Re: [www-redesign] status of http://wwwredesign.gentoo.org

[Curtis Napier]

> Xavier Neys wrote:
 >
 >> Curtis Napier wrote:
 >>
 >>> Xavier Neys wrote:
 >>>
 >>>> Links to GWN RSS feeds are not properly displayed:
 >>>> http://wwwredesign.gentoo.org/news/en/gwn/gwn.xml
 >>>> http://www.gentoo.org/news/en/gwn/gwn.xml
 >>>
 >>>
 >>> I forgot to copy over the image. fixed.
 >>
 >>
 >> The xml image is underlined and it's darn ugly IMHO.
 >
 >
 > It's even worse on printable pages:
 > http://wwwredesign.gentoo.org/news/en/gwn/gwn.xml?style=printable

Is it OK now?

> Xavier Neys wrote:
>
> I prefer a list of links to older news just like on the current site,
> but obviously not crammed in the left margin anymore.
> I you choose the "more news" approach, fair enough, but why use an extra
> /main/en/morenews.xml file with an extra ID that has to be defined in
> the DTD even though those IDs are not use anymore and extra logic in the
> xsl?
> All you need is a "?newsitemcount=20" link.
>

I went with the newsitemcount solution. Why didn't I think of that? Oh 
well, it's fixed now.

>>
>> 2. This design/layout does not lend itself very well to font resizing.
>
>
> Fair enough. It feels weird that some much emphasis has been put on
> accessibility but a site that does not allow visually-impaired users to
> grow their fonts is OK.
>

I'm working on this one. I think after the past year of this I have 
started to lose sight of a few major principals and have gotten 
sidetracked. I stepped back today and really looked at everything and I 
made some major changes to the underlying structure in the content area 
that will improve the way it handles increased font sizes/small windows. 
I'm still working on the menu but I should have it done by tomorrow.

More about this at the end of this mail.

>> 4.2 The nav bar is within the /xsl/handbook.xsl file. I was told not
>> to touch that file. I take your suggestion to change the nav bar as
>> permission to touch it now. Swift, if you still want me to not touch
>> the handbook let me know and I'll drop in the unchanged one. I have
>> started experimenting with how to make that nav bar better, if anyone
>> has any ideas let me know.
>
>
> Improving could be done, simply removing the <hr>'s is not an improvement.
> Anyway, this should not be a requirement to more on with this project IMO.
>

I'm still working on the handbook menu, anybody have any ideas? I'm 
going to try the green arrows somehow or other unless someone can come 
up with something better.


> 2nd & 3rd level title look better.
> I can't say as much of the top titles :(
>

How are the titles now?

> BTW, numbered chapters in the handbook index would be better IMO
> (http://wwwredesign.gentoo.org/doc/en/handbook/handbook-x86.xml)
>
> Besides, guides start with an unordered list, book chapters start with a
> numbered list. Neither has any "Content" title.
>

I made all the content lists numbered/lettered and added "Content:" to 
them. Look at the Handbook (the main handbook index AND the content) and 
a guide and see what you think. Is this good?

-------------------------------------

I made a major change to the content area. I did this to address the 
problem of "Dead Space" under the ad bar that several people have 
complained about and to help make the site degrade properly when fonts 
are increased or the window is small.

Doing this caused a problem with block items overlapping the ads. This 
is because in order to get text to wrap under it (ad bar) I had to float 
it instead of absolutely positioning it. Items like: warning, important, 
note and codetables had to change the way the title is done from a div 
to a span to keep the background color from stretching across the page 
and overlapping the ads. The bottom part of them is now a <p> instead of 
a div for the same reason. The header will now only have a colored 
background directly under the text instead of a banner that goes across 
the page. Other than that it still looks the same.

Look for this in the next few days: I'm going to be making a change to 
the way the menu works (not the way it looks, only the HTML that renders 
it). The change will make it degrade more gracefully with larger fonts 
or in small windows. As usual IE is giving me lots of headaches or I 
would already have it done.

Thanks for bringing this up neysx. You are right, if I am going to focus 
on accessibility I need to apply it everywhere and not selectivly.

It's all coming together now thanks to the excellent feedback. Keep it 
coming people! :-)

-Curtis
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