Dressing up a website

[BobLfoot 301]

TW I'll be as polite as I can see this link for more info. Why not try a more neutral color for the banner and use the pastel for the icon and company header name. Maybe use the blue TW Controls and TWC but a biege header background.

[TimWilborne 108]

Don't be polite, just come out and say it. I'm new at this and am happy with any advice

[Ken Moore 23]

I would try BobLfoot's advice, I was distracted by the banner, and didn't pay much attention to the "meat" of the page.

[TimWilborne 108]

Ok, I calmed the header down and took the top menu out since it was the same as the side menu. Besides the red logo and banner what do you think now? I'm not sure how to incorporate the logo and banner yet How about the search box at the top? Do you think it should stay or go? Blue - http://www.twcontrols.com/index.php?option...ge&Itemid=1 Green - http://www.twcontrols.com/index.php?option...=1&Itemid=2 Red - http://www.twcontrols.com/index.php?option...ch&Itemid=5 Thanks TW

[Ken Moore 23]

I think I prefer the blue version.

[TimWilborne 108]

Ok I'm switching it all to blue. Is anyone using IE6 also seeing the newflash and poll on the right side shoved to the bottom?

[TimWilborne 108]

Never mind on the IE6 question. This is a fixed width template and it was too wide for IE6. It is designed specifically for 1024. I am wondering if that is going to cause me trouble. Anyone still using an 800 x 600 display?

[TimWilborne 108]

Ok got the site completely switched to blue and removed the banner completely in favor of a simple text display of the name of the company. www.twcontrols.com Any opinions?

[TERdON 9]

Yep, quite a few actually. See for example the stats at http://www.w3schools.com/browsers/browsers_stats.asp Edit: about image formats: JPEG is a lossy format great for photos where slight distortion is okay if it means a lot of saved storage space, and there aren't any sharp edges. PNG for computer generated graphics, as it lossless and thus retains the exact color of all pixels and all sharp edges. GIF is an older format, and it has only two ways in which it still shines: 1) support for animations, 2) backward compability SVG is an interesting forthcoming open format for vector graphics (all the above mentioned are for bitmaps), but the support for it this far is negligible... Edited 17 Nov 2006 by TERdON

[TimWilborne 108]

That's a good link. Thanks

[Mickey 71]

Ultimate Web Site design: http://www.toyota.com/vehicles/minisite/la...iser/index.html Edited 19 Nov 2006 by Mickey

[TimWilborne 108]

Wow, that is a little beyond my capabilities

[Mickey 71]

Hope you had the sound turned up.

[BobLfoot 301]

Looking better TW, but still "feels" a little bland. Nothing just grabs me and make me want to dig further into the site from the home page. Maybe add some images from your place and your work for link anchors.

[TimWilborne 108]

Yes I desperately need images on it. Trying to figure out if they should be equipment images or have people in them. I think people images would give it a warm feeling but most of the time you just see equipment. I have no digital images so need to scan images in, that is why there is only the windows image. It is going to be something else, but is just a place marker for now. Any suggestions about what type? Thanks for the input TW

[BobLfoot 301]

I've always used gif files since they scale well.

[TimWilborne 108]

By type I meant should they be equipment with white backgrounds, equipment in plants, people? This is proving to be much harder than designing an HMI. The operators paycheck is all that is needed to grab attention

[BobLfoot 301]

I think a mix of machines doing as designed and some with people would be good. Might even want a landscape or two from that view you call a front porch.

[TimWilborne 108]

Ok thanks for the input As for the front porch some of my hunting buddies prefer to call it a tree stand

[PdL 71]

I think some neat control panels and some wired PLCs look nice too, perhaps some pneumatics. Photo's or screencopy's from HMI or SCADA systems will look nice too I think but I don't know if you can publish them.

[GerryM 2]

I liked the menu on this site: http://www.welday.com Look around at some other sites that are in the same business and find things that catch your eye. Edited 24 Nov 2006 by GerryM

[BobLfoot 301]

This site always seems kind of dul, but might give you and idea.

[Chris Elston 78]

I caution you on pictures of machines...There are TONS of stuff I wish I could post on MrPLC and share with all of you, however some of the stuff I work on is closely guarded. Your customers may not want pictures of their machines on your website. The first thing I do is remove the customer parts from the pictures. Only take pictures of the machine. Do not take pictures of the machine with your customers product running on the machine. If you want to use a media clip or picture WITH your customer product on the machine, ALWAYS, ALWAYS seek a media release form from them FIRST....I recently had to remove an article, then get some new pictures then re-publish an article. I didn't have the customer parts in the photo, but our machine intergrated with their machine, and you could see a picture of their machine in the background and they wanted me to remove the picture. I did so immediatly, then got some new pictures. I also had some screen shots of an HMI and had to remove that as well...So I've been treading on some thin ice myself. In most cases, I have asked and I have to be careful what I publish. I want to start some kind of a blog, but I would struggle without being able to post a picture of what I am talking about. That's why writting articles are getting harder and harder for me. I have to becareful the pictures I use. I also have to becareful what I say and not give away a process. I might explain something I've done, but it's something that I know has been done a zillion times by one of you guys anyway so in my opinion it's not a secret even though the customer has never seen it before...for example vision guided robotics.... Anyway, my two cents for the day.

[BobLfoot 301]

Chako makes excellent points I learned in Photography class. Always , always, always get a release if possible. Pictures taken from public property of newsworthy activity might be the one exception to this.

[TimWilborne 108]

Yes, very good point. I hadn't thought about that part yet