Author Topic: New Site Spinner site in development  (Read 14051 times)

Offline hidden

  • Global Moderator
  • Senior Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 1497
  • I Dare to Dream!
    • InspirationMotivation.com
New Site Spinner site in development
« on: June 15, 2007, 09:59:11 PM »
http://inspirationmotivation.com/ferry/index.htm

Here is the preview - I put the program aside when I became too busy to work on my site remake and after running into troubles with it before. Although I made some progress I think the learning curve was a bit much for such a large project. This smaller site was a good tester. I haven't built the forum or calendar page yet but it's coming. There are word edits that need to be done. Looking at this I realize I did not use a lot of the features I like about the program yet - but probably will. Its such an informative site rather than meant to be a creative site there wasn't much call for it. I learned a lot making this site and there are definitely some things I don't like so much about it compared to cute. When I get through I will need to decide if this is the program I will use for the site rebuild that I am still putting off. I am not sure although it is getting easier now that I am truly understanding things like the xyz orders and how to set up a master template. I am such a free style web designer that these tedious elements of using the program aren't things I like to be concerned about. Still I am so far pleased with how its working out. Just thought you would like to take a peak. I may take it out of an im.com folder and set up its own site if I do I will post back here the new link.

Comments? Questions?
Success is a way of life found moment by moment

Offline hidden

  • Global Moderator
  • Senior Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 1497
  • I Dare to Dream!
    • InspirationMotivation.com
Re: New Site Spinner site in development
« Reply #1 on: June 16, 2007, 08:29:17 AM »
I've integrated the free google calendar it was so quick and easy with lots of nice features - I guess as long as people don't abuse it -- they can't add things but they can leave comments and invite people to events - that's nice. I was able to get savetheferry.org I can't believe that was available! lol Now I'm trying to get somewhere with godaddy on a new server so far its very frustrating -- think I'll post in genral about that .. and Sammy, I'm thinking about doing a smf forum instead of yabb although I have yabb down pretty well - I hate how you have to add mods.. so far the site is still at the address above.
Success is a way of life found moment by moment

Offline hidden

  • Global Moderator
  • Senior Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 1497
  • I Dare to Dream!
    • InspirationMotivation.com
Re: New Site Spinner site in development
« Reply #2 on: June 17, 2007, 06:20:35 AM »
All done including the forum!  :clapping:

well -- you know for now that is!  :yes: :noshake:

http://savetheferry.org
Success is a way of life found moment by moment

Offline hidden

  • Global Moderator
  • Senior Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 1497
  • I Dare to Dream!
    • InspirationMotivation.com
Re: New Site Spinner site in development
« Reply #3 on: June 24, 2007, 06:33:00 AM »
Things are progressing and I am becoming more comfortable with the program including its glitches. The text boxes still occasionally give me trouble but I have learned ways to get around them. Still in a very high text remake that I am considering this remains a factor. Just thought I would tell you of some new features and I wasn't sure whether to put it here or in a critiquing area.
Success is a way of life found moment by moment

Offline hidden

  • Global Moderator
  • Senior Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 1497
  • I Dare to Dream!
    • InspirationMotivation.com
Re: New Site Spinner site in development
« Reply #4 on: June 27, 2007, 11:57:34 PM »
I got this in a critique at the site spinner forum today and I replied by asking the browser and resolution of the person who sent it in. I was thinking of changing the red but am still not sure if it needs it.

Any comments on if you agree with them about the colors and especially the stretched nav bar or see the horizontal scroll bar??

"The text on the nav bar looks stretched to me, and there is a horizontal scrollbar... however i love the blues and greens but i think the reds a bit of a contrast."

Thanks for any input - now today I volunteered to set up a site for our homeowners association  :v8slap:  :ss-shocked:  I would probably use this template with a few changes and just run with it - another freebie - ACK! So now it is even more important to me to get it looking as well as possible - my neighbors will be the users of the new site.

Success is a way of life found moment by moment

Offline hidden

  • Expert Member
  • Senior Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 1348
  • LaughLots
Re: New Site Spinner site in development
« Reply #5 on: June 28, 2007, 06:52:59 AM »
I don't see a horizontal scroll bar in 1024X768 but the linked text in the top frame does look ever so slightly stretched but if I didn't know to look there I wouldn't have noticed it. There is a vertical scroll bar for the left frame at 1024x768. I would however only have the web site name once and try to put the great looking graphics in the top frame. I do not see red anywhere though. Everything looks OK and works fine fine to me.
:dogwalksm: Ed

Offline hidden

  • Tolkien Queen
  • Expert Member
  • Junior Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 106
Re: New Site Spinner site in development
« Reply #6 on: June 28, 2007, 08:42:21 AM »
Are we talking about the "Save the Ferry" site? If so:

I usually keep my monitor at home set at 800x600 for my own site-designing purposes (except when I get so frustrated with scrolling that I turn it up for browsing a site!), and I can read almost all of the text without needing to do a horizontal scroll. I have to scroll to see the last 2 or 3 letters in a line. But the scroll bar goes w-a-a-a-y off to the right and scrolls over a lot of extra white space. I've never built a site using that type of a set-up, so maybe that's how it's supposed to be and I'm just supposed to stop scrolling :P .

I don't see any stretched text, but that's probably because I'm at 800x600. The red text is a contrast, but I don't think that's necessarily bad. If you're going for a subtle "do your civic duty" type message by using the red/white/blue, I think it works well. If that's not what you're going for, a different color might be better (not because it looks bad, but just because - IMHO, anyway - it does give that message).


Offline hidden

  • Global Moderator
  • Senior Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 1497
  • I Dare to Dream!
    • InspirationMotivation.com
Re: New Site Spinner site in development
« Reply #7 on: June 28, 2007, 08:47:59 AM »
Hi Etienne!! Thanks for replying. Oh my gosh you see a left frame with a scroll bar? That is odd as can be. When you say the left frame do you mean the nav buttons with the light blue background? Because the way I set this up is without frames. That is why I am really puzzled. I tried reducing my res and I still don't see a left frame. I see a scroll bar on the right only.

I can't see any stretched text on either place - the other person was referring to the nav buttons on the left if I understood him right. Maybe its the font chosen.

If you read this can you please confirm where on the left the scroll bar was? Thank you very much.

Success is a way of life found moment by moment

Offline hidden

  • Global Moderator
  • Senior Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 1497
  • I Dare to Dream!
    • InspirationMotivation.com
Re: New Site Spinner site in development
« Reply #8 on: June 28, 2007, 08:56:10 AM »
Hi TG!! I was posting when you were. Thank you also very much for replying. The red white blue was a theme and I wanted that to stand out although I have thought about changing the color. Trying to get peoples attention to serious subjects was my intention.

I still may change it.

I am going to have to go look at the site now to see if there is a way that I can reduce the outer space. It may be because I have placed some hidden HTML text over there. Although I wouldn't think that should cause it. Does it do the same extra space on the left side? Is it centered in your screen otherwise? This is my first site with spinner so I definitely have lots to still learn. Thanks if you can let me know as I am not seeing that either on my laptop or my super wide PC screen.

This is in 800x600 for a target

Thanks so much for the help. It is appreciated.

Success is a way of life found moment by moment

Offline hidden

  • Global Moderator
  • Senior Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 1497
  • I Dare to Dream!
    • InspirationMotivation.com
Re: New Site Spinner site in development
« Reply #9 on: June 28, 2007, 09:04:01 AM »
That was it! Good grief! I moved the HTML field to the bottom of the page and the side disappeared. Or at least on my laptop. I hadn't even noticed that thank you!

If you happen to check it again let me know if it corrected it on yours as well. Now it has extra space at the bottom which I don't like either - i need to go over to the spinner forum and see how to stop that from happening.
 ???
Success is a way of life found moment by moment

Offline hidden

  • Expert Member
  • Senior Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 1348
  • LaughLots
Re: New Site Spinner site in development
« Reply #10 on: June 29, 2007, 10:31:26 AM »
Hi Wanda,

Quote
please confirm where on the left the scroll bar was

Your h**p://inspirationmotivation.com/ferry/index.htm page is perfect. My apologeeeees  :surrender:. I was looking at your home page h**p://inspirationmotivation.com/ which has the left frame.
:dogwalksm: Ed

Offline hidden

  • Global Moderator
  • Senior Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 1497
  • I Dare to Dream!
    • InspirationMotivation.com
Re: New Site Spinner site in development
« Reply #11 on: June 29, 2007, 09:45:14 PM »
LOLOL!!  rofl That is OK - whew - you sure had me wondering there. Glad to hear it. My IM site needs a remake in the worst sort of way!! I have been on and off of it for a long time now - testing this software still leaves me wondering if its the right one for my huge IM site. The little SaveTheFerry site is one thing but hundreds of pages in sub folder after sub folder is another.

Thanks again for your time and comments -- Perfect??? Etienne, that just made up for the first post big time! lol You sure know how to apologize!  :D
Success is a way of life found moment by moment

Offline hidden

  • Expert Member
  • Senior Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 1348
  • LaughLots
Re: New Site Spinner site in development
« Reply #12 on: June 30, 2007, 06:46:39 AM »
I actually like the red because it immediately focuses the person viewing to the 'whats new' and at only 10k in size it loads super fast.

Can Site Spinner highlight the menu/links items on the left when the mouse pointer goes over one, or can it darken lighten the background?
:dogwalksm: Ed

Offline hidden

  • Global Moderator
  • Senior Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 1497
  • I Dare to Dream!
    • InspirationMotivation.com
Re: New Site Spinner site in development
« Reply #13 on: July 01, 2007, 03:31:08 AM »
Thanks! I am still debating on the red lol I tried a few pages in the support the site area in a dark green color because I wanted to check it out and it isn't so pushy - but I might change it back -still in the works in that area - one more Page and I am done! Its funny that the red text is one of the most controversial things over in the rate my site spinner forum. Some like it and some don't lol ( Ya can't please everyone right? ) The input here and there has been very helpful to me and I have already made a few changes based on input. It is also funny how things that I would notice immediately in someone else's site go right past me when I look at one of my own.

Thinking about it now - I understand why you asked the question maybe it would be better to have those links change colors - Spinner gives you multiple choices of what to do for links but the overall page prefs are related to text links. I could have put those in a text field and chosen no underline and to have a roll over effect but for what ever reason that I don't remember now - I chose to build them instead in a Title field - that converts itself into an image -- I think?? - I am not sure but then you can click the space of the title and indicate to link it to what ever you want - in this case because I have chosen a field not text there are no roll over effects. And that was so early on in the design that I might not have even thought it through very well - the good thing about titles is that you can size the field up and down and the text will follow the size you give it to fill. Hmmm Oh OK that is probably why I chose to do it this way. Because I did not know if some unforeseen issues would appear that I might want to add links to in that area without making the blue side bar field bigger. This way I can scale them all down and just add more.

Success is a way of life found moment by moment

Offline hidden

  • Expert Member
  • Senior Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 1348
  • LaughLots
Re: New Site Spinner site in development
« Reply #14 on: July 01, 2007, 04:39:19 PM »
Yes, I often don't see how I can improve until someone else points it out.

Your explanation of site spinner sounds very impressive (e.g. being able to scale the links down). I don't know it and am still mainly using CSB5 and do designs in Front Page. I hope to get some time in the future to investigate it and it is nice to read about it in your and others postings in the meantime.
:dogwalksm: Ed

Offline hidden

  • Global Moderator
  • Senior Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 1497
  • I Dare to Dream!
    • InspirationMotivation.com
Re: New Site Spinner site in development
« Reply #15 on: July 01, 2007, 05:14:30 PM »
My experience with it has been a love/hate thing so far. As of now, they actually named a bug I found in order to refer to it - The Safari Woman Bug - LOL. I got past that bug but there are some tricky things in the text field areas that have driven me nuts. They have admitted it is a previously discovered bug that so far no one has determined the cause of or cure for it. I guess I have found my own way around it because it doesn't bother me quite as much as it did at first. But if it weren't for this text entry problem and the lack of a site map, I would have had my IM site rebuilt long ago. Admittedly, I only reluctantly broke down and studied the program's help files to understand XYZ orders and various other things new to my thinking in web building. Being I design and build by the seat of my pants - lol ,this was one of the hardest things for me to do. But I am growing to like it more and more and am finding my way around how the program works so entirely different than Cute.

Being one is able to draw their own shapes and such right in the program, creating objects is easy. I don't have to make a back ground item in another program and import it. Just like in cute - inserted objects like images can be linked to anywhere - and in this case by selecting title rather than text the outline of the text area is treated like an object therefore it can be scaled and linked. I wish I were a more technical person because honestly this is my interpretation of what is happening. I never really read that part of the tutorials but am just replying according to my observations.

I'm one of those people who operates software the same way I do vehicles, - for example: I know it goes forward when I push this pedal but for the life of me I couldn't really tell you why - sort of thing..  :-[  LOL


I finished ( lol well you know what I mean ) the last known page of the site today other than that I am milling over a couple more of the input suggestions. I find myself glad to be done -  :kickdancing: it has been quite the experience.


Success is a way of life found moment by moment

Offline hidden

  • Global Moderator
  • Senior Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 1497
  • I Dare to Dream!
    • InspirationMotivation.com
Re: New Site Spinner site in development
« Reply #16 on: July 02, 2007, 12:38:06 AM »
That was it! Good grief! I moved the HTML field to the bottom of the page and the side disappeared. Or at least on my laptop. I hadn't even noticed that thank you!

If you happen to check it again let me know if it corrected it on yours as well. Now it has extra space at the bottom which I don't like either - i need to go over to the spinner forum and see how to stop that from happening.
 ???


Just a note that without bothering the forum - I was able to figure out that all I had to do was reduce the field that contained the html code to a tiny speck about 10 x10 pixels and place it somewhere out of the way on the page and the bottom space disappeared on all but one of the pages. I can't figure why that is happening though unless it is the cousin to the safariwoman bug lol I may have to go over and bug them about it!

Success is a way of life found moment by moment

Offline hidden

  • Global Moderator
  • Senior Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 1497
  • I Dare to Dream!
    • InspirationMotivation.com
Re: New Site Spinner site in development
« Reply #17 on: July 05, 2007, 01:04:46 AM »
Someone reported seeing a link to my site on a forum and since this is the only place I posted about it, I think they must have found it here. I replied and gave the board at VM Sammy's address in a post here.. where I asked for a critque.

http://virtualmechanics.infopop.cc/eve/forums?a=tpc&s=3636038591&f=8296057891&m=8891054432&r=3891025532#3891025532

Success is a way of life found moment by moment

Offline hidden

  • Sami
  • Administrator
  • Senior Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 5924
  • Not a geek. Just a Nerd.
    • CSB Tutorials
Re: New Site Spinner site in development
« Reply #18 on: August 12, 2007, 08:22:59 AM »
Interesting!
-Samantha
TNG: "Sometimes, you can make no mistakes, do everything right, and still lose" - Capt Picard to Data
(:turtle: In memory of Turtle: May 22, 1944 - Nov 24, 2007  GURU, mentor, and really nice guy! :turtleleft: )

Offline hidden

  • Checking the place out
  • *
  • Posts: 7
    • Rockn' V Southestern Ranch
Re: New Site Spinner site in development
« Reply #19 on: March 14, 2008, 11:50:31 PM »
SafariWoman:
How is the Site Spinner software doing for ya? It's caught my eye. I'm new on the forum and I have literally no experience with a web builder other than software asscociated with a web host.

Sam has been so kind and encouragin'; urgin' me to take that first step and try out a website builder software (trial version). I'm sorta leary and somewhat overwhelmed by it all. After lookin' more  closely at Site Spinner, it looks like something that might work for me, if Site Spinner is compatible with my system. What do you think Sam? I need to to try and keep the basic layout/design, pretty much as the websites are, but, as Sam mentioned to me, they can always be "tweaked". I use my own background image for the website's background. I've looked at many of the referral websites that Site Spinner has listed on their website and I see several different kinds of backgrounds (also, different textures and etc), so I'm thinkin', I could use my own backgrounds on it. Site Spinner looks like it might be worth tryin'. I'm sure I'll probably need some guidance and support from the ones that are familiar with Site Spinner!!

All of you here are all "pros at this" and I'm just a baby tryin' to crawl :yes:.
Happy Trails Forever,
~Buffalo Gal~

Offline hidden

  • Global Moderator
  • Senior Member
  • *****
  • Posts: 1497
  • I Dare to Dream!
    • InspirationMotivation.com
Re: New Site Spinner site in development
« Reply #20 on: March 15, 2008, 01:53:09 PM »
I absolutely love it, love it love it. It is so easy and does everything I want and need it to. So far all of the sites I have built look great consistently on Firefox and Explorer. I rarely ever have to ask a question but if I do their forum is also very friendly and helpful.

Oh yes, you can use your own back ground images and once you see how easy this program is to learn, I just bet you might be like me and start thinking way outside of the boxes that using Cute dictates you work in. lol Sorry - I still love Cute too but that is the truth.

Although most everything is pretty intuitive. I actually ran through the tutorial on this program my first day of using it. After that 80 percent of it stuck and I have never been sorry that I chose Site Spinner. I highly recommend it to anyone.
Success is a way of life found moment by moment