New template (need crits!)

[Spearin]

I just created a new template for my site: http://andrew.spearin.ca

Any crits? Mostly looking for ways of improving :)

EDIT: Sorry, is this in the right section?

[Connie]

yes it is the right section

did you validate your template, HTML and CSS?

I will have a look at it after work this evening, but I am tired of running into too much validating errors ;=)

[Joe[y]]

i don't like how the hover effect on the photo also shifts down the menu below - shifting bits of website make me crazy. nice otherwise.

[blinking8s]

yeah, in firefox the image has a red underline on rollover...it gets old fast

[tinyblob]

First impression is that i like the template. I like the grey banner at the top, especially your logo and the buttons. Nice rollovers there. I like the arrangement of the description/exif/comment box. Very nice.

Things i don't like:

* At the top you have "8/12/05 ~ high five (#73)", i can work out what this means, but at a chance it looks nasty. The most important part is the image name, put that first, put the date and image number afterwards, in a smaller font.

* In Safari the image has a red underline while it's loading, but once it's loaded it doesn't (it's because it shares the same "a" class as your text hyperlinks. just make an exception in your css file).

* The "links" button doesn't have a rollover. I'm guessing you just don't have a links page yet. Check out my commenters urls addon for a quick way to get a nice one set up.

* There's too big a gap between the image, and the dashed box with links. Half that gap at least.

* The links in that box are spilling onto two lines, sort that out it looks really bad.

* The text for "description and comments" looks similar to the hyperlinks, so you assume it's clickable. It's not, the plus is. I can see what you're going for, but as a user it's annoying. Change the text to a link as well, that'll also mean that the text ends up the same colour as the other links.

Those are just minor things, if you changed them i'd like the template a lot. As it stands, i do like it, but it seems like it needs a bit more work.

Great going though! Keep it up!

[Spearin]

hmmm Yeah I'm trying to sort out the underline on the image, which isn't intentional.

I will take all other crits into consideration and try to get them sorted out, thanks!

[Spearin]

Alright, I changed the following:


Rearranged top title, image #, and date
Fixed image underlining problem
Fixed 'link spilling'
Reduced space between image and content above/below
Changed open/close method of description & comments from +/- to text

I'm not sure what you mean though tinyblob, when you talk about the links button not having a rollover, because it seems to work for me in both IE and Firefox.

And no Connie, I didn't validate either :p

[familyman]

I think this template has lots of potential. I really like what you've done with the comments and description area. The top navigation doesn't seem to be working though. I am assuming you just haven't created the about page yet. Also, what happened to the archive or browse page? Good work so far!

[tinyblob]

definitely no rollover for links in safari!
will check it in Firefox in a while

[Spearin]

The 'links' button tinyblob or all hyperlinks in general?

And yeah, forgot to mention that I haven't created any of the other pages yet, so those buttons don't do anything at the moment :)

hmmm I forgot about a browse/archive section. I'll see what I can do about that.

[tinyblob]

how strange.. the links button does have a rollover in Firefox. but not in safari..
and i can't see any reason for it in the source!

[kayjay]

already downloadable ?

[Spearin]

already downloadable ?
Nope, but if people would like to use it... then I may make it available.

[Connie]

I just don't get the meaning of the red tilde at the top before the number of images...

has this character a special meaning? I know it either in the context of Unix or as the sign for "around... not so exact..."

what do you want to show by that?

[unseen]

connie, i think it's just meant as a decorative dash, instead of "high five - (#73) 8/12/05".

overall i think it's a really nice template. the only thing i don't really like is the title in the nav bar... maybe if it was just the title without the date and photo number it would be okay. or the title and date in the same color, but the date in a smaller font size. i don't think the photo number is really neccessary though. but those are just personal preferrences... i REALLY like the drop-down description and the link that changes from 'open' to 'close'. clever :]

[Spearin]

I made a few minor adjustments:

Tweaked title bar to have only image title
Moved date posted and image number to description area
Tweaked exif info style

And that ~ in the title before wasn't representative of anything... just aesthetic :)

[blimmer]

I like it, the color coordination is spot on: black red white dark grey
the mouseover wasnt that obvious though since it changes from dark grey to black

other than the simple template, i've not seen another template that looks as good on opera. gj!

[unseen]

very nice! i do like it better without the date up there... it looks cleaner. not a lot of extra colors or showiness to distract from the photo. great job!

[unmake]

If you feel like being really picky, you might make the site-title 'button' slightly wider, so that it's the same width as home|about|links. This would cause the image title to be accurately centered.

Not like it being slightly off-center is very noticeable or anything (it's not).

[Spearin]

Centered the title :)

Next I suppose I should finish up the about and links pages eh.

[jeremycherfas]

Coming very late to this discussion, I think this is an excellent template. Clean, usable, functional. The one problem I have, which is not your fault at all, is with having to scroll to see portrait oriented pictures. I've wrestled with this myself, whether to resize them so they fit on screen, and am not happy with either option. I guess until we have square monitors -- and they seem to be getting wider, if anything, it will forever be a problem.

Good work.

[familyman]

I really like it. Any plans on releasing it for download?

[cbtoday]

simple and nice. good job!