Webpages that Suck October 4, 2007

 http://www.webpagesthatsuck.com/10-worst-mystery-meat-navigation-sites-featured-on-web-pages-that-suck-in-2006.html

 Wow, he’s pretty harsh!  But, it is good to know ahead of time or have guidelines to follow when designing your website. You certainly don’t want yours to suck!

Mystery meat navigation- Wow, I can’t believe people would actually use links that you can’t find. You really want the most computer/Internet user- illiterate person to be able to navigate through your site! Lucky for me, this is most of the people who work for my company…. I’m an IT person to them!  So I have a lot of people to test my site on before I go live.

#9- Wow, that does suck! Come on people, use some graphics you actually wantto look at. It feels like a Power Point presentation, some of the links don’t work, & some don’t take you back to the home page.

#8- Not sure what is going on here.  I looked cool how the photos zoomed in, but then I was hunting for the way to get to any information & once there, I really didn’t want to read it. Wow, too much going on and it’s not clear how to navigate. Next…

#7- It looks cool, but who has the time to rollover all those pills to find what they are looking for. In this fast-pased world, you want users to be able to find what they are looking for quickly!

#6- Wow, those images are small!… and what exactly is it that I’m looking at?!… and after being click happy, I found that it continued to other images, with still no text!

#5- Why can’t I just click the words?! … Next!

#4- Please, just tell me where to click and what I’m clicking into. You really have to hunt and peck… and try to figure out how the heck to return to the other pages. The font is really small also, don’t really want to read it!

#3- I feel like I’m being hypnotized or it’s some kind of science project. Again, just tell me what I’m looking for!

#2- I really don’t understand what this website is all about. Very childish looking!

#1- Well this one has no words at all. What is it a website for?

What ever happened to less is more?!  It seems these designers are being what I will call as too designy! One word… Wow! Ok, so maybe I was harsh too.

Top Ten Mistakes in Web Design October 1, 2007

http://www.useit.com/alertbox/9605.html 

Bad Search-  I really wish Dreamweaver had spell check. If it does, I’m not aware of it. I am not that great of a speller.

 PDF files- I don’t completely agree with this comment.  I think Adobe Reader has come very far in it’s software and is easy to use. The ability to zoom in and print easily give it an advantage. I understand, as far as navigation, you can only use the back button to return to previous screens, so I think it all depends on how the pdf is used.

Changing the color of visited links- It is very useful when the colors of the already visited links are different from those that have not been. I believe Dreamweaver does this automatically, doesn’t it?

True, when something looks like an advertisement, you are more than likely to exit it without thinking twice.

Opening new browser windows- I agree and disagree with this. It’s true that when your screen is small, you sometimes can’t tell another window has been open. However, if I’m being linked to another site, I would think you would want it to open it in a new window, so you don’t get to far away from the original site.  But, I do understand there is an open in new window button.

Not Answering Users’ questions- This is extremely frustrating. There’s nothing worse then specifically going to a site to find out the price of something & they don’t list it!

Storyboards, Flowcharts & Design Comps October 1, 2007

http://bcts-potomac.aacc.edu/128b/19/week5.zip

I really like the direction we are going in for the final project. I think it’s a great idea to use the flowcharts & storyboards to map out our ideas before diving right into them on screen. It’s basically an outline for our website. 

Fireworks is a lot like photoshop, but I’m glad to see it incorporates great editing features, like those in InDesign (such as leading).  Very easy to follow assignment!

Using Vector Tools September 24, 2007

Mistake… it says to use the same color red as the outline of the circle, but then the color they tell you to use in order to fill the triangles is a different color red.

I don’t like how all the keyboard commands are not the same, as other Adobe programs… of course, I am using the MX 2004 version. I will have to check on the CS3.

 

I chose to do a swirl in the middle of my mint because that’s what my real mint looks like!

Good exercise. Helpfull to know about the paste into feature as well as the filters. I really like the trim canvas feature! Good shortcut tips too (ie clone, transform, & replay)!