the cells resize as the window resizes, and the images resize as the table cells resize.

I'm thinking something like this:



Problem is, the header won't resize. the two shield do, but the header is always way too long, no matter what recentage I set it to. Any ideas why it does that?

...but I am the ferret king!!!! BWAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!! tremble before my ferret minions!

5Louiz
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Posted: 13th May 2008 18:47
That is one problem about using tables. You have to pollute the layout with invisible structures to get some results, and that makes the page slower and less flexible.

Right now, using tables, if you want to make a smaller header, you will have to create an other table inside the cell at the middle and resize it, or create one empty cell at the right and one at the left of the header's cell to be used as spacers and resizes. Both methods would do it, but none grants flexibility and performance.

Learn basic CSS. It will take one day for you to learn what you need.

NeX the Fairly Fast Ferret
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Posted: 13th May 2008 18:56 Edited at: 13th May 2008 18:56
I don't think there's anything wrong with tables. I like CSS and use it for some formatting, but I generally use tables for layout. There's no problem if this entire page redraws as fast as any other window on a dreadfully slow school computer.

The content is temporary test material and will all be replaced. I think the images look bad resized, too.




I fail at life. No, really.

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Omega gamer 89
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Posted: 14th May 2008 17:38
@5Louiz:
I tried that, but it only worked in firefox. I've got it all good and working there, but IE is still being wierd. In IE the header still wont resize, even tough the two shield will. I don't understand why one thing won't resize, and yet two others will, when they're all made the exact same way.
So was that only supposed to work in Firefox? I appreciate your help.

...but I am the ferret king!!!! BWAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!! tremble before my ferret minions!

dab
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Posted: 15th May 2008 08:48 Edited at: 15th May 2008 08:49
Since you know that the website is broken, I'll offer some advice xD

Well your links ( Home, games etc) load slowly, because you load the whole thing for each link. Since the backgrounds are the same, use 1 background, and position the text on top of it. This way, you're saving some extra loading time.

As everyone else was saying, I'd learn some CSS.

Tables are bad, based on rendering since browsers render tables slowly. Also, sizing can get a bit screwy, and it's just not something you should do.

Learning CSS makes life easier in the sense of being able to load a different css file, and being able to create a completely different looking website, if you can get it good enough

I like the direction you're heading in with the website, just needs a lot of work. I'm sure you can do it though.

Edit: Snap. I hope I didn't bump this. I wasn't paying attention :S
Omega gamer 89
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Posted: 15th May 2008 17:23 Edited at: 15th May 2008 18:05
@dabip:
Thanks for the advice. But I don't think that would work. See, the links are rollover images. If I was to use a single background for all six links, then they would either not be able to roll over at all, or all rollover at once, regardless of which one your mouse was over. Also, the text would take a long time to load even with just one background, because the text is a image by itself. (Or it would be if the links all shared one background. So I COULD do what your suggesting and it WOULD save some loading time, but then the site would lose a good bit of its style. The links wouldn't rollover correctly, and I would have to make the text of the links into just text instead of images, which would make it look a lot more dull.
Thanks for the advice, I'll look more into it, but to be honest, I'm probably going to keep the links the way they are.

EDIT: Okay, the site has been updated! If you guys could try it out and see if everything qworks okay, I would really appreciate it! It SHOULD work right on most, if not all, screen resolutions now.

...but I am the ferret king!!!! BWAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!! tremble before my ferret minions!

Insert Name Here
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Posted: 15th May 2008 18:51
You need to make the logo bigger

Lee Bamber - Blame Beer
Omega gamer 89
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Posted: 15th May 2008 19:35
lol, did you read my post in the other website thread?
http://forum.thegamecreators.com/?m=forum_view&t=129560&b=2

If not please read my last post in that thread. It explains a lot.

...but I am the ferret king!!!! BWAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!! tremble before my ferret minions!

Insert Name Here
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Posted: 15th May 2008 21:36
Yes, I read that post

Lee Bamber - Blame Beer
Omega gamer 89
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Posted: 15th May 2008 21:44 Edited at: 15th May 2008 21:47
I thought so.
Heres that video I mentioned in that post. I find it hilarious, but thats because Im in the design business. Its still funny even if you're not.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yJexyQT0l1c

OOH! Heres another great one!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U6Ap6Ck0aKI

...but I am the ferret king!!!! BWAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!! tremble before my ferret minions!

dab
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Posted: 16th May 2008 02:11 Edited at: 16th May 2008 02:13
Quote: "@dabip:
Thanks for the advice. etc.."


Hmm. That rollover thing isn't true. It's 100% possible to do the rollover thing. yes, even with CSS

http://www.webcredible.co.uk/user-friendly-resources/css/rollover-buttons.shtml
^ That website has great code for techniques on how to do things. Wonderful site.

Edit: By the way, the site fix looks very nice. Still loads slowly, but using some of the techniques I suggested, you can speed it up.
Omega gamer 89
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Posted: 16th May 2008 17:57
Okay, cool. I'll have to try implementing that later.
See, I misunderstood you. I thought you meant have one solid background behind all the buttons, and just have plain text instead of what I already have.

...but I am the ferret king!!!! BWAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!! tremble before my ferret minions!

Omega gamer 89
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Posted: 16th May 2008 21:12
Arrgh! I just noticed there's a problem with the download for Endurance pong! Every time I try to download it, it goes to the dreaded 404 not found page! Any idea why that happens? I put a link to the zip file on the button, and it works whenever I preview it in Dreamweaver, but the actual online page doesn't work!

...but I am the ferret king!!!! BWAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!! tremble before my ferret minions!

Manic
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Posted: 16th May 2008 22:33
works for me.

Why do so many people on here hate CSS? You can do stuff with CSS that you wouldn't dream of being able to do with tables, not to mention the overhead advantage.

As for any dreamweaver bashing, it only makes bad code if you don't know what you're doing.

I don't have a sig, live with it.
tha_rami
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Posted: 17th May 2008 16:02
CSS is cool, but CSS has problems. Like, cross-compatibility, for example, and the fact that a single of those incompatibilities can screw up your site for 25 to 60 percent of your visitors. And that we need to use hacks to get it to work as it should. And the fact that tables are so much easier.

I like CSS, by the way, but I can understand pretty well why someone would disagree about it.


A mod has been erased by your signature because it was larger than 600x120
Nicholas Thompson
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Posted: 19th May 2008 15:48 Edited at: 19th May 2008 15:50
Quote: "CSS is cool, but CSS has problems. Like, cross-compatibility, for example"


Generally speaking, when done properly, you VEY rarely see incompatibility issues. Also, you can usually quite easily either work around those issues or learn to become aware of what breaks what in certain browsers.

Also your 25-60% of visitors statistic is HUGELY misleading. Getting a site to work in IE, Firefox and Safari is pretty easy and that easily covers 90% of your visitors. Generally speaking, once a site is working in "the big three" it will usually work in all the others such as Flock (which is Firefox really) and Opera, etc.

Manic - Dreamweaver does suck - it really does. However I do agree that it sucks MORE if you dont know what you're doing - but that applies for all editors I suppose. The problem I have with Dreamweaver is how it has a BAD habit of creating spaghetti code and producing really poor CSS styles.

As for the site - I personally do not like the fact it resizes for the window size. Scaling images up make them look blurry. Also not a big fan of the sheering menu images on mouse over. Also not keen on the fact that the header, menu and footer take up about 75% of the vertical space and the content only 25%.
Your site also fails validation on 70 counts...

http://validator.w3.org/check?uri=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.threeswordsproductions.com%2Findex.html

PS: I cant seem to make that into a link on this forum! I believe its related to the URL Encoding...

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Benjamin
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Nicholas Thompson
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Posted: 19th May 2008 23:28
Ohhhh... Thats stupid! Cheers Ben!

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Omega gamer 89
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Posted: 20th May 2008 20:48
@Nicholas Thompson:
Lol, all those errors are Dreamweavers doing, not mine. I'll still see if I can't fix them, but I'm not as good in code as I am in just designing it in the design view. Thanks for checking that validation thing, now I know exactly what to fix.

...but I am the ferret king!!!! BWAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!! tremble before my ferret minions!

hessiess
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Posted: 20th May 2008 22:29
Quote: "Lol, all those errors are Dreamweavers doing, not mine. I'll still see if I can't fix them, but I'm not as good in code as I am in just designing it in the design view. Thanks for checking that validation thing, now I know exactly what to fix."


HTML is not hard to lean, Its well worth your time

Omega gamer 89
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Posted: 21st May 2008 17:40
Quote: "HTML is not hard to lean, Its well worth your time"


Yeah, I know. I was just saying that at this point, my skills in HTML are sub-par, and that I'm better off using the design view UNTIL I get better at HTML.

...but I am the ferret king!!!! BWAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!! tremble before my ferret minions!

Nicholas Thompson
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Posted: 21st May 2008 20:22
Omega - as much as I can see your point... It really does make your life easier if you simply bite the bullet now and read up on HTML/CSS. The dreamweaver design view might make the job easier now but it WILL break something and it DOES make errors (which you've already experienced). You'll spend the time today, tomorrow or next week researching fixing problems which wouldn't occur if you'd spent the time doing it by hand.

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Ocho Geek
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Posted: 21st May 2008 20:54
i think a black backround might work better

Omega gamer 89
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Posted: 21st May 2008 21:43
@ Nicholas Thompson:
I'm not saying I'm not gointo learn HTML/CSS. I'm learning as we speek! I just meant that my skills in design view CURRENTLY beat my skills in code view.

...but I am the ferret king!!!! BWAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!! tremble before my ferret minions!

Nicholas Thompson
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Posted: 21st May 2008 23:20
Yup - I understand that. I think my point might have been misinterpreted... Its my opinion that it makes more sense in the long run to have never opened the design view in the first place

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Omega gamer 89
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Posted: 22nd May 2008 17:37
Oh, okay, I get what you're saying. you're probably right, but we can't change the past.

...but I am the ferret king!!!! BWAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!! tremble before my ferret minions!

Omega gamer 89
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Posted: 23rd May 2008 18:02
By the way, my forums are now fully functional! It was a pain in the *** to get these up and running, I kept having to unistall and reinstall and over and over and over... But now its working! So sign up and look around!

...but I am the ferret king!!!! BWAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!! tremble before my ferret minions!

Nicholas Thompson
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Posted: 24th May 2008 20:27
Nice forum mod - but why have a forum? There is nothing worse/more sad on the internet than a forum which wont get used... Your site must be getting, what, 10 visitors a day?

I get nearly 2,000 unique visitors to my site and I have no urge to have a forum - its simply not enough traffic thats likely to post anything of any use.

Why would anyone want to post on your forum? It is basically the same as 99% of every other forum out there and has no traffic.

Dont get me wrong - i'm not telling you NOT to do a forum. I'm:
a) Expressing my opinion... For what its worth!
b) Suggesting that you either hold back on a forum until you get decent traffic OR you make your forum something 'different'...

Just be 2 cents (again).

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Omega gamer 89
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Posted: 26th May 2008 01:56
lol, its mainly for my partners at Three Swords to communicate. I just felt like making a forum instead of just using email.

...but I am the ferret king!!!! BWAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!! tremble before my ferret minions!

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