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 Posted: Fri Jun 23, 2006 2:28 pm
brokenyoyo Div tables, thats what I mean by divs. I know of tons of sites that use div tables and work fine in IE. (example: PureVolume)
brokenyoyo Yes, but the content scripts still says: echo " *etc..* ";
While the templates, again if they use a template, says:
k, i'm starting with php so i'm gonna trust you... redface
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Posted: Wed Jun 28, 2006 3:38 pm
Catani brokenyoyo Everytime I use div it works in IE just fine. What messes up in IE is the positioning elements. Everything, to my experience, works fine. brokenyoyo But back to the redesign, the code is a mess. It uses both divs and tables. I'm not sure but I think the PHP still output everything using tables, while the template, if it even uses a template, uses divs. miksago brokenyoyo miksago we should do an activity, of redesigning gaia to what we think it should be like! I would love to do that. I say lets do it. oki, when should we do it? What a great idea! I hope I have enough free time to enter...
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Posted: Wed Jun 28, 2006 11:07 pm
The New Layout
Negative -
Too much negative space on some of the pages.
- I've adjusted the Gamma and Brightness on my monitor just to accommodate Gaia.
- Several of my friends have mentioned that the sheer amount of bright white is giving them headaches if they use the site for prolonged periods of time.
Navigation -
- Lack of Flash or Rollover Navigation makes things more tedious and less user friendly than the old layout.
Avatars
- While Gaia has worked out the initial kink that makes the Avatars pixilate in the upper right corner, the images are still smaller than the site standard.
Old Issues
- The preview feature in the shops is entirely too pixilated to give an accurate preview of the items.
- The market place still can't search for three letter words.
- Cards is still breaking down too often.
Positive -
- Gaia's new layout aside from the use of negative space is graphically stimulating.
While the new header's characters do appear to be younger than Gaia's target demographic it's not a huge concern. It also carries the tropical summer theme Gaia was going for.
- The new clothing sets are very nice and make the site more user friendly to new members.
- The world map is easier to navigate with the addition of easily accessible thumbnails.
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Posted: Thu Jun 29, 2006 1:36 am
I posted my thoughts in my journal, but I'll repost them here ^_^ It's nice to know that Lanzer is listening ^_^
Anyhoo, these are my thoughts on the most recent Gaia redesign:
THE GOOD
It's more happy and bright, and has less of a corporate feel to the previous design.
The landing pages of each of the sections, especially the spotlights, put more focus on real Gaians and bring more of a community feel ^_^ They also brought more people to my profile throught Lull's featured one, and that's always nice too xd I like that each one is relevant to its section - I'm interested in featured profiles and homes and things on the Community page, and not so interested in Games stuff - which I end up not seeing, since I don't go to games.
The new menu structure better reflects what Gaia has become - it's not longer just an anime roleplaying forum with extra stuff, its more than that. It brings emphasis on the games/towns up to the same level as the forums, which makes sense as they're important parts of Gaia now too.
I'm glad that they kept the more handy form of navigation instead of forcing the World Map - but still glad that they decided to keep the map in there for people who choose to use it.
New emotes! Yay. What does the cheese/wine one mean?
Starter sets for all! Very smart move - hell, I remember people complaining when newbies started getting free peasant outfits when we had to pay for them when we started. This way everyone is happy. I've also heard more than one person say that they dislike the new layout but love the free items, so they were happy - clever way to ease the rebranding in with some subtle bribery.
THE BAD
The orange in the logo isn't really brought through in the rest of the layout. I like orange, and some little flashes of it here and there might make it more consistent and ease in the rebranding a bit better.
Too much white! gonk I agreed with complaints that the background of the previous layout was too dark, but the amount of white in this layout makes it look plain after you've gotten past the header (which is mostly white too...), especially at higher resolutions. This doesn't look so bad in areas with lots of graphics (like the landing pages) or even pages with that blue strip and the wing borders (like the forum pages) - there is some kind of border there to guide the eyes, give them a rest from the expanse of white, and let them know that its a new line. In threads now I have the feeling of the content leaking out the sides of the page.
The header is a bit plain for my tastes, and adds to the plainness of this layout sad I don't mind the new look of the people, but I can't help feeling that they don't match the NPC art which has such an anime influence, and it appeals less to me. It would be interesting if the admins decided to make the image change with the seasons ala the Google logo... but it's winter here, and personally, seeing happy smiling WARM people while I'm cold makes me feel like I'm being mocked :XP
I think the 'A place to meet people, share stuff, play games and more' is unneccessary on every page and really does seem to trivialise what Gaia is somehow, like its being marketed towards a younger crowd. If it has to be there at least use a different type from non-aliased Verdana - its in a picture, go crazy and put some aliasing in there at least!
I really liked the convenience of the menu in the previous layout - you could get anywhere you wanted to go in one click. After spoiling is with that we really can't go backwards to this more clunky system that forces you to click on a section and then on a subsection. I'd like to see a dynamic menu again like before, maybe with the added feature of it snapping back to the current page when the mouse isn't hovering over something.
The Gaia home page looks really cluttered for some reason... I'd say its because the coloumns that the content is arranged in are a bit all over the place.
The Gaia info in the blue bar on the right that appears on some pages - I'm sorry, I really don't care sad I was hoping that we could get some more relevant info, like a mini version of channels or a (Gaia specific) feedreader kind of thing in that area.
I really don't understand why my avatar has to be so small! There appears to be enough room there for it to be its actual size, so why not? When I started on Gaia my avatar was the first thing I'd see, in the prime area in the top left corner of my screen. Then it got moved to the fell area in the top right, separated from the world... and now its beeen moved further down and shrunken. I hope this isn't symbolic of the view Gaia has of its users as individuals.
I understand that the new buttons for trades, mail etc might be better from a functional perspective - we can now access all these things from there instead of wading through the menu. It does feel less cute and more impersonal compared to the little speechbubble that we've all grown used to. I also don't really like the way that it's positioned - it really feels that since these buttons are relevant to me that they should be close to my avatar, not floating by themselves.
I don't like the Gaia A-Z - it seems pointless, I think the tour should really be enough for new users to get the idea. At the moments its just taking up space and won't be used by the majority of users.
The footer is boring sad Put some colour back in there! Even if its just a bar of the same colour as the bar at the top - it would bring the layout a bit more of a sense of balance.
There are a lot of remnants ot previous layouts here and there - a more consistent feel across the site would be nice.
THE INTERESTING
Gaia did a pretty big rebranding - if you are a large, successful and recognisable company, then even something as small as changing the colour of your logo is a big thing. Your logo is part of your identity, how people recognise you. So Gaia changing its blue and pink logo for orange was a big move that must have had a lot of consideration put into it.
There's also been quite a change in direction from Gaia's humble beginnings - I went through a phase where I wanted to try and make a forum RP site, and looked up a lot of history of Gaia and interviews with Lanzer. Gaia was originally focussed on its anime link list, which no longer exists. The site had a focus on anime/fantasy type role playing, inspired heavily by games like Ragnarok Online. Gaia has grown beyond that, and now seems to be aiming for a wider audience than anime fans, and the new layout really shows that.
That's all I can think of for now ^_^
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Posted: Thu Jun 29, 2006 2:29 am
nice points there chisa, and i do agree on the header image, they could be a bit more creative.
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Posted: Thu Jun 29, 2006 2:30 am
just something to add to that, they could use a Ajax/dom tab style nav.
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Posted: Thu Jun 29, 2006 3:52 am
Celesial The New Layout Negative - Too much negative space on some of the pages. - I've adjusted the Gamma and Brightness on my monitor just to accommodate Gaia. - Several of my friends have mentioned that the sheer amount of bright white is giving them headaches if the use the site for prolonged periods of time. I really agree on that one. I've seen people in the Feedback forum telling people to stop whining and just adjust their monitor, but the point is that they shouldn't have to. People shouldn't have to adjust things for a single website, the designers of the website should design it so that it fits the (majority of) users. @Miksago: Yeah, it just looks very small compared to all the white at my screen resolution sad I don't have a clue about Ajax - I hear its all the rage these days, I should really look it up.
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Posted: Thu Jun 29, 2006 2:27 pm
The Good in the New Layout: (for me, at least)
Towns actually works.
Multiplayer fishing actually works.
Bad:
I can't edit my Details in my profile.
Worse marketplace search options.
Too much white space.
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Posted: Fri Jun 30, 2006 7:06 am
I think the marketplace search thing is more a matter of getting used to? It's actually more like a real search engine this way. Although perhaps ranked less logically confused
Yay, I have it on good authority that the happy people in the banner will be replaced with something else whee
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Posted: Wed Jul 05, 2006 2:09 pm
Update!
looks like navigation issue has been noticed:
top row is as we already know it, with the "more" button on the left, the bottom is:
dress up | forums | guilds | thread subscription | marketplace | map
it is better then it was, but it hides completly the user name, gold count and logout button
(only firefox) - no way to hide the additional row, only reloding or going to another page
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Posted: Mon Jul 10, 2006 10:37 pm
I understand that gaia has always been sort of "kid friendly"
but they really did not have to use that horrible picture that looks like some stock "welcome to so-and-so's site" at the top left. It is so ugly that I have adblocked it.
I do like the concise bar.
the avatar squished in size? What is the purpose of that? to save space? As if a couple of pixels larger would ruin the interface.
The "grunge" thing looks like some second grader's crayon project. I really dislike that they kept some things clean cut and made some things randomly grunge
cheese_whine This means "Would you like some cheese with your whine?" to complainers like myself.
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Posted: Tue Jul 11, 2006 12:01 am
A quick note, using the stylish extension for firefox it is possible to fix the navigation problem.
Basicly stylish lets you add css to any site. You could have also use greasemonkey, to fix it but I don't know that much javascript.
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Posted: Tue Jul 11, 2006 1:01 am
Chisa I think the marketplace search thing is more a matter of getting used to? It's actually more like a real search engine this way. Although perhaps ranked less logically confused I pretty much agree with her XD it's pissing off when you use to search for 1 item and it only came up with what you need instead of 2423543541354+ pages of what you don't need at all and make you look over those pages again =_= the new layout?, I'm loving it lol... lots of tricks like the little arrow nesxt to the squar icon near the avi, but the avi got too small :/ the logo's ok giving the page more space to present and about the menubar, I think it sould be like putting the mouse over it and the other small menu(like the flash one) come up instantly instead of clicking it and wait for the page to load up for another small menu... but the admins worked hard on it so Im just gonna enjoy :3
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