| Author | Comment |
Andy
Administrator
Posted: 6 Jun 2005
05:44 GMT
Total Posts: 939 | A friend of mine offered to redesign the site for free, provided he could put it in his profolio. It would require some work on our part (implementing it in all the scripts and such, but to be honest this low-contrast scheme is getting to me (especially when I'm using the laptop on batteries with the screen dimmed). We also could maybe redo how some of the pages are accessed -- it seems to me that some are quite hidden.
I don't know, it just seems to me at the very least the colors could be tweaked. Post rants and raves here.
(Poll opportunity maybe?) |
TI Freak
Probe
Posted: 6 Jun 2005
06:06 GMT
Total Posts:
Edit | I agree on the navigation for some of the things on here are hard to figure out for new comers, but you learn how to navigate it after a while. And as to the color scheme, I like it. It just seems right for calcgames, since ticalc.org and calc.org are white... |
zkostik
Carrier
Posted: 6 Jun 2005
06:19 GMT
Total Posts: 2486 | I'm kinda more on TIFreak's side but it's true that a fair portion of menus need big updates and JS code for the top drop downs needs to be redone and made crossbrowser. I've found it to look good on most laptops except Toshiba's which have really lame screen settings when run on batteries but on everything else it look nice in my opinion. I tend to like the darker tones since they don't strain the eye that much. A color scheme selection can also be coded in to allow for custom colors but let's see what your friend has to offer. Also, if his design is not framed LOTS of code will have to be heavily revised.
I'd say let your friend show his proposed design and how all of our features would fit into it and we'll go from there. If the layout and all is good and admins are happy with the output we'll put out a poll for the other folks to choose or we can do it at the same time for everyone to choose and. Let's see what he's got and decide.
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Andy
Administrator
Posted: 6 Jun 2005
06:23 GMT
Total Posts: 939 | Well, I can adjust the brightness myself, all the way up to maximum. It's just very hard to read on the lowest setting. I suppose I could tell opera to use my own stylesheet or something... But it is easy on the eyes, most of the time.
I'll see what he has to say later. |
korkow
Ultralisk
Posted: 6 Jun 2005
06:52 GMT
Total Posts: 465 | Heh, Z I know exactly what you mean by Toshibas with lame screen settings.. seeing that Im using one right now. Anyways, frames can be extremely annoying to any computer with low resolution (this one is 800x600). So the frames get in the way of everything and I have to sidescroll a lot. |
zkostik
Carrier
Posted: 6 Jun 2005
08:59 GMT
Total Posts: 2486 | Well, at that resolution you'll have to sidescroll on pretty much any website unless its designed for 800x600. CG is designed for 1024 and up. On low res everything is squished up and there's no room for content, text will be aligned into tall columns and all that. But hey, if that's what you have you'll have to deal with it unfortunately. Even if we were to eliminate the side menu bar you'd still need to scroll a little but only on certain news articles. Though, we've already made frames resizable so they'll shrink down on low res but you'll sometimes need to scroll. Btw, any reason you're running your comp on 800x600? It should be capable of higher res than that...
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Andy
Administrator
Posted: 6 Jun 2005
09:16 GMT
Total Posts: 939 | Some old computers only support that much. :)
[10:26:22] <+Korkow> I would have wireless internet on my lappy... If it wasn't so dang old
^^^^ Old. :) |
JcCorp
Probe
Posted: 6 Jun 2005
13:38 GMT
Total Posts:
Edit | I'm for a redesign. Of course, I have "almost ADD" (not clinical at all, but a very, very, very low attention span.) So maybe you should avoid what I say.
Anyways, I'd love to submit little banners or logos if I could. If given the chance, i think that a few extra images could really improve the look of CG. |
allynfolksjr
Administrator
Posted: 6 Jun 2005
14:49 GMT
Total Posts: 1892 | What we could do is have both versions, and give the users the choice between the two. With the scripts and such there shouldn't be any problem maintaining both for a while. And then eventually decide which one to keep. |
zkostik
Carrier
Posted: 6 Jun 2005
20:51 GMT
Total Posts: 2486 | Yes, but most likely many scripts will need to be redone to make them work with proposed new design. I'd say it's a better investment of time to work on a skin system to that website skins/layouts can be changed easily. That will require a unified system to hold various layout data and all as well as finally fixing all that CSS mess we have floating around the codebase as well as getting rid of static colors and tags printed by some (many) of our scripts. That's take a good effort to complete but sounds like a more sound investment of our time and general improvement direction. With a well designed system we could have different website looks and flavors depending on anyone's taste...
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allynfolksjr
Administrator
Posted: 6 Jun 2005
21:52 GMT
Total Posts: 1892 | Yes, if we used a few style sheets for the entire site, that could make a skin system possible. |
zkostik
Carrier
Posted: 7 Jun 2005
06:12 GMT
Total Posts: 2486 | Well, we could have but everyone is lazy as usual (that includes me) so things didn't get done in the most efficient way... We could start updating those however or maybe wait to see what Andy's buddy has to offer and then decide.
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Andy
Administrator
Posted: 7 Jun 2005
06:40 GMT
Total Posts: 939 | I gave him a link to this thread... He said he'll start working on something when he has time. |
Xero Xcape
Marine
Posted: 7 Jun 2005
07:10 GMT
Total Posts: 29 | Personally I like the site... (It looks like my calcs!)
But something diffrent would be nice...
maybe along the lines of basic.revolution?
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BASIC flames are for n00bs, you don't want to be a n00b do you? | My other calc is a Porsche. |
Barrett
Administrator
Posted: 7 Jun 2005
07:59 GMT
Total Posts: 1676 | Tell him to just show the basic look and layout and not to go into any depth... with the current way people are working, changing the entire site to a different design would take years. (i'm talking about all of the scripts and such... some people have no idea how large the back end of this site is).
I like the idea of a frameless site, so show us what you've got, and through time we may move to it.
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-Barrett A |
Xero Xcape
Marine
Posted: 7 Jun 2005
08:00 GMT
Total Posts: 29 | I like the frames...
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BASIC flames are for n00bs, you don't want to be a n00b do you? | My other calc is a Porsche. |
alex10819
Wraith
Posted: 7 Jun 2005
08:16 GMT
Total Posts: 507 | yeah, i like the frames too...
useful things, i can get around faster with those... i just wish i could get my frames to work right...
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Barrett
Administrator
Posted: 7 Jun 2005
08:23 GMT
Total Posts: 1676 | I wouldn't worry about the frames... if I have any final say in a new design, it will be frameless, BUT, it will be fast loading, and all of the links will still be there... meaning no more than 3 images loaded per page (with the exception of screenshots and avatars), and the javascript tabs will still be there (probably different, but there will be javascript tabs with links to every archive section on every page).
The colors will be easy on the eyes... not as dark as the current site, though. (for example, imCommunity.net)... Not those colors, though... those don't suit a calculator website at all... but it just takes some experimenting.
[Edited by Barrett on 07-Jun-05 17:24]
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-Barrett A |
korkow
Ultralisk
Posted: 7 Jun 2005
09:08 GMT
Total Posts: 465 | I personally like the color scheme of this website.
[Edited by korkow on 07-Jun-05 18:10] |
Ray Kremer
Ultralisk
Posted: 7 Jun 2005
11:48 GMT
Total Posts: 310 | You can clean up a site design, streamline the scripts, etc. without necessarily changing all that much of the appearance/layout/color scheme. It just depends on what your goals are. |
jhaygood86
Probe
Posted: 7 Jun 2005
14:23 GMT
Total Posts: 4 | Hello. I am Andy's mentioned friend. I believe I am to the task of doing it. I was thinking of moving to a cleaner design, with a theme system (that doesn't require any reworking of the backend code to support it).
Objectives:
1. Make website more standards compliant, using HTML 4, CSS, ECMAScript, and DOM. Validation isn't necessary, but more compliant can help alot!
2. Move layout code to HTML 4 and make it CSS friendly. Current theme can be reimplemented quite easily using CSS.
3. With a new layout system, themes can be implemented just by using different style sheets. This should be very easy to implement using JavaScript and CSS.
Please give comments and suggestions.
[Edited by jhaygood86 on 07-Jun-05 23:45] |
JcCorp
Probe
Posted: 7 Jun 2005
17:29 GMT
Total Posts:
Edit | Would it need any images done up? |
zkostik
Carrier
Posted: 7 Jun 2005
20:15 GMT
Total Posts: 2486 | Definitely! Those top buttons are old and ugly and definitely need an update. As with themes is really the way we need to head in to make any layout changes or customizations possible and easy. You ideas jhaygood86, sound like a step in a right direction. Please let us know when you come up with something and we'll go from there. Thanks.
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Lunchbox
Carrier
Posted: 10 Jun 2005
19:18 GMT
Total Posts: 2007 | I have a few suggestions as you guys take on this monster of a project:
1) Use css, but be aware that some browsers (Firefox mostly) have really touchy css dtd's and that they don't like alot of attributes (e.g., you must implement the bacground color using the bgcolor property in the body tag for ff to recognize it, unless I am quite mistaken)
2) Redo the js so that EVERYTHING works. *cough* top buttons *cough*
3) Make the navbar layout a little cleaner
4) Add some images for ease of use or whatever, but as B said, don't overdo it. This site is already long to load in IE and none to grewat in ff either.
5) If you decide to make the site frameless, make sure it doesn't screw up the site too much.
But, good luck with everything, and hope to see something before summer ends :) . |
allynfolksjr
Administrator
Posted: 10 Jun 2005
20:14 GMT
Total Posts: 1892 | *shrugs* Opera follows CSS standards quite nicely. |
TI Freak
Probe
Posted: 11 Nov 2005
15:44 GMT
Total Posts:
Edit | I was lookin through the new lay out, and noticed everything but the Site tab was working. How much longer do you guys think before that version is completely operational? |
jessef
Goliath
Posted: 11 Nov 2005
17:44 GMT
Total Posts: 192 | where is this new layout you speek of? |
allynfolksjr
Administrator
Posted: 11 Nov 2005
18:16 GMT
Total Posts: 1892 | design layout. When will it be done? No clue. :)
[Edited by allynfolksjr on 12-Nov-05 03:17] |
zkostik
Carrier
Posted: 11 Nov 2005
19:08 GMT
Total Posts: 2486 | Yeah, everyone's uber busy right now so like allyn said, no idea when new design will be done. Hopefully we'll be able to get something done during winter break but no promises...
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TI Freak
Probe
Posted: 12 Nov 2005
06:15 GMT
Total Posts:
Edit | Well, it looks great anyways! :) |
