The time has come to think of re-design and 2007

[Dan]

Righto guys. the time has come to start re-designing the site for the new season.

list your likes and dislikes about last years site and what you would like to see this year. Any suggestions or examples would be great. Not so much for new features but more for layout of the site is all.

If anyone wants to try making a design themselves I would be more than happy to accept it and put it to the vote of the members.

So lets get cracking hey?

Dan

 

[Matabele]

Can you reinstate my ability to change the poll?

 

[Jatz Crackers]

This will most likely be same or similar to my feedback last year but ill put it forward anyway.

I like the 2 east & west pillars with a central wider main column in the middle as the design. This being the design setup as we see in the forum page.

Because there is stacks of info involved, I would like to see the east and west pillars to each have a heading, such as west being "user info" and east being "footy info". As an example the west pillar could contain only user specific info boxes like, "online Info" "Private Message" "chatbox" etc etc. While the east pillar would only contain footy specific info boxes like, "gallery" "articles" "NRL ladder etc etc

Also, maybe colour the pillars background in maroon with white or light coloured info boxes &/or writing imposed over the top of the maroon. The main middle section inbetween the pillars could be coloured and formatted differently or contrasting so as to standout.

With this design, there is the issue of where to put the necessary income making ads. Maybe a thick horizontal band area located just underneath the band containing
>>Home >>Forum >> Silvertails articles >> Ex-Player profiles............
with the ads scrolling across screen. Similar to (but much thicker) than the current scrolling band containing the articles, which could be done away with IMO. The ads banner would then be in a prominent position and would do away with boxy style ads that look untidy where currently located.

Other feedback is sometimes when I go into forums the format there is all disjointed with some posts moving outside the middle coloumn and into the pillars on the side. No big drama but when that happens it makes it difficult to follow. A code writing issue maybe ??

In my wish list would be more info including head shot photo & players stats of all NRL & PL players . I know this might not be possible considering copyright issue.

Good stuff about the site in no particular order is a) overall layout/design (continually being improved) b) good user info so we all come to know other users well c) honest & forthright nature of the site and its contributors d) photo contributions are a real assett. Oh and the forum here is the best ive seen.

Hope this helps somewhat.

 

[Dan]

thanks Jatz I will wade through that and respond shortly. some good feedback and I like the idea of the columns being for specific things rather than anything anywhere, i kind of try to keep the more important stuff up top at the moment

As for the posts being disjointed this is due to users signatures, banners and images, unfortunately if someone posts and image i can not control its size with great ease which in turn pushes out the width of the page.

I will see what I can restrict though

 

[The Wheel]

Apart from removing any trace of YARTS from the site can I suggest:

1/ The site to get a more maroon & white look/feel, inc forums
2/ The revolving photo gallery should only include recent photos of players eg I have nightmares everytime I see a photo of Solo or Chad Randall pop up
3/ Not sure of the value of the next 'next game/result box' - maybe just a countdown clock until the next match with the location etc

 

[fLIP]

Is there any way of making a quick menu where the sites most visited sections are put in one short list on the front page. And it can change itself when something else becomes more popular for that time period.

It might steer people to the sections that are most popular when they first arrive at the site, enticing them to stay. Rather than stumbling through menus to find the best content.

 

[Dan]

That is coding. I want design and layout only. I like the idea but that will be a phase 2 thing

 

[fLIP]

Ok, sorry. Maybe just narrow it down to the Theme's you usually give us and we could vote.

 

[gomanly]

put a thread of "calls" people make through the year, eg "king wont be in first grade" or "Manly will be top four" etc, this way we can see what people say through the year and it would be interesting to see how opinions change as the '07 season goes forward, who knows we might uncover the oracle!!

 

[Fluffy]

add a porn and downloads section so i can do all my net surfing on the one site