Test Home Page now available for viewing.  Eventually the rest of the site will resemble this page.  This is live data on the site, it'll change like the front page of the site does tomorrow. 

I'll probably do the parody section, followed by the misheard lyrics next. 

Test Home Page now available for viewing.  Eventually the rest of the site will resemble this page.  This is live data on the site, it'll change like the front page of the site does tomorrow. 

I'll probably do the parody section, followed by the misheard lyrics next.


i dont like it

i dont like it


Are you even a parodist?

If newtattoo is referring to the logo, i agree slightly. It looks like something for an oil or technology company, not a wacky, casual website. Otherwise, I think the layout is a-ok on my Android smartphone, although a newbie might have a hard time finding the general subsections if they dont want tonecessarily see the latest updates. Also, I think you should make the description of the site tighter, in one sentence maybe, because it is so much more than a misheard lyrics site now.

If newtattoo is referring to the logo, i agree slightly. It looks like something for an oil or technology company, not a wacky, casual website. Otherwise, I think the layout is a-ok on my Android smartphone, although a newbie might have a hard time finding the general subsections if they dont want tonecessarily see the latest updates. Also, I think you should make the description of the site tighter, in one sentence maybe, because it is so much more than a misheard lyrics site now.


I tried for a "wacky" logo but none of the designs I tried were all that legible in the small sizes I wanted it to be visible at. I did make the word "Right" kind of playful.  In the end, I just wanted to get moving on the rest of the design, since upgrading the site is going to be a huge undertaking.  I'm going from XHTML to HTML5 (not that I'm using many HTML5 things) so lots of stuff needs to change. I spent two hours on the first page today, because the cite tag has changed drastically since the last version of HTML.

I might change the logo later, I have some other ideas, but at this point I just need to keep moving away from the old design.

I get your drift, Chuck, and appreciate all the hard work you do for us with this place. Keep it up!  8)

but at this point I just need to keep moving away from the old design.

I understand making it more friendly for mobile devices, but other than that, why is it necessary to keep moving away from the old version per se? Specifically, why change things like "Author latest comments" and "Author song page"?

I don't like the thick black bars on an individual parody. Breaks up the visual flow from the intro (if any) to the song, and from the song to the outro (if any), and also from there to Votes and to Comments. Are they necessary?

Author song page seems to me to have cut off vote and view numbers. Agreed that votes may not mean much these days, but views over time help to tell an author what parody themes, styles, OSs, etc. are attractive to readers in the long run. The very fat-tailed curve discounts for random hits or search results.

Also, if the individual parody pages themselves are in larger font (which seems to be the case), why are the Author Latest Comment and Author Song Page in much smaller font?

Logo: As an old fogey (I guess), if I weren't already familiar with the site, I'd have no idea what the site name was from the current logo. Just senile, I suppose.

A lot of authors and commenters aren't members of this forum. I've heard some negative comments on the style from a few.
Perhaps a poll, conspicuously on the main page, and password-protected (author song submission password), to prevent ballot-box stuffing?

In any case, if these changes are kept, could you please offer an option for users to choose the old style, perhaps with a link or button on each page? Just calling the old css sheets etc.? Thanks.

Note: All of above observed while allowing script from AIR, and also from the new source, jquery.

I understand making it more friendly for mobile devices, but other than that, why is it necessary to keep moving away from the old version per se? Specifically, why change things like "Author latest comments" and "Author song page"?

I don't like the thick black bars on an individual parody. Breaks up the visual flow from the intro (if any) to the song, and from the song to the outro (if any), and also from there to Votes and to Comments. Are they necessary?

Author song page seems to me to have cut off vote and view numbers. Agreed that votes may not mean much these days, but views over time help to tell an author what parody themes, styles, OSs, etc. are attractive to readers in the long run. The very fat-tailed curve discounts for random hits or search results.

Also, if the individual parody pages themselves are in larger font (which seems to be the case), why are the Author Latest Comment and Author Song Page in much smaller font?

Logo: As an old fogey (I guess), if I weren't already familiar with the site, I'd have no idea what the site name was from the current logo. Just senile, I suppose.

A lot of authors and commenters aren't members of this forum. I've heard some negative comments on the style from a few.
Perhaps a poll, conspicuously on the main page, and password-protected (author song submission password), to prevent ballot-box stuffing?

In any case, if these changes are kept, could you please offer an option for users to choose the old style, perhaps with a link or button on each page? Just calling the old css sheets etc.? Thanks.

Note: All of above observed while allowing script from AIR, and also from the new source, jquery.


the old style is never coming back. EVER.  it's XHTML vs HTML5 and it's not something I can switch on and off. it's one of the reasons it's taking a long time to upgrade.  I have to modify every single section in multiple places to kill old code. the site predates many CMS packages, and everything was coded by hand, so I don't have the luxury of changing one style sheet to make an update, I have more like 200 places that need changes.

there is a news article on the front page of the site people can click on the comments link to leave feedback there.

the vote counts and hits aren't cut off, they aren't on the index at all right now.  I will be revising the "latest comments" link which is broken at the moment and make an "author's view" for things like comments, hits and votes that will probably open in a new tab or a modal or something that doesn't have the right navigation bar.  Or maybe multiple views of the page instead of the table sort that is currently there, since it is way too slow on large author pages and can't be used with paging (which is needed on large author pages).  either way, I'm not done yet with the author pages, I just needed to move onward to the other sections of the site  so it looks consistent at the moment.

as  for the dark section heading bars, those will probably change once I finish moving to the new layout. I'm not entirely happy with that part of the design.  I'm trying to make things consistent across the site still.  it's always been a little jarring because there's an advertisement there anyways.  if you're running ad block you're not aware of it

The only thing the jquery is currently used for is to hide the navigation bar.  if I could write a suitable replacement for that code without jquery I'd probably use it since including a large javascript file for a little piece of code is ridiculous.

Thanks for the very thorough reply.


the vote counts and hits aren't cut off, they aren't on the index at all right now.  I will be revising the "latest comments" link which is broken at the moment and make an "author's view" for things like comments, hits and votes that will probably open in a new tab or a modal or something that doesn't have the right navigation bar.  Or maybe multiple views of the page instead of the table sort that is currently there, since it is way too slow on large author pages and can't be used with paging (which is needed on large author pages).  either way, I'm not done yet with the author pages, I just needed to move onward to the other sections of the site  so it looks consistent at the moment.
Cool. However, if there's any way to keep the table sort, I do find it useful for many purposes. E. g., not just which parodies are most/least popular, but also to sort by OS to group all the parodies I've done to a given OS or original performer. Easier to find when looking for one, but can't remember which one, due to senility. :sigh: Perhaps for those authors with 1000+ parodies (or whatever threshold), the Author page could have a limited number on one page, with a continuation link to however many more pages are needed? I understand the difficulty with large author pages. I once tried to copy John Barry's author page into a spreadsheet, and it crashed Open Office. :eek: Maybe label: "Author pages beyond X parodies are not sortable"?

as  for the dark section heading bars, those will probably change once I finish moving to the new layout. I'm not entirely happy with that part of the design.  I'm trying to make things consistent across the site still.  it's always been a little jarring because there's an advertisement there anyways.  if you're running ad block you're not aware of it
Oh. That's even more intruding to the author's work. Having ads on the side (or both sides, and in a top banner, if revenue is an issue) is visible without intruding on the creative work. IMHO. Others' mileage may vary.

The only thing the jquery is currently used for is to hide the navigation bar.  if I could write a suitable replacement for that code without jquery I'd probably use it since including a large javascript file for a little piece of code is ridiculous.

I have a friend who's pretty good with JS. I'll ask him to take a look at the site and see if he can write something simpler.

Cool. However, if there's any way to keep the table sort, I do find it useful for many purposes. E. g., not just which parodies are most/least popular, but also to sort by OS to group all the parodies I've done to a given OS or original performer. Easier to find when looking for one, but can't remember which one, due to senility. :sigh: Perhaps for those authors with 1000+ parodies (or whatever threshold), the Author page could have a limited number on one page, with a continuation link to however many more pages are needed? I understand the difficulty with large author pages. I once tried to copy John Barry's author page into a spreadsheet, and it crashed Open Office. :eek: Maybe label: "Author pages beyond X parodies are not sortable"?


what's going to happen, is I will have three pre-sorted versions, one by page title, song title, original performer.  Each view will then paginate every 100 pages or so.  Then there will be a separate view with just the basic title and vote/hits that can be sorted like the older version.  I know I use the sort function when I'm looking at an author's page, so it's not something I want to go away entirely.


Oh. That's even more intruding to the author's work. Having ads on the side (or both sides, and in a top banner, if revenue is an issue) is visible without intruding on the creative work. IMHO. Others' mileage may vary.


kind of sucks, but most large sites now have ads with the content.  They've been there a long time, not new to the redesign.  I plan on changing the design a little more, I want the header and footer text broken out a little differently, not as dramatically.


I have a friend who's pretty good with JS. I'll ask him to take a look at the site and see if he can write something simpler.


I'm sure I could do it, I've just been too busy trying to upgrade everything else.  It's kind of low priority at the moment since it works and I wasn't even sure I could make it work in the first place.

I've tried out the current logo design on a few other people at random, and I'm definitely going to need to drop the upside down A.  It's not as obvious as I'd like to think it is.  I think the i in the guitar can work if I give it a little more tweaking.  So I'm back to trying to do something with the AM graphically.  I've got a sketchpad with about 200 different designs so far, so I'll work it out eventually.

what's going to happen, is I will have three pre-sorted versions, one by page title, song title, original performer.  Each view will then paginate every 100 pages or so.  Then there will be a separate view with just the basic title and vote/hits that can be sorted like the older version.  I know I use the sort function when I'm looking at an author's page, so it's not something I want to go away entirely.
Awesome.
Um, if it's any of our business, curious why you look at and sort author pages other than for deletion/banning? Just curious.  ;D

Sidebar navigation: My friend, a professional programmer, came up with this:

I'm not sure exactly what the site owner wants, but one way would be to simply expand the rest of the content to fill the page (hiding the sidebar), then shrink it again to show the sidebar:

document.getElementById("content2").style.width="100%";

document.getElementById("content2").style.width="74.359%";
Any good?

O/T: Firefox and Seamonkey now have an available add-on, User Agent Switcher, which includes various flavors of IE as well as IPhone. I'm sure you have all major browsers available for testing, but with this one, you can see what it looks like in Firefox, navigate away, switch to IE version X and see the IE version, then look at it as it would display to an IPhone. Plus you can add/edit new UAs. Might be convenient for multi-browser display testing.

Awesome.
Um, if it's any of our business, curious why you look at and sort author pages other than for deletion/banning? Just curious.  ;D

mostly when I want to see what the popular parodies for a particular author are, much like you mentioned earlier


Sidebar navigation: My friend, a professional programmer, came up with this:
document.getElementById("content2").style.width="100%";

document.getElementById("content2").style.width="74.359%";
Any good?

I'll give it a shot and see if it does it.  I think it might need more than that, like hiding the side bar as well


O/T: Firefox and Seamonkey now have an available add-on, User Agent Switcher, which includes various flavors of IE as well as IPhone. I'm sure you have all major browsers available for testing, but with this one, you can see what it looks like in Firefox, navigate away, switch to IE version X and see the IE version, then look at it as it would display to an IPhone. Plus you can add/edit new UAs. Might be convenient for multi-browser display testing.


I haven't seen that particular tool yet, generally I test in IE and Firefox.  Everything is so close to Firefox now with the exception of IE I rarely have a problem if it works in those two.