Offtone.com - Ready for traffic, I suppose

[AaronW]

I spent the better part of yesterday finishing the second version (or rather, attempt) at www.offtone.com . I'll take opinions and/or constructive critisism, but I'm mostly here to beg for browser checks ;) Most specifically, Mac users and older IE users. I've got Opera and FF, and Mozilla is implied. IE6 too. Am satisfied with the rendering of those.

Thanks guys 'n' gals,
Aaron

Edit: Content is still being added, just not at the moment...

[KeZZeR]

Wow, very nice site. Only criticisms are that there may seem to be TOO much carbon fibre on the page. Fair enough for the background but the header area etc seems to over-do it.

Also, it'd be nice if the navigation bar highlighted what page you were on (perhaps different colour font?)

That's my input anyway, other than that, very nice. Also, what blog script thing are you using? I'm interested :)

[AaronW]

Ah, will have the navigation give more clues to what page you're on (though the category tree shows you the subsection in orange).

I wrote the CMS myself.

[KeZZeR]

Nice, i'm going to be writing my own CMS since all the pre-made ones are difficult to use.

Also, the footer has carbon fibre in it as well, it just look over the top with carbon fibre. Anyway, that's all i have to really say, other than that, it's a really decent site :)

[AaronW]

I rather like the carbon. Took me like 40 attempts to finally create a believable carbon texture in Photoshop :eek: I don't find it overused at all. It frames the site nicely. The "Latest" boxes only show on the home page, so the other pages are lighter too.

I've never used another CMS. I don't like the idea of bloat, so I write my own and everything gets used and nothing gets ignored. Plus it's just crazy fun... My AdjacencyList class is insanely speedy, just as compact, and of course supports infinite sublevels. It's probably the neatest thing on the site, second only to the content of course ;)

Thanks for checking it out. Anyone else? Heh.

[Sayonara]

I really like that design (and that's unusual for me, even with my own stuff).

Use this lovely site to get a general idea of what your page looks like (stress on the "look", as it generates an image) on the Mac:

http://www.danvine.com/icapture/

[chilipie]

Yey, iCapture's working again :p ! It's been busy for the last week.

When it's not overloaded, you might also want to try http://www.danvine.com/iecapture/ to have a look at Offtone with IE 4.0.

[AaronW]

Doesn't seem to be working for me... iCapture nor IECapture :(

But hope is not lost. For one, I care little for IE4 users. If it's not God-awful in IE4, I might try to fix it. I'm thinking IE5 should be my cap. IE4's just wrong (though maybe you made a typo?) Secondly, we've a few Mac users on these boards who I hope wouldn't mind reporting any weirdness.

Thanks Sayanara, am glad you like it. I've always liked the look for carbon fibre (much of my road bike is made of it) and figured it'd give me a reason to use black ;) Didn't want too much colour, as I'd rather my photographs provide that.

[Sayonara]

It takes a few minutes before your pic appears on iCapture - just check back in 10.

(Although it is often very busy, so it may take longer).



[edit]

Personally, despite my support for accessibility, my view on the seventeen IE4 users who don't know about updates is "screw 'em".

Mind you I only support IE5 because I have to use it at work ;)

[Sayonara]

There it is:
http://www.danvine.com/icapture/detail/31858.html

[AaronW]

Blarg. Background image is off... Am using background: [...] 50% 0% now. Submitted another iCapture request. *waits*

[AaronW]

Blarg. That didn't fix it... Am lost now. I just noticed that huge horizontal scrollbar. And my calendar's buttons are a bit weird... Safari need's a Windows version :(

Anyone with ICQ/AIM/MSN on a Mac willing to be my browser tester? Heh. Can't keep waiting for iCapture.

[Sayonara]

I'm not sure I understand the need for you to specify the positioning percentages.

Can't you just make a small tile and use this:

background: #fff url(/images/bg.jpg) repeat;

?

[AaronW]

My background image doesn't work that way ;) Though what's stretching my content like that in Safari, I've no idea... Can't see the whole thing.

[mindlessLemming]

:( The layout is badly broken in IE 5 and 5.5. Go get the standalone versions so you can tweak out the bugs :)
http://skyzyx.com/downloads/

I like the design, I think I've told you that before, but I do agree that the background carbon is too heavy. Even if you just back off its contrast a bit...

[gsnedders]

iCapture wouldn't show most of the problems, as it doesn't allow you to scroll ;)

Here's some Safari Screenshots: http://geoffers.uni.cc/CF/offtone/

[AaronW]

I've fixed the IE5 bugs (well, IE 5.5. Only needed the box model hack)

As for the background being too "blunt", I think I disagree... I might play around with it a bit, but I like the way the site's just a big bold strip of white down the center (and I'm at 1600x1200.)

The Mac issues are still unsolved I think, though. Would definately be open to any thoughts on what's causing that weirdness.

Thanks again :)

[AaronW]

iCapture wouldn't show most of the problems, as it doesn't allow you to scroll ;)

Here's some Safari Screenshots: http://geoffers.uni.cc/CF/offtone/

Thanks :) If you're willing, you can get ahold of me via:

ICQ: 61376990
AIM: aaronmvvright
MSN: me at aaron-wright dot com

No rush though, of course, and that contact info is open to anyone with access to a Mac browser (or anyone wanting me on their IM list for whatever reason.)

Thanks again.

[AaronW]

Sorry to spam my own thread (or at all, for that matter), but I've just lightened the background image a fair bit. It's growing on me... How about you guys? Heh. Must. Please. Everyone.

[AaronW]

Woot. Fixed in Safari (Thanks Error 404.)

[mindlessLemming]

It's growing on me... How about you guys?

Dig :D

[Basscyst]

It looks really good. I like it alot. Especially your little pop up buttons.

Good Job. :thumbsup:

Basscyst

[AaronW]

Ah, excellent :) Thanks.

Seems there're still bugs in Safari... For some reason, there's sufficient padding under the calendar caption in Firefox, but IE and Safari need me to literally tell it to have 15px bottom padding... Will have to look into why FF assumes that padding is there already.

Also Safari, the buttons in my menu seem to be in both states at the same time... Very strange. Waiting for Error 404 to come back and help me with that over AIM tomorrow :P

And the last thing I noticed from the Safari screenshots is that my dropcap (the big :first-letter) is only properly positioned in FF. I killed it in IE because it just wouldn't listen to any of my style rules other than colour, font-size, and font-family (of the ones I tried, anyway). I need margin settings on it. Will play with that some more too.

Any strange bugs on any other parts of the site? Aren't a whole lot of page types, and I think they all validate.

Thanks again.

[gsnedders]

Also Safari, the buttons in my menu seem to be in both states at the same time... Very strange. Waiting for Error 404 to come back and help me with that over AIM tomorrow :PI'm still here, just very busy, and for me, technically it's later today :)

[AaronW]

Heh, figured you'd be in bed or something? Heh. No problem. It's not getting flooded with traffic, so I'm not worried about Safair users being turned off quite yet.

[tsguitar2004]

The header image is trouble in IE6/pc. It's exhibiting similar problems to your previous design: when the window is smaller than max and the page is loaded, as soon as the window is maximized, that header image stays centered as if with the previous, smaller dimensions. When reloaded with window maximized, it's fine. But then when the window's shrunk, the header's trouble again. Does that make sense?

I love your "piggy bank" idea for the comments. Good stuff...
-ts

[Jalenack]

the most obvious error in safari is the navigation...see attached to see what i mean. its possible that the percents you specified in the css isnt rendering. But it seems to be tiling the image...don't know why it might do that with no-repeat on...try not using shorthand css...i'll be around for the next 2 hours or so you can AIM me at Harc Serf if you want me to troubleshoot in safari...

[AaronW]

Aww geez... Why does IE insist on doing that... It's the absolute positioning of the #header. I've fixed it by giving it a left of 50% of and negative left-margin of half its width. Seems to be working.

Jalenack, sorry I missed you last night. Was sound asleep ;) Am up now though.

Thanks again folks!

[ronaldb66]

Bit late in the game here, but: wow! Amazing job!
Like the layout, like the graphic treatment, like the colors, love the carbon fibre textures! Very realistic; believe me, after spending a couple of hours trying to cut small parts out of a 3mm carbon fibre / epoxy plate with a dremel, covered in black dust, I know how the stuff looks from close by... :o

[AaronW]

Heh, I have my roadbike stored in my bedroom for the winter, and it's what I used for a guideline. Trouble is, the actual stuff's like those hologram stickers which change depending on your viewpoint, so nailing the texture in Photoshop took a fair bit of very small adjustments to the two gradients.

Thanks :)

[]|V|[agnus]

Visually, I'm not very crazy about it at all, and I look at some coding details like <div class="carbon"> and wonder what "carbon" means structurally...

... but you have some fantastic photos, sir! I really dig those. :)

I liked the older layout with the flower in the header much more. It almost feels like you overthought this one, but that could be just me.

The layout adjusts beautifully to adjusting text sizes, however, which is a detail I love to see.

[AaronW]

Over thought? How's that?

And I agree about my carbon class... It's one of a few things I've yet to change from the initial draft of the source. I was just happy that my stretchy carbon box was working with its PNGs in IE, and moved onto other stuff. Will rename to '#latest', as there will only be one.

Glad you like the pics :) I'll be adding more photos than anything, I think. I'm just adding two a day (from my existing collection) at the moment. Didn't want to just toss them all on there at once.

Thanks.

[]|V|[agnus]

The overthought thing is hard to explain I guess... just that it feels like it got more complicated, busy, etc. when it doesn't need to be. Overall, there's nothing grossly off about anything, so a lot of it could very well be personal preference.

[AaronW]

I've lightened up the font now, too. Got a new monitor, and it was definitely too light at #666. Now it's #333, and far easier on the eyes I think.

Anyone have any ideas on how to get my site "noticed"? Would be nice to have some frequent visitors/comment-leavers :rolleyes:

[tsguitar2004]

Overall, I love your CMS. I like the photos and the link to a larger version of the image and the caption, etc. It's a very sharp system. You should think about marketing that. I'd consider using it and I wouldn't be the only one.

To get folks showing up at your doorstep, keep writing and posting new stuff. I liked your scottie tissue rant, but I tend to like things written in that style. Just keep it up. You have the format down, now keep filling it with things people want to read and look at and want to tell their friends about. That's what I'd be doing if I were in your position.
-ts

P.S. Seriously, I'd consider using it... :)

[AaronW]

Hehe, well the entire system is pretty tiny, but it definitely doesn't have the ease-of-use I expect WordPress or MovableType to have. Then again I've never used those, but I'm still confident that they're easier to use. Were I to add a page to the menu, I'd have to write that page myself in a text editor and save it to /pages directory, edit index.php and add it to the menu, etc.

What I might do is document the various classes I wrote to build it. Rather than create one giant lump of classes that depend on each other, I wrote them to be fairly independant so I could use them in ANY situation that called for them. The CMS's most important class is my AdjacencyList class which controls my categories, but uses a few others like Cache, Calendar, Prompt (error/confirm messages), Time, MySQL, and String.

I think I'll first release my Classes and their wee documentation, and then maybe consider structuring my CMS to make it more friendly to people who didn't write it ;) It's small enough to serve as an example of what can be done with my classes.

[]|V|[agnus]

Overall, I love your CMS.

Oh, you've used it?

[AaronW]

The actual CMS consists of one form for data insertion, and another for category adding/editting/deleting. I've no idea what WordPress or MovableType look like in their admin panels, but I'd assume they're a bit more complex because they try to cater to everyone. I just wrote it for me so it could be as fast and easy as possible.

Edit: Any MT or WP users happen to know the average query count on a page? Am curious if, or by how much, I can beat them.

Edit 2: I just visited JKD's site which I recalled was made with MT and saw 9 queries to build the index page. Mine calls 4 right now.

But that said, I realise MT is much more powerful and easier to use, and that the query count isn't anything terribly important in the grand scheme of things. I just enjoy making everything as efficient as possible :p

[mindlessLemming]

Edit 2: I just visited JKD's site which I recalled was made with MT and saw 9 queries to build the index page. Mine calls 4 right now.


Jason's site uses Wordpress.

[AaronW]

Doh. WP... Prolly would've caught that had I not used an acronym...

[tsguitar2004]

Funny how, if a piece of code is for us to use, we quickly realize how complex it is when considering letting others use it! It's hard to make what is complete sense to us easy for others. I just finished working on something like that and the toughest part was making sure the client had something simple and intuitive.
-ts

P.S. No; I haven't used it, but I enjoy looking at the results of Aaron's CMS. Is that better?

[AaronW]

The classes are simple, but my use of them isn't as simple as it could be. I've a few duplicate loops which could be consolidated into one and then shared, etc. Everything's commented though.