#1 (permalink)

I'm currently in the process of creating a new template and layout for my Bo Avid website. I would like your thoughts and ideas on how I could add to and improve the current design. All thoughts would be greatly welcomed.

Also, if anybody could help me out with a couple of problems, by giving me advice on how to solve them that would be well appreciated. I've been trying to get the design so the navs are on either side of the screen but I can't manage to do it. I would like to make it so they appear on the edge of the screen on the left and right hand of the screen in all resolutions. I have seen this done before on other websites but I'm not sure how they have done it.

The Audio Clips link, I've tried to get the tables so they all align and there is no left over space although I found this quite hard and the tables are a little uneven. If anybody could advise me on how I could sort this that would be great.

I want to improve the site as much as I can, so all comments and suggestions are greatly needed.

http://www.tester.boavid.com/audioclips.php
http://www.tester.boavid.com/biographies.php

Note: These pages aren’t active and the content linked to is only for display purposes. The domain is only being used to show the template and how it will look.

#2 (permalink)

Hi

OUt of curiosity what did you create the page in ? Frontpage by any chance ? Only ask because there is a lot of repetion of un-needed code that I wouldnt expect dreamweaver to create.

Anyway main problem for you is use of layers. I like layers personally use them on my website but don't have a site that is laid out like yours. And with layers they are pretty much fixed where you put them so its hard to get the resizing. If thats what you want then use a table instead. A main table as a frame which contains smaller tables.

For your nav bar just repeat the code in the far column of the table. Your tables were struggling because of sizing too.

Make your tables 100% width & try not to allow it to create heights in cells or tables. If it does manually delete them from the code if possible. (Which is why although dreamweaver and other wysiwyg programs are great they are no subtitute for knowing how to actually read and fix HTML code)

Also use valign (vertical align) property of cells to get your text and other tables to sit at the top of a cell rather than having to manually put in lots of false breaks or in your case Paragraphs. (basically you hit enter till it worked!) This wont help with your alignment.

look at this link. I nicked your code & messed about with it a bit to get rid of some of the unwanted code. Look at view source to see and also if you want to save it.
http://www.xtab.co.uk/test%20pages/audioclips1.htm
(this is my dev & testing server !)

the main table is set at 80% which means to a point on any window it will size to that width of the window.

Is that the sort of thing you wanted ? Also another thought for the nav panel is using an include file. I know dreamweaver can do this through menu's (i hand code ) not sure about frontapgae check tutorials for how to do it if you want to. Otherwise just copy code in.

Hope this helps at all

Tonya

#3 (permalink)

is it take da moan? or kick da caney?

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#4 (permalink)

Thanks for the advice. Yeah, I use Homesite for the basics and retouch the site up in Dreamweaver. I was thinking of using a table with no border and sorting the site out within that although I thought using layers would be better. I'd like to set the navs up so they are on the edge of the screen for all resolution monitors like this example - http://little-britain.toson.net/html/index.php (a nuke site I'm in the process of setting up).

I've used PHP inserts for all the navs, like this - 'include("bars/nav.php");'. On the homepage I have a Cute PHP board which wouldnt set up for the subdomain (thats why I didnt make a test page for that) which you should be able to view at www.boavid.com/index1.php

You're right about the aligment. I'll use the 'vertical align' method to try smarten up things a bit. I know everythings not perfectly aligned. Thanks for the advice, was very helpful. I'll have a fiddle around with the page tonight and see what I can come up with.

#5 (permalink)

wel i click on wallpapers i got

Internal Server Error
The server encountered an internal error or misconfiguration and was unable to complete your request.
Please contact the server administrator, webmaster@boavid.com and inform them of the time the error occurred, and anything you might have done that may have caused the error.

More information about this error may be available in the server error log.



--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Apache/1.3.27 Server at www.boavid.com Port 80

and it did take a while to load????

but the idea is great

Laskos

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Laskos ;)
http://www.Birthday.co.uk - Birthday eCards and gift ideas.
http://www.ComputerExtras.co.uk - Computer Accessories.

#6 (permalink)

Hi David, I do hope you realised I was doing what I would want others to do with my websites and not just trying to be critical. I would want people to tell me if there were problems that could be sorted and offer suggestions if they thought they could help.

Seriously I do think its a great idea, layout is nice & colours are fab & server side includes are the best thing for navs, footers, headers etc (although I can't code in php yet- I am an ASP girl only at the moment I think the principal is the same).

Agreee with table alignment. Love the little britain layout & colours too. And see what you mean about the php board on the index1 page.

Good luck, Tonya

#7 (permalink)

I know and you did a great review for me, and gave me a lot of points to consider. Please don't think I was being negative or critical because your comments were very constructive and helpful to me. I'm not really too good in ASP, I've hard coded with it in the basic (just doing the basics) but it's never been my strongest point.

The design of the site you did, looks really good, I'm going to use that design to adapt the site and help reduce the number of layers in place of tables. Like you said, tables help with the scructure better. I'm still trying to get the navs so they appear on the left and right margins of the screen (on 1024 resolution at the moment the right hand navs don't and there is some left over space). I think this can be done by changing some values in the centre table (where the content goes).

This is because as I explained in my first post and the bottom, the pages are set up on a subdomain of mine, and are being used to test out the new layout and show the new layout to others. The Bo Avid website can be found at www.boavid.com where all the links to the pages should work.

#8 (permalink)

Another point I forgot to add, if anybody has any suggestions for the graphic design of the site, I'd be interested to hear what you think of the current design and ideas for improvements.

I'd like to maybe add some curves to the content table in the centre like this example - Example Graphic

I've had a play about with this kind of thing before but the curve never joins in with the table. I'd like to use a table for the content with two smooth curved corners on the central table of the site to give the site a bit of character. Like this example Example Site. If anybody has any ideas on how I can do this, please let me know.

#9 (permalink)

Sorry for reposting but I've found a good example of the nav effect I'd like to use on my site. It has the navs on the edge of the screen (left and right) on all resolutions. I'm not sure how its done but I'd like to use something similar for my website. Example - Link

If anybody has any ideas on how to do this, please reply to the thread and let me know. And any other reviews of the layout are greatly needed.

#10 (permalink)

In your audio clips table the text often buts up right against the border. To prevent this put:
cellpadding='4'

or with the best number you find into your table tags.

#11 (permalink)

Be careful of text relations. One or two with similar sizes is always a smoother look.