New website in the UK for complementary therapies

[happy_hands]

Hi there,

We've been having this site designed for us for a few months now (by an outsourced design company), but keep encountering more and more glitches as the site goes along. Virtually all of the front end is now there and working (as far as I know), with exception to page detailed below:

Unfortunately the 'Search for a Therapist' function isn't ready just yet (some other glitches to be sorted), but I'm hoping this will be fully functional very soon (ie in the next week).

There are also a few login areas that you also won't be able to access just yet without usernames and passwords (although if you think a test facility would be good, I'll see what we can set up if you think this would help sell the site).


Anyway, here's the address:
http://www.therapy-agency.co.uk

As you can hopefully see, this website is aimed at a number of markets, from individual consumers, to businesses, and to therapists!

Any feedback and improvement ideas would be great!

Jason

[Paul Jr]

On the homepage, the links above "FAQ" in the sidebar aren't working, and if you navigate to the "Your Account" link, then "Business Login," the menu that pops out right there is partially hidden by flash movie in the center of the page.

I can upload an image of both issues if you'd like.

[happy_hands]

Hi Paul,

I've just tried installing Mozilla as a browser, and can see what you're talking about.

I've also noticed rather weirdly, that the page also doesn't seem to quite fully load when using Mozilla!?


Having previously tested most of the menus and pages in both Netscape and Explorer (where we'd found a few bugs), thankfully though, these were resolved so the issues above aren't showing now.
However, I'd assumed the designers had checked for most of the other browsers! Although clearly, either they hadn't tried mozilla, or they hoped I wouldn't notice!?


I'll be getting word to them ready for tomorrow! However, I've tried looking through the mozilla.org website, but can't seem to see what I'm looking for (as it seems to still be very much a new browser) but what's the approximate number of people using mozilla on the web today.. and are the described issues also showing on any other browsers?

[iniquity101]

Originally posted by happy_hands
what's the approximate number of people using mozilla on the web today..

Not sure about number, but 12.2% people use Mozilla

From w3schools (http://www.w3schools.com/browsers/browsers_stats.asp)

[happy_hands]

Thanks for that link iniquity101. That's really useful to see the usage from the various browsers!

Having just installed Opera too (as I see it's also one of the most used browsers), viewing my pages gives the same problems are there as with Mozilla!

So that's 12.2% + 3.4% of web users in July can't fully use my pages in the way intended!

Not good.


Thanks for your help guys!

-- --

So in addition to those navigation bar errors, (which I hope will be quickly resolved) is there anything else on the site I can do to make it better?

Many thanks,

Jason

[Vladdy]

Whoever designed that site for you (front-end at least, as I can not tell about the server side code) has no clue about modern web design.
Ask for your money back and start over (before you ask "why", open your site in Mozilla/FireFox and hit "Ctrl"+"+" two times - something I had to do to comfortably read your microfonts on my 1600x1200 Sony Trinitron 21")

[sharkey]

The text is resizing ok for me vladdy but a problem i notice is with the menus its really slow for some reason probably becuase its bad javascripting all could be done with css.

[happy_hands]

Well that's a pretty surprising comment about their idea of modern web design Vladdy, as using Mozilla, setting my screen resolution to 1600 x 1200 (although it's only 19") makes virtually every major website I go to, present the text at the same size to the text on The Therapy Agency site. (ie yahoo.com, google.com, webdeveloper.com, bbc.co.uk all seem to have the main body of the text at the same size!)
Do you have to use Ctrl + on all those sites too? Or is there something I haven't found out about yet that makes things substantially smaller on my site only? If so, I'd be very interested in being able to do something about it.

-- --

I'm really interested in your comment about using css for all those drop down menus sharkey, where you say it could all be done to the same format with css instead of JavaScript?
Do you by any chance have any sample sites I could go and view to see it in action with the same type of formatting?
This particular set of JavaScript coding for the drop down menus, was supplied by www.burmees.nl/menu last year.

[MstrBob]

Just because there are a lot of sites who don't do this, doesn't mean you shouldn't. You should, afterall, be getting your full money's worth and the best product you can. If your design company can't give you a website written in Valid HTML (http://validator.w3.org/check?verbose=1&uri=http%3A//www.therapy-agency.co.uk/) that meets Basic Accessibilty Standards (http://www.contentquality.com/mynewtester/cynthia.exe?rptmode=-1&url1=http%3A//www.therapy-agency.co.uk/), than perhaps you should search for a new one.


Horizontal CSS Menu (http://www.alistapart.com/d/horizdropdowns/horizontal.htm) There are many others, as well.

[Conor]

you could also check out vladdys

http://www.vladdy.net/Demos/CSSNav.html

[MstrBob]

Originally posted by RefreshF5
you could also check out vladdys

http://www.vladdy.net/Demos/CSSNav.html

You know, that was the first that came to mind, but I couldn't for the life of me find that link... sorry Vladdy

[happy_hands]

Well I had a word with the design guys today, and they tell me it was first tested with Mozilla and it worked then, although they're not too sure why it's not working fully now, but they'll be looking into it.

I'll also be having words about the various elements of Alternate script that have been missed out, and the other features recognised as not quite right with the standard web protocol.

Those are all really useful links to see.

-- --

That's pretty sweet with what's been done with your site on the css sheet Vladdy, do I need to quote or reference any-one to use it on the site?