Txpq

zero · 2007-10-27 15:24:22

I’ve struggled with this one. I thought I had one or two good ideas but they didn’t work in practice, and basically I’ve given up on it. I can’t see which direction the graphics and design should go.

But it’s a TXP community site so I’m hoping I can leave it to you to put some artistry and graphical sense into it. It needs your input desperately!

TXPQ

Edit: I’ve redesigned the front page.

Last edited by zero (2008-01-14 00:28:40)

colak · 2007-10-27 18:48:26

Like it… Bookmarked it for a better look tomorrow when I’m fresh…

els · 2007-11-01 16:44:57

I like it, Peter! An interview a day, whoa! Bookmarked :)

zero · 2007-11-01 19:30:12

Glad you like the site! But there’ll have to be more authors than just me to do an interview a day, Els! One a week is good going for me!

colak and Els, you surely don’t like the design/graphics very much do you? I can’t see any pizzazz in it at all and I’m just not artistic enough to know what to do about it. I think it desperately needs a touch of magic from an aspiring young artist or something…

els · 2007-11-01 20:27:11

Peter, I’m not a designer so don’t expect any useful input from me on that area. I think the design is ok, but not the images, the quality is not very good and I think the border is much too wide. But I’m not sure if a site like this needs so many images. Maybe some more quotes in the left column, like you did on the Sam Brown page? I like that.
What I also like is the way you show the previous article in the left column on the front page.

I think it desperately needs a touch of magic from an aspiring young artist or something…

I’m neither aspiring, nor young, nor am I an artist :( But I’m sure there are lots of them here :)

And that leads me to another thought… The way you are emphasizing the youth and coolness of the target audience deterred me a bit at first sight. (Cool is not a word I like at all!) But after reading those two interviews I realized that even though I’m not so young and cool I still like it :) So maybe you should make it look a bit less like you’re excluding a certain part (however small) of the txp community…

zero · 2007-11-02 18:50:43

Thanks for the tip re the border. Is it better now? I’ll bear in mind what you say about images.

Re youth and coolness you got me thinking and I don’t want to exclude anybody. I hope older users are only as deterred as you, Els, because I would like young people joining in and part of the reason is to do with cool . As this is a design discussion forum, I don’t want to hijack it, so I’ve started a debate about how cool is TXP where I hope young and old alike might voice their opinions.

I’ve already got interviews lined up with slightly older TXPeople but I do think that the majority of users are young so I hope they will join in as soon as possible before ‘mature’ folk like me turn TXPQ into a senior citizen’s newsletter:)

els · 2007-11-03 15:07:06

zero wrote:

Thanks for the tip re the border. Is it better now?

I like the border better this way. That doesn’t necessarily mean it is better :)

(I replied on TXPQ re the other thing.)

Gocom · 2007-11-03 15:49:45

I like the content and idea of the site lot, like child enjoys eating candy :)

But I don’t actually like the design. Too much colors, paddingless and little hazy. With better design the site would be awasome, like candy with a awasome looking packing and a lovely candy-papers.

Cheers!

zero · 2007-11-03 16:27:59

Glad you like the content and idea, Jukka! I agree about the design but am feeling lost. Are you referring to the front page re padding? What would you do with the colours? And I don’t understand the hazy bit either – it seems clear to my eyes, but I do wear very strong lenses in my glasses!

If you can help turn it into an awesome design, we would all appreciate it!

Gocom · 2007-11-03 17:10:25

Well I looked the XHTML and CSS of the site, that is quite – ymph, messy.

Why sites main headline is: “My love of socks is an esthetic/comfort thing, caused by the fact that my feet are often quite cold”? :D
Nav is written uppercase, which should be done with CSS text-transform: uppercase; – not with real uppercase
What we do with 6 alternative stylesheets? They all load u know, so they all slow down the site.
The search-form’s submit button has label. Kinda odd.
Sometimes I feel like there is too much of block-elements. Like labels wrapped with ps.

Are you referring to the front page re padding?

Sidebar, and actually all the text. I don’t like when it have no space to the edges.

What would you do with the colours?

Changing them something that fit together. Like this, example

Cheers!

zero · 2007-11-04 18:47:41

Thanks for your reply, Jukka. It has helped a lot and I think the site’s better now (but I’m sure not finished yet!)

Gocom wrote:

Well I looked the XHTML and CSS of the site, that is quite – ymph, messy.

It’s just as messy but I’ll clean it up when finished

Why sites main headline is: “My love of socks is an esthetic/comfort thing, caused by the fact that my feet are often quite cold”? :D

This alters depending on the latest date of article publication. If you’re meaning semantically, I’ve altered it to a p and altered the question below the logo to a h1

Nav is written uppercase, which should be done with CSS text-transform: uppercase; – not with real uppercase

But if I do that the lowercase style indicators become uppercase so no indication of small or big

What we do with 6 alternative stylesheets? They all load u know, so they all slow down the site.

As I understand it, they load and go into the cache, so just one download. I prefer to give users style options for accessibility reasons as well as for fun. Anybody else find the site slow? It seems fast to me.

The search-form’s submit button has label. Kinda odd.

Accessibility

Sometimes I feel like there is too much of block-elements. Like labels wrapped with ps.

I’ll clean that up sometime too ;-)

I don’t like when it have no space to the edges.

Yes, I agree. I thought I’d try it for a change, but always felt a bit uncomfortable with it.

Changing them something that fit together. Like this, example

That’s a nice palette but before I dump the Textpattern colour theme what are your thoughts now I’ve made some changes? (The images are now different size and distorted so I’ll change those when finished)

maniqui · 2007-11-04 19:03:11

Just a suggestion about the design: maybe TXPQ can use a template from TxP templates or the Textgarden.

els · 2007-11-04 19:12:30

I think this is an improvement. It looks lighter now. May I suggest one more thing? The a:hover with the dark red background and black font colour (in permlinks and the ones just above recent articles and recent comments) is quite heavy. Maybe change the font colour to white?

jm · 2007-11-04 20:20:26

I definitely like the content of the site. However, I do have some comments and suggestions on the design:

Start from scratch in terms of HTML and CSS. Build out each page component with as little HTML and CSS as possible.
Minimize the number of classes and ids – make greater use descendant selectors. Additionally, style the html and body elements to reduce the number of divs.
Think about the semantics of every element on your page. Most of your elements and attribute values are not semantic (ie. class=ee, class=topright, class=headline). Additionally, while class and id usage is up to the author, classes are for recurring elements – topright doesnt’ appear twice on the same page.
Once you have your base template completed, create additional style sheets. Could you also label the alternate style sheets with something more descriptive than a symbol?
I agree with Jukka – the nav should be written in u&lc and use CSS for uppercase. When CSS is disabled, it’s not a pretty sight. The menu should also be a list. To get around the style sheet case issue, insert a nested ul and position it on the same line with the rest. Then: ul#menu { text-transform: uppercase } #menu ul { text-transform: none }
Move the style declarations to an external CSS file.
IE for Mac is dead, so you don’t need to use the backslash hack, especially since the Textpattern audience is web savvy.
Only link to one XML feed. Users don’t notice a difference, so linking to two is a waste of HTML. Atom is more semantic IMO.
The footer has potential, but in its current state, it is cluttered. The columns are suffocating at the moment – narrow the column widths.

zero · 2007-11-04 21:13:08

Thanks everyone for the suggestions! Looks like I’ve got my work cut out! I used a template from Textgarden, my own! I’ve been chopping and changing it though so it’s a lot more messy than it was when I started. None of the other templates gave me what I was looking for re different kinds of magazine type layouts. Some style has to be in head or body to override the basic style, JM, but I’m going to act on your suggestions and do the job right. Cheers!

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#1 2007-10-27 15:24:22

Txpq

#2 2007-10-27 18:48:26

Re: Txpq

#3 2007-11-01 16:44:57

Re: Txpq

#4 2007-11-01 19:30:12

Re: Txpq

#5 2007-11-01 20:27:11

Re: Txpq

#6 2007-11-02 18:50:43

Re: Txpq

#7 2007-11-03 15:07:06

Re: Txpq

#8 2007-11-03 15:49:45

Re: Txpq

#9 2007-11-03 16:27:59

Re: Txpq

#10 2007-11-03 17:10:25

Re: Txpq

#11 2007-11-04 18:47:41

Re: Txpq

#12 2007-11-04 19:03:11

Re: Txpq

#13 2007-11-04 19:12:30

Re: Txpq

#14 2007-11-04 20:20:26

Re: Txpq

#15 2007-11-04 21:13:08

Re: Txpq

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