Pre-Assignment Task 4C-1

Identifying Web site content and design problems

1. Site examples that represent content problems identified in lesson 4.

1.1 http://www.5safepoints.com/
1.2 http://www.ownyourc.com/
1.3 http://www.alternativetransportservices.co.uk/

1.1 This site has virtually no structure, everything looks disjointed, there are way too many text based links the designer has over-used emblems/logos and
ended up with a page that looks more like a listing of sponsors than a site that provides the 5 safe points for driving that it implies.

1.2 This site is illogical, it makes no sense to a casual browser, it is confusing to navigate and presents itself more as a puzzle problem to be solved than a web
site the provides information. the interface is not sensible and on slower connections takes a long time to load.

1.3 The URL is too long and could annoy users when typing it, especially if they make a spelling mistake and have to repeat the process.
The site looks messy and the designer tried to use too many bright colours on a black background to make his headings stand out but instead ended up with
a page that hurts the eyes. The artwork does not flow in any sense, it's a jumble of different styles of images and they make it look cheap and badly designed.

a) http://www.ecodraindragon.com/

The colors of the menu, background and the green block doesn’t much. Some of the text is unreadable. It’s unstructured and illogical. The logo (flash) fuzzes a bit and is unreadable. You can’t almost read the red text in the green block. Some of pictures (in the Products) were enlarged to much

b) http://www.freedomair.co.za/

The background and other pictures are distorted and looks like they have been enlarged to much. The menu buttons are distorted on their borders creating a weary shade affect. Some of their links don’t work and some of the pictures don’t show. The white text is unreadable against all the background picture that has been enlarged to much.

c) http://www.freewebs.com/roguesquardon/

The green text overlaps the red heading and disappears under the text block. The sound on the YouTube video is messed up. The heading is also out of place.

With regards to the third site addressed by Dirk (http://www.alternativetransportservices.co.uk/) I agree with Dirk.

To improve on the site the following should be done:
- a theme should be established and used throughout the site:
- A specific font should be chosen (a legible font)
- A legible colour should be used (one colour: white given the black background) for the body text
- Headings in a more Noticeable colour (red) and in Bold
- The pictures in the site should all carry the same artistry or imagery (animated, photo, etc.)

- The main page is overburdened with information
- The page layout is confusing
- It is not easy to see where the main information on the page.
- The page should only have three Frames not four different columns with the main content of the page in the middle Frame
- The information of the page should be broken down into better sub-categories if not transferred to a different page with a link
- The navigation Frame should display which page you are busy with, with tool tips or short descriptions of the other pages when the mouse hovers over the links
- The navigational Frame should also be static or non-scrollable if possible
- It is not evident which of the text have hypertext links attached to them which is annoying if you are trying to link to a certain document
- The scrolling title is hard on the eyes and should be replaced by a static title
- There is a repeat of images as you scroll down the page which does not emphasize any content on the page and should be removed, as you have to scroll through all the images to reach the bottom of the webpage which is not practical

Applying this to the website will enhance this website dramatically.

1. www.bcsit.co.za
www33.websamba.com
2. On the first site the page title is not named and still remains “Untitled Document”, on their site you will find that they do web designing, but what business or person will let them do it if their site looks like that. On the second site only says “Important Announcement Due to the market difficulty, we are unable to continue provide the free web hosting service.” And then directs you to the hosting page.
3. No Action or time on their site are made and it gives a bad example of the business, if a IT specialist that does websites, sites are that bad who would want to do business with them… And if the sites does not work what is the use of having the site…
4. A total redesign by a professional web designer that can assure a site to get attention. Make sure that the site does not have that spelling errors.

http://www.5safepoints.com/
The pic of the guy in the site adds to confusion, why is he so big, and the choice of pic. My word. Iit really is an odd site, people think they save money by designing a site, they actually lose money.

http://www.teacherexpress.com
Way too many links, and with no visual stimuli, such as photographs, the site is very dull and impractical to navigate as you is expected to read through all the links before finding the one you're looking for. As a user, I am put off by the amount of reading necessary to simply navigate the site.
If the links were perhaps categorized into sections, so that you knew which links you were looking at without having to read every block of small writing, the site would be greatly improved.

http:www.thomasedison.org
The amount of information on this iste is immense, but the links have been fancified to the point that navigation is tedious and difficult, as the writing is so small that you are unaware of the name of the article until your mouse passes over it. The writing describing Thomas Edison that is NOT linked to anything jumps around according to where the mouse passes, which adds confusion and makes the site generally unpleasant to follow. If I were looking for a journal or article written by Edison I would choose a site with at least a search function, or a navigation style that made some kind of sense in addition to simply looking pretty.

http://yvettesbridalformal.com
Overabundence of unclear links, that look exactly alike to text messages. The page scrolls down very far and is filled with too many pictures that would be more easily noted if categorized, and garish colours that overwhelm the them. The photo editing itself is very bad, some of the pictures are blurred or stretched, and there are random screen dumps of works in progress on Blender Render pasted in the middle of the page. There is no clarification as to why they are there and seem to have almost been pasted accidently.
As a prospective customer I am put off by the garish use of colour and the haphazard placing of the photos - considering this is someone who is supposed to be in charge of a person's 'style' it would be a lot more impressive if the website was designed with some kind of colour co-ordination, and perhaps if the pictures were organized into galleries, edited properly and captioned. The links could also be more easily discerned from the comments if they were simply designed to look different.

LingCars.com is by far the worst example of poor design. there are far too many objects, too many fonts are used and it is almost impossible to focus on anything.

http://www.drivingskills.on.ca/ is pretty bad as well. The fonts are extremely large and the website is totally unappealing.