johnbeales.com

[johnnyb]

All right - it's more or less done.

http://www.johnbeales.com

Have at it! I'll be checking back.

John

[Pennimus]

Hi John. Hmm, where to begin. Well, a good start would be to practice what you preach and validate your code (http://validator.w3.org/check?uri=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.johnbeales.com).

I think the appearance of your site is a bit messy, in my opinion you've used too many colours and this leads to a disorganised look and somewhat confusing UI. Why do you use two different blues for links? What's with the drab orange and yellow?

I tried performing a search on your site for 'xhtml' and nothing happened (except the URL changing). Other than this, I think two things are worth mentioning about search - 1, your search box doesn't look like a search box. 2, you don't need search on a site of this size, and even if the site does grow to a size that would justify it, search will never make sense without some context. Right now, it's not at all clear what I would use it for. If it was in the context of an articles section, then maybe.

It's my feeling that your name in the header bar should be an image, background or otherwise. Text at this size simply looks shoddy.

You really need to look at the footer on pages where the content doesn't fill the vertical height of the screen; at the moment it looks like a mistake the way the white background is suddenly cut off.

Finally, the Google ad unit on the homepage just looks cheap.

- Adam Bunn

[ns1987]

1) You're sending XHTML as text/html; this shouldn't be done.
2) The code isn't even valid XHTML, which (if sent correctly) would spit out an error.
3) Like Pennimus said, the organization is very messy.
4) The banner is "not pretty" at best.
5) Colours could use some work.

Oh, and imho, you're overpaying for your hosting.

[Masterslave]

When the dropdown menu collapse, it collapse over the blue bar, it isn't nice to see that.
Looking for a web desinger?
That's a typo.

When I scroll with Firefox, my CPU really goes crazy, I alsmost a full load!

[johnnyb]

Ok. Comments taken to heart. I'll post back later today with changes.

I wasn't too happy with the front page and the search box.... and I have an idea.....

I know where the code validation problem is on the front page and it will be fixed ASAP - I just hadn't had a chance to get to it.

A couple of questions for things I'm not familiar with:
Sending page as text/html - that's the server default. I assume I can change it with PHP. Can you point me to somewhere that says how? and what should I send as, text/xhtml?

I liked the dropdown menu collapse over the blue bar, I thought it showed for sure the dropdown's parent, but I will change that.

I'm overpaying for my hosting? What did you find wrong with it? (btw I'm not paying anything, but I'll let my host know what the problems are so they can improve their service).

The firefox CPU thing. I think it's because the background on the page is postition:fixed. It seems to happen to me too on any page with background position:fixed. Any ideas why or just bug in FF?

Google on homepage will go.

That's it for now, I have to head out this morning. I'll do some fixing this afternoon.

JB

[Masterslave]

The firefox CPU thing. I think it's because the background on the page is postition:fixed. It seems to happen to me too on any page with background position:fixed. Any ideas why or just bug in FF?

My primary browser is Firefox (offcourse! :p). But the problem also exist in IE and Opera.

[Tynan]

'I am a freelance web designer and ballet dancer living on Montréal, Québec, Canada'

in?

[rmedek]

1) You're sending XHTML as text/html; this shouldn't be done.
2) The code isn't even valid XHTML, which (if sent correctly) would spit out an error.
3) Like Pennimus said, the organization is very messy.
4) The banner is "not pretty" at best.
5) Colours could use some work.

Oh, and imho, you're overpaying for your hosting.

For what it's worth, the sending XHTML as text/html isn't as harmful as people would make it seem. It seems to be good enough for some of the best (http://alistapart.com) in (http://mezzoblue.com/) the (http://shauninman.com) industry (http://happycog.com).

Also, XHTML sent as XML needs to be well-formed, not valid. There's a difference.

[johnnyb]

Ok. Many updates completed.

1) After eating a nice lunch & dinner of my own words, my whole site validates, so far as I can tell.
2) The layout of the front page has been updated to be similar to the rest of the front. The colour scheme has fewer colours.
3) The search box has been removed. It may re-surface a couple of months down the road, but if it does it'll be pretty different.
4) I have made it so the background image scrolls, this reducing the CPU hogging I believe
5) The ad is gone from the front page
6) The dropdown menu no longer drops in front of the menu bar, it drops below it.
7) the on/in typo has been corrected, (although I guess technically I could say on - Montreal is an island)

I have decided to continue sending as text/html. I may change that for the future, but for now it seems to work fine, and as Richard says above many of the best do it.

I am trying to deal with the issue on short pages where the white does not continue to the bottom of the window. It's a lot harder than it looks. I may have to re-evaluate some stuff.

Please continue the comments, also, I don't have a mac so if someone wants to look at the site on the mac platform that would be great.

John

[Masterslave]

CPU thing is solved.
But the dropdownmenu doesn't work properly.
When I hover the mouse over the menu, I have to point my mouse quick to the submenu, because when I don't the hover is gone and the submenu is invisible.

[johnnyb]

Ok, masterslave,

I assume you're using FF the version that's in your signature?
Is the drop-down dissapearing or hiding behind something, (or can you tell)?
Are you on a mac?

I'll see what I can do, but I'll probably need to duplicate the problem first.

JB

[Tynan]

'Looking for a webdesigner, hire me!'

seems quite a leap of faith for the front page, perhaps the call should be more like 'see my work'?