website poll!

[kaydeefalls]

Since I'm completely overhauling my fic/icon website, I want to be as user-friendly as possible (well, within my personal aesthetic tastes, that is). Take two seconds to tick a few boxes and I will be eternally grateful, and also my site will be prettier.

[Poll #1118561]

Comments

[semielliptical]

I prefer white background/black text, but will happily read other light/dark combos as long as there is enough contrast. I often force different styles on dark background/light text pages, or give up and don't read if I can't do that.

When you use css, you can create a site is readable without the css, even if it doesn't look as nice.

[kaydeefalls.livejournal.com]

Nifty. I'm using a light beige background and very dark brown text, and I really like the look of it, so I'm glad that'll work.

[newredshoes]

Mostly I just like being criminally insane. Also, you should make liberal use of the <blink> tag.

Also also! Would love to hang out, but am vaguely sick, and, to confirm your thoughts, in solo mode after a weeklong guest. I will get back to you, though!

[kaydeefalls.livejournal.com]

Heh.

Yeah, I figured. I'm vaguely sick too! 'Tis the season, I guess. My new temp job starts Monday, so I'm free tomorrow (until rehearsal) and all day Friday...

[msilverstar]

Largish text, with lots of contrast, because my eyes suddenly went all middle-aged on me!

[kaydeefalls.livejournal.com]

That's...a very valid concern which hadn't occurred to me. Define "largish". I like 10pt Verdana, which works out a lot larger-looking on my site than it does on my LJ. Ignoring the dark bkgd/light text issue (which will change), is my current site (http://kaydeefalls.dombillijah.com/) readable, or is the text too small?

[msilverstar]

that's readable, yeah. Nice contrast too. I'm a little concerned about light/dark brown, if it's less contrast than at that link. *reads your RPS*

[kaydeefalls.livejournal.com]

It's just as much contrast, believe me, just in shades of brown instead of grey. And light bkgd to dark text. I need to read this stuff too. :)

[acari.livejournal.com]

I voted black text on white, but as long as the background isn't glowing or blinking (which pretty much makes me back away instantly) I just hit Opera's magic button and ignore any unfortunate formating.

I really like having wordcount or size noted somewhere. I prefer wordcount.

[kaydeefalls.livejournal.com]

Wordcount! I knew I was forgetting something. Good catch.

[dreamflower]

Genre.

[kaydeefalls.livejournal.com]

Good point.

[uluviel.livejournal.com]

For compatibility, it's always best to test your CSS in several browsers. IE, particularly, has crappy CSS support. Firefox is pretty good and Opera is excellent.

Making things work both IE and standard-compliant browsers will make you tear your hair out though. The best way to go about it is: 1. Accept that a part of your visitors might see the website slightly askew or 2. Detect user's browser and apply a style sheet customized for that browser.

I love having fun with multiple style sheets. The homepage of fourhobbits.net (http://www.fourhobbits.net) will load a different style sheet everytime the page is loaded, and on nightfall.fourhobbits.net (http://nightfall.fourhobbits.net) users can select a style at the top and it'll stay with them as they surf the various pages. They're not "pure" CSS though, I still use tables.

[kaydeefalls.livejournal.com]

Yeah, I always test it in a few browsers -- even when I was just using plain html, IE used to fuck it up. Now, IE makes this version a bit uglier than it should be, but there's nothing particularly screwy. Here's hoping. I'm not sure I'm good enough at css yet to really play around with browser-customized style sheets just now...

[strawberryelfsp.livejournal.com]

I was going to say "genre" too. That way people know if they're going into fluff or angst or death or whatnot.

[secondsilk.livejournal.com]

Have you seen grrliz's post on e-accessibility (http://grrliz.livejournal.com/599801.html)? It was where I started out re-designing my work's webpage. Especially the colour contrast check (http://www.snook.ca/technical/colour_contrast/colour.html).

I prefer to have 'warnings' rather than ratings for fic. A list of the things that a fic would be rated for: particular kinks, violence. Also spoilers/setting.