themoonshake Posted…

I come to read the latest post, so i never go past the first couple posts on the fornt page. So older posts are kinda useless to me. Do anything, but don't use a dark background. Stick with white. Eye-friendly. And let's not make the columns too wide, my screen is 1400px wide but I try to minimize the side-ways movement of my head and eyeballs while reading. That and it's so easy to get lost if the paragraphs are too wide. The heading should say web-graphics rather than wg. And the "Find" button should stand out, like grey on white, not white on white.

P.S.: One thing i just noticed: I'm typing my name on this form and I hit Tab and the cursor lands on the Find button. I want it to move to the URL field. So the tab order need some fixing too.

Nate Posted…

I'm going to put a reminder to myself here - I need to make the comment box work better, this whole HTML-required thing is unfriendly. Personally I like using Markdown, how would other folks feel if the comment system used it? You can try it out here.

Elaine Posted…

Don't go any wider, please, just for readability reasons. Honestly, I'd love to see the font size go up a bit; my eyeballs are getting old.

I like to see what's going on out there, and you guys often have excellent links with a little bit of useful commentary.

And I agree about the tab order, too.

liorean Posted…

Well, I like the current airy design. Don't clutter it - if you are going to have different types of content, keep them separate. I much prefer the model where seldom changing links and such are separate pages to when everything is in it's own little box in the side bar on the main page.

One change I would consider is to have one blog for short and small entries and one articles section for the mustier ones.

I personally like the HTML part of the comment system. It gives much more freedom of expression. I never quite know how my posts are going to look in other systems. But a choice of plaintext/XHTML/Markdown wouldn't hurt.

Oh, about the width: As long as it works in half-screen 1280 I'll be happy. I size my browser so that I can have two full windows beside each others. Maybe a liquid/fixed switcher?

I second the font size, not because it's hard to read but because I don't particularly like small font sizes.

Andreas Posted…

Some random points:

• I support liorean's idea for a liquid/fixed switcher.
• The subscription manager is a good thing - I hope the new design also has one.
• What to do with the forgotten resources page?
• Markdown & co are OK, but also allow HTML input in the comment field.
• It would be cool if "Reported by PosterName" is clickable and refers to the about page with # reference.
• RSS feed: instead of the current <title>PosterName: lorem ipsum</title> it would be nice if the PosterName was included between <author> tags or so.
• overflow: hidden for long links in comments.
• Comment URL field should be longer.
• Comment layout that doesn't break older comments (without <p> tags).
• Better margin/padding balance - now, there's too much space between lists and paragraphs and between paragraphs and paragraphs.

paul haine Posted…

I really like the existing design as it is, but anyway...if you're going to move to a wider layout, then you should only do so if you plan to add more content to the pages — simply increasing the width now would just lead to longer lines and decrease readability, unless you plan to increase the font size at the same time (which wouldn't hurt — like Elaine, my eyes aren't what they used to be.

I've got no problem with the forced HTML — it is a web designer's resource, isn't it? Anybody commenting ought to be fine using HTML. I don't see any gain in removing it but using Markdown or Textile instead — it's still making the commenter use a markup language.

Nate Posted…

Just a quick note about Markdown - it has no limitations in terms of HTML you can use with it, at least that I'm aware of. So while I do think making this comment box friendlier is important, we won't be removing the ability to customize posts for the advanced set.

Jeremy Keith Posted…

Please don't increase the width of your pages. My monitor is 1440 pixels wide but I don't like browsing with a large horizontal browser window. If you're looking to make some changes, I would strongly suggest moving to a liquid layout. As long as it's done properly, i.e. the negative space expands and contracts along with the content, then it's going to keep everyone happy.

As for design, what I really like about Web Graphics is what it doesn't have: gradients and drop shadows. Whatever design changes you make, please don't follow the now very tired trend of putting gradients and drop shadows on everything.

Posted…

I think I need to clarify. Paragraph widths would remain close to where they are now. What I meant to convey is that the layout would exist in a slightly wider format. For instance, 900 pixels instead of 730.

Pepe Posted…

Deal. No drop shadows. How about a simulated page curl? Just kidding.

Nate Posted…

This is more technical than design, but regarding Andreas's "The subscription manager is a good thing - I hope the new design also has one." - how would folks feel if each post had a comment RSS that you could subscribe to instead?

liorean Posted…

Hmm, just a thought: How much clutter would introducing a post category system add? It's be nice to have separate Accessibility, Web Design, Browser News, Usability, Scripting, Utility etc. non-exclusive categories.

Pepe Posted…

Categories have been kicked around a bit. If all the authors can agree on a particular # of categories, I think it could work.

Andreas Posted…

How would folks feel if each post had a comment RSS that you could subscribe to instead?

Sounds good, too.

If all the authors can agree on a particular # of categories, I think it could work.

In case WG introduces a category system, this is maybe a good place to decide which categories we are going to use. The UMD Web Design References taxonomy looks like a good start. Anyone?

liorean Posted…

Well, what I think is important about a category system is that it's not exclusive - e.g. just because an entry belongs in the Accessibility category , it's not directly by necessity not a perfect candidate for the Usability category. An entry can fall out of any defined category, or fall in multiple categories.

Nate Posted…

I've always had issues with categories applied to blog posts here, I very much like the concept and aims behind some sort of category system, but I think there are too many failure points. Much of the problem stems from the multi-author environment we have here. I want to make sure that creating a post is easy for authors to accomplish, and isn't discouraged by a complex classification system. Here are some problems I see with applying categories to Web-Graphics weblog posts:

• Too few (problem: "design, markup, other" - even the first two have lots of crossover)
• Too many (problem: author must evaluate 15 or more category concepts, labor intesive, who decides if a new topic is "category worthy")
• Hierarchy/Taxonomies (problem: complicated system of categories and sub-categories, also labor intensive for author)
• Muliple Categories (problem: simillar to "too many" problem)

I'm more inclined to apply a tag system, which seem to be all the rage these days. I really like how tags work with Flickr for photo searching, I'm not sure if that would be a good idea to apply to blog posts though - for the readers or the authors.

The other issue - I can't recall ever once using a weblog's category system, but that could just be me.

Andreas Posted…

Hmm. You got a couple of good points there, Nate.

About tags: tagging is the latest hype indeed, but it might slow down posting even more than a category system. As this is a site smaller than Flickr or del.icio.us, WG authors will try to use tags in a coherent way, so as to avoid doubles or synonyms—verifying those doubles will cost time, thereby slowing down the posting process.

Blair Millen Posted…

As I'm in the middle of redesigning my freelance site with a default width fixed of 900px wide, I'm inclined to give you the thumbs up regarding width. I'm also including a styleswitcher to adjust it to 700px for those who prefer the smaller scale.