RamiusJoined: July 19, 2000Administrator, ClubPAadmin
edited November 2005
You know how you have that database of keywords for the comics? How about throwing those keywords into a list of words as alt-text for the comic. That would also help out google and everyone who uses it a whole bunch. I think there is also an alt attribute or something similar that goes on <a href> tags that can be used to describe what the link is. Tycho regularly links the comic from the newspost. Those same keywords could be made to be part of that link. When you have as good of pagerank as PA has, it makes sense to be as descriptive as possible where you can, because your pagerank will contribute to great placement on all of those keywords.
Plus I think the alt text might be what you can search for in the comic search thing and no ones done it for a while, so you can only search for older comics.
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Just_Bri_ThanksSeething with ragefrom a handbasket.Registered User, ClubPAregular
Plus I think the alt text might be what you can search for in the comic search thing and no ones done it for a while, so you can only search for older comics.
Wasn't that paticular problem corrected some time ago?
Just_Bri_Thanks on
...and when you are done with that; take a folding
chair to Creation and then suplex the Void.
A note : Gabe and Tycho use some really old and invalid HTML syntax, and they aren't too consistent about it. I understand it is broken at places, but really, I'm only one man and there are hundreds of news posts.
Couldn't you make some sort of BBCode esk code for them to use? I have no idea what the set up is for them, and what they must to do update the news, but I figure if you implamented something like that, it would keep them from using invalid HTML syntax. It wouldn't fix the old post, but it would deffinitly help keep the new ones in line for the future.
Plus I think the alt text might be what you can search for in the comic search thing and no ones done it for a while, so you can only search for older comics.
A note : Gabe and Tycho use some really old and invalid HTML syntax, and they aren't too consistent about it. I understand it is broken at places, but really, I'm only one man and there are hundreds of news posts.
Couldn't you make some sort of BBCode esk code for them to use? I have no idea what the set up is for them, and what they must to do update the news, but I figure if you implamented something like that, it would keep them from using invalid HTML syntax. It wouldn't fix the old post, but it would deffinitly help keep the new ones in line for the future.
Eventually that is the plan, but I'd rather the frontend be clean and the backend be ugly than vice versa.
Plus I think the alt text might be what you can search for in the comic search thing and no ones done it for a while, so you can only search for older comics.
:oops:
That was the old site.
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RamiusJoined: July 19, 2000Administrator, ClubPAadmin
edited November 2005
One thing I'm noticing is that while the page-text is loading super duper fast, the entire page (graphics and everything) is feeling like it loads slower than before.
For some reason I notice it more in IE than in Firefox. I don't know if that has to do with the way it handles caching, or if it is just more noticiable because the png's take a moment to snap into transparent mode, or what.
When doing a shift-reload, so as to force it to reload all the graphics, I'm counting slowly to about 5 or 8 before everything loads.
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RamiusJoined: July 19, 2000Administrator, ClubPAadmin
edited November 2005
I've been thinking about the [*] problem, and something you might do as a pretty straightforward interim fix is this:
div.postbody > li { margin-left:14px;}
I only tested it in Firefox and IE, though. I couldn't tell you if it will work for Safari and Opera.
EDIT:
while you're in the css file. You should sneak this into the .newspost .postbody:
line-height: 1.3em;
It should be a subtle difference, nobody needs to know except you and me.
A note : Gabe and Tycho use some really old and invalid HTML syntax, and they aren't too consistent about it. I understand it is broken at places, but really, I'm only one man and there are hundreds of news posts.
So no possibility of batch editing? Perhaps it's time for distributed computing or something.
Also, I'm getting a fairly frequent "forums cannot connect to MySQL database" error. I figure it's just some server dyspepsia.
A note : Gabe and Tycho use some really old and invalid HTML syntax, and they aren't too consistent about it. I understand it is broken at places, but really, I'm only one man and there are hundreds of news posts.
So no possibility of batch editing? Perhaps it's time for distributed computing or something.
Also, I'm getting a fairly frequent "forums cannot connect to MySQL database" error. I figure it's just some server dyspepsia.
Firu!
Wow long time no see.
Anyway, they aren't consitent in the way they end tags. I have some scripts that will be helpers, but it isn't automated.
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Just_Bri_ThanksSeething with ragefrom a handbasket.Registered User, ClubPAregular
edited November 2005
This isn't really a problem, just something I am curious about: Why is the PA logo in the center of the new main page a clicky leading to... the Penny Arcade main page?
Just_Bri_Thanks on
...and when you are done with that; take a folding
chair to Creation and then suplex the Void.
One thing I'm noticing is that while the page-text is loading super duper fast, the entire page (graphics and everything) is feeling like it loads slower than before.
For some reason I notice it more in IE than in Firefox. I don't know if that has to do with the way it handles caching, or if it is just more noticiable because the png's take a moment to snap into transparent mode, or what.
When doing a shift-reload, so as to force it to reload all the graphics, I'm counting slowly to about 5 or 8 before everything loads.
Maybe it's just taking longer to render with the CSS?
I just got several 500 - Internal Server errors, both in the forums and in the ads on the main site.
I am running a big backup of mysql's data and then I am going to drop the entire old site from database (freeing up a lot of memory as it no longer needs to be dumped into RAM)
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RamiusJoined: July 19, 2000Administrator, ClubPAadmin
edited November 2005
oooh, here's one I just noticed.
It is considered bad form by professional web designers to use the text "click here" as the only text for a link. SEO's will tell you the same. At the very bottom of the page it says:
bah, the bbcode didn't like the link. You get my point, though. This is another very minor design issue that you can change without telling anybody. Hopefully you noticed my bottom-paged edit on the last page as well. Be a rebel! You know you want to!
This isn't really a problem, just something I am curious about: Why is the PA logo in the center of the new main page a clicky leading to... the Penny Arcade main page?
Its the only way to get back to the main page I believe. So if your actualy on any of the other pages, you just click the big'ol logo and BAM you're home.
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MetalbourneInside a cluster b personalityRegistered Userregular
This isn't really a problem, just something I am curious about: Why is the PA logo in the center of the new main page a clicky leading to... the Penny Arcade main page?
Its the only way to get back to the main page I believe. So if your actualy on any of the other pages, you just click the big'ol logo and BAM you're home.
Its the only way back to the main page from the main page? Genius!
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RamiusJoined: July 19, 2000Administrator, ClubPAadmin
I'm sure that put to the task, the forumers could find all of them within a day, but I don't know if that is pointless, if you have some better way of identifying them.
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Just_Bri_ThanksSeething with ragefrom a handbasket.Registered User, ClubPAregular
This isn't really a problem, just something I am curious about: Why is the PA logo in the center of the new main page a clicky leading to... the Penny Arcade main page?
Its the only way to get back to the main page I believe. So if your actualy on any of the other pages, you just click the big'ol logo and BAM you're home.
Unless you click PAX or Store, then you are stuck.
Just_Bri_Thanks on
...and when you are done with that; take a folding
chair to Creation and then suplex the Void.
This isn't really a problem, just something I am curious about: Why is the PA logo in the center of the new main page a clicky leading to... the Penny Arcade main page?
Its the only way to get back to the main page I believe. So if your actualy on any of the other pages, you just click the big'ol logo and BAM you're home.
Its the only way back to the main page from the main page? Genius!
The PA logo remains on all other the other pages. So, if you clicked "comic" and wanted to go back home, you'd click the logo.
The only exceptions are the store (which links to an external site), and the PAX site, which seems to be intergrated into the main site now. I know it really isn't, but the two are strikingly similar enough that some will think they're still within in the www.penny-arcade.com borders.
AFAIK, there's no way to get back to the PA site from the PAX site.
Anyway, they aren't consitent in the way they end tags. I have some scripts that will be helpers, but it isn't automated.
Sounds messy. If they were only doing it at the end of paragraphs it would be easy, but if they do it all over the place then you've definitely got a headache.
You know, if it's nothing more than updating and cleaning HTML, you've probably got enough coders on the board to distribute it. Just hand out a spec sheet (to make sure everyone's on the same page), put up an FTP site and let (trusted) forumers chew through the old posts for you. Fossils like myself who used to code HTML back when a text editor was the standard software would finally have a use again!
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Just_Bri_ThanksSeething with ragefrom a handbasket.Registered User, ClubPAregular
Anyway, they aren't consitent in the way they end tags. I have some scripts that will be helpers, but it isn't automated.
Sounds messy. If they were only doing it at the end of paragraphs it would be easy, but if they do it all over the place then you've definitely got a headache.
You know, if it's nothing more than updating and cleaning HTML, you've probably got enough coders on the board to distribute it. Just hand out a spec sheet (to make sure everyone's on the same page), put up an FTP site and let (trusted) forumers chew through the old posts for you. Fossils like myself who used to code HTML back when a text editor was the standard software would finally have a use again!
I have nothing better to do.
Just_Bri_Thanks on
...and when you are done with that; take a folding
chair to Creation and then suplex the Void.
I appreciate the advice guys, but please keep the design ideas out of this thread. Code first. Design second.
Does stuff like the span/a swap count as code, or design?
Code. XHTML\XML\CSS\XSL\RSS\JS is all fair game. Saying "make this larger" or "get rid of the 3d logo" or "I don't like gray" are all design based and are things I really have no authority over. (Things like the above miscropping of an image are definatly fair game though)
I'm going to hit the sack, I'll finish reading this thread and respond to all this in the morning.
If you guys want to try and make an XHTML version of the site that looks identical to this one but uses spans \ divs \ whatever I'm game. It just has to be cross platform\browser compatible. I'm a fairly open developer and I welcome input, that said, I don't do well with people second guessing me. I know that if I used tables, transparent gifs, jpgs, and HTML 1.0 the site would be identical in all browsers. This site is unique in the fact that we can push the limits a bit. Right now it isn't all ready, but eventually I imagine this site being XHTML + RSS compliant. I have more to post about this, but it will be later, for now I demand sleep.
I appreciate the advice guys, but please keep the design ideas out of this thread. Code first. Design second.
Does stuff like the span/a swap count as code, or design?
Code. XHTML\XML\CSS\XSL\RSS\JS is all fair game. Saying "make this larger" or "get rid of the 3d logo" or "I don't like gray" are all design based and are things I really have no authority over. (Things like the above miscropping of an image are definatly fair game though)
I'm going to hit the sack, I'll finish reading this thread and respond to all this in the morning.
If you guys want to try and make an XHTML version of the site that looks identical to this one but uses spans \ divs \ whatever I'm game. It just has to be cross platform\browser compatible. I'm a fairly open developer and I welcome input, that said, I don't do well with people second guessing me. I know that if I used tables, transparent gifs, jpgs, and HTML 1.0 the site would be identical in all browsers. This site is unique in the fact that we can push the limits a bit. Right now it isn't all ready, but eventually I imagine this site being XHTML + RSS compliant. I have more to post about this, but it will be later, for now I demand sleep.
Night. Here's some stuff for morning:
EDIT: removed stuff I got wrong. Thanks typhoon!
The newspost software is bad:
It deals with apostrophies in a retarded way. I had to run a big search/replace to get it to validate. Every apostrophy seems to become either "'" (an invalid sequence) or the hexidecimal code 0x92.
I also added "
"s to the beginning of every newspost after the <div>, since the software doesn't crate those. Instead, the first </p> in the newspost would cause an error. The software made up for this by appending
s to the newsposts, with no closer.
Furthermore, it does not properly encode ampersands. It simply sends them through as "&", when it should change them to "&"
I don't know what Tycho and Gabe use to make newsposts, but there's an editor for the web browser named FCKEditor (demo). FCKEditor outputs valid markup, so getting them to use that instead of whatever it is now will make keeping newsposts correct easier. Should also make them easy to write.
If you don't want to use FCKEditor, or they use something else to write their posts, run them through a validation perl script or something. Replace characters according to what I had above.
Posts
Wasn't that paticular problem corrected some time ago?
chair to Creation and then suplex the Void.
For some reason I notice it more in IE than in Firefox. I don't know if that has to do with the way it handles caching, or if it is just more noticiable because the png's take a moment to snap into transparent mode, or what.
When doing a shift-reload, so as to force it to reload all the graphics, I'm counting slowly to about 5 or 8 before everything loads.
div.postbody > li { margin-left:14px;}
I only tested it in Firefox and IE, though. I couldn't tell you if it will work for Safari and Opera.
EDIT:
while you're in the css file. You should sneak this into the .newspost .postbody:
line-height: 1.3em;
It should be a subtle difference, nobody needs to know except you and me.
So no possibility of batch editing? Perhaps it's time for distributed computing or something.
Also, I'm getting a fairly frequent "forums cannot connect to MySQL database" error. I figure it's just some server dyspepsia.
Wow long time no see.
Anyway, they aren't consitent in the way they end tags. I have some scripts that will be helpers, but it isn't automated.
chair to Creation and then suplex the Void.
Maybe it's just taking longer to render with the CSS?
It is considered bad form by professional web designers to use the text "click here" as the only text for a link. SEO's will tell you the same. At the very bottom of the page it says:
For Advertising Options and Media Kit Click Here.
it should just say:
Advertising Options and Media Kit
or
Contact Us for Advertising Options and Media Kit
bah, the bbcode didn't like the link. You get my point, though. This is another very minor design issue that you can change without telling anybody. Hopefully you noticed my bottom-paged edit on the last page as well. Be a rebel! You know you want to!
EDIT: it's for the theme I mentioned before
It looks like Rockwell to me.
Search newsposts for something common. Like, "gabe".
At the bottom of the search results is a link that says, "Next Page". That link doesn't work.
Its the only way back to the main page from the main page? Genius!
I'm sure that put to the task, the forumers could find all of them within a day, but I don't know if that is pointless, if you have some better way of identifying them.
Unless you click PAX or Store, then you are stuck.
chair to Creation and then suplex the Void.
The only exceptions are the store (which links to an external site), and the PAX site, which seems to be intergrated into the main site now. I know it really isn't, but the two are strikingly similar enough that some will think they're still within in the www.penny-arcade.com borders.
AFAIK, there's no way to get back to the PA site from the PAX site.
One emergency at a time there guy. I am sure everything will be seen to in time.
chair to Creation and then suplex the Void.
Yeah, I'm totally returned from the grave. I no longer have to babysit the grad students.
Sounds messy. If they were only doing it at the end of paragraphs it would be easy, but if they do it all over the place then you've definitely got a headache.
You know, if it's nothing more than updating and cleaning HTML, you've probably got enough coders on the board to distribute it. Just hand out a spec sheet (to make sure everyone's on the same page), put up an FTP site and let (trusted) forumers chew through the old posts for you. Fossils like myself who used to code HTML back when a text editor was the standard software would finally have a use again!
I have nothing better to do.
chair to Creation and then suplex the Void.
also when i created my acct i got a error "Unable to inser user information into table" or something... anyways... it still let me log in and post tho
a few mins in photoshop and i its all better:
also noticed that when i save it as a PNG it can work on any background or multiple ones... whitch is news to me :O
I'll give you a cookie if you can change the wrapping for the <span> and <a> elements on the navigation bar buttons:
eg, from:
To:
This will let me change the nav buttons and logo. Right now, if I change them the links won't carry over to the new ones
Yes but now the one you made has shittastic edges. The solution? Ditch the corny ass outer glow completely.
I'm glad I'm not the only one who doesn't like the glow. The solution?
i like the glow, but I always thought it was cool function
either way, i like the 3d look of the logo
Does stuff like the span/a swap count as code, or design?
I'm going to hit the sack, I'll finish reading this thread and respond to all this in the morning.
If you guys want to try and make an XHTML version of the site that looks identical to this one but uses spans \ divs \ whatever I'm game. It just has to be cross platform\browser compatible. I'm a fairly open developer and I welcome input, that said, I don't do well with people second guessing me. I know that if I used tables, transparent gifs, jpgs, and HTML 1.0 the site would be identical in all browsers. This site is unique in the fact that we can push the limits a bit. Right now it isn't all ready, but eventually I imagine this site being XHTML + RSS compliant. I have more to post about this, but it will be later, for now I demand sleep.
Night. Here's some stuff for morning:
EDIT: removed stuff I got wrong. Thanks typhoon!
The newspost software is bad:
It deals with apostrophies in a retarded way. I had to run a big search/replace to get it to validate. Every apostrophy seems to become either "'" (an invalid sequence) or the hexidecimal code 0x92.
I also added "
"s to the beginning of every newspost after the <div>, since the software doesn't crate those. Instead, the first </p> in the newspost would cause an error. The software made up for this by appending
s to the newsposts, with no closer.
Furthermore, it does not properly encode ampersands. It simply sends them through as "&", when it should change them to "&"
I don't know what Tycho and Gabe use to make newsposts, but there's an editor for the web browser named FCKEditor (demo). FCKEditor outputs valid markup, so getting them to use that instead of whatever it is now will make keeping newsposts correct easier. Should also make them easy to write.
If you don't want to use FCKEditor, or they use something else to write their posts, run them through a validation perl script or something. Replace characters according to what I had above.