Website Navigation

This week we felt our website needed some minor changes to make it a bit more fluid. One are we felt needed the most consideration was the navigation. A recent article in Web Designer magazine illustrated really well how we all have predefined layouts of our houses as one example (like you would know if you went to my house where the best to look for my socks would be). But the same can't be said for websites. The article also highlighted a survey recently that found that a bar across the top of the page that remains constant throughout the site lead the least number of errors. So that's one part solved - where to put the main navigation.

But we also felt that we need to make navigation inside the different subsections clearer too. A good example of the sort of thing we liked was the idea of thumbnails of each project inside the subsection. I can't make my mind up though on whether a patterned border to the page (allowing for widescreen monitors etc...) are a good idea. I think it would have to be an inoffensive yet stylish design to pull it off well.[1]

But that is off the point slightly. The key it seems is making sure the user knows where they are on your site but can also get back to the home page easily and also reach other pages easily without having to go to the homepage first.

1. Headscape & BoagWorld - use background images very effectively

[edit - ak]

Podcasts

Many people listen to podcasts the world over, many of you reading this will do so too. But unlike the rest of the world i think you are more interested in Web-Design if not Technology podcasts. So without further ado heres my to ?? of podcasts for the PurePages Group Blog readers.

1. BOAGWORLD - No# 1 on my list, as for many others. Boagworld is the longest running podcast and is for anyone vaguely in the web-design field. An utterly fantastic (uk based) podcast, and highly recommended - www.boagworld.com for more info.
2. .NET Mag - (web design TV) .NET Mag is a web developer magazine and is one which i highly recommend subscribing too, however the podcast (which is a video cast) is also well worth a look - www.netmag.co.uk
3. TWiT - (This Week in Tech) another great podcast, American based and covers a much broarder spectrum of tech and the internet than Boagworld or .NET mag. Well worth a listen if you have a little spare time on your hands. Furthermore if you have the time then tune-in to watch TWiT tv live for all thier other casts in recording.- www.twit.tv
4. WebDevRadio.com - Only tuned to this a few weeks ago but is already having a lasting impression and this podcast offers more than its fair share of hints and tips. Web Dev orientated as the name suggests. - www.webdevradio.com
5. Tech Weekly - The No# 1 podcast of the gaurdian, a general tech podcast a bit short and is simply out for the news and analysising it, presented by the gaurdians very own tech lady Ms Alecks Krotoski with various geusts. A great listen on the move. - http://tinyurl.com/565kdl

Other podcasts of note include: http://web20show.com/ - http://webaxe.blogspot.com/ - http://podcasts.engadget.com/

Hope you enjoy the above as much as I did and will continue to do so im sure.

Be sure to visit our site at www.purepagesgroup.com for PPG updates

This week's work

So this week we've been trying to update a lot of stuff. Mainly websites we did ages ago that seem to have been forgotten about that need updating drastically. But other than that we've been trying to update ourselves too so getting a few things in order that were kind of needed too - think spring clean in terms of administration but in the summer instead.

In getting a few things sorted did we come across a couple of nifty sites. For any hardware requirements we found www.gammaglobal.com very helpful. For web design trends in 2008 we thought www.webdesignerwall.com was chock full of excellent ideas and examples of cutting edge design. On a slightly different subject if any of you are involved in Google Analytics then their own official blog is worth checking out too.

More on Colours

For a lot of designers colours are one of the most important ways (after content layout) of conveying a message to an audience. So with this in mind it is easy to see why so many designers spend so much time dithering and experimenting with colour schemes.

Over the past few months here at PurePages, we have spent numerous hours playing around with colours, colour scheme software and visited many websites to find the colour scheme we liked for a clients website (some of these have been mentioned in our last blog).

So here's a quick look at what we have found most useful.

Websites
-colourlovers.com- My personal fravourite of the bunch. This site has thousands of colour schemes/palettes along with hundreds of patterns (for use as backgrounds or as you wish). This really is a top notch site.
-Adobe KULER- A Fantastic little gadget and certainly one to take a look at if you have a few minutes on your hands. KULER although flash based is slick and easy to use (though i doubt it does much for seo), it has a nice collection even if a little limiting.
-websitetips.com- Once you've played around with this you will find this a nice little tool to add to your arsenal of colour scheming tools.
-Dulux.co.uk- This may seem a little odd, but Dulux on their website show colours that go together (imagine it as a static version of their tv adverts). So in theory its as simple as letting them do all the work so you don't have to... as long as the client likes those colours that is.

Software
-Colour Schemer- As well as the online version this site also allows you to download a much handier tool (working out at around £25). This tool is far more advanced than what you see on the internet. However I would urge caution in it's use as I believe its likely to be a combination of this software and a website from above that gives the best result.

[EDIT: AK - KULER ADDED]