Hey people.
this is my first post...

i would like to know what do u think of my site and its design.

www.peterdesigns.com


thanx to all....

peace...

This post has been edited by PeterDesigns: Jun 17 2008, 05:20 PM

Link doesn't work

Works for me Karinne.

Now it worked! Weird!

Working for me

Thanx for testing the link...

now tell me what do u think of the site...

peace...

Link worked for me!

Hi Peter and welcome!
I took a nice long look at your site! I can honestly say I don't always do that. Your site really captured my attention. From the moment it opened I had this feeling was was going to see something special.

Start the critique which isn't going to be very long because there wasn't much I found that needed changing.

Actually the first thing I'll mention is the homepage. It is stunning to look at, however you may want to consider taking it down for SEO reasons. It currently doesn't have much text there it's not giving Google very much information at all. It's also creating an extra click for people so that's another reason not to have it.

When I went to the main site I felt like I was looking at a sports car with all the flames painted on! Love it! Love how you used your tagline and backed up the tagline with the fire and flames.

Little goodies such as "site loaded in a certain amount of time" won't really mean much to the visitor. I don't really see that as necessary.

Your portfolio is gorgeous. Your work is gorgeous. You are talented! The only site that I think probably should not be in your portfolio is St. Mary's Church. That doesn't look like the quality of the rest of your things!

All in all, I loved it!!
Again, Welcome!!

I like your graphic work, i don't however, like the use of tables.

I recommend looking into CSS for the layout of your page.

No offence but you code is shocking lol, no doctype , you should take a look into some basic html tutorials though.

One good thing however is that you seemed to have to have mastered what a lot of people cannot, graphics lol

Sort out the code and you will have a great site

Also agree about the splash page, not good for SEO.

The above comments were not meant to sound harsh, if you have seen any of my design work you will understand that i am commenting more on the code, love the graphics

I was so into the graphics, I didn't even check the code. Glad you mentioned it Craig!

We are non-table people and we like other's to be as well!

If all the talk about CSS for layout is getting rather confusing, there's an excellent tutorial by the legend that is, Karrine, right here on TWS

http://www.thewebsqueeze.com/tutorials/a-w...rom-a-to-z.html

Thanx for this really cool critique.
I actually do need that splash page...it helps preload the images so it takes less time to load.
and about that page loaded in ... seconds...i like using it as a sign of speed..

and about seo...i will add some meta tags to the page...will that solve the problem?





Thank you too for replying...
actually, i am mainly a designer...so coding isnt my biggest interests...i know that i need help in the coding..
but i have a question, if the site looks fine in tables, why use css...
i feel that tables are much easier for ME when designing an unusual website...
anywayz...thankx..



thanx again...and no...u were not harsh...

peace up...

thank you linda...
i really appreciate your comment...

peace..

That's one of the most asked questions in web design lol

Tables take longer to load, they do not produce clear code, are a lot less easier to edit and make changes to the whole site compared to CSS...and about 100 other reasons:

http://www.chromaticsites.com/web-design-b...website-design/
http://www.hotdesign.com/seybold/
http://www.decloak.com/Dev/CSSTables/CSS_Tables_01.aspx

and btw Linda,
I am in the process of redesigning that st mary church site...same concept and trend...but different layout and touches...so stay tuned....

thanx...
peace...

but craig...
my site isnt slow in loading...

and i am able to edit the code easily...

For a beginner it might be difficult to understand why tables should not be used for layout, and why CSS is a better option. Coming directly from W3 they say...



Here are 10 reasons why tables are bad for layout, and why CSS is a better option.

http://phrogz.net/css/WhyTablesAreBadForLayout.html

Also, I would recommend you to read the following articles which explain more in depth why CSS is the best option.

http://www.hotdesign.com/seybold/index.html
http://www.chromaticsites.com/web-design-b...website-design/
http://www.thewebsqueeze.com/articles/bene...ur-website.html

Hope this helps, and please let us know if you have any questions or problems.

Have you ever had to go through every page on your website and change one color or item from a table? Re-designs with table layouts are hell, you end up just starting fresh or doing loads of edits depending on how many pages you have. However, with CSS you edit one file and your entire site updates with the new design or theme!!

Well you are going to hate me after reading this post, but I feel you should know since you are building websites for others. You should consider accessibility and search engine optimization when building websites. What good is your website is no one finds it, or you never get any new visits or customers through the site? You need to be thinking about your visitors and how you can get more business?

Suggestion 1) Better title tag for all pages.

Suggestion 2) Headings with keywords (<h1>, <h2>, <h3>...etc.)

Suggestion 3) Ditch the tables for layout! Tables are meant only to display tabular data.

Markup! All Google and your users care about is your content! We obviously want to make it as easy as possible for Google to know what our keywords are, and we should try our best to change these on a page by page basis. Your markup is a mess and really needs to be cleaned up. You really need a complete redo on the site as far as code goes, and content for that matter.

You need to ditch the tables and cut down the code-to-content ratio. One of the most important things in SEO and in web design to me, is separating your presentation from your structure. Not only does this just make since, but it will also help your search engines rankings. Think about it, you have all of your page style in a separate document allowing Google to be able to read what it cares about....your CONTENT!

Google won't have to search through your page to find the content through all of your inline style, but will be able to index and rank your page more highly for your target keywords. This will also help you, as you will be able to update your style sheet and the whole site changes....rather then going into each and every page copying and pasting the new table style/layout. Using valid XHTML/CSS and separating your presentation from your structure is vital to your success as a web designer/developer.

The next thing is to make your headings (<h1>-<h6>) contain keywords you wish to rank highly for. Also, the more "READABLE" content you have....the better!!! Bold and italicize your keywords that way Google knows they are important to you. Remember, those page headings are very important!

If you are still questioning what the best method is, please review the links I posted above. If you still have questions or disputes after reading those links then post back!

Have a look at the 3rd sticky in the CSS forum There's a bunch of links in there to help you understand the "WHY?"



Not really ... Search engines like Google look for content in heading elements (<h1>, <h2>, etc...) and in <strong> tags. So ... make sure you put keywords in those headings.

As for the design ... it's not bad. The font is not something I would pick tho as it's not really a font you would see on a portfolio/designers' site.