paulaosborne.com

[l3vi]

Hello,
I am the webmaster of paulaosborne.com, and I am doing a total facelift of the site. Here is the URL of the site... its very long, temporarily: Paula Osborne

Please tell me what you dont like about the site, if it is concerning the code, how can I fix it? Constructive Critisism is welcome!

[ronaldb66]

Three points:

• The swirling chains animation started getting on my nerves in about, oh, four seconds (about two full rotations). Lose it; it looks very old-school and unprofessional. The graphic itself is very nicely done though, so a static version of it might very well come to use.
• the page is some 20 miles wide!!! My horizontal scroller shrinks to a stripe, and after scrolling through endless amounts of nothing, on the far right there appears some content. I really don't know what's causing this, but it's obviously unacceptable (oh, I use IE5.5/win; yeah, I know, company box).
• Something, I don't know what, took forever to load, and I didn't manage to interrupt loading. After clicking "stop" a number of times with no result, the "back" button is just a button away...

I suggest fixing these first; after that we can go to the good stuff!

[mindlessLemming]

The unstoppable rotating chain gave me a twitch in my left eye, so I escaped to the source....

<div class="menu">
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;
HOME
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;

||
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;
Listings
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;
||
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;
Tools &amp; Services
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;
||
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;

Community Information
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;
||
&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;
Request a Home!
</div>

L3vi: I think you've been an active member here long enough to know what I'm about to say about that... Perhaps it's merely there for design purposes, but even so, that will behave nothing like the unordered list with "||" symbols outside the link text which I recommend you use

<ul class="menu">
 <li>
   <a href="" title="Paula Osbourne Home Page">HOME</a>
   <span>||</span>
 </li>
 <li>
   <a href="" title="Current Properties Available">Listings</a>
   <span>||</span>
 </li>
 <li>
   <a href="" title="You make up this one">Tools &amp; Services</a>
   <span>||</span>
 </li>
 <li>
   <a href="" title="You make up this one">Community Information</a>
   <span>||</span>
 </li>
 <li>
   <a href="" title="You make up this one">Request a Home!</a>
   <span>||</span>
 </li>
</ul>

You can start beating it into shape with this:

ul#menu {
list-style:none;
padding:0;
margin:0;
}
#menu li {
display:inline;
margin:0;
}
#menu a span {
margin:10px;
}

**/totally untested
When I increased the font size the left column grows, reducing the room available for the main content and causing it to literaly 'spill it's guts' all over the place. Seeing as you're using a fixed width for the primary conainer, perhaps you should also designate the left column's width in pixels.

You haven't checked your code against the validator yet....what's <embed>?
You've used < in your link text when you need to use "& lt;" [space added]
You also have a missing </td> on line 117.
[validation results]

Things like this:

	background-color:#FFFFFF;
	border-top:1px solid black;
	border-left:1px solid black;
	border-right:1px solid black;
	position:absolute;
	left:50%;
	margin-left:-376px;
	margin-top:0px;
	width:768px;
	padding:0px 0px 0px 0px;

Can be shortened down...

	background-color:#FFF;
	border:1px solid black;
        border-bottom:none;
	position:absolute;
	left:50%;
	margin:0 0 0 -376px;
	width:768px;
	padding:0;

Sometimes every byte counts, and when you do it all the time you start to notice the savings on sites with 3+ stylesheets with over 200 lines each..

Oh Dear!
..Unnecessarry....nested....presentational...tables!
Why l3vi? You're capable of so much more?

I like the new layout, though the text in the Contact Form is totally illegible. It's so small that it's just a blurred mess at 100% on the browser.

I really was trying to be purely constructive, but if I've come across a bit harsh, don't take it to heart

[l3vi]

nahh.. you werent harsh Thanks a bunch for the help. I will fix those things. I have a question though... I tried using div's instead of tables, because I hate tables more than anything...
But for some reason, I cannot get two divs to come on the same line and give me the same look that I want...???
When I used div's, it made the next div, that was supposed to be right next to it, go to the next line, even though they didnt take up that much space... I will fix that menu thing two and the &lt;

Thank you a bunch for the help!

BTW, I did run it through the XHTML validator, and its somewhat confusing me... Ill insert the </td> where it should be, I dont know where that goes... but, I guess that since im new to using flash... I dont yet fully understand how to put one in the page, without causing errors... any help?

EDIT:
Okay, I changed the << and >> to &lt; and &gt;, I added in the missing td , I did the menu thing like mindlessLemming said I made the contact me font larger as well. I am also working on cleaning up the CSS right now... anything else?

[l3vi]

Originally Posted by ronaldb66

the page is some 20 miles wide!!! My horizontal scroller shrinks to a stripe, and after scrolling through endless amounts of nothing, on the far right there appears some content. I really don't know what's causing this, but it's obviously unacceptable (oh, I use IE5.5/win; yeah, I know, company box).

Hmm.. I dont know whats causing that. Do you mind taking a screenshot for me?
Your using IE5.5 WIN? Or WINXP? What resolution are you using?

Still not sure why that happens... Guess I gotta downgrade to IE5.5 now

[mindlessLemming]

Lining Up Divs:
You need to assign float:left; to the first one so that it will allow room for the second one next to it. Div's are block level elements, meaning they will take up as much horizontal space as is available.

Flash:

   <object classid="clsid:D27CDB6E-AE6D-11cf-96B8-444553540000"
           codebase="http://download.macromedia.com/pub/shockwave/cabs/flash/swflash.cab#version=6,0,40,0"
           width="300" height="120">
    <param name="movie" value="http://www.macromedia.com/shockwave/download/triggerpages_mmcom/flash.swf"> 
    <param name="quality" value="high">

    <param name="bgcolor" value="#FFFFFF">
    <!--[if !IE]> <-->
    <object data="http://www.macromedia.com/shockwave/download/triggerpages_mmcom/flash.swf"
            width="300" height="120" type="application/x-shockwave-flash">
     <param name="quality" value="high">
     <param name="bgcolor" value="#FFFFFF">
     <param name="pluginurl" value="http://www.macromedia.com/go/getflashplayer">
     FAIL (the browser should render some flash content, not this).
    </object>
    <!--> <![endif]-->

   </object>

-- via Hixie.

IE 5.0 and 5.5, standalone versions via Skyzyx

[l3vi]

Im almost done with the non-table version... bTW, the non-table version appears perfect in IE 5.5... (you can add notables.html at the end of the current adress to view it)

[l3vi]

Okay, I think I fixed everything you guys said to fix. I got the page done without any tables, and I think it looks better without using them
It appears correctly in IE 5.5, IE 5.0 Safari, and I think anything else! YAY
Like I said,
Thanks a bunch for all of your help! ITS GREATLY APPRECIATED

[gsnedders]

paula.osborne@coldwellbanker.com goes over the border in Safari...

[l3vi]

Argh... another thing to fix
Okay, its good now. I hope... stupid iCapture

[JAVAEOC]

the only thing i do not like is the flash unit at the left, why are u using flash for that, the text looks all blury and small...

[l3vi]

Okay, no more flash for that! I have now clue why I did that

[mindlessLemming]

Good stuff
But I get a 404 Error for notables.html

[l3vi]

Oh, I got rid of notables.html I put the original with tables into a BAK folder, and renamed notables to index. Shoulda put it in here I guess

[mindlessLemming]

Cool, now the next step is to get it working without set heights on the boxes...That way it can reflow with more content/larger fonts. Plus that will allow you to use the template for anything the client throws at you