This morning I am uploading the new "magazine style" template for this site!
Update: unfortunately the post footers didn't transfer as easily as I'd hoped. Some of the links may look odd and may not work at all at the present time. Sorry if this causes any problems, I'll get on with the fix as soon as I can!
For the next hour or so, you may notice things look a little odd as I upload all of the new widgets and configure the template to appear the way it should be. During this time, all of my existing posts will be accessible, though the sidebar and home page will probably look a little odd!
Please bear with me for a while until the reconstruction is complete. Once the update is complete, I'll post a full explanation of the changes which have been made, and of course I would love to know your opinions on the new look!
Looking great so far :)
ReplyDeleteWill go through it in more detail soon to see if I can see any problems.
Nice use of the Twitter. Might have to think about doing that myself!
Hello Dark UFO,
ReplyDeleteThanks for your comments. At present there are still some issues on post pages, though these should be resolved very soon.
Please let me know if you see any more bugs on the site. I've been checking in FF and IE6 (running on Windows) so far, and may have overlooked issues with other browser types.
Best wishes and thank you,
Amanda
Amanda.
ReplyDeleteUse this site
http://www.browsercam.com
You can plug in a URL and select 20-30 browsers in one go and get a screencap of what it looks like.
This is an invaluable service. You get free account for 24 hours. Then just sign up with another email if you need to use it again ;)
Hi Amanda! :) Great work on the new design. I'll try to help so here are my comments:
ReplyDelete- check the page curl on post area (there's a 1 pixel line on the right which i think shouldn't be there)
- font size for content of recent comments widget is a little too big
- top navigation - it says "Advertize" (is that intentional?) and the "Advertize" link does not have an accompanying icon
- perhaps the red bar (main navigation) should be a little transparent so it blends in more
- image under "Sponsors & Ads" is not aligned
- maybe you can remove the heading, "Updates Via Twitter" -- i'd prefer it simpler up there. after all, the well-known twitter bird is there ;)
- add little spacing after each widget -or- make the sidebar headings in a different color because it's not too easy to distinguish
Whew! Anyway, love the new logo! And how did you do the changing image-to-post under "Featured Post" widget? Lovely! :D
PS. Safari on Mac looks fine.
Hi Amanda,
ReplyDeleteMostly a lurker here but love your site, get great tips, however lately I haven't felt in the mood to blog or mess with my template, I know it needs work!
Nice job on your new look.
This is very creative design and felt the need to comment. Your use of Blogger is very creative.
ReplyDeleteFor Dark UFO: thank you for the link. Everything seems to look okay, though I still can't guarantee that everything works okay (with regard to the scripts and all).
ReplyDeleteSo far no-one has reported anything drastically wrong though, and I'm glad everything seems to be working as it should so far :)
For Angel: Thank you for your honesty in pointing things out!
I've fixed the glitch in the page curl now (and that awful typo in the navigation section!).
I see what you mean about the recent comments font. The simplest solution didn't work, so I'll have to go back into the code to make the font size a bit smaller.
The AdvertiSe link does now lead to a proper page, though I have yet to create a proper page for the "Links" (most likely this will be a major post, so I'll probably make a placeholder for the time being!).
The spaces between widgets in the sidebar is unfortunately a browser issue. In IE6 on my computer, there is adequate space, but on FF there is little space between them (and it's one of the few things I cannot control as much as I would like to). So I'll experiment with some different colors instead.
With the Twitter heading and the nav-bar color, I'll wait a few days or so to gather the reactions of other readers. I'm not sure that every reader here would recognize the Twitter icon to understand why it's there.
But I am glad you like the overall design! I was a bit anxious that many readers would consider this too drastic a change for the site!
For Janeywan,
ReplyDeleteThank you for stopping by to comment! I always love to read comments from my readers, and if there's anything particular you'd like to know about customizing your Blogger template, just let me know :)
For Jaklang,
I'm glad you like the new design, thank you for your comments :) With this new look, I hoped to push the boundaries of what can be achieved with Blogger templates, and hope it's as user friendly as it is unique!
Firstly, WOW, I can see why you were excited. Great use of the magazine/grunge/crest styles. Love the background especially, very classy! Also good that you kept some elements from before.
ReplyDeleteSo here's my two penneth worth:
Twitter I'd keep it just as it is, yes lots of people know the bird, but lots of people reading this site will just be starting out with Blogger and so won't know the bird. I also think the twitter title helps balance that section out.
Navbar I wouldn't make it blend more, better that people find it quickly.
Sidebar Spacing between the widgets, I'm on FireFox so I've got the more squished version and I feel for you with the browser issue there. Would a spacer.gif be a working hack, forcing both browsers to keep the same distance? It looks pretty squished on IE7 too I have to say. However I am a big fan of "whitespace" so I'm biased! I would also say that I would like more spacing between the two sidebars in the widebar, that bugs me far more than the spaces between widgets. I do understand though that you have to cater to all screen widths. I think the Blogger's choice awards badges need a line space between them.
Footer Like the nice simple footer with the navigation repeated there.
Featured posts Kicks ass!
Search Nice integration into your design
Feeds Really good positioning of these I think, having them at the top and the shield lower down, (actually also quite nice seeing that it is redirected via Feedburner).
Popular Posts Small confession here, I noticed these in your previous design and think they're pretty cool. Have to admit though, and I'm sure I'm the only one, I'm so used to graphical ads, that my eye always skips past them assuming they're ads. Ignore that though, cos I'm just a freak! ;)
About and Advertise Post pages For some reason on the About and Advertise pages the first line of text is rammed right up next to the date line, whereas on your other pages there is a gap. That's on FF and IE7.
Favicon I'm guessing it's probably just the usual browser lag in recognising a new favicon, but it's reverted to the standard Blogger icon for me for now.
Recent articles by category Like the way you have these sectioned out and the vertical label is a neat idea.
So all in all, LOVE it, it looks great, just a couple of tweaks us whitespace junkies would like! :)
Hey Amanda,
ReplyDeleteThe new design is brilliant. I especially like the new logo and header section.
I was just wondering how you managed to keep the title tags with the blog posts titles in your post pages with the new design, despite Blogger not letting any "b:section" within the head tag.
Thanks:-)
Amanda, try making the "if IE" condition in your CSS so you can set different styles for the spacing between the sidebar widgets. ;)
ReplyDeleteIt's beautiful, Amanda. Love the use of Twitter. Very classy. :)
ReplyDeleteCongratulation Amanda for this new temlate.
ReplyDeleteSMSreports
Wow, awesome job! i like chocolate very much. Looks tasty and classy! Good for you and reader like me.
ReplyDeleteHello Amanda,
ReplyDeleteI really liked your new template.
Changes are welcome, specialy when they represent an improvement!
Nice job!
Hi, Amanda!
ReplyDeleteThe new template and design it was beautiful! Congratulations and grateful for sharing all this with us!!
Hugs!
PS: Sorry for my poor english! :-)
This is awesome Amanda, Loved the new logo...waiting for it be fully done :)
ReplyDeletehey when i click on blogger template download picture it open image....
ReplyDeleteanyways nice template !!
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ReplyDelete