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First of all, thank you everyone for all the feedback. Your input is |
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important and greatly appreciated. |
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|
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I should have said that the last update was not complete as far as |
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design was concerned. I was mainly looking for accessibility and |
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rendering issues on as many browsers/OS's as possible. I got that |
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feedback and fixed the issues that came up. I also implemented the rest |
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of the design so it should now be more visually appealing and better |
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match Aarons reference design. I took into consideration all of the |
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suggestions that were submitted and now ask for additional feedback to |
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ensure that my changes didn't introduce any additional |
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rendering/accessibility bugs and that the design is acceptable to as |
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many people as possible. |
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|
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If there are no more outstanding issues reported I will submit this |
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current layout for approval. |
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|
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|
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Questions to some of the answers and suggestions that were brought up: |
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|
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The artwork is all part of the winning design. Any issues with the |
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infinity symbol should have been addressed a year ago. |
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|
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I am not the designer of this site. I am merely implementing it in the |
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XSL backend. I am the only person working on this and I am the |
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designated official developer, the project lead is Swift and his role is |
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to offer advice, enforce design policy and generally oversee my actions |
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and help me with internal gentoo policies and procedures. The project is |
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actually owned by Infra and they (they == infra leads which is klieber |
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and ramereth as far as I know), along with Swift, have the final say on |
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everything. I welcome any and all patches that you are willing to |
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submit. All submissions will be evaluated on a case by case basis. |
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|
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Aarons reference design at www.aaronshi.com/gentoo/ is exactly that: A |
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reference. In it's current form it differs from his original submission |
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which was the winning entry and should not be considered as anything |
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else but a reference. I tried to stick to that design as much as |
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possible but some things were simply not possible. |
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|
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Aarons design uses a smaller default font, that is not acceptable from |
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an accessibility POV. The main font is at 1em and all cursory fonts |
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multipliers of 1em. The main font will remain at 1em which is the |
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standard for the accessibility guidelines. If you don't like the |
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standard font size every single graphical browser offers a font zoom |
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capability, use it. |
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|
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Aarons use of a smaller font allows more information to appear on the |
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page. This is an illusion of size. If you have your browser window set |
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to 800x600 or smaller the jumpads disappear and the page has to be |
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scrolled to see them no matter how big/small the font is. If you enlarge |
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the font on Aarons reference to the standard 1em the jumppads disappear |
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and the page must be scrolled anyway so this point is moot. |
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|
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Purple background with yellow text is hideous. Not going to happen. |
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|
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The "Locator" would require rewrites of not only the XSL but also the |
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actual xml files and is outside the scope of this project. Touching any |
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xml content file is strictly off limits, all existing xml should be |
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backwards compatible with the new design. This point is not debatable. |
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Use of a database would make this task easier while allowing backwards |
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compatibility but it will have to wait for a future update to the site |
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to be implemented. |
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|
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I actually implemented a search that used google much like the example |
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that was posted here. The search was discussed at length with the |
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project lead and it was decided that using a third party search engine |
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such as google was unacceptable. As Lance said, this will have to be |
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coordinated with infra at a later date. Gentoo is a not-for-profit but, |
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unfortunetly, it is the wrong kind of non-profit so Google will not |
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sponsor us. |
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|
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The contents of the uppermost menu are to sites that are outside the |
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www.gentoo.org website. They will stay in this location. They are green |
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to contrast with the purple background to ensure that colorblind and |
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other visually impaired people can see it. Green is the compliment to |
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purple so I am baffled that people think the combination is not |
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attractive. In Aarons preview the light purple color of these links is |
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not visible to color blind individuals thus it is unacceptable. This |
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color will not change. |
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|
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The grey menu should contain links that would be used in order of a new |
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user and that highlight the main parts of the site. I did this quickly |
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to have something there to look at. I didn't notice any good suggestions |
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to replace what is there. If you have suggestions please send them. The |
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same goes for the wording in the purple boxes, if you don't like what |
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they say submit a suggestion for each. Suggestions of "I don't like it |
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you should change it" that don't include a clearly worded replacement |
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will be ignored. The donate box is here to stay until the search |
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function is implemented. |
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|
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Graphics should be implemented in the CSS as much as possible to aid |
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future maintenance (the xsl templates are huge and not easy to maintain. |
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The least amount of editing of these files as possible is one of the |
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major goals). In text browsers that can handle graphics but don't |
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support CSS the upper left logo (which is a background image so it can |
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be put in the css) will not appear but will leave space for the missing |
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background image. I can't figure out a way around this. If you have a |
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suggestion I would appreciate it. |
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|
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Horizontal scrolling of the entire page when a code listing is wider |
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than the page only happens in IE. All other browsers understand the CSS |
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scroll:auto tag and will only scroll the actual code listing. The same |
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applies to inline images within the page contents. IE is broken but I |
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did everything I could to make it behave the same as other browsers. |
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This is one issue that IE is simply broken on and there is nothing I can |
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do to fix that. Javascript fixes are available but the use of Javascript |
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is strictly forbidden. Javascript is not debatable. |
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|
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Redundant links to important pages such as the Handbook and Documention |
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only serve to make them easier for a user to locate. They will remain |
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for the time being unless someone can come up with a good reason to |
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remove them other than "I don't like it". |
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|
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The <hr /> tags in the Handbook navigation are contained within the |
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handbook xsl template. Touching that file is outside my scope. |
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|
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The redesign test site is not a full mirror. I added the security index |
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page so we could see what it looks like. |
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|
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The site is not XHTML it is HTML-4.01 Transitional and it passes the w3c |
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validator. Manually overriding HTML-4.01 Transitional in the w3c |
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validator is not required and any errors that it reports if you do this |
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will not be addressed. If you can come up with a good technical reason |
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why doing this would benefit anyone I will address it. |
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|
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Navigation and useability studies are beyond my scope. These issues |
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should have been addressed a year ago. |
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|
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The left hand navigation column is dead. No amount of beating this dead |
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horse will resurrect it. The jumppads will remain at the bottom and |
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appear on all non-documentation pages so that those links are accessible |
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as much as possible. |
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|
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<base href> is not needed for this site to function properly. If you |
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want to save the page locally you are free to do so and add the tag |
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yourself for your local copy. |
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|
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The CSS is only 12k. Why would shaving 4k off of it to make it 8k make a |
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difference to anyone? |
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|
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The site is dynamically generated with XSL/XML all the pages end in |
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.xml. There are no plans to change it to .xhtml now or in the future. |
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|
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The image on the about page is within the content xml file and not |
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within the XSL template. Touching about.xml or any other xml content |
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file is outside my scope. |
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|
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GLEP 10 is outside my scope. |
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|
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The jumppads have alt text. They always have. They pop up as tool tips |
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on every browser I have tested. If they aren't for you please submit |
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your browser version and OS and I will look into it. |
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|
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The blue text that represents code was darkened for accessibility |
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issues. It will not change. |
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|
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In Aarons preview the search box and the ads column are placed with a |
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Position:absolute and has it's size set. At resolutions below 800x600 |
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this makes the ads overlap the content and the search box overlap the |
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box to the left on every browser. When content is scarce the ads overlap |
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the footer. This is not fixable given the current state of css support |
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in the various browsers. After many many many long hours of research and |
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experimentation I decided that we would have to resort to a table for |
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the ads column and include the search (now donate) box within the div |
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that contains the four purple boxes with a % width to fix this issue. I |
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lowered the % width of the donate box and increased the others to bring |
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it more inline with Aarons original design. It's not perfect but it's |
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close enough. |
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|
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Accessibilty guidelines say that all text links should be underlined. I |
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made an exception for the grey menu bar for aesthetic purposes but will |
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not make an exception for any other links. |
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|
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gentoo.org and all domains owned by the Gentoo Foundation should render |
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correctly in all browsers that are still in general use. IE5 on the mac |
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is still a valid browser and will be supported as much as possible. |
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|
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Summary and authors are important and should be prominently displayed |
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before the actual content. On the current design they are on the right |
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in a tiny column that wraps every two words. This is unacceptable. These |
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items will stay at the top for now unless someone can come up with a |
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place to put them that makes sense, looks good, allows the summary to be |
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seen on top and not below the content (because a summary should be above |
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the content otherwise why have a summary if you have to scroll past the |
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content to see it?). The handbook is the only page that has a large list |
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of authors and authors only appear on the first page so this should not |
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be a problem. |
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|
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|
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|
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Here is a list of items that have changed since my last post: |
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|
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*menu code was changed from a floated block list to a simple inline div |
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with non-breaking spaces. This should fix the IE5 on Mac issue. |
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|
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*Background color for content was made light grey with black text for |
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better visibility of the text. Bright monitors should no longer be a |
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problem. |
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|
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*background color of the ads was made darker to contrast with the |
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content area. Decorative header was added. |
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|
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*white space was collapsed as much as possible. |
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|
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*all extraneous information and decorative news headers were removed |
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from the front page to help readability and to bring focus to the |
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information. This includes the cow image and text. Overwhelming amounts |
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of information on the front page should no longer be a problem. This |
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also brings the jumppads closer to the top so new users will be better |
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able to spot them. |
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|
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*table headers were centered and data cells left justified. |
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|
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*table borders are now collapsed and only 1px thick. They are no longer |
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ugly. |
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|
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*removed the BOLD from the design credit in the footer. This wasn't |
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supposed to be BOLD in the first place, probably a mistake on my part. |
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|
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*The purple boxes below the grey menu bar now only appear on the main index. |
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|
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*news poster date and submitter color changed to match Aarons design |
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|
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*added a filter that removes the author and date if they are missing or |
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script generated. |
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|
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*removed redundant doc title |
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|
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*removed the donation button image and replaced it with a simple button. |
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