In This Issue:
1. The Real Estate of Web Design
2. In the News
3. More News Headlines
4. This Week's Q&A
5. Wrapping It Up
_________________
The Real Estate of Web Design
We hear this question a lot, usually from people who have just
reviewed the web sites listed in our portfolio: "How come
some web sites sit in the middle of the screen and some are lined
up on the left? And I've seen others that fill the entire screen?" It's
a great question -- one that gets to the heart of professional
web site design. What the question is essentially asking is, How
do you determine how much "real estate" a site should
use on the screen, and where should that "real estate" be
placed?
The designs we do are fairly consistent from site to site because
our bottom line goal for every project is to make a web site
that looks and functions as consistently as possible across different
computer platforms (PC and Macintosh), different browsers (Internet
Explorer, Netscape, Safari, etc.), and different monitor sizes
that users have. This is the most basic element of professional
site design, and it's where most amateurs fall down: they create
something that works in Internet Explorer for the PC and call
it
good. Sure, that combination is what well over half of the web
surfers in the world use ... but creating a web site that only
2/3rds or even 3/4ths of your customers can use isn't good enough,
is it?
The structure we use today goes something like this:
- We develop for the 800 x 600 monitor resolution because statistics
suggest that about 95% (or higher) of web surfers use that
resolution or higher.
- We use fixed width layouts because we believe it's the safest
way to ensure that a web site will look consistent on both
big and
small monitors. Pages that use "liquid width" (i.e.
-- pages that fill the screen) tend to look very odd on larger
monitors
with the web browser extended fully from side to side.
- The decision to have the site rest in the middle of the screen
or against the left is handled on a case-by-case basis.
Our web site, owtweb.com, sits in the middle of the screen because
the
design dictates that. It would look goofy over against
the
left side of the screen. Conversely, a site like amshockey.com is
justified to the left of the screen because the fiery
red top and sidebar
would look silly sitting in the middle of a screen with
some other color surrounding it.
Whether you're developing web sites yourself, or hiring someone
to do it for you, be sure to ask questions about these
issues, and in doing so, make sure you're developing the web site
with ALL users in mind, no matter what combination of computer,
monitor, and web browser they use.
On a related note, those of you who develop on a PC may
want to use Dan
Vine's iCapture web site to see how your
site
looks on
Safari, the default web browser on the Macintosh platform.
It's free, web-based, and easy to use.
_________________
In The News
Finally, a week without some major announcement from the big
search engines. That's my clue to use this space to catch up on
a couple of the smaller bits of news that have come out in recent
weeks, but didn't fit in the previous newsletters.
Did you know Google is playing around with a new site design?
Some people have been reporting seeing the new design for a couple
months
now. What happens is that random visitors to Google's home page
are given a "cookie" that gives them the new design instead
of the current one. It's an incredibly small percentage of people
who get to see this new look, but some programmer-types have figured
out how to let anyone see it with the simple click of a link.
Follow the instructions in the first
message posted on the GoogleGuy Says web site.
I was able to simply drag that link to my Links toolbar (I use
Safari on a Mac) and now whenever I'm using Google, I can click
it to switch between the current look and the new one. Your
mileage may vary, depending on the browser you're using, and
perhaps
on your own computer-savviness. I like the new design. The
changes are very subtle, and it still retains Google's legendary
spartan
appearance. But it's a nice change.
Here's another one that's pretty interesting:
Yahoo vs. Google
This is a tool that lets you compare search results between
Yahoo and Google. Just type the query into the search
box at the top
and wait for the results to appear. (You'll need to have
Flash installed.) You'll see the top 100 results from each
search engine, and you can move your mouse over the dots to
see what
URLs each
one represents. Blue dots represent sites that appear
in both engines, and the connecting line gives you a quick
comparison
of the position.
In the "widgets" example above, you can see that the
#1 site in Google is not in the top 100 Yahoo results. But, the
#1 Yahoo result is #5 in Google. _________________
More News Headlines
Here are a few news headlines worth your time to read.
These are just some of the headlines we've posted
to OWTweb.com in recent
days.
All eyes on Google
March 22, 2004 - Newsweek
Newsweek cover story: Gunning for Google are Internet giants,
clever new start-ups and an 800-pound gorilla in Redmond, Wash.
A marketer's view of Search Engine Strategies - New York
March 18, 2004 - Search Engine Guide
This is a great recap of the tips and ideas discussed at the
recent conference dedicated to better search engine marketing
and visibility.
How Google is revolutionizing the ad game
March 18, 2004 - Fortune
Good article with basics about how Google AdWords works,
with focus on business owners using it to advertise
on Google. More headlines: http://www.owtweb.com/news/
_________________
This Week's Q&A
Hi Matt,
I travel on business several weeks a year and take a laptop to
stay connected. Getting my work e-mail is easy, regardless if I
am on a Juno dial up account or a hotel high speed connection,
since I log into our e-mail server.
But, sometimes dealing with my personal e-mail is more of a problem.
My home internet/e-mail account is via Charter cable. When I
am on the road I connect to the internet via Juno or the hotel
high
speed. I can receive my Charter e-mail via Outlook Express, but
can not reply to it...I end up replying via a Juno e-mail account
or a Yahoo e-mail account. I believe that the problem has to
do with the outgoing SMTP mail server setting.
Is there a simple way to reply to my Charter e-mail that is received
in Outlook Express while connected to the internet via something
other than Charter?
Jerry
Hi Jerry -- I'd be out of my element trying to answer this one,
but Don Short (OWT President) offered this in reply:
"This really varies from provider to provider immensely.
Most cable providers and many other large ISPs are blocking any
OUTGOING smtp
traffic essentially forcing you to use their mail services.
There is some rationale to this in this era of worms and viruses
but
it is quite inconvenient. Any decent ISP will offer web-based
Email as the solution to this. OWT offers that and a secondary
SMTP port
that ISPs won't be blocking but very few will do this.
If you wish to reply to one account while connected to another
the only somewhat reasonable solution is to set the Reply-To
header to the appropriate account. This will be apparent in
the headers
but most won't notice that. Somewhere in the Outlook Express
account setup there is a place for Reply-To address." (Have a question? Email questions@owtweb.com)
_________________
Wrapping it Up
Believing that P.T. Barnum was right when he said there's a sucker
born every minute, domain registrar Network Solutions is now allowing
you to renew or register domain names for up to 100 years. 100
YEARS!!!!! Being stuck with them for one year is torture of the
highest degree, but 100? Shudder....
(Besides, who's certain that Network Solutions will still be
around in 100 years, or that domain names will still exist in 100
years?
As fast as web technology changes, anything is possible.) See you next week!
Thanks for reading,
Matt McGee
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