www.creativecabbage.com

 

What do you like/dislike about this website?

 

What do you think I should change/improve (besides the actual written content)?

OK first off I'll be critical please note I'm not having a go.

 

First of all a biggie. The navigation/header image appears to be a .png and IE6 will make the gradient area a nice dull grey (which it has on yours). Also the entire right hand side content disappears along with the grass. Whilst you're looking at fixing that (javascript fix might help) also fix the uppermost navigation as this sits differently on IE6.

 

Then FF3 when you hover over "home" instead of the speech bubble thing it's a green line. (You know your feedback form doesn't work?)

 

Personally I'd like to see some capitals on headings and at the start of paragraphs. In general (as with most of us) your copy needs work.

 

Right now some code issues. Your pages have errors and don't validate...this needs to be sorted you can't call yourself a web design company if your code doesn't validate (searching my local area for web designers only one out of about 20 sites validates, this is good news for me but it's unprofessional).

 

You've got a link to a stylesheet in the body instead of the head.

 

Code is overcomplicated, containers in containers in containers where simply styling the html elements would suffice. Header navigation first example, just use an <ul> instead of two containers. Also use <ul> and <li> for navigation. From there it gets messier, what's with all the <span>s you don't need them. You don't need to put (for example) a logo in it's own container like that.

 

Look at your code and try to write it based on occam's razor.

 

Style-wise i quite like it, maybe a little washed out and in need of contrast.

Overall I like the design, very nice. Couple of things though:

 

Your links need some attention as there's on indication what's clickable. Underlining links is an accepted standard for a reason.

 

Strip out your break tags (<br />). they are totally unnecessary. Warp a paragraph element round them instead (<p></p>).

 

Also it looks fine in Firefox, but IE6 is all over the place. Considering your target audience is the general public I'd get that sorted ASAP.

Your website doesn't work properly in IE6, and your markup makes me cry. You have three doctypes, three head sections, and three body sections.

 

If your webpage is a person (as I believe all webpages are), you've got a pretty crazy skeleton going on there.

 

Your quick enquiry form lets me send blank messages and doesn't use form labels.

 

Your navigation tooltips work in IE6 but the links aren't clickable - I'm assuming these are the links squished in the top left corner of the page?

 

http://i34.tinypic.com/fk6v6f.jpg

 

That's how your home page looks in IE6. I think you'll agree it's not exactly the most inviting splash page. Why do you even have a splash page? You don't need one - you're just making it harder for people to get into your website.

I really dislike the design, sorry. When users enter the site I think they would be slightly confused on the genre.

 

And by what other people have said, you need to address your coding issues.

I did like the design of the site upon viewing it. Haven't tested it in IE6 as others have, so can't really comment on that. I think the most important think would be to clean up the code, fix the validation errors and then go about trying to make it cross browser compatible.

 

By viewing some of the sites in your portfolio and noticing they all seem to be table based layouts, i'm assuming you must be fairly new to CSS. If so, just try to take it slow and focus more on usablity and accessibility before you start thinking about design.

I do like the design, but I'm not sure about the words partially hidden by the clouds. I didn't look at the things others pointed out because I'm sure they know what they're talking about and there's no need for me to look at it in IE6 again...but I totally feel that pain, I spent hours yesterday trying to make a site view properly in IE6.

Wow! This is just what I needed. Thank you all for contributing. Yes, I am new to CSS.

 

I have been trying to use "php include" in my files which I now know that it is not letting my site validate. It adds extra "<html>" and such. What do you think I should use instead?

 

Again, thank you all.

The PHP includes will only add extra <html> and stuff if you tell it to.

 

Could you show us your includes / where you're including them? That would really help us give you solutions for how to fix the problems.

Rachael, Thank you but I think I just fixed them. The code looks better but I am still having problems with validation. I keep getting this warning:

 

Error Line 33, Column 17: document type does not allow element "div" here; missing one of "object", "applet", "map", "iframe", "button", "ins", "del" start-tag.

There's quite a lot I like about the site, but it's overshadowed by the things that are getting in the way IMO. First off, having the words obscured my the clouds in the nav menu is not doing it for me at all.. And I'm having trouble with the graphics as a whole, which is a shame, because I think your content areas are working very well visually - nice colours and typography.

The thing is, it's creative cabbage, but aside from the big old cabbage on every page, there's nothing else to visually tie in the cabbage theme. Cabbage doesn't grow on grass - I don't know why the grass is there - wouldn't an allotment or veg garden be more appropriate? And the clouds are giving me a bit of grief too - it's not that I don't like them, it's just I can't reconcile the cabbage theme with them, especially with a cabbage sitting right in the middle of one of them.

I also think the splash page is unnecessary and not as good as the rest of the site.

The reason for your validation error that you are asking about in the last thread, is because you have nested a <div> inside an <a> - this is not allowed. Your <a> must be contained my your <div> , not the other way around.

Other than my objections above, I think there is a solid foundation here, and I look forward to seeing how the site develops.

Good stuff.

Thank you notbanksy. After posting this, I have a completely different perspective on the site. I have always believed that the first idea is always the worst. That was my first idea, thank you for the rest.