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drogers -> NJSpot.com (4/13/2006 9:27:19)

http://www.njspot.com

The site will be launching soon and I wanted to get some feedback.



Minix -> RE: NJSpot.com (4/13/2006 11:01:22)

The colors just don't quite do it for me. I like orange and a shade of blue or orange and a shade of purple - those combos work. But I can't get comfy with orange, a shade of purple and three different shades of blue.

What is the purpose of the site? Is it going to be a money maker for you in some way? There are a lot of these type of sites out there, from CitySearch on down to the little guys. What is it that separates you from the crowd with your site? Because I didn't notice anything.

If it's just a personal site and hobby, then enjoy it. In that case you.ve done a decent design. Colors being the exception.



drogers -> RE: NJSpot.com (4/13/2006 13:05:14)

The site centralizes around interests of people in NJ, kind of a hangout to talk about what's happening around the state, whether it's the bar and club scene, music, sports, politics or what ever. There is a rating component to almost everything, and it will eventually end up acting like a city guide to some extent as well. I like to think of it as a combination of a localized myspace, CitySearch and something like CollegeHumor.com all roled into one.

What do you think about the layout of information? Ease of use, that sort of thing?

The colors, well, I guess that's a personal thing. Eventually there will be themes which the user can select, so I don't anticipate that being a problem.


We'll probably throw up some google ads to cover costs, but making money isn't the primary focus.



walrus -> RE: NJSpot.com (4/13/2006 16:12:48)

I like the colours, but...

black text on a purple background just is not going to work.

White is really the only font colour you should consider against such a dark background. Then I think it would actually look quite good.

Otherwise I would maybe have gone with the terracotta in the middle to give a
dark-light-dark spread for balance.



drogers -> RE: NJSpot.com (4/14/2006 10:13:53)

You mean in the center? I think the black will work if I make the font larger for the headings and then maybe change the copy text to white, but I see what you are saying and I agree with you. We went with a light purple so I thought we could get away with it, but we've heard this same comment a few times. Time to take it seriously.

Thanks for the comments so far.



jaybee -> RE: NJSpot.com (4/14/2006 12:16:31)

Yep, the text is a major problem. Anyone with really good eyesight will have problems, anyone with bad eyesight won't be able to read any of it.



Tailslide -> RE: NJSpot.com (4/14/2006 12:23:46)

I agree with the others about the text - it's really hard to read (and I'm not that old!).

The central content area is too wide in FF and it shoves the right hand column off the page completely. Also in FF and Opera the dropdown navigation drops down behind the Flash banner.

The navigation items on the left hand side shift when you hover them - which is a bit irritating. If you want them to have the border effect then include a border (same colour as the normal background) around the non-hover item so that basically on-hover the border's just changing colour - if that makes any sense.



drogers -> RE: NJSpot.com (4/14/2006 13:07:55)

Thanks guys! I'm going to be spending this weekend trying to get the site cleaned up (I have my own laundry list). I was hoping you would stop by Tailslide. I know what you are saying about the left side nav, I think it's that the text bolds on hover. I've had some arguements with the client about that one, I think I need to compensate with the bold and border when non-hover.

That Flash animation has caused no end of trouble. That is probably what extends the center section in FF and Opera. It is set to 100% of the container table. Also, the CSS dropdown menus getting hidden is a real issue. My computer rebooted yesterday for a forced Windows update and now in IE the flash sits behind the nav, but there is some focus issue where if you click on a menu item over the flash, it clicks the flash the first time. Stupid IE!

Thanks again for all the great feedback.



Tailslide -> RE: NJSpot.com (4/14/2006 13:30:08)

I'm about as far from a Flash expert as you can get (I've used it once on a site and I didn't even make the thing) but this seems to be the regular solution for that issue:

Add the following to the Embed tag: 

wmode="transparent"


and the next bit to the object tag: 

<param name="wmode" value="transparent">



drogers -> RE: NJSpot.com (4/14/2006 13:51:09)

Thanks Tailslide, that hit the spot (pun intended). Now I have to figure out this new IE problem. I'm getting a scrollbar in FF too, just a slight one, but I hate horizontal scrolls.

Why can't the world agree on a single web browser? Is that really too much to ask?



Tailslide -> RE: NJSpot.com (4/14/2006 14:10:27)

I don't know if this might cause problems at all - but it certainly isn't "correct" - you've got two head sections - one nested inside another. You should probably make sure that you get rid of the extra head tags just in case...

There are a few HTML errors in there such as missing or extra div tags which again could mess things up a bit so it's probably worth going through and ensuring.

Oh - just had a thought - and this is a guess - have a close look at your footer as that seems to be what's pushing the screen about 20px wider that you want.



drogers -> RE: NJSpot.com (4/14/2006 17:26:06)

I need to give back a little more here. Thanks for taking the time.

The entire site is controlled by Skyportal.net, they've developed an outstanding freeware open source portal. Very well coded and modularized so that customization is a breeze for ASP coders. Most of the CSS (excluding some add ons produced for the portal system) is in one sheet. There's a language file with most of the static text in it and the backend has a lot of great features.



billoutfrontforum -> RE: NJSpot.com (4/19/2006 11:37:48)


Yep, black text on purple background makes me want to run away.



1eagle -> RE: NJSpot.com (4/26/2006 21:57:14)

quote:

ORIGINAL: Tailslide

I'm about as far from a Flash expert as you can get (I've used it once on a site and I didn't even make the thing) but this seems to be the regular solution for that issue:

I need to say thanks as well. I was having this same problem on a site I am presently building. Just goes to show how a little browsing and use of the search feature here saves duplicate questions.



Nicole -> RE: NJSpot.com (4/26/2006 23:06:32)

Dave,

I haven't read all the responses but I believe that the black text on purple has already been mentioned but what about the iframe on the right with black times new roman and sky blue on orange?

Something happens to Verdana when it's made bold that I don't like either. possibly Arial for headings?

Top left menu item "Register" seems to have some other text underneath it when hovered over?

Firefox 1280 x 1024




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