New site, please look.

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Paula -> New site, please look. (4/1/2002 17:15:09)
Hi guys, Before I forget www.glendaelkins.com I've got problems. First of all I can't seem to get the load time down to a reasonable level. I've optimized and taken stuff off and I don't know what else to do. Any suggestions? Second, on the Contact page, I've got a Javascript problem. Privacy Statement- I used a J-bots Floating Window and it keeps repeating the link. I take it out, it puts it back. I don't know anything about Javascript, except how to cut and paste or use J-bots and I've read everything I can find on the board about it, but I'm dense and don't understand how to fix this. Can anybody help me? Other than that, I would appreciate any comments. I'm sure there's tons of stuff, but I really can't see anymore, I've been looking at it too long. This site is for one of my oldest friends and it's important to me. She wanted a patrotic theme, but subtle. What do you guys think? Thank you in advance. Paula The more I learn the less I seem to know.

smy2 -> RE: New site, please look. (4/1/2002 18:11:42)
The site looks great, I think. FP tells me that your (really really cool) spinning "@" alone takes 13 seconds to download on a 28.8 modem. Perhaps that is part of the problem. The patriotic theme is perfect.

Shirley -> RE: New site, please look. (4/1/2002 20:15:48)
There is way too much stuff on the home page for me. I couldn't decide where to look first. I like the inside pages alot. Are you using open realty?? Was it easy to configure? Shirley Nobody realizes that some people expend tremendous energy merely to be normal. Money Tree Web Design

Bill Seper -> RE: New site, please look. (4/1/2002 21:19:39)
Well, I agree with Shirley most of the time but this is one of the rare cases when I don't. I couldn't tell you about the load time realy since I'm on cable but I thought it looked stunning and wouldn't change a thing if I could help it. But if it's loading too slow then I guess you gotta do what you gotta do. I don't have time to check the javascript just now but I'll have a look tomorrow if no one else does first. I'm stunned that I disagree with Shirley so much on this one because I really think it's one of the most beautiful web pages I've ever seen!

Rangler -> RE: New site, please look. (4/1/2002 22:33:40)
Hi Paula, I like the home page but I think you have too many images on it. I would keep the top part but eliminate the spinning e-mail graphic. Just put an e-mail link under the address. The graphic goes best on a personal site. Eliminate the 3 "faded" flag graphics and just use text links there. Get rid of the Recommend-it thing. I get the impression that this is a carnival site rather then a professional real estate site. Besides, I don't want to give my address to a third party. Also, no privacy statement on the site. Flip a coin on the weather link but remember that you are dependent on the speed of the feed from the weather site. Rangler Anyone know where I can get my black & white TV fixed?

Paula -> RE: New site, please look. (4/1/2002 22:40:14)
Thanks guys! I'm speechless, well not quite. Smy2, thank you for your kind words. I didn't realize that little graphic was taking that long. I have to check and see how big it is, it might have to go. Shirley, yes it's Open Realty and very easy to configure, believe me, if I can do it anyone can. I was wondering about whether or not it was too much on the home page. Since Bill doesn't think so, maybe I'll wait and see if anyone else comments about that. I think all those features need to be pretty prominent, but I might be able to figure out how to move some of them off the first page. I don't know. Thanks Bill, that's high praise, I really appreciate it and I can sure use it at this point. Can't seem to scare up much business and I'm losing confidence. Your comment really helps. Paula The more I learn the less I seem to know.

Paula -> RE: New site, please look. (4/1/2002 23:04:35)
Hi Rangler, I must have been posting at the same time as you were. Thank you for your comments. I'm going back and forth on the spinning email thingy. She wanted something "eye-catching." That was as eye-catching as I could find without being, I don't know, toooo tacky I guess. With all the trouble I was having with Javascript the Recommend-it thing seemed like a good solution, thank you for pointing that out, I didn't think about the 3rd party getting the address, besides it's tacky, for real. Guess I'll leave it off all together. There is a privacy statement, that's on the first page and on the contact page, where I'm having the javascript problem. Thank you for looking at it and for the helpful suggestions. Paula The more I learn the less I seem to know.

EWD -> RE: New site, please look. (4/2/2002 7:40:51)
I really like the inner pages and think the home page would be better if it were more similar to them. I would move the three questions/links that are on the flag graphics to the area "above the fold" along with the mortgage rate thing and move things that are less important down on the page. What is "Open Realty"? Don't lose confidence! I think things are just about to break open. With the economy on the mend money is starting to loosen up for business "extras" and unfortunately to a lot of small businesses a website is an "extra".

Paula -> RE: New site, please look. (4/2/2002 15:03:33)
EWD, Thanks for looking at the site and for your suggestions. Open Realty is an open source PHP program for displaying real estate listings. I found it looking around at sourceforge. I hope you're right about the economy, but I'm beginning to think it's just me. Maybe I'm just depressed because my husband is about a month away from being layed off and I don't want to work at MacDonalds! Thanks for the comments. Paula The more I learn the less I seem to know.

EWD -> RE: New site, please look. (4/2/2002 22:07:19)
Put your Hubby to work getting business for you! My spousal unit and I are both laid off. I prefer to call it "forced into self-employment". There is always a reason for things and I have never been laid off when it didn't mean a short period of hardship till something WAAAAY better happened. I don't mean to be flip. It certainly is an uncomfortable thing. But don't lose your confidence over it. You're doing fine. Thanks for the info about Open Realty. I'll check it out. I have a realtor client about to sign! Do you know PHP?

robble -> RE: New site, please look. (4/2/2002 22:14:27)
Thanks for putting a charity link on your site. So few people do it yet it costs nothing.

Paula -> RE: New site, please look. (4/3/2002 12:22:41)
Thanks for the encouraging words EWD. No, I don't really know PHP, although I know a lot more than I did. I set up a "gallery" using an open source PHP program and now the Open Realty on this site. I'm concerned that something will go wrong and I won't be able to fix it, sort of like the Javascript problem I've got now only worse. So I really need to learn, first Javascript, CSS and then PHP so I can handle things. I'm a slow learner though, so I'm having trouble. Robble, thanks for mentioning the charity link. I try to support The Hunger Site and their advertisers however I can. It's an easy way to do something, and I would encourage anyone to check it out. Thanks everyone for your comments about the site. I'm not sure what I'm going to do with it at this point. If anyone else has comments, I'd really like to hear them. Thanks. Paula The more I learn the less I seem to know.

Bill Seper -> RE: New site, please look. (4/3/2002 12:33:21)
For what it's worth Paula, I have your homesite bookmarked because I thought all the samples you had there were so darn good! I'm not very clever with artwork and I have to browse through what other people have done to get ideas for things because I'm just not tallented enough to come up with something on my own when it comes to eye-candy. I've stolen more ideas from you than anybody. (I hope that's a good thing. ) I used to put a link to the Hunger Site on all my pages too, but somehow got away from it. I'm glad to hear it's still operating. I did a search on them once and found they were extremely legit BTW.

Paula -> RE: New site, please look. (4/3/2002 12:56:53)
Thanks Bill. It's worth a lot! Any ideas you want to use, that's fine with me, I'm honored. You've done wonders for my confidence level with just a few words. The Hunger Site was down for a while and now that it's back up, they have a lot of information posted about how they do things, very straight forward about all of it. I like that. Thanks again. Paula The more I learn the less I seem to know.

leehintz -> RE: New site, please look. (4/4/2002 11:21:46)
Hi Paula, I think the site looks great and it loaded pretty fast for me. I agree with some that I would lose the spinning email graphic. The info on the bottom of the home page is a little "busy" but it probably depends on individual taste. I did a realty site too, if you would like a comparison. [url]www.2point4realty.com[/url]Unfortunately it loads slowly, due to all the thumbnail images in the footer. Good Job! Lee A. Hintz, Consultant ART GALlerieS, ltd. lhintz@artgals.net www.artgals.net

Paula -> RE: New site, please look. (4/4/2002 15:14:51)
Thanks Lee. Nice site, I enjoyed looking at it. Are your property listings a set-up from the local MLS? Paula The more I learn the less I seem to know. Edited by - Paula on 04/04/2002 15:16:09

leehintz -> RE: New site, please look. (4/5/2002 11:35:31)
Yes Paula, since the client wanted to show all the detailed info in the MLS listing, it seemed easiest to just link to their listing site. No problems with it. Lee A. Hintz, Consultant ART GALlerieS, ltd. lhintz@artgals.net www.artgals.net

WRXSTi -> RE: New site, please look. (4/5/2002 21:00:11)
Are all your images GIF's? They seem to be photos and my understanding is the .jpg format should be used. If the images contain things like straight lines then using GIF is better. I brought one of your images up in Photoshop and converted it from gif 55.5k to jpg 3.33k with very little degragration. Anyway I have 1mb cable and the home page loaded just fine. rgds, Me

Paula -> RE: New site, please look. (4/5/2002 23:17:51)
Almost all the images are jpg, two of the link graphics at the bottom are gif, but they aren't very big. The text banner at the top is a gif but it's not that big. Could you tell me which image you pulled up? I really need to check on that. Thanks. Paula The more I learn the less I seem to know.

tpslwebmaster -> RE: New site, please look. (4/6/2002 12:00:20)
I kept wanting to say that it was too busy, but I can't think of a think to drop. WELL DONE Paula! My only comment is that the weather link text goes to two lines and doesn't line up with the box.

Paula -> RE: New site, please look. (4/6/2002 13:30:54)
Thank you tpslwebmaster. I'm not sure why it does that, I'll have to look at it again and see if I can figure it out. I'm having the same problem with figuring out what to take off, so I haven't done anything yet. I did stop the spinning of the @ sign, that made the file size much smaller and I dumped the "Recommend-it" thing, but I'm having trouble deciding what else to do. Guess I'll just study on it a while longer. Thanks again everybody. Paula The more I learn the less I seem to know.

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