@mary, links on top nav bar

alexandra · 2006-08-03 07:12:32

Mary schrieb:

Sides? We have sides over the wording of one of two areas consisting of 10 links? I must say, you all continue to surprise.

Sorry mary, i do not understand. Does ‘side’ in english mean something else than a physical side? Honestly i am sorry – my english…

However, the nav bar has been fine before and it still is on Textbook. so what is the problem? i do not understand … puzzled..

Destry · 2006-08-03 10:16:19

alexandra wrote: Sorry mary, i do not understand.

She’s referencing the descriptive word Reid used, and it’s in context to there being different points of view about how the link labels might read.

Mary wrote: We have sides over the wording of one of two areas consisting of 10 links?

Uh…you lost me there, but I think I gather what you’re really getting at.

As is usually my position, I don’t care what you guys do, I can machete my way through the jungle anyway; however, being this is a community forum to discuss things, and being that at least some of us here take such things as Web usability with some measure of seriousness, well, I guess we’re offering viewpoints to something that seemed to be fine at one point and then went backwards. You really shouldn’t be so surprised, this is a jungle after all. ;)

marios · 2006-08-03 10:46:59

The support header links, look less appealing now from a layout point of you.
(The extra descriptive text in the brackets wrecks it a little)
Don’t know how it looks in other Style variants, but in mercury it doesn’t come along nice.
My suggestion:Could be provided as a tool-tip if at all)
color value could be increased be changed as well.
The old glory is gone.

regards, marios

masa · 2006-08-03 11:10:40

Just a few observations…

I actually liked the streamlined version from a few days ago. The current top bar is the least-pleasant of all recent incarnations: if a name/label needs to be explained in brackets it was a poor choice in the first place.

In the main bar I’d much rather see something like this:

Textpattern Home · FAQ · Resources · TXP Magazine · Mailing Lists · Developer Weblog · Custom Development

… and under Resources I’d group the following:

Manual
Tips & Tutorials
Plug-ins & Mods
Styles and Templates

On the respective pages call it Textbook , Textgarden etc.

Also is there any good reason not to unify the design of most of these sections with the obvious exception of TXP Magzine? It all looks rather incoherent to me…

I mean, since someone here mentioned *branding*…

Cheers Martin

Last edited by masa (2006-08-03 11:12:02)

Destry · 2006-08-03 13:49:07

masa wrote:

Also is there any good reason not to unify the design of most of these sections with the obvious exception of TXP Magzine? It all looks rather incoherent to me…

Oh, you don’t want to open that can of worms, trust me. I think if you dig a little in the forums (unless it was a dead-letter thread) you’ll find a very long thread about this very topic with a much heated debate. People passionately threw around such things as branding definitions, creative freedom manifestos, common theme (or not)…et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. What you see is more or less what the majority preferred.

The Resources site was supposed to undergo a redo quite a while ago and that petered-out, so you can imagine that there wouldn’t be any gusto for redoing three sites at the same time. As for TextBook, that’s a recent design change with a lot of hard work from David_1cog. We shant be changing it anytime soon.

(For what it’s worth, I was one of the minority that favored a common theme way back when, but it’s too late now.)

alexandra · 2006-08-03 14:04:23

a bit off topic, sorry

Destry schrieb:

that favored a common theme way back when, but it’s too late now.

why is it too late now?

Last edited by alexandra (2006-08-03 14:05:07)

masa · 2006-08-03 14:05:04

Destry wrote:

<blockquote>Oh, you don’t want to open that can of worms, trust me.

(snip)

(For what it’s worth, I was one of the minority that favored a common theme way back when, but it’s too late now.)</blockquote>

I see. :-)
This was just my impression as someone looking into the different options for a CMS and not knowing much at that point.
No offense to anyone intended, but it is my experience that people that have been involved with a project for a long time tend to not see some things that are fairly obvious to an outsider – happens to me, too.

But I shall say no more ;-)

Cheers Martin

hcgtv · 2006-08-03 14:06:40

Destry wrote:

Oh, you don’t want to open that can of worms, trust me.

I was the one that originally suggested a top navbar to make it easier for users to bounce from site to site. In a previous project I suggested something similar, users were thrilled and traffic to all the sites linked in the navbar increased quite a bit.

I’m not the one who invented using a navbar, I have OSTG, formerly OSDN of Slashdot fame, and many other sites that I got inspiration from to thank.

As a new member of the community, I’ve purposely stayed out of this thread, being involved in the last one and seeing the feelings everyone expressed.

masa · 2006-08-03 14:40:37

Bert,

I think Destry’s “can of worms” was directed at me inquiring about the reason for sites not sharing a common design; I didn’t read it as concerning the navbar.

Cheers Martin

Destry · 2006-08-03 15:39:41

masa wrote: No offense to anyone intended, but it is my experience that people that have been involved with a project for a long time tend to not see some things that are fairly obvious to an outsider

I absolutely agree.

masa wrote: I think Destry’s “can of worms” was … about the reason for sites not sharing a common design; I didn’t read it as concerning the navbar.

That’s correct. Though now that I think about it (and I could be shakey on the details) the navbar was one of the compromises of not having a common theme. An idea of mine at the time was a button bar, but the navbar was/is more effective I think.

hcgtv · 2006-08-03 15:44:43

masa,

I see, I was also involved in a similar situation, where a unified look was implemented. No regard for the hard work put into the individual sites by those who started them, it was a political nightmare.

It got uuuggglllyyy ;)

David_1cog · 2006-08-04 10:54:40

[facetious]
Can I suggest some changes to the new, improved navbar:

change ‘Developer Weblog’ to ‘Textpattern Developer Weblog (an online diary of development for the Textpattern project by the Textpattern development team)’
change ‘FAQ (Frequent questions and problems)’ to ‘FAQ (Frequently Asked Questions about the Textpattern project and answers to those questions)’
change ‘E-Mailing Lists’ to ‘Electronic-Mailing Subscription Lists (a facility to subscribe to communications about the Textpattern project, delivered by electronic mail’

I think this will further help the move away from minimal, elegant presentation and also help those community members with barely double-digit IQ points to understand what is going on.
[/facetious]

;)

Textpattern CMS

Textpattern CMS support forum

#13 2006-08-03 07:12:32

Re: @mary, links on top nav bar

#14 2006-08-03 10:16:19

Re: @mary, links on top nav bar

#15 2006-08-03 10:46:59

Re: @mary, links on top nav bar

#16 2006-08-03 11:10:40

Re: @mary, links on top nav bar

#17 2006-08-03 13:49:07

Re: @mary, links on top nav bar

#18 2006-08-03 14:04:23

Re: @mary, links on top nav bar

#19 2006-08-03 14:05:04

Re: @mary, links on top nav bar

#20 2006-08-03 14:06:40

Re: @mary, links on top nav bar

#21 2006-08-03 14:40:37

Re: @mary, links on top nav bar

#22 2006-08-03 15:39:41

Re: @mary, links on top nav bar

#23 2006-08-03 15:44:43

Re: @mary, links on top nav bar

#24 2006-08-04 10:54:40

Re: @mary, links on top nav bar

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