You have just seconds That's all you
have to convince a user to read your webpage. And that's from
when the user first clicked on the link. So load time is important,
actually it's critical. Then once they see the page, will it keep
their interest long enough to get your message across?
Legos are recognized
around the world as a child's toy, primarily blocks that link
together first in such basic shapes as the wall of a brick building
and later with many modifications and great creativity, such intricate
shapes as full size animals and more. The same is true about the
basic tools of formatting a webpage. While some formatting can
be done with spacing and attributes in tags, three methods will
be considered here first: frames, layers and tables. We'll try
to be fair to all three, but we will discover strengths and weaknesses
of each.
Ah, frames. They allow
us to scroll on one part of the page while another part remains stationary.
It's wonderful to scroll down through a long document while the links
remain stable and readily available for moving on. Essentially the
webpage has been divided into several smaller webpages and you can
view each one separately. That means that you are also coding several
webpages to create one webapage. Of course, the "link" webpage
doesn't have to change with each "visible" webpage, only
the "main" portion has to be created each time. But, webmasters
and broswer develolpers have left the "frames" in the dust.
It is not heralded as a great formatting tool and is seldom used on
big popular websites.
Certainly layers is a
heaven-sent for webpage deisgners. You can put images and text almost
anywhere on the page and you don't need to worry predesigning a layout.
While this option is exciting and very enticing for those who don't
want to dwell in the land of rigid tables, browsers don't know how
to handle layers well. Each browser seems to do something a little
different and so the webmaster never knows how the webpage will look
to the user. Some companies have spent big money to get rid of their
"layer" websites. If you a "layer" lover, don't
despair, there is a place for layers which we'll explore in more detail
later.
So we're stuck with
tables, blocky awkward tables. But there's help. Probably one
of the easiest places to get help is from PhotoShop when you take
an image, slice out a block, the program figures out the surrounding
blocks and when you save the image as a webpage, it codes the
table for you. After you watched the mindless computer do this
several times, you too can do what a computer can do. And more.
Assignment Two For this assignment
you are to search the Internet to critically review the quality and
effectiveness of websites. For a start go to Websites
that suck and get other group's opinion. This website also gives
tools and hints for designing your website. Choose one or more websites
and write your thoughts about why it is good or bad. It is not acceptable
for you to merely choose one of the Websites
that suck and say that you agree. Check out the Top 20 Confessed
Web Design Sins.
There are commentaries on good websites
also, such as WebReference.com.
Remember write about one page, double-spaced
type, with a opening paragraph identifying several websites, at
least one paragraph giving details about the good or bad features
of the websites and a final paragraph summarizing your argument.
The topic? Something like "The Terrible Features of the Foogle
Website."
This is due April 15-16.
Office hours: Tuesday - noon-4:00PM
Wednesday - 8:00AM-noon
Thursday - noon-4:00PM
Also by appointment and drop-ins
