Topic: Website Testers

[ThinkStopThink]

Hi all,

Would you mind giving my site a test run, just got it going and working on the bugs...

http://www.jonwitsell.com

Thanks!

Jon

[gregor]

Looks good (mac 12' powerbook, safari, omniweb & firefox).  Not crazy about the cursor change to a zoom icon, instead of a standard link cursor.  It's distracting rather than informative.

Nice work.

[ThinkStopThink]

Thanks Gregor, appreciate you using multiple browsers...

[Pete_R]

XP and Chrome - works fine. I don't dislike the +/- cursor but I think, as you have it, the comment that pops up is unecessary and distracting. The only other thing is the nav bar and small thumbnails that appear below the image are disconnected from the image and I looked at several images before I even realised they were there. Having the gallery images still showing through behind doesn't help. Maybe a line around the window that's displaying the image to connect it all together would help.

XP and IE6 - total disaster. I know IE6 is out of date but, for what it's worth, the page layout was completely screwed. Worst was displaying individual images when the symbols for the nav bar appeared up the left hand side of the screen.

Edit: I just checked the stats for my site to see what browsers people are using and more than 5% still use IE6 so I guess that's significant. A few still use IE5???

[LT]

looks great on safari 4.0.4 on OSX 10.6.2

really nice work too.

[vicky slater]

All looks grand over here.
I'd like to see an about page though, some kind of writing about you and a picture, I'm always curious about the photographer.

[ThinkStopThink]

Thanks everyone, I really appreciate the comments!

Peter:

So far the browsers that have viewed the page have been in this order, from most hits to least: Safari, IE, Firefox, Chrome, Camino.

I actually have turned off the tooltips in the software used to build the site--however, the browsers themselves have the setting also, so I'll have to investigate further. I really find them annoying also!

I've built a couple websites and there is always a battle to get Microsoft's browsers to display correctly. I even had a 'viewing' page on my last site recommending people use Firefox on the PC instead of IE. Each page on my site has a 'compliance patch' to try to get MS' browsers to play nice, but it doesn't appear to work with IE6. Endlessly frustrating!   

Leon:

Thanks for the compliment, I do appreciate it.

Vicky:

That's a good point, but it was a big step for me to even use my name as the URL... I often like to read about photographer's bios also, so maybe I'll add an about page.

Thanks!

[Pete_R]

I actually have turned off the tooltips in the software used to build the site--however, the browsers themselves have the setting also, so I'll have to investigate further.

The text which appears over the image ("Click to close image, click and drag to move. Use arrow keys for next and previous.") appears in the highslide.js file. It looks like a default setting. Maybe it just needs deleting. I've never used highslide though so I'm not sure. I use lightbox.

[Francois]

I just checked it out using Firefox with NoScript. You can still get the images but you loose the possibility to go from one image to the next without going back by hand. You also don't get the zoom icon.

I tried it with Opera 10.10 also. Works flawlessly and no zoom icon is shown

[ThinkStopThink]

Hi Francois,

Thanks for checking it out. Yep, the whole gallery runs on java script...

Jon

[ThinkStopThink]

Hey Peter,

I think I'll dig around in the .js file--shouldn't be too hard to figure out. Or break... 

>The text which appears over the image ("Click to close image, click and drag to move. Use arrow keys for next and previous.") appears in the highslide.js file. It looks like a default setting. Maybe it just needs deleting. I've never used highslide though so I'm not sure. I use lightbox.

[gregor]

If you can only view one full size image at a time, what's the purpose of dragging an image?  The full size image isn't below the fold, nor are the controls and it disassociates the large size from the controls. If there was a real benefit for side by side viewing of images the drag function would be great.

For readability you may want to consider a hex color of #444444 for text - a darker gray than you currently have.  The light gray is a bit hard to read.

Not to toot my horn but my day job is interactive art director, so the above and my 1st post are the nits that I look at in usability in design....

As far as the CSS/document structure & IE6 is concerned - which should be a concern because very few people will upgrade a browser to view a single site and you don't want to loose people for that reason - lightbox is compatible and has less unneeded features like the drag functionality. The biggest Issue for IE6 is the doctype - XHTML Strict.  XHTML Transitional with a table structure instead of divs would give you greater cross browser/operating systems stability. Lightbox is tabular using XHTML Transitional.

From the stats on my site I've had enough IE6 users to design for legacy systems.

[ThinkStopThink]

Gregor,

I don't know why Highslide would do that. You could always ask the developer:

http://highslide.com/

With Microsoft itself recommending that users immediately stop using IE6, I don't think I'm going to modify the site for that bit of legacy software:

http://apcmag.com/microsoft-warns-stop-using-ie6-ie7-now.htm

And, according to Google Analytics, only one person has visited with IE6, and I think that was Peter who posted above.

Thanks for the suggestions. It definitely still needs some tweaking...

Jon

[gregor]

Sure, Microsoft has warned people - but who really listens to that?

33% of visitors using Internet Explorer (for Windows) looking at my site were/are using version 6. 67% are using IE8. There are a few mac users using IE 5 (the last version made for mac) - less than 2%. Interestingly I have had no visitors over the past 6 months using IE7.

Only an in depth analysis of your statistics will indicate which traffic sources are using what operating systems, connection speeds and browsers.  In my experience, I've unfortunately found that in far too many cases, gallery dealers are 2 - 4 years behind the general public in both hard & software as well as 'web savviness'  (i.e. they don't know they should click on a thumbnail to open a larger image, unless some text or other literal indicator on the site tells them to do so). That's a generational issue - most dealers matured before the onset of  the digital age. My site is guilty on the thumbnail issue....

Very few artists, including photographers have intermediate or advanced knowledge of User Experience and usability issues.  The goal being, of course, don't make a user learn how to use a site (the site should intuitively guide the user through it) and provide the most pleasant experience for the largest number of visitors.

But hey, it's your site.  I'm not invested in it. If you're satisfied and you feel like it's doing what you want that great. Your work is very nice and I sincerely hope the site successfully brings interest to your work, showcasing your talent.

[ThinkStopThink]

I don't know who would listen to Microsoft--I've avoided their products for fifteen years now. But, since this is really the first time MS has actively encouraged people to drop a functioning browser, maybe it will be different?

Yes, and an in depth analysis will have to happen only after the site is up for more than three weeks. That will really tell me what, if any, tweaking will have to happen in regards to the browser issue.

Fortunately, I work for a company full of visually and technically savvy people (motion picture biz), who have been not holding back their opinions on what should be changed... 

I think the site is ok, but for now minor tweaks will have to suffice.

Thanks for the compliments and suggestions. Now can I stop working on the site and get back to taking photographs?   

[gregor]

The best test audience is not the tech savvy crowd  - they already get 'it' and have a ton of opinions on top  of it all !

in the end, let photographers photograph & designers design.  that's my motto !

[ThinkStopThink]

Well, my point was, there are several very talented usability people at work who have looked at it.

>in the end, let photographers photograph & designers design.  that's my motto !

Is that a hint?? 

[Pete_R]

Well, my point was, there are several very talented usability people at work who have looked at it.

Well maybe you should have just asked them in the first place. I'm not sure why you asked for comments of the people here as you seem to have just thown most of them back and have taken no notice whatsoever.