Opinions on Website Design

AuthorityActionAuthorityAction Missouri Member
edited July 2008 in Internet & Media
I am currently working on a new website for an organization I am involved in at my university and I am looking for advise on the design. There are a couple things that bother me about the current design, but I would like others opinion before I go making changes. Are there any colors that you would change to be more appealing or any layout changes?

Also, the site has valid HTML and CSS but sadly good ol' IE7 and below does not like it. In IE7 the right column becomes hidden behind some other text. Anyone know how to fix that? I'm still working on it, but haven't come up with anything yet. Thanks!

http://www.fusionxlan.com/ucra/dev/

Comments

  • LincLinc Owner Detroit Icrontian
    edited July 2008
    Design looks nice; simple and clean. I'm thinking you're getting too clever with your CSS though; it looks like you're using a bunch of hacks to make it look pretty in IE5 (PC and Mac) which I really don't think is necessary unless you have a mandate to do so. IE5 people, imho, need to be left behind at this stage.

    Try replacing the #rightColumn CSS with this:
    [html]#rightColumn {
    float:right;
    position: absolute;
    z-index: 2;
    right: 25px;
    margin-top: 30px;
    padding:.7em;
    width:13em;
    background-color:#eee;
    border:1px solid #000;
    font-size:.8em;
    }[/html]
  • AuthorityActionAuthorityAction Missouri Member
    edited July 2008
    That seemed to do the trick Keebs, thanks! I took a basic skeleton layout and modified it to what I wanted, so that explains the IE5 hacks. I could care less about people with IE5.

    Thanks for the comments as well.
  • kryystkryyst Ontario, Canada
    edited July 2008
    Looks nice and clean. I'd personally like a little more pop to it as the colors are kind of flat. Also some shading around your floating box would be a nice touch.
  • AuthorityActionAuthorityAction Missouri Member
    edited July 2008
    kryyst wrote:
    Looks nice and clean. I'd personally like a little more pop to it as the colors are kind of flat. Also some shading around your floating box would be a nice touch.

    I agree, I think the one thing that bugs me about this design is that is needs more of a 'wow effect'. I'm not exactly sure how to go about that though. Thanks for the shadow idea, I added a thicker border to the right and bottom and I think it looks good.
  • LincLinc Owner Detroit Icrontian
    edited July 2008
    Maybe move "Events" and "Links" (or whatever) onto the home page so you have more material to work with. Maybe flip the white border on the gray boxes to a gray border on white boxes to give it higher contrast.

    What's up with the orange link color (webmaster @ bottom)? Is that a conscious choice for all link colors or just there?
  • AuthorityActionAuthorityAction Missouri Member
    edited July 2008
    Keebler wrote:
    Maybe move "Events" and "Links" (or whatever) onto the home page so you have more material to work with. Maybe flip the white border on the gray boxes to a gray border on white boxes to give it higher contrast.

    What's up with the orange link color (webmaster @ bottom)? Is that a conscious choice for all link colors or just there?

    I'll play around with switching the colors later tonight. The orange is the link color I choose for links on a deep maroon background. I guess it does kind of stand out more than what I want it to. I might make the hover text the gold and regular be white.
  • AuthorityActionAuthorityAction Missouri Member
    edited July 2008
    I made some changes that hopefully makes things pop out more. I would still like to include more color to spice things up, just not sure how to do that. My plan is to make each content div (ie. Our Purpose and Our Meetings on the main page) expand and collapse. Some of the other pages will have a decent amount of content and it should help to contain everything.
  • kryystkryyst Ontario, Canada
    edited July 2008
    The slight colour changes do help to create greater contrast but there's still a harshness about it that I can't quite place.

    Now given what the site is supposed to be - and I do understand the joy of coding something yourself - have you ever though that instead of re-inventing the wheel about using any of the existing cms packages like Drupal for example?
  • LincLinc Owner Detroit Icrontian
    edited July 2008
    I'm generally not a fan of using Javascript to create expand/collapse effects. Any time I've seen it used I've wished it wasn't, and any time I've used it I've ended up undoing it later. :-/ Hiding things generally doesn't help usability.

    The colors you're using now look very official; it complements the logo well.

    My only comment at present is that the stacked colors around the content box are a little visually confusing (red->gray->white); they're all about the same thickness so it feels like one of those Russian wooden dolls with the smaller doll inside and a smaller one inside that one. :) The easiest change I can think of to fix that is to reduce the thickness of the left/right red borders (leaving the inner boxes the same size). That might let the gray offset the boxes enough to make them stand out better.
  • LincLinc Owner Detroit Icrontian
    edited July 2008
    kryyst wrote:
    Now given what the site is supposed to be - and I do understand the joy of coding something yourself - have you ever though that instead of re-inventing the wheel about using any of the existing cms packages like Drupal for example?
    Truth. If you're going to be doing updates, or if others will need to update it, I really recommend diving into Wordpress or Drupal.
  • AuthorityActionAuthorityAction Missouri Member
    edited July 2008
    kryyst wrote:
    The slight colour changes do help to create greater contrast but there's still a harshness about it that I can't quite place.

    Now given what the site is supposed to be - and I do understand the joy of coding something yourself - have you ever though that instead of re-inventing the wheel about using any of the existing cms packages like Drupal for example?

    I have thought about using a CMS, but I am unsure if php will be supported on the server this will be hosted on. I will look into that and see what's available. The only updates will be the minutes twice a month and events. Not much of a change, but a CMS would make things easier.

    Thanks for the ideas and suggestions, I will try to make some of those changes when I get off work.
  • LincLinc Owner Detroit Icrontian
    edited July 2008
    AuthorityAction wrote:
    I have thought about using a CMS, but I am unsure if php will be supported on the server this will be hosted on.
    These days, a webserver isn't a webserver if it doesn't at least support PHP. :) That's the baseline for general hosting, even at colleges.
  • AuthorityActionAuthorityAction Missouri Member
    edited July 2008
    I would hope that they do support PHP, but I just wasn't sure or not. All the other organization websites hosted at the university were very primitive. I'll have to find out about database support as well.
  • kryystkryyst Ontario, Canada
    edited July 2008
    Most cms's will require php and mysql - but then again those are pretty much the basics to really be considered a webserver.
  • SweetDragonSweetDragon Casselberry, FL Member
    edited July 2008
    I don't know anything about web design but there is something missing. It's like it is just a note someone left on a desk. Is there a way to dress it up with eye candy. Maybe a cool logo or something.
  • kryystkryyst Ontario, Canada
    edited July 2008
    The green arrows don't contrast well.

    I think the problem I couldn't pin point before is that it looks like it's from a word template.
  • AuthorityActionAuthorityAction Missouri Member
    edited July 2008
    kryyst wrote:
    The green arrows don't contrast well.

    I think the problem I couldn't pin point before is that it looks like it's from a word template.

    I'll play around with some other arrows and see if I can find one that works better.

    kryyst or SweetDragon, do you have any suggestions to make it look more like a web page and not a word document or note? I have been playing with different things to give it a little more spice, but haven't found anything that I like. The dark maroon doesn't make things very easy.
  • LincLinc Owner Detroit Icrontian
    edited July 2008
    Look to your logo - very classical facade. That gives you lots of elements to play with :)
Sign In or Register to comment.