www.ecampsite.co.uk

ecampsite.co.uk · #1 (**permalink**) 09-08-2005, 07:45 PM

Hi!
I'm quite new to this site, so go easy on me!!
I've just created a new website on my own.
Never had any IT lessons, just learned HTML all on my little self, however, i wondered whether you think my site is any good, and i would love some constructive critism to work on!!!

Thank you all in advance!!!
Oh yeah, the site's
www.ecampsite.co.uk

Craig

Steve W · #2 (**permalink**) 09-08-2005, 08:51 PM

Hi Craig

The fast paced vertical scrolling and horizontal banner scrolling is unpleasant to be amongst and had me kill the window before reading very much.

It felt a bit like rubbing your stomach in circles whilst tapping your head - you know what I mean?

I would have the banner animation play only once, and s l o w the vertical scrolling panel right down to a crawl - otherwise it's too distracting.

The look is very 'frontpage template' which is somewhat a dated, and it looked like the elements were thrown onto the page and displayed where they landed - no grid or flow to the design.

Just my 2c, others may feel differently :)

preciouschild · #3 (**permalink**) 09-10-2005, 01:27 AM

It does feel very busy. The back ground squares are distracting. The scroll on the left felt like an arcade game. I like the balance between pictures and text.

If you have a minute, please review my site.

Paul B · #4 (**permalink**) 09-10-2005, 05:17 AM

You've made a good start, but gone in a few wrong directions.:

Frames. These will end your SE chances
Declaration at the start of code
Moving things. These annoy visitors.
Interfering background
All the text on your opening page is hotlinked... to nowhere.
Dead link: "Not Found
The requested URL /featured2.html was not found on this server."

ecampsite.co.uk · #5 (**permalink**) 09-10-2005, 12:29 PM

Thank you everybody who has commented on my site!
I've been quite busy altering the opening screen and would appreciate everyones comment on the new look.
Am currently working on the dead links.
Because i script the code from scratch using notepad im not sure what code i should put in at the top, is it something like <DOCTYPE Something?>

Thank you once again for all the help and advice you guys have been giving!
Cheers

Paul B · #6 (**permalink**) 09-11-2005, 04:29 AM

Quote:

<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01 Transitional//EN">

(Copied off the code of this page.)

Well, the alterations now include a fading logo as well as the two nasty scroll effect that were pointed out above. Here is a basic website design rule: stuff that moves about and jiggle around for no very good reason looks naff and annoys and distracts punters...

Your first font "Century Gothic" is neither a websafe font, nor does it work well on screen. It looks jaggy at the edges.

I always wonder what the point of the date is? This would be more useful (though untrue):

Site updated: Sep 11, 2005.

ecampsite.co.uk · #7 (**permalink**) 09-14-2005, 10:18 AM

Hi everyone!
Thank you for all your comments, all have been appreciated.
Ive taken most of what you said into consideration and done something about it.

I've changed the font throughout the site, now a websafe font

Changed the flash animation, now only moves once, then fades out

Added a declaration to the start of the code, and checked it at w3.org

Changed the opening page to give it a more stylish look, (i know there isnt much content for SE, but am willing to take that risk for now!)

Made sure that the links are not dead.

The things i havnt done is making the jump to a frameless site. I like the frames for the fact of its easiness to modify.

I'm still open to more comments and suggestions though, and if you can find any bugs with different browsers it would be greatly appreciated!
Thank you for your time!
Craig

ecampsite.co.uk · #8 (**permalink**) 09-20-2005, 05:34 AM

If there is anyone else that would take the time to review my site, it would be greatly appreciated!! I will return the favour and review yours!!!
Craig

mikesmith76 · #9 (**permalink**) 09-20-2005, 06:20 AM

frames aren't necessary to make navigational elements easy to modify, there's always alternatives such as server side includes. think frames are rapidly becoming a dated technology, no one seems to like them anymore.

one thing i did notice on your site was the dreaded "click here" type link. from a usability perspective this is not good, users should be able to glance at the link and see where it will take them, in this case you have to read the entire sentence for the link topic.

another thought would be to hotlink your logos to your site homepage, makes it a bit easier for users to get back to the beginning.

mike

ecampsite.co.uk · #10 (**permalink**) 09-20-2005, 07:54 AM

Hi
Ive just moved to university and been overhauling my website on my computer. However, they wont let me have an internet connection for a week, (im in the library at the moment), and i cant install an ftp an the network, so i cant show you what i have done to update it. I have gone frameless, (sounds a bit bizarre) and have worked quite a bit on the navigation.

You'll have to bear with me though, as i cant upload my new files.

Cheers
Craig

**dharrison** · #11 (**permalink**) 09-20-2005, 08:11 AM

hi Craig

Looks good. Wish my first effort was that good :-)

One comment though: Does all of your text have to be in bold? I always thought that was classed as shouting. It also makes for a viewer with a headache (which they won't thank you for).

Fair enough for the links and headings, etc, but bold as all the paragraph text is overkill.

I've just been seen to a customer with exactly the same bold text on his site and it actually looks better and is easier to read without.

And that animation playing with every page load is a bit annoying, but I guess tahts what you get with a frameset (I can't remember as my last frameset was a while ago).

Hope this helps. If I can help further please feel free to post on the thread or PM me.

Best regards

ecampsite.co.uk · #12 (**permalink**) 09-20-2005, 08:15 AM

That was an issue that i have corrected in my newer files, but still trying to find a way to get them all uploaded, its so annoying because ive got all the files ready to go and the ftp program says i do not have admin privileges as i am using the uni pcs!
Cheers Debbie

**dharrison** · #13 (**permalink**) 09-20-2005, 10:12 AM

What FTP program?

ecampsite.co.uk · #14 (**permalink**) 09-20-2005, 10:26 AM

Ive tried lots, even the uni ones, coffee cup, blade ftp, 123 ftp, and deluxe ftp, all of them wont install on the network, so i will be talking to the uni admins soon!!!

OLYMPOS · #15 (**permalink**) 09-20-2005, 10:46 AM

Craig, i had a look at it, its okay just the news-scroller on the left site is much too fast.

On http://www.ecampsite.co.uk/northumberland.html

http://www.ecampsite.co.uk/nor2.JPG

http://www.ecampsite.co.uk/tn_nor1.JPG

http://www.ecampsite.co.uk/nor1.JPG

http://www.ecampsite.co.uk/tn_nor2.JPG

These images are not working.

Checked 13 documents in 214.6 seconds.

CJacobson · #16 (**permalink**) 09-20-2005, 02:25 PM

You had two threads running for awhile... I'm not sure if you saw the following review (from September 13), since you never responded and since your site remains very, very buggy...

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I bet you don't know that your website doesn't work at all on Netscape 7.0? Your lefthand-side navigation bar doesn't show up at all. I selected "How to Use", and I found some really interesting bugs there too.

You might want to try running a validator (like this one: http://validator.w3.org/ ). It'll tell you where your html isn't in compliance with industry standards... so in practice it's a pretty good bug-finder. However, before you use it you need to make a very basic correction. (Note: this has been updated Sept 20.) You need a doctype tag on EVERY page, including: "top.html" and "bottom.html". Also, you've got a bug in the way you've defined your frameset on "www.ecampsite.co.uk" - why on Earth are you using frames in the first place? Don't you want potential visitors to find your site in the search engines?

Re: how the home page (and other pages) look stylistically... I don't care for the way it looks on a wide screen size. I think you'd be much better off to design the site to ONLY use the middle 800 or so pixels of my screen. Since you didn't do this, there's a big gap between the navigation bar and actual functional content.

If it were my site to design, I'd look for some sort of valuable and informative content to put on the home page. Why would a person bookmark the home page instead of a page deeper into the site? Why would they come back to it at all? What interesting keywords will a search engine spider find to index on your home page? Three thumbnail pictures and three little color blocks? That's not value added. Why not put something on the homepage that campers will want to read, and then change it every so often so they'll have a reason to come back and look again?

Re: service icons... On the "how to use" page I read "Don't worry if you can't remember them all, just put your cursor over an image and it will tell you (try it!)..." Okay, I tried it in Netscape, Firefox and IE, and it doesn't work in any of the three!

The icon you use for indicating "electric hook up" service looks like a skull to me... Makes me think the campsite is haunted or something.

ecampsite.co.uk · #17 (**permalink**) 09-21-2005, 07:47 AM

Ive looked into the Netscape problem and your right, i dont understand why it has done that, however it has been fixed as i have changed my website, and gone frameless. Unfortunately im still not able to upload it. could someone tell me how to display a picture in a reply and what i need to write, i will put a screen dump of a couple of pages then.

I cant understand why the alt tags dont work in I.E either on the howto page, it seems to work fine on the computers ive used.
I will put a doctype on every page and check for major errors, its just sooooooo annoying not being able to upload.

Cheers CJacobson!
Craig

**dharrison** · #18 (**permalink**) 09-22-2005, 05:54 PM

Tut, tut, Craig. Telling porkie pies and all that. :-D

No you haven't. I've just checked and although the top bit is no longer static, the LHS menu is still static.

I have also checked your bottom and featured pages and do you know you have 2 body tags with different background colours? This might be a clue.

Have also run a check through bottom page with W3C validator and it screams 'page not valid'. You need Doctype on all the pages, before it will give you anything.

I know its frustrating, but surely you'd rather invest a little extra time in getting it right, than rushing it and losing business due to your site being disfunctional?

Anyway gotta go, there a glass of claret calling my name. :-D

Later,

ecampsite.co.uk · #19 (**permalink**) 09-23-2005, 03:52 PM

Hey everyone, just uploaded all my new files.
I havnt got a doctype on any page as of yet, but i would like feedback about the new layout and navigation. Thank you everyone for your brilliant comments!

Craig

ecampsite.co.uk · #20 (**permalink**) 09-24-2005, 05:05 PM

Only me again!!!
My websites up and ready to be looked at and discussed.
Ive worked hard at cross browser compatibility, and my site works well in IE, FF, Opera and Netscape which is all a big bonus.
My code doesnt seem to validate, also due to the fact of no doctypes, but is it really essential that it validates if it displays well in all browsers?
Another question.... (sorry), if anyone has access to a mac pc, would they be able to tell me how it looks!
Thank you for all your critical feedback!

Craig

nullvariable · #21 (**permalink**) 09-24-2005, 07:45 PM

Hi Craig,
I can't get to your site from here. When I ping it I get no response when I use dnsstuff to ping it it responds right away. Any suggestons?

ecampsite.co.uk · #22 (**permalink**) 09-24-2005, 07:53 PM

I dont understand, when i click on the links it just takes me to the site with no hassle. The server is very rarely down aswell so i cant understand the problem come people have accessing it???

Can you think of anything that might be wrong?
Cheers Null

CJacobson · #23 (**permalink**) 09-25-2005, 11:09 AM

Quote:

I've worked hard at cross browser compatibility, and my site works well in IE, FF, Opera and Netscape which is all a big bonus.
My code doesn't seem to val