http://frankie.227net.com/Main/

Hello all,

Well over 2 years on, it is time to re-vamp my sons website.
The current site is still available at http://frankie.227net.com to you can compare old with new.

The new site is here: http://frankie.227net.com/Main/

I am particularly looking for feedback on:
1: Looks in different browsers, is the text / background viewable OK
2: Download speeds
3: Ease of navigation

I have 2 main issues at the moment.
1: Download of the final image in "MyPics" sometimes takes up to 12 seconds, other times 1. Not sure whether that is my connection or bad scripting (eg: go to http://frankie.227net.com/MyPics/2003/March/ and click on an image)
2: In Opera, if the page goes from short to long (i.e. you have to scroll), the background image appears twice - you need to refresh the page

Please note that:
1: it is still in debug mode, so there might be a few page errors that may appear that won't in the final version;
2: Also, there is no error trapping in image gallery, again errors that will be removed in final version;
3: The stylesheet will be imported in final version, so it may kill Netscape 4.7
4: Contact page isn't written yet

The site is XHML/CSS validated and AAA approved for most pages

Thanks in advance for your comments.

nice and clean layout, like it,
no crossbrowser issues found, (haven't checked in k-html browser)

except for the blue colour on the submenu etc.
(its crashing to much, with the background,)
might want to make that a tad lighter ( take a screenshot, then greyscale it, then you see why)


the code looked very good,
only thing i can put a finger on is the <p class="titles">Main SubMenu</p>
would be better with an appropriate hn-tag,

and in the css.
font: normal 95% "Trebuchet MS", tahoma, verdana, serif;
wouldn't it be better to suggest an generic sans-serif font as the last option instead of serif, as all the other suggestion is sans-serif fonts.

Hi,

Thanks for the reply -> I agree about the blue (do you mean the actual blue text? will change accordingly anway).

With regards to <p class="titles">Main SubMenu</p>, I did this because of the document outline. Unless I make them h2 and change subsequent h* in the document, the outline is all screwed as it is actually written before the content of the page, if you know what I mean.

Fonts -> agreed, thanks for pointing it out. Will change accordingly.

No download time issues?

If you are going to use blue, I suggest using it all the way instead of the black and white platform. The blue seems invasive on this site.

yeah, meant the blue color,
it looks much better now.

no download time issues as i can see.
though got this error at the top at the page
Notice: Undefined index: HTTP_REFERER in /home/jamieb/www/frankie/includes/mypics.php on line 96

it is because i had turned off "send referrer" in my browser,
no error when i turned it on again.


i still disagree a bit about the p class=title,
you can have more than one h2. the outline wouldn't be screwed. And you don't have to change the existing hn-tags.
http://www.webaim.org/techniques/structure/

Thanks again - your comments are greatly appreciated.
I will read that document linked again, and then change accordingly.Notice: Undefined index: HTTP_REFERER in /home/jamieb/www/frankie/includes/mypics.php on line 96, I know about this issue, I have all error reporting on at the moment. I will modify that code when I have finished debugging
Re download times, I think it must be my network connection at work. It seems to work 50% if the times here, and fine at home.
Thanks again

Hi again,

I have done a lot of tidying up, just a couple of pages to go.
Was just looking for a few more comments really.

Have been testing in Netscape 7 today, and I noticed that the images down the site come after the rest of the page (not particularly bothered as the content comes quickly), but do you think that is because I am importing the CSS file?

I have the entrance page ready, but it is no on-line, but it is very similar to the error page that I have created.

Please tell me what you think

Thanks again.

Hello Jabba_29, cute kid you have! So young already have a website, I think can safely say he will be a computer whiz when he grows up! among other things.

I think the site is very clean and easy to surf around, I didn't face slow download issues at all.

Some observations
The menu hover BGpics has a lag on first visit, this very cool CSS method by Petr Stanicek, may help in that http://www.pixy.cz/blogg/clanky/cssnopreloadrollovers/
(visit his home page for other cool stuff too)

Although your navigation is very clear, it lacks location cues. Meaning wherever one lands on your site, the navigation remains the same. No highlighting for easy visual identification. Both the lefthand navigation and the right hand side text ones too.

A more subjective comment is that your son's site looks too adult! it seems more appropriate as your own site. Its so well behaved and disciplined.

The earlier site you showed, with the blue banner and hand written text looks more fun. Color wise, just for your consideration, warm colors are cool too.

A nice font http://www.signalgrau.com/eyesaw/ht...dmade/atman.htm

The font you use as logo, Futura is very well made, among typophiles they refer to it as a workhorse font (meaning it works well in many situations), ikea uses Futura on their catalogues for example, But for a child's website something that has a naive kind of look may work better, like your previous banner


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I think its a job very well done.

Thanks for your comments bambam.
I have to agree with you on the navigation links thing and possibley the "seriousness" of the site. I intend to have a "skinning" option that will incorporate some more "childish" looks when the site is up and running properly.

I have tried this link's, http://www.pixy.cz/blogg/clanky/cssnopreloadrollovers/, technic before - I think I will give it a bash again.

Back to the drawing board again almost.
Thanks again..