Rework this Blog
As I’m progressing forward, I realize this blog needs a new design. Completely. Something that will stick for a long time. I don’t want to have to keep doing this. In fact, I’m really dreading coming up with a theme.
So the question is to you, my readers, is how would you like to see this blog portrayed? I linked to an article yesterday from Problogger to Chris Pearson who talked about some novel concpets on blog architecture.
One reader suggested highlighting more past content. I think thats a good idea and something I’m leaning toward. Maybe less new content up front pushing more readers to RSS? I don’t know. Seems overly radical but my RSS subscription number keeps climbing so it might work.
I think a wider design is necessary. More whitespace, perhaps. Three columns I guess? What do you suggest?
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Written by Aaron Brazell on July 11, 2006
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I personally don’t mind wide designs as I always browse full screen (and I run dual monitors so that’s not a problem). I doubt the people who read this blog have a standard resolution of 800×600, but you’d know better than I.
If you’re going to go wide, maybe stick with two columns, but have a kind of pseudo three column effect further down the page. Let me see if I can demonstrate:
________________
| HEADER |
| C1 | Content |
|____| |
|2|3 | |
| | | |
| | | |
|_|__|_________|
|__FOOTER______|
So if that comes out totally screwed up, I claim no responsibility. However, I like the two columsn split into three look.
Maybe in that upper part you could highlight “best posts” or something like that, whereas you would use the ones farther down for advertising or something else. You may totally dismiss this idea, but you asked for suggestions, so there’s mine.
Doh, forgot about wordpress stripping extraneous spaces… I’ll throw something together later… Sorry about that.
I personally don’t mind wide designs as I always browse full screen (and I run dual monitors so that’s not a problem). I doubt the people who read this blog have a standard resolution of 800×600, but you’d know better than I.
If you’re going to go wide, maybe stick with two columns, but have a kind of pseudo three column effect further down the page. Let me see if I can demonstrate:
________________
| HEADER |
| C1 | Content |
|____| |
|2|3 | |
| | | |
| | | |
|_|__|_________|
|__FOOTER______|
So if that comes out totally screwed up, I claim no responsibility. However, I like the two columsn split into three look.
Maybe in that upper part you could highlight “best posts” or something like that, whereas you would use the ones farther down for advertising or something else. You may totally dismiss this idea, but you asked for suggestions, so there’s mine.
Doh, forgot about wordpress stripping extraneous spaces… I’ll throw something together later… Sorry about that.
Hehe. Okay. Or just use the code/pre tags :)
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
|_HEADER_______|
| C1 | Content |
|____| |
|2|3 | |
| | | |
| | | |
|_|__|_________|
|__FOOTER______|
Let’s try this again…
Nope, but I get the point. :)
Right? :)
Haha, exactly… thanks for being patient and getting the idea.
Hehe. Okay. Or just use the code/pre tags :)
Let’s try this again…
Nope, but I get the point. :)
<pre>
|_HEADER____|
| | Cont |
|___| |
| | | |
| | | |
| | | |
|_|_|_______|
|_FOOTER____|</pre>
Right? :)
Haha, exactly… thanks for being patient and getting the idea.
Changing the traditional Wordpress mainpage view has been on my mind this week too Aaron as I’m finding it doesn’t really suit my needs on one of my own sites.
I want to go to more of a portal style look and less of the list of all recent posts plus a few other things but I’m not sure how I want to go about it either.
Time for crayons and paper methinks!
Changing the traditional Wordpress mainpage view has been on my mind this week too Aaron as I’m finding it doesn’t really suit my needs on one of my own sites.
I want to go to more of a portal style look and less of the list of all recent posts plus a few other things but I’m not sure how I want to go about it either.
Time for crayons and paper methinks!
I’ve been getting a lot of hits with that “timecapsule” plugin .. on some days that had interesting posts a year ago. It would be nice if that would work for 1-year ago from the date of a post, and not just today’s date (at http://PetLvr.com/blog/)
I’ve got three sites screaming for a redesign and 4 more in progress of being setup/created .. I’ll be watching here to see what you do :)
I’ve been getting a lot of hits with that “timecapsule” plugin .. on some days that had interesting posts a year ago. It would be nice if that would work for 1-year ago from the date of a post, and not just today’s date (at http://PetLvr.com/blog/)
I’ve got three sites screaming for a redesign and 4 more in progress of being setup/created .. I’ll be watching here to see what you do :)
That’s a hrad question to answer. But I will say (check this word out) wasinever you decide make sure it is something you like no scratch that…something you love and some that reflect who you are.
To me those are the best.
That’s a hrad question to answer. But I will say (check this word out) wasinever you decide make sure it is something you like no scratch that…something you love and some that reflect who you are.
To me those are the best.
Aaron,
As a starting point, I’d suggest taking inventory of what you already have (in terms of content) and also what you intend to offer via the new design.
Every layout decision that you make should be solely based on the content that you’re delivering…In my opinion, it’s not ok to say, “Well, I think this version should have three columns and a nice big footer.”
The above statement may be the best layout decision for some sites, and maybe even for yours – but the bottom line is that utility and function need to drive the decisions that will ultimately produce your new design.
I honestly think that for my next layout, I’m going to have to really go back over ALL of my content and categorize it in more meaningful ways. That way, I’ll be able to deliver useful “blocks” of content to my visitors. To elaborate, I’ve got quite a few posts that people who are looking to improve their site would be interested in reading. Ultimately, I’d like to have all these posts grouped together so that they could be delivered as a single resource that they could use to improve their blogs.
Also, I have some posts that are pretty funny, but they don’t necessarily offer anything usable, per se. Despite that, I’d still like to have these posts lumped together into a place where users could access all of my “funny” content should they so choose.
I think the bottom line is that those of us who are serious about the utility and function of our sites really need to take a second look at content organization and production.
I’d cite the USA Today as a nice example of what a blog COULD be. How’s that, you ask? Content is organized by type – Sports, News, Life, Money, etc. Technosailor covers a wide variety of topics, so it makes sense that the content should be organized in a similar manner.
Of course, we are already using categories, so you could claim that everything I’m saying is just reinventing the wheel. The problem is that we’re not using content categorization in a broad enough fashion. In fact, I really think that we need to start taking an object-oriented approach to our content, viewing things as though we’re editors of newspapers.
This is not such a big deal for niche sites, but for blogs like Technosailor and Pearsonified, I can see this becoming a bigger and bigger issue as time goes by.
Aaron,
As a starting point, I’d suggest taking inventory of what you already have (in terms of content) and also what you intend to offer via the new design.
Every layout decision that you make should be solely based on the content that you’re delivering…In my opinion, it’s not ok to say, “Well, I think this version should have three columns and a nice big footer.”
The above statement may be the best layout decision for some sites, and maybe even for yours – but the bottom line is that utility and function need to drive the decisions that will ultimately produce your new design.
I honestly think that for my next layout, I’m going to have to really go back over ALL of my content and categorize it in more meaningful ways. That way, I’ll be able to deliver useful “blocks” of content to my visitors. To elaborate, I’ve got quite a few posts that people who are looking to improve their site would be interested in reading. Ultimately, I’d like to have all these posts grouped together so that they could be delivered as a single resource that they could use to improve their blogs.
Also, I have some posts that are pretty funny, but they don’t necessarily offer anything usable, per se. Despite that, I’d still like to have these posts lumped together into a place where users could access all of my “funny” content should they so choose.
I think the bottom line is that those of us who are serious about the utility and function of our sites really need to take a second look at content organization and production.
I’d cite the USA Today as a nice example of what a blog COULD be. How’s that, you ask? Content is organized by type – Sports, News, Life, Money, etc. Technosailor covers a wide variety of topics, so it makes sense that the content should be organized in a similar manner.
Of course, we are already using categories, so you could claim that everything I’m saying is just reinventing the wheel. The problem is that we’re not using content categorization in a broad enough fashion. In fact, I really think that we need to start taking an object-oriented approach to our content, viewing things as though we’re editors of newspapers.
This is not such a big deal for niche sites, but for blogs like Technosailor and Pearsonified, I can see this becoming a bigger and bigger issue as time goes by.