Requesting a Website review

travelagent's picture

He has: 26 posts

Joined: Dec 2004

I've been designing websites over the past few years, and this is my latest one; however, apparently the HTML rules have changed recently and I'm struggling with it terribly.

Everytime I check it using that gawd-awful "W3C Validator", it returns alot of errors -- so, I have painfully tried to understand what that poorly-written system is trying to explain to me and, after making a few corrections I upload it to the server; run the test again, and it comes back with more errors than I originally had! Mad

So, I'm looking for constructive criticism along with some help and guidance, as I will hopefully try and assist others with their struggles:

Discount Military Travel

Troy1960's picture

They have: 152 posts

Joined: Sep 2004

I've looked through the forums and I think maybe that you've just picked some topics and left generic statements about web sites just to get your post count up to get reviewed. I would check out this article so that you could have more influenial reviews in the future .
http://www.webmaster-forums.net/showthread.php?t=24973

JeevesBond's picture

He has: 3,956 posts

Joined: Jun 2002

Hmmff, there's nothing wrong with the W3C validator, if you know how to interpret the results. It can be rather ambiguous in its results but detecting exactly what is causing an error is often difficult for something automated (ever tried reading the output from a C compiler?)

Most likely is that you've typed a tag name incorrectly or forgotten to close a non-empty tag so always check for that kind of thing first. Smiling

a Padded Cell our articles site!

travelagent's picture

He has: 26 posts

Joined: Dec 2004

Troy1960 -- do you always make "assumptions" in your daily life? No ... you're dead wrong about your assumption; I "reviewed" many sites of which didn't stand out that great to me and I don't need to "get my posts up" for a review.

However, after reviewing each site you have, it looks about like {yawn} a rating of around 2.0 for each one.

travelagent's picture

He has: 26 posts

Joined: Dec 2004

JeevesBond -- maybe I didn't make myself clear in the opening statement:

When I started doing websites, there was no HTML Validation system -- I can interpret results if it's written in a way I, and many thousands more, can understand ... perhaps you have more experience with the Validator than I do.

JeevesBond's picture

He has: 3,956 posts

Joined: Jun 2002

Don't think HTML think XHTML and CSS baby! What's more:
Tables are used to display data in a tabular format, nothing else.
If you code using XHTML and CSS (properly -- using the semantic web ethos of the great Mr Berners-Lee himself) you can change the entire design of a site just by using different CSS, with no change to the content!
You can provide a different look according to the viewing technology being employed by the end-user, for example: Screen, print, projector etc.

Bear in mind that CSS has been a W3C Recommendation since 1999, and that css written for print/screen (I haven't tested the others) will even work in IE5! Another item of note is that the number of Mozilla and Opera users is on the rise whereas IE is gradually losing market share (as it should - its W3C Standards support is terrible and it distinctly lacks many of the features of other browsers). Mozilla and Opera are both standards compliant, so there is no excuse for not designing to these standards.

Yes the web is changing, and for the better, the W3C validator is just one more peice of technology you'll have to familiarise yourself with.

a Padded Cell our articles site!

travelagent's picture

He has: 26 posts

Joined: Dec 2004

I understand what you're saying, Jeeves -- guess this "old man" is gonna have to keep reading and trying ... thanks for the tips; I did have my site in those gawd-awful, cumbersome tables until I finally figured out how to shorten the code and load time using CSS. Laughing out loud

Now...back to more reading... Sticking out tongue

He has: 153 posts

Joined: Nov 2004

W3 validator can be a bit confusing, but it works very nicely and is brutally honest Smiling

They have: 3 posts

Joined: Jan 2005

The greys look very boring (a gradient is a good way to make it exciting) and maybe a flash menu or something.

He has: 93 posts

Joined: Jun 2004

OK some tips to help get your site validated:

  • To help tidy things up a little put your styling info into external CSS files
  • Forget about using tables to layout the page, use div tags that are defined in your style sheet
  • Use lists for your navigation buttons

At the moment things are a bit all over the place, you have content prior to your opening body tag, no opening table tag, a whole heap of center tags at start of the page with no closing tags just to point out a few things I picked up.

Check out the link below it should give you a bit of an assist.
http://css.maxdesign.com.au/selectutorial/tutorial_intro.htm

There are no stupid questions, only stupid people!

slickfish
web site design, production and maintenance for small business

www.justapickle.com
Blogging for the socially conscious

JeevesBond's picture

He has: 3,956 posts

Joined: Jun 2002

Well, when you realise tables are evil you're half way towards the freedom and glory of standards based, semantic markup

rluther's picture

He has: 7 posts

Joined: Jan 2005

Well, I am not crazy about your colors. And the information write up in the beginning does not really tell me what the site is. Instead of telling me it is the idea of your vice president, which means absolutely nothing to me... tell me what I am looking at.

That's my 2 cents.

Robb

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