First public site

[WillGibson]

I've been doing intranet sites for about 8 years and this is my first internet site ever.

I'm a firm believer in becoming better via criticism so let it fly :)

*url removed*

Thanks
Will

[ilmus]

Well done Will :thumbsup:

[Crake]

cool man its looks brillient i like the nav bar
:thumbsup:

[JamieR]

The overall design is ok - simple and effective. However I didnt see any DTD like XHTML 1.0 Transitional etc. It would be better if all your pages were valid XHTML and used CSS for layout rather than the good old table element.

Anyhow, the overall site design is ok:p

[WillGibson]

Thanks for the feedback everyone

I added the DOCTYPE and for now its gonna be HTML 4.01 Transitional, I'll get to XHTML later.

Any other comments or criticisms? Its all welcome feedback.


Thanks
Will

[ronaldb66]

As Jamie (weazel) already mentioned, your markup is rather table-heavy; you could do a better job at utilising the various HTML elements instead of sticking everything in table cells, shaving off a nice bit of the page weight along the way.

Also, I wouldn't recommend relying solely on JavaScript to make your navigation work. There really is no shame in repeating the menu on every page of your site; there aren't that many anyway. If you want to save yourself having to maintain each menu, rather look into server side solutions.

The flash animation on the home page is nicely done, but it really needn't loop all the time. Run through it once, and then stop.
If it were up to me, I'd ditch it altogether. Remember that you don't have to attract visitors with pretty pictures: they've already found you. Draw them in with information, give 'em what they're looking for.

[JamieR]

Remember that you don't have to attract visitors with pretty pictures: they've already found you. Draw them in with information, give 'em what they're looking for.

To attract visitors that want the most out of the web, then you might want a cutting edge design that is still simple. What i say is to cut out 99% of the flash all together:p

[WillGibson]

Ronald and Jamie
Thanks for your pointers :)

The Javascript for navigation is going away, I agree that its not a good idea to use js that way. I'd like a js free site but I don't think I can get all the effects I want across all browsers with out it.

As to the Flash...well, I've won about as much of that battle as I can. Given a choice it would not have been there. To me the opening page is pointless. Let me just say there is an order of magnitude (or two) less Flash then some people wanted so I count it a victory.

As for table heavy, yes it is. And that is my fault. It's what I am comfortable with and know well. Help me out here, how would I do it differently? Divs?

Thanks again :thumbsup: