Fonts again...

Typography is one of those things that the more I learn about it, the more I realise how little I actually know about it!

So I was reading a Six Revisions article on fonts in animation (Fundamental Typography Guidelines for Motion Designers) which led me to think more re fonts and the screen, which took me to reading their article on fonts and web design 'A basic look at typography in web design'.

Although in my past readings I'd discovered things like the difference between serif and sans serif, kearning, web safe fonts etc, I'd never really considered why you would pick one font sizing method in your CSS over another. I assumed it was just a personal preference thing and I had no idea there are actually quite a range of options! I'd inherited % sizing after seeing it employed by other people but usually stuck to pt myself as I was familiar with it, having used it in all of the word processing type programs I've used. It turns out this was a FAIL! Only the other day, in my cross browser tweaking trials and tribulations, I was cursing IE for the annoying way it was mucking about with my font sizes - what looked good on FF/Chrome/Safari zoomed right out in IE. Now I discover, it was a case of user error and I've been using the incorrect sizing method!

So it turns out pt is a unit of print measurement (which is why it's used in word processing programs, as the stuff produced by them is often (and used to be always) printed). Each browser treats pt differently, so I should have expected to encounter the issues I did!

Percentages are excellent to use - not only will proportions between font remain consistent across browsers (so you should in theory achieve the same effect in all cases), it also allows you to retain the design you intend even if the user has changed the browser font settings. Good design practice.

LIF2 pretty much there...

So, I haven't felt very chatty over the last week but that doesn't mean I haven't been a busy bee...

In and around busy work days, networking drinks, job hunting, barefoot running, 6am yoga classes and accidentally discovering a love of smoting in Age of Empires II, I have pretty much finished off LIF2. I tried to address the SEO concepts covered in my last blog post by adding in the non-repetitive key words & meaningful meta and title tags, I got rid of the extra old versions of the site floating around out there (except for the prototype site that I built for my uni assignment which is part of my academic portfolio...). I also set up a subdomain for the client so we can move the blogger-hosted blog over to the website (just waiting for the client to redirect the blogger site before I add in the link to the nav bar), hopefully all of which will giving it a greater hit rate and be better spotted by search engines...

I've also been cross browser testing and tweaking. It now looks good in Safari 4, Firefox 3.6, Chrome and IE 7 & 8. I chose not to cover IE6 - I know a massive proportion of peeps might still be using it, but they aren't most of the site's visitors (based on Google Analytics) and they must be starting to get used to things looking a bit odd in it these days anyway, now that so many major sites are no longer supporting it. (note: I'm cringing as I type this - the OCD part of me doesn't like such slack control over how people might see my work. It actually doesn't look bad at all in IE6 - there's a margin out here or there but nothing horrendous. Give it a week and I bet I can't help myself revisit this...)

The biggest hassle I had was trying to get things to work in IE7. I know I've cursed IE in previous posts (and trust me, I was doing so again prolifically in this current tweak job) but MS have added back a few brownie points on my kudos score board by including the compatibility view in IE8 (not to mention the built in dev tools - not as good as FF's but a handy inclusion!). It was great having to not try to install the two on the one machine, and just flick between them as I tweaked (as I'm still having zero joy with free cross browser test websites).

In the past I've built a separate IE style sheet but I decided this time to just add in what I imagined would be a couple of small hacks, based on the fact IE8 already looked fine. I employed the * CSS hack described in a very handy Nettus tutorial to target IE7.

I thought it was only going to be a matter of adjusting a few margins/padding/width values here and there, but it turned out to be a good chunk of a day just trying to figure out what the hell was throwing everything out. As it turned out, I discovered IE7 doesn't play well with floating objects (and doesn't read clear:both) - particularly when there are two floats on opposite sides of a div, which I had used in a couple of spots, including the header div. Much trawling of the internet didn't bring me much joy re providing a quick solution - among many things I tried shifting the padding to the parent element, removed floats and tried to have the divs display inline etc (I can't even recall everything I tried last week - I think I've blocked it all out). Anyway, I ended up finding this article that suggested absolute positioning as a potential solution to the problem. I was a bit wary of trying this - I'm not a fan of commitment at the best of times and I don't like the idea of something stuck in an exact spot - which I thought might go horribly wrong in the wrong browser/window size etc. I'd tried everything else so I gave it a go - well, I typed in *position: absolute, and gave the div a width, and it just sprung into place! I didn't actually have to give it coordinates. After that it was just a matter of a few padding adjustments and tweaks to font sizes, and the site was good to go in IE7!

So that's pretty much it for LIF2 (or will be once the blog has transferred over and the site goes live). I'm still stalling re launching into Flash by revisiting the site and tweaking here or there. Which I need to stop doing. Maybe I can build the site a Flash banner...

SEO considerations for LIF2

This is something I haven't been concentrating on and I wish I had thought of sooner - it might have changed my approach to things slightly...

So I was just reading Six revisions' 9 ways to improve the SEO of every website you design (who doesn't like a nice short checklist!) and it gave me a bit of food for thought. Looking at LIF2 - have I addressed these?

1. Add a blog
Yes, I have had Sue create a blog and I've linked it to the site, but I haven't actually made it part of the site...I might look at hosting the blog with the site, I'm sure Sue must have a subdomain included in her hosting plan... now I'll have to incorporate it into the navigation bar and maybe style the blog?

2. Add Google analytics to each page
Done

3. Reduce code bloat
The new site is certainly an improvement on the old site

4. Make each page unique
There is a bunch of repeated contact info on each page, but what I'm more worried about is all of the old trail versions of the site out there with the free hosting cos that I haven't bothered to delete - all with basically the same content. I just deleted a bunch of them, which should hopefully help. Once I replace the old site and remove the draft version from thejct.net, that should also help with that...

5. Use meta description tags
I thought these were useless to some extent i.e. search engines barely paid attention to them after designers just loaded them with all manner of words in the early days. I might revisit these and punch a few words in...

6. Remove repetitive wording from the website
The contact info, motto and the header is repeated across all pages. Hopefully the rest of the content is different enough to combat this...

7. Add footer links to every page
Done

8. Create a separate web page for each keyword or keyword phrase
Done, pretty much. I've at least got 'personal training' in there...

9. Use keyword rich title tags on each page
I might need to reconsider the ones I've used...


So there are a couple of extra things to add to the to do list!

css3 gradients in different browsers + buttony buttons

Came across this today

http://www.webdesignerwall.com/tutorials/cross-browser-css-gradient/

I've been exploring gradients in the current site redesign project (particularly when building buttons. For me, a gradient is like a text underline, it says 'link' or 'click me'...). Anyhoo, I hadn't considered you could possibly achieve this just using code! I really need to take a moment after my flash projects to investigate CSS3... I quite like the way this article also points out you need to not rely on it but instead use it as an enhancement for those using browsers that support it...going back to that article on degrading style...

Speaking of buttons, I was in Fireworks last night playing around with the Blog button for the LIF2 site. I originally went the rounded corner path but when I stuck it next to the official FB one, it looked naff. I decided to match the style of that button and squared off the corners. Interestingly, it still looked buttony to me. And better. So now I'm rethinking the 'sign up' button...I might square it off as well. I don't know why I'm so excited re rounded corners on the site. I originally went that path being inspired by the flowing, roundness in the logo, but now I think it's almost like 'just because I can'. It reminds me of all the sites that started rounding corners way back when - but that's like SO 5 years ago...

Tweak, tweak, tweak, tweak...

So I've been stuffing around with small tweaks and not really getting anywhere (it feels that way anyhow...).

I reworked the right hand column sign up button using the lessons I learned from http://learnola.com/2008/10/28/css-tutorial-roll-over-button/ and used a pre-loaded hover state image. It's quite cool except I got hung up on making the button look buttony. Which was my day yesterday...the worst thing is, not I don't like the way the site looks at all. I think I've been looking at it too long. I did visit the famfamfam.com icons and borrowed an arrow. Now I have to work out how to attribute it...

I still need to sort it out re IE7 and include a link to the blog and FB on all pages (just creating those buttons is a process in itself...). Either way, I want to wrap this up so I can start Flash work. My first project will be trying to build a basic game for my nephew. Then after that I'm going to try to recreate it in HTML5, just to see what that's like...

LIF2 draft complete!

OK! So all of the pages have now been built and can be viewed at www.thejct.net/lif2.html

I've sent the client an email asking for a review of the work and I'm drawing a line in the sand on Monday re content changes.

The good news is I sorted out the nav bar links re the Fitts Hicks law recommendation. I tried to display: block the links but I wasn't getting a bigger hit area. I couldn't for the life of me work out why until I looked at the layout in firebug and realised that the link area had a height of zero, with zero padding. Which meant zero hit area. derr. So I shifted the padding from the list element to the link and *presto* problem solved.

I also had a bit of a problem reintroducing the PHP form on the contact page. It's the exact same code I used in the prototype, and it seemed to mostly work i.e. it forwarded on the email address when entered and rejected it if the pattern match failed, but kept giving me an error message on loading the page. For some reason it just started stumbling and couldn't identify the variable 'email' (which should have been blank on page load and therefore the form didn't require action or the need to display a message). So I stuck an isset check at the start of the form code and all sorted! (I know I make that sound easy, but it gave me a bloody headache...)

I've already done a W3C check (and passed the strict xhtml test!) but there are still a couple of things that need to be refined, and I'll have to retest once I'm knocked those off.

One thing I need to sort out are the buttons. I have created buttons for the facebook and blog links, but I need different states (on hover/click). I've cross browser tested in IE7&8 and Chrome (PC), as well as the latest Firefox and Safari (Mac). It looks awesome in all except IE7, so I still need to go back and sort that out (I think I'm going to try out putting in hacks like I found in that article last week instead of building a new style sheet - see how well that works).

Something else I need to do (other that find a couple of better quality pictures) is perform a QA check on the whole site and test every link, if nothing else. I had another derr moment last night when I realised I hadn't linked the 'sign up!' button on any of the pages. The quick solution sent the style haywire, so I'll have to revisit that. I did want to change the button anyway, I might have to go back to that CSS button article list and see if something there will help...or try making the whole div a link...

960 grid system - CSS best determined practice

I wish I'd come across this Web designer depot article when I first tried to implement the 960 grid system code: Fight Div-itis and Class-itis With the 960 Grid System. It gives you a break down re how to actually use the generated code with clear diagrams explaining how it translates to your webpage. So simple! Now I get why it's been picked up so widely! I've been sticking to the grid sizing with LIF2, building my own code. Next time, I'm going to give this a spin again...

One good thing was they recommended applying classes to parents, not children, which I've been trying to do since learning from N. Design Studio's code. It keeps it neater and easier to reference back to as well...

Buttons and progress

So I finished off the major bits on 4/5 of the main pages last night (you can see these drafts at www.thejct.net/lif2.html). I added on my to-do list a note to sort out the 'sign up!' button on all of the pages. I just don't like it, the shape or position. Anyway, I just happened to come across this Speckyboy article today with a list of CSS button styling tutorials and techniques - I think I might look for a solution in there...

In the mean time, onto to building the contact page. I'm going to reinstall the php form at the client's request, which I had on the prototype site. Speaking of prototype site, I might have to move all the files over to thejct.net - the free hosting I was using keeps throwing up random ads these days... *sigh* I think I've got a few random bits all over the place, I'm going to have to consolidate everything so the links stay alive in my portfolio...