Re: Visual problems on the front page
Hello again,
Jutta Wrage wrote:
At first the corners are already CSS. I can play a bit with the
border-radius. But more it not possible in my point of view, if we do
not want static box sizes. Posting the link to layouts was not really
helpful for me at all. Maybe, a new layout will not have rounded
corners at all. But until ha new layout can be applied to all pages,
there is other work to be done first.
If corners looks jagged with CSS that does not include images, I would
suggest using images for the corners. This is entirely possible without
using static box sizes.
It's a pity the link to the layouts wasn't helpful, as at contains a lot
of good examples of nice web design.
When it comes to doing other work first, I would strongly suggest to put
the look of the front page high on the list. Here's why:
- The front page is the face of the entire Debian project; it's crucial
to make a good first impression
- Jagged corners, horrible combinations of colors, fonts that doesn't
fit the logo's, <hr>-lines and a design that looks like it was pulled
out of a monkey's ass in the 80's does not give a good first impression
I'm not meaning to bash your or your website here - it is technically
brilliant! I have a lot of respect for all of you, and your work. I love
the Debian project. But, for heavens sake, do something about the
design! I'm telling you this very plain and straight-forward, with
constructive intentions. No, actually, I'm pleading you. :-)
Now, I'm no web-guru. I've made a few pages, read a few books about the
topic, had a subject about it at uni, been responsible for an intranet
with 1,4k users but I truly suck compared to the clever people out
there. If I felt I was the right guy to rescue the Debian front page, I
would take on the task right away, but I'm not. I can point the finger,
but not fix the problem.
Here's a page a just made about rounded corners, which includes a
screenshot of how jagged the corners look at my computer:
http://www.pvv.org/~alexanro/rounded.html
I understand the culture of the meritocracy, where every suggestion
are responded to with a "do it yourself",
That is not my thing normally. But your message was not really helpful
at all. Maybe, the corners look more ugly on your computer than on my.
Then a screenshot might have been helpful. Many people did not notice
the switch to css instead of using table and fixed size images for the
navbar. So it cannot be that worse. ;-)
I'm sorry if you don't find "Wake up! The website is ugly and I think it
hurts the Debian project!" helpful. That's all I have to offer right now.
If it was up to me, I would introduce CSS-corners right away, even if
the fallback was square corners. Everything is better than jagged
edges. :-)
I am really not sure, if gecko based browsers will display CSS3
corners differnent from the current CSS corners with
-moz-border-radius in the CSS.
I'm not sure either, but I believe they do.
Doing it the same way as the majority of pages with rounded corners
(images in the corners, without jagged corners), is also a possibility.
Not an option, if you want to display the navbar well with font-sizes
from very small up to extremely large.
For larger text boxes images are an option, for small ones like the
blue ones in the navbar, not.
Why isn't it an option?
BTW: look at the page with the free layout, choose larger font setting
in your browser and see how that page breaks totally while the debian
pages still are readable with large fonts. I invested several hours to
find another solution for the navbar with the same look and feel as
the old one with images. But everything did either not work at all or
was totally broken with large fonts.
Hey, at large font-sizes, the corners look a lot better. I must say I'm
really impressed with how well the page scales with the font-sizes,
browsers and screen sizes. That is incredibly well done and I'm totally
inferior when it comes to skills like that. See, I'm not all full of
critique. :-)
No matter what direction you may choose for your webpage, I wish you the
best of luck, and appreciate your work.
Best regards,
Alexander Rødseth
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