Thoughts, Opinions, Comments
 

I know I just had another thread here, but that one focused only on the color scheme. Probably would've been wise to make it general.

Anyway, I've been frantically working on the site for the last 2 weeks. I'd appreciate any comments, negative or positive, on any part of the site. Keep in mind, some parts are still incomplete, but that's why I'd like the help now.
Get it out of the way before the season starts.

http://team964.dyndns.org/

Re: Thoughts, Opinions, Comments
 

Very nice website. I like the title design, like the windows vista or mac os background. The Calendar is great. Very interesting, and big enough to see. And i think the download page is a great idea. But im just wondering what kind of things will you put in there? Like videos, or Lab view upgrades. Just make sure you're allowed to put the items up that you are posting for public downloading. But over all, looks like its gonna be a great site! Good job. :)

Re: Thoughts, Opinions, Comments
 

About the downloads, that was more to see what it actually looked like than for functionality. I don't think we intend to upload anything significant, so most likely it'll be removed. Any programming code, etc, will be uploaded to the project management area, which was just installed tonight.

Re: Thoughts, Opinions, Comments
 

Very good site. Pretty much flawless, the red box for under construction doesn't really fit in but other than that really god.

I'd also like to point out that I read something about having the FIRST logo with no white background not being legal or something along the lines of that.

Very good site though

Re: Thoughts, Opinions, Comments
 

Very nice.

I don't understand why you have two navigation menus, the horizontal one on top and the vertical one on the right.

86 the Under Construction banners

How did you like working with Joomla?

Re: Thoughts, Opinions, Comments
 

Yeah, those were placed to mark the areas I were working on the night before. My memory, despite me being young, isn't as good as it should be. But yeah, I'll probably take those out ASAP.

I used the one from their site that had the black background, so I assumed it was alright. I'll read up on that in the morning...

I don't quite know, really. I started off just using the top menu, then after I realized how many links I'd need, I switched to the sidebar. I'm still not sure how navigation will work out. Maybe have one or two links up top, with the rest on the side. What's your suggestion?

I love it. It's very simple, yet extremely flexible, right out of the box. Support is everywhere, more extensions/modules than you can count, and very professional-looking (if you know how to work with it).

Re: Thoughts, Opinions, Comments
 

A couple things that I can think of...

The FIRST Logo that you got from the website, (it is not fully the original copy, as in the registered thingy is not there along with that you edited the "FIRST" out of the image, that is still part of the image in my opinion.

The contact page, I would suggest having only a couple emails, like a webmaster one, a general team one (that gets sent to like the captains and mentors and they can then distribute info). I would do that instead of, and this is assuming, everyone on the team or who signs up will get thier information exposed to everyone. I might suggest having the couple of emails like I said above and then those that are registered on your site can then see everyones contact information.

If you are going to have the navigation on the side AND the top, have the side one on EVERY page as it makes the site uninviting if you have to keep visiting the home page to click on those links in my opinion.

Also not everyone has Firefox, I prefere Firefox myself but it is also good to have it work in explorer and safari too. You never know(if submitting for website design) what browser that they may use to judge. When I viewed it in explorer on the team page the little gray background saying that this site was designed for firefox thing was not at the bottom of the page. Just another thought of food.

I might also suggest having your own page describing FIRST, not just for those that don't like browsing external links but also for the website design awards, that is one thing that they look for and judge on.

Currently this is all I can think of for now. Sorry if I may seem a little to over critism, this is stuff that I like to look for when I ask people to check our site. I do like the site, the color scheme is very inviting. I really like it.

Re: Thoughts, Opinions, Comments
 

No, that's cool. Like I said, it's better that I get it set straight while it's still being born. I can take constructive criticism.

Are you using IE6? If so, can I get a screenshot of a few areas of the site? The issues came from a lot of the coding in the modules, worked much better with FF than IE. The biggest culprit, though, has been uninstalled, so I might consider taking out the footer.

The navigation is up in the air. The problem is, some of the integrated software (forums, photo gallery, etc) don't display correctly with the side-modules enabled. I'd like to move just about everything to the side, and keep maybe "Home" and "FIRST" up there. My guess is I'll probably have to go in and edit the themes of the gallery and forums to make them play nice inside of Joomla.

The logo on the menu, I guess I need to take out, then. And I think what I'll do is make it a link to our own page describing FIRST, with a link to the external site from there.

Again, thanks for the words of advice. By the way, you need to edit your signature. Your team's website is including the ")" at the end. ;)

Re: Thoughts, Opinions, Comments
 

Oh, for the contacts page, that will only be important contact emails/phone. Mentor, webmaster (me!), financial/technical contact, etc. I never planned on everybody's information being posted, and Joomla! helps to organize it very well.

I like the idea of a general address to forward to the core group.

Re: Thoughts, Opinions, Comments
 

Thanks for the signature edit :)

I don't remeber what version it was since that was on schools computer and they have many different versions I don't remember which one that one was(I had the laptop out and was using that so I don't really remember).

And kind of like I somewhat mentioned in the last post about website award, I would look at last years requirements (in the manual Section 5 which is the awards section and I think it is around page 10-13, scary if that is true as that is a guess) as the requirements mention what they will look for on the website.

Re: Thoughts, Opinions, Comments
 

Ok, I've been toying around with the photo gallery today, so now I put the side-menu on every page, and removed all but three links up top, and may change that to two, or even remove it completely.

I've also created our own FIRST page, which has yet to be filled with content. I'm leaving that for another, more qualified, member.

Working on tweaking the themes of the calendar and forums. Still need to finish filling in content throughout the site, including the frontpage. Otherwise, I'm fairly satisfied with this project. This is the first website I ever made that actually came out pretty nice.

Re: Thoughts, Opinions, Comments
 

I would just use a single navigation menu, I prefer to have them on the side although I usually put it on the left hand side of the page. Not sure that there is any advantage to it being on the left. My mantra as a designer is to be simple and consistent. Users should not have to think unecessarily, such as trying to figure out which menu to use to do what they want.

Re: Thoughts, Opinions, Comments
 

About it being on the right, I read somewhere that since readers read from left-to-right, the most important content (the main) should go on the left. I'm not sure whether that's a huge deal or not, but I figured it can't hurt. It can always be move back to the left side, but I kind of like it there.

As for the top menu, I'm convinced to completely remove it. There's really no reason for it to be up there any more.

EDIT: I just happened to be browsing through websites, and realized how similar I had created our site to the Adambots'. Coincidence? Yeah, I'm pretty sure. :D http://www.adambots.com/

Re: Thoughts, Opinions, Comments
 

I would personally if putting links on the side I would place them on the left hand side as many people look for menus on the top or the left hand side since that is what most websites place the menus. A menu could be considered as important content as that can link to other pages on a site.

Re: Thoughts, Opinions, Comments
 

After extensive research, studying, polling, trying, crying, and bribing, I've set my pride aside and moved the menus to the left.

Re: Thoughts, Opinions, Comments
 

Ok, made some major changes to the site. The forums were removed from being displayed within the site itself until I can debug the bridging component.

Re: Thoughts, Opinions, Comments
 

It's looking better.

I would stack the login, password and remember me controls on the top right to balance the header.

The three icons (login, reminder, register) are not very helpful, I had to hover over them to figure out what they meant.

Not sure why you need the login icon since the login and password are in the header.

Not sure what the reminder icon does. Once I clicked it I realized what it was. I would replace it with a link like "Forgot your password?" You could use the icon in front of the link although I am not sure if it is necessary.

Also use a link for the register as well.

Re: Thoughts, Opinions, Comments
 

Thanks. You might've caught the site after I installed this huge component, which changed the login box and added a bunch of functionality to the site.

I'll move the box to the right, and make the other changes you mentioned.

EDIT: The login icon is coded in, with no config from the backend. It's not a hard thing to do, but I'm not sure if I should get rid of the icon. I'll experiment with it out, though.

Re: Thoughts, Opinions, Comments
 

Getting better everyday !

Aha, now I understand, the login icon is what you push after you fill in the userid/password. Shame it's not a button, that would take less thought ;)

I still think you should stack the login controls on the right if possible.

Re: Thoughts, Opinions, Comments
 

Yeah, I'm about to rework that right-side tonight, so I can (possibly) include a text-only news fader. I don't want it too cluttered, but if I can execute what I have in my head, it'll be perfect.

And I think your statement is hinting at something, but I'm not sure what.... ;)
I'll make a login button to throw up there, also.

Re: Thoughts, Opinions, Comments
 

What? You're not a mind reader? :eek:

Here is a crude mockup of what i was thinking. Working from memory since the site is down for maintenance

Re: Thoughts, Opinions, Comments
 

Yeah, that's what I thought you meant. I had some minor issues upgrading the operating system (darn bind9 not updating) but it should be up again soon, then I'll working on that login box and newsfader.

Re: Thoughts, Opinions, Comments
 

I clicked on the register and got the following message:

Fatal error: Allowed memory size of 16777216 bytes exhausted (tried to allocate 40 bytes) in /var/www/libraries/joomla/database/database/mysql.php on line 460

I was going to test where you put the Logout link once you are logged on.

Re: Thoughts, Opinions, Comments
 

Haha, sorry about that. I had to reinstall Apache/PHP/MySQL when I upgraded the distribution, but for some stupid reason it reset my php.ini, even though everything else went untouched. I just fixed it now, so try again whenever.

And I fell asleep with my headphones on last night, so I didn't get much done. :rolleyes:

Re: Thoughts, Opinions, Comments
 

Probably don't need the login form on the registration page, to the left of the registration area. Especially the link to Register (loop, see loop) :yikes:

Oops, no way to logout. You should put a logout button or link in the top right corner where the login control normally is.

Are you doing any traffic analysis with your site? How are you doing it?

Re: Thoughts, Opinions, Comments
 

Oh wait, I saw the Logout icon. Missed it the first time, wasn't real obvious. Either needs some text, or use a link or button.

Re: Thoughts, Opinions, Comments
 

Hahaha, I know, I know. My laptop's cooling pad died, so I'm dealing with it overheating. Lemme try to make a crude button right now...

Re: Thoughts, Opinions, Comments
 

My laptop HDD has some fatal errors. Don't know when I'll get a new one or a new computer, but until then, it's gonna be rough...

Re: Thoughts, Opinions, Comments
 

Have you tried running Spinrite on it?

Spinrite performs miracles, its worth its weight in gold.

http://www.grc.com/intro.htm

Re: Thoughts, Opinions, Comments
 

Right now I'm having a blast with Ubuntu, but eventually I'll need my files (and space) back from the broken Windows installation, so I'll check that out soon.

Anyway, I had to recompile the Apache and PHP on the webserver, but I had time to change a few things around. I didn't like how the logins looked stacked, though I did try it. Ultimately, I found a slide-down module, and installed that for the sole purpose of logging in and out.

I moved the news slider down next to the search box, but still need to space it out. Gotta clean up a few things here-and-there. Need to fill in a few of the other sections that are still empty. Probably create a News area, so that the Blog could be for just thoughts, the Calendar to view events, and News for writing articles and whatnot. AND, we're getting ready to move it to an actual dedicated box hosted by my video game community this week, with a real big-boy domain name and all. ;)

Next on my agenda is an intranet for the team shop. Nothing too fancy. Control music via ShoutCast throughout a LAN, project management, who-knows-what else. Basically, whatever we feel like putting in there for fun. :D

Thanks for all the help you've provided, rsisk. If you don't mind, I'd like to put you in the "special mentions" section of the website.

Re: Thoughts, Opinions, Comments
 

I'd be proud to be mentioned on your site, thanks!

And if your team ever competes in San Diego or LA, look me up.

Team 2493: Robokong