Somone over at Thesis Theme HQ reviewed TechPatio.com recently and compared the current site design and layout (as of December ’09) to the one I had before switching to the Thesis theme, back in August 2009.
She did a really fantastic and lengthy review of my site and I’m really happy to see how much effort she put into it. She even went on to provide some really great ideas on how I can improve the site. Some of the ideas I had already thought about but some of them I haven’t, so I’ll have to look into some changes next year 🙂
I’ll just really quick comment on some of her suggestions:
“Suggest drawing out a colour or two from your header image such as brown, blue or orange to add extra flair.”
Interesting idea. I’m not a designer but maybe I can come up with something that will add extra flair.
“Suggest the nav items be reviewed so that the Subscribe item fits better and doesn’t create a second row with void of white. Perhaps reconsider the use of the ‘Articles’ button as the other nav items also have articles.”
I haven’t been able to reproduce this, as it’s an error. It looks fine in my browsers so I suspect it could be a resize issue somewhere. It’s supposed to look like it does in this screenshot, e.g. the “Subscribe”-link to the right being in the same row as the rest of the menu, and not on a new row, below the navigation menu:
How does it look in your browser? Leave a comment below!
Another great suggestion:
Length of Page
* The ‘About’ page for example is of standard length, however the insertion of every category in the right-hand sidebar and additional Google AdSense units stretches the page out to more than twice its length, making the task of scrolling down to check out what is in the footer a bit of a marathon.
* Suggest removing some of the category listings to the nav menu, a drop down system or a shorter manually coded text widget with the categories you really want to include in the sidebar.
I agree. That’s definitely something that needs to be looked into and some of the things could easily be moved to the footer, as Somone also suggests.
Feel free to head on over and read the entire review and check out all the other great Thesis ressources she offers.
Klaus,
Your site now appears in the Thesis Theme HQ Gallery with a link to the above mentioned review. Have a happy new year. I look forward to interacting with you via our blogging networks.
Somone
.-= Somone | Thesis Theme HQ´s last blog ..Thesis Theme Site Review: Tech Patio =-.
Thanks Somone – looks really good to be in the Thesis Theme HQ Gallery 🙂
You too have a happy new year!
Thats quite an interview, publicity ftw!
Anywho, subscribe button here looks exactly as on your screenshot (win7, FF 3.5.6)
Lookin good to me as well, good job!
.-= Dennis Edell´s last blog ..UPDATED – ONE MORE DAY & MORE DOMAINS! Again – Pick My New Domain Names With A chance To Win $10! =-.
Commention on
“Suggest the nav items be reviewed so that the Subscribe item fits better and doesn’t create a second row with void of white. Perhaps reconsider the use of the ‘Articles’ button as the other nav items also have articles.”
It creates another row in my browser too. (FF 3.5 on Windows Vista).
My suggestion: You have bigger subscribe button just below the subscribe on menu. Why not turn it off in menu and let there be just one? Makes sense…
If you need help with that then I am always up for Thesis Volunteering.
~Let’s be awesome.
.-= King Sidharth´s last blog ..Meditation Rocks gets facelift and Thesis =-.
Hi King. The bigger subscribe button below the nav-menu subscribe button, is not always there. I sometimes use that spot to promote a featured post/article etc. The bigger subscribe button is only there when I don’t have anything in particular that I want to promote.
It’s odd that you also have an extra row, I guess I just have to remove one of my nav menu items to fix it. Plenty of space between the last button, “tech news” and the “subscribe” link, in my browser, as you can see on the posted screenshot in the post above.
Hmmm… I guess that’s coz our browsers are rendering padding and margins differently. Doesn’t really matter. You have great content so small things wont really matter… or maybe removing extra space between ‘/’ and the words ‘guides’ and ‘how-to’ will do the trick.
.-= King Sidharth´s last blog ..Meditation Rocks gets facelift and Thesis =-.
I tried to remove the space around “/” – does it look any different in your end, now?
Thanks!
Hey ! It’s done!!!! YAY!
.-= King Sidharth´s last blog ..101 High School Meditation & Rocking Life Tips – Best of Best =-.
Cool – thanks 🙂
My theme is completely black So I made my logo Brown , check it out if you want by clicking on my Name (Link) , Thanks for the tip
Excellent post and actually I have not yet tried thesis theme, I am looking one or two more options and would like to change my blog with the new theme in the coming months.