Site Ratings & Reviews - May I see some good examples?

Author

May I see some good examples?

mvmishler@yahoo.com

2006-03-11, 6:17 pm

I'm just confused at what is good, because nobody's site in here even comes
close to cutting the mustard. What is an example of a site that's even
close to critique standards? What are the URL's of the people here who
critique. I'd like to know by example what is a good site.

Thanks in advance!
Michael

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Jim Moe

2006-03-11, 10:15 pm

mbstevens

2006-03-11, 10:15 pm

mvmishler@yahoo.com wrote:
> I'm just confused at what is good,

At the risk of feeding a troll
I would suggest beef ribs and a very cold beer.

What is an example of a site that's even
close to critique standards?

http://www.webstandards.org

And any site covering beef ribs and very cold beer.
--
mbstevens

Chris Beall

2006-03-12, 6:26 pm

mvmishler@yahoo.com wrote:
> I'm just confused at what is good, because nobody's site in here even comes
> close to cutting the mustard. What is an example of a site that's even
> close to critique standards? What are the URL's of the people here who
> critique. I'd like to know by example what is a good site.
>
> Thanks in advance!
> Michael

mv,

Keep in mind that this is alt.HTML.critique, so you should not be
surprised to find that most comments you receive here are related to
HTML technical issues, not to the kinds of things that would concern a
traditional graphics designer (though we often get into those as well).

To 'cut the mustard' here, a site should demonstrate awareness of, and
respect for, a number of basic truths. I have summarized most of them
at http://pages.prodigy.net/chris_beall/TC/index.html. I believe that
those pages themselves meet most of the technical criteria that would be
applied here. Note, however, that they are informative but not
presented in a way that would win any graphics design awards. I
believe, however, that the presentation is appropriate to the material
being presented, which is a design criteria often overlooked in sites
submitted here.

Another site of mine, http://BeallSprings.org, also should meet most of
the technical criteria. Again, it does not provide the sort of flashy
display you most often see in commercial sites. A very early version of
this site was reviewed here with little negative comment (except that it
was sparse on content, which is gradually being corrected.)

Most of the sites presented here for critique were done by people who
are just getting started or have done only a few sites. They have
learned from tutorials they found on the web, many of which are
seriously deficient, rather than from the primary sources (i.e. the W3C
Recommendations). It is therefore not surprising that many of them
generate numerous (and similar) 'negative' comments. But these comments
are not negative in the value sense. We assume you submit your site for
review because you want to learn; each comment is therefor part of the
learning experience you requested. [There's a fair chance, even though
I haven't requested a review, that I'm about to learn something about
the sites I've referred to above. I expect that. I will learn
something. That's why I'm here.]

Chris Beall

Spartanicus

2006-03-12, 6:26 pm

Jim Moe <jmm-list.AXSPAMGN@sohnen-moe.com> wrote:

><http://www.csszengarden.com/>

CSS zengarden is an example of poor coding. It tries to push CSS as a
technology capable of radically changing the look and layout of a site.
To do this it litters the markup with loads of spurious code. CSS should
*not* be used in that way. Markup should be minimal, the idea that major
changes can be made to a site without touching the markup is a fallacy.

><http://www.independent-testers.org/>

Poor alt content.
Screwed up document outline.
Headers that aren't headers.
Divs & spans used where semantic & structural markup should have been
used.

--
Spartanicus

Andrew Cameron

2006-03-12, 6:26 pm

Spartanicus wrote:
> CSS zengarden is an example of poor coding. It tries to push CSS as a
> technology capable of radically changing the look and layout of a site.
> To do this it litters the markup with loads of spurious code. CSS should
> *not* be used in that way. Markup should be minimal, the idea that major
> changes can be made to a site without touching the markup is a fallacy.

That's pretty accurate, but there are some damned pretty sites there,
and Dave Shea even mentions that this is not how markup should be
written. This doesn't stop clients asking for sites that can be "Zen
Garden-ified" so that they can change the entire layout with one CSS
file. If it really was that easy to re-style the site completely
through the CSS, they wouldn't be coming to me for the work in the first
place.

--
Regards,
Andrew Cameron
http://dumpage.net/

Jim Moe

2006-03-12, 6:26 pm

Spartanicus wrote:
>
>
> Poor alt content.
> Screwed up document outline.
> Headers that aren't headers.
> Divs & spans used where semantic & structural markup should have been
> used.
>
Well! I rashly assumed such an organization would test its own site.

--
jmm (hyphen) list (at) sohnen-moe (dot) com
(Remove .AXSPAMGN for email)

SpaceGirl

2006-03-17, 6:18 pm

Chris Beall

2006-03-18, 6:20 pm

SpaceGirl wrote:
> mvmishler@yahoo.com wrote:
>
>
>
>
> www.thefwa.com
>
Michael,

Everyone is entitled to their opinion, but I would like to point out
that Spacegirl's entry on this list, as well as the sites that it lists,
do not meet the criteria generally espoused here. They may be good
sites from the perspective of visual appearance, but they are not good
from the standpoint of:
- Use of open, nonproprietary technology.
- Adaptability to a variety of user environments, including
accessibility for those working in a non-visual mode.
- Search engine accommodation.

In other words, they appear to be good print designs, but not good web
designs.

Chris Beall

kchayka

2006-03-18, 6:20 pm

SpaceGirl wrote:
> mvmishler@yahoo.com wrote:
>
> www.thefwa.com

Hey, where's your smiley, SpaceGirl? I figure you must be joking to post
a Flash site as a good example in a newsgroup for *html* critiques. ;)

Microscopic, low-contrasting text doesn't exactly fit the criteria,
either, methinks.

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Please reply to the group so everyone can share.

Chaddy2222

2006-03-19, 6:23 pm

SpaceGirl

2006-03-20, 6:16 am

kchayka wrote:
> SpaceGirl wrote:
>
> Hey, where's your smiley, SpaceGirl? I figure you must be joking to post
> a Flash site as a good example in a newsgroup for *html* critiques. ;)

hah!

>
> Microscopic, low-contrasting text doesn't exactly fit the criteria,
> either, methinks.

Which shows how little you know about design, marketing and targeting
an audience :)

kchayka

2006-03-20, 6:34 pm

SpaceGirl wrote:
> kchayka wrote:
>
> Which shows how little you know about design, marketing and targeting
> an audience :)

LOL.

Lots of things look pretty (on paper or on screen), but that doesn't
mean I can read the fine print without a magnifying glass, or that I
want to sit in the dark just to improve the contrast on screen. ;)

I may not be a graphic designer, but I'm not totally clueless on the
subject of targeting an audience. Someone just sent me this link and
wanted my opinion on the site:
<URL:http://www.msr-advertising.com/>

From strictly a usability standpoint, it's about as bad a site as you'll
ever come across. I concede, however, that it may be entirely
appropriate for their particular target audience, which obviously isn't me.

They must be targeting those folks who are attracted to shiny objects
and are mesmerized by movement on screen, like toddlers or TV executives. ;)

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Please reply to the group so everyone can share.

Els

2006-03-20, 6:34 pm

kchayka wrote:

> <URL:http://www.msr-advertising.com/>

> They must be targeting those folks who are attracted to shiny objects
> and are mesmerized by movement on screen, like toddlers or TV executives. ;)

Or people who like white.
The Flash doesn't load at all in my Opera. It does in Firefox, and I
do know I have Flash enabled in Opera too, so I'm guessing it needs a
certain version of Flash and they don't bother to tell the visitor
that? I only get a blank screen.

--
Els http://locusmeus.com/

Now playing: Jethro Tull - Broadsword

Ben Measures

2006-03-20, 6:34 pm

On Mon, 20 Mar 2006 02:09:16 -0800, SpaceGirl wrote:

> kchayka wrote:
>
>
> Which shows how little you know about design, marketing and targeting
> an audience :)

How does "low-contrast text" have anything to do with "targeting an
audience"?

Designers need to be careful they don't unconsciously use fluff-speak such
as "targeting an audience" to justify /restricting/ an audience - it's
just not the same thing.

--
Ben Measures
$email =~ s/is@silly/@/

SpaceGirl

2006-03-21, 6:17 pm

kchayka wrote:
> SpaceGirl wrote:
>
> LOL.
>
> Lots of things look pretty (on paper or on screen), but that doesn't
> mean I can read the fine print without a magnifying glass, or that I
> want to sit in the dark just to improve the contrast on screen. ;)

A site doesn't need to be "pretty" to work well. The problem I have is
with designers to boxed in to understand the WWW is so much more than
static pages and HTML. Random digs at flash display nothing other than
the shortsighedness of the poster, I think :)

> I may not be a graphic designer, but I'm not totally clueless on the
> subject of targeting an audience. Someone just sent me this link and
> wanted my opinion on the site:
> <URL:http://www.msr-advertising.com/>
>
> From strictly a usability standpoint, it's about as bad a site as you'll
> ever come across. I concede, however, that it may be entirely
> appropriate for their particular target audience, which obviously isn't me.
>
> They must be targeting those folks who are attracted to shiny objects
> and are mesmerized by movement on screen, like toddlers or TV executives. ;)

LOL! yes :)