Please Have A Look At My Website

[camdaman]

I would like to invite anyone to take a look at my site and review so I can work on making changes.

It is greatly appreciated!

http://www.crystalgage.com :)

[the tree]

Splash pages were an idea thought up for slow loading applications and such like, there's no point in using them for webpages. Don't confuse webdesign with sex (http://www.webpagesthatsuck.com/dontconfusewebdesignwithsex.html).
You realy ought to run that through the validator (http://validator.w3.org).
You evidently haven't tested the site in Firefox (http://getfirefox.com), it falls apart.
The gallery, and the journal are really inconsistent with the rest of the pages, it just looks unproffessional.

[spufi]

No web design professional would be caught dead using the fonts that are used on the splash page either. I was almost surprised the fonts were fairly solid once I got to the actual site.

[camdaman]

Right away you people start attacking, 85% use IE therefore my site looks fine, majority have high speed so if you still have dial up GET A LIFE, on top of that I have gotten lots of great comments on the sites design and everyone loves it so really I dont know why I opened the forum for this.

I think I wanted suggestions on how to make it better not rude comments about it!

Also, The Journal page is obviously not my code, and neither is the Messageboard page and trust me there are many pages where one page is different then the rest and really WHO REALLY CARES, technically the design is not the purpose of the site anyways its the information on the site that is important.

So all of you who have made cruel comments already can shove it! :mad: :mad:

[Vladdy]

You asked for review, you got a review.
If you wanted a praise, you should have asked your mom's opinion :rolleyes:

Adding to the aforementioned reasons why your site sucks:
- It tries to set a cookie when I first get there. I did not ask for it.
- No DOCTYPE
- Use of last century markup
- No form data validation makes your site vulnerable to SQL insertion :eek:

[the tree]

Right away you people start attacking, 85% use IE therefore my site looks fine,I really don't follow that logic, it may well look fine for 85% but your still excluding 15% of your visitors. majority have high speed so if you still have dial up GET A LIFE,Well although I do have high speed, the majority don't. It still took at least a minute to load, not that I'd actually commented on load times but anyways.on top of that I have gotten lots of great comments on the sites design and everyone loves it so really I dont know why I opened the forum for this.As Vladdy said, you can always ask your mothers opinoin if you want to seek praise.I think I wanted suggestions on how to make it better not rude comments about it!You think that? Well you may well be wrong if you react like that wehn you get your suggestions.Also, The Journal page is obviously not my code, and neither is the Messageboard pageSo your point is? Is it that hard to use a few includes and change colours?
trust me there are many pages where one page is different then the rest and really WHO REALLY CARES,Well consistency makes getting around the site easier and doesn't give your visitors a sense of having more thrown at them than they asked for. technically the design is not the purpose of the site anyways its the information on the site that is important.That is rather true, so why do you put a splash page between your visitors and thier content? and for that matter, why are you making your content inaccessable to visitors who chose to use standards compliant browsers?

[LJK]

Hi -
Yeah, it's always tough when you put your 'baby' out there for others to critique - I mean, everyone thinks their kid's adorable, right? ;-)

Trust me, you need to hear this kind of thing in order to develop your skills, or you'll get too complacent. It's also a fact that others may actually know more; and thus, can help you to grow as a designer and coder. Don't get pissy; just get better.

Good luck,
El

[Sir Jake]

Camdaman,

These people reveiw all kinds of sites and don't try to butter up a negative point. Take what they say as lessons NOT rude comments.

The splash page is unessessary, and the font on it is silly, really.

The site does not look professional, really. It's not a silly site for fun, it's to promote a singer...it's business. Look at the sites of other singers and bands and you'll see what I mean. Yes the Journal and Message Board should have the same look of the entire site, (by being IN the same site). Use a template like css or something if your having trouble unifying everything.

Dare to compare.......you'll notice no splash page........

http://www.islandrecords.com/fefedobson/home.las

[camdaman]

I have read the last few comments and have relized that I was out of line and yes I am going to take these things into consideration.

I would like to comment on some of the suggestions though.

- The journal and messageboard is not mine and www.jasonmccoy.com has the same messageboard and it does not follow same color scheme either, I feel this is fine, not that big of a deal

- validation for my style sheet, I copied CSS file from another site and changed it to fit mine and I think its to big deal, site still works

- I am not sure what cookie you are talking about and that may be from my counter and again I use that as a free program have no control over that

- No DOCTYPE - dont know really what you mean by this, I know when I use dreamweaver, it puts stuff at the top of the page, I always delete it cause I think its junk you dont really need

- Use of last century markup - I am not sure of this either, I find my coding is pretty good for what I am trying to accomplish

- No form data validation makes your site vulnerable to SQL insertion - the new version of the site(updated in January) I have not added form validation, I am currently changing to ASP.NET and I will use validation for my forms here.

- I found out the hard way with the first post saying FireFox it falls apart, I use IE, so I DL FireFox and WOW, I think I have design changes to work on. I am redoing the entire site to look good with firefox and IE, not worried about mozilla or opera.

I am sorry for my attack back at you all, I will again use this to my advantage and hopefully when I am finished with the new site I will be up to par with my coding and techniques.

Again Thanks and Hope for more reviews :)

[camdaman]

so why do you put a splash page between your visitors and thier content? and for that matter, why are you making your content inaccessable to visitors who chose to use standards compliant browsers?

I am using the splash page mainly for news and stuff that happening. Also I have dl some flash templates for entire flash website, do you think this is a good idea, they are from swishzone.com? :confused:

[spufi]

I am using the splash page mainly for news and stuff that happening. Also I have dl some flash templates for entire flash website, do you think this is a good idea, they are from swishzone.com? :confused:

The news and what's happening can easily be put on the actual main page of the site. Using a Flash only site is going to really hurt for dial up users. You could use Flash for your logo, or something of that sort, but Flash is generally best used in small amounts.

[camdaman]

I can understand this for dialup users, I guess I can eventually have sites for both, what is the percentage of users that have dialup now a days is it not almost gone!!! other then country people!

[LJK]

Hi -
Chicago, Il., USA - dial-up

[spend $ on other things
that seem to matter more...]

"I love learning Flash; I just don't always enjoy viewing it."

El