Check out a few of my Atahualpa based sites:
Vacation Rentals: http://www.papasaloha.com/ Air Tours: http://ellisonair.com/ Land Surveyor: http://eco-land-llc.com/ Steel, Aluminum, and Fabrication: http://www.weldair.com/ Vacation Rental/Private Accommodations: http://www.russian-river-house.com/ Photography Gallery/Portfolio: http://www.paviilax.com/ Parenting Blog: http://www.utterlyobvious.com/ Online Tobacco Shop: http://www.alaskansmokeshop.com/ Auto Detailing Website: http://www.morrisautodetail.com/ Chaga Sales: http://www.alaska-chaga.com/ Documentary Filmmaker Site: http://www.pawproductions.org/ Labrador Trainers (dogs): http://www.lastfrontierlabs.com/ Author Website: http://www.shirleykurthschneider.com/ Critiques, comments, compliments, and questions welcome. |
Papasaloha- lovely...nice big font, simple navigation. I like it. Put your CSS and JS external (ATO at the very bottom) You want your content to be as close to the top of the page as possible.
ellisonair- very nice. What is the script font you use there? eco-land- also nice, you have a very friendly design style. I like your use of backgrounds online tobacco shop- lose the birthday thing. All anyone has to do is lie to see it anyway and other tobacco shops don't have it. Anything that stops people from seeing your site IMMEDIATELY will more likely send them away. http://www.pipesandcigars.com/ does not have it for instance Overall, very good work! |
@wskdigital. Nice work - Have you considered using Themeframe? I think you'd enjoy it :)
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Here's one I put together using Atahualpa for "15 Now Tacoma," a collective of worker, religious, and activists in the Pacific Northwest port city of Tacoma (located in the far northwest part of the USA). It's only a few days old, and I will be adding more material.
I also did the artwork. Here's the link: http://15nowtacoma.info/ Regards, Alan OldStudent The unexamined life is not worth living—Socrates Gracias a la vida, que me ha dado tanto—Violeta Parra |
Hi Alan,
I like the fact that you have a larger font size, it makes for easy reading, however, your lines of text are too long. 75-80 characters is optimal and your lines (inlcuding spaces) are 115. This can be fixed by increasing the width of your sidebars. And while you are at it, decrease the size of the Widget title so you are not "yelling" at people. I make my Widget titles 1 em not 1.6 or whatever the default is, which is pretty ugly. I would likely make the length of the drop down menus wider, too, to see if I could fit the topics on one line not two, without making them way too long...perhaps you have already tried that. And lastly in ATO at the bottom, make your CSS and javascript external, so that your site content is closer to the top of the page. Good luck with your initiative! |
Hi SharonJ
Thank you so much for your comments, as well as your best wishes for our initiative. Looking at your bio, you're definitely a professional, and I'm an amateur, self-taught, with some holes in my graphics and website design education.
Again, thank you so much for your advice. Regards, Alan OldStudent The unexamined life is not worth living—Socrates Gracias a la vida, que me ha dado tanto—Violeta Parra |
Making the CSS and JS external will not change the look of the site, Google just likes you better if you do that.
Speaking of Google, I use Google Fonts, Google Analytics and Google anything else I can find for plugins. Google is still the king and Chrome sucks. The more Googlier you are, the more they like you. to make the lines shorter in the content, again go to ATO to Style and Edit Centre Column and the default padding is Default: padding: 10px 15px; Try making it 10px 25px 15px 25px; and see what happens this page will teach you all you need to know: http://www.w3schools.com/css/css_padding.asp I always set my width at 1000px or 1100px and then I use a plugin called WPTouch for mobiles. There may be better plugins out there, and would like to know if there are but this would be great for now I also never use Jetpack, it takes up a lot of space and you will never be using all 36 or whatever it is plugins. I download the plugins I need only. You can change the word Activities to Help Us and lose the dropdown there, too, you have LOTS of room on your navigation bar. For someone who describes himself as an amateur, you are doing a fine job. |
Thanks again, SharonJ, for your help and encouragement.
PADDING I played with the padding and eventually settled on this: Code:
ATO>Style & Edit CENTER COLUMN>Center column setting>padding: 10px 33px 15px 33px JETPACK There are a few things I like in Jetpack. I disabled all the other ones, and I assume (perhaps foolishly) that inactive parts will have little or no resource overhead. ACTIVITIES DROPDOWN I decided to keep the dropdown under "Activities," as we have a lot of activists attending picket lines, demonstrations, gathering signatures at churches, leafleting malls, participating in telephone banks, and so on. We even do doorbelling. Then there are fundraising activities. Our collective is quite involved in the community, and I'd like to have that part there for posts encouraging folks to participate. We're a pretty active and fairly large group. WPTOUCH I decided not to use it. Now that I got rid of the Jetpack mobile plugin, the site looks okay on my iPhone with its tiny screen. Both the header and the site background are scalable, owing to code Juggledad and others posted elsewhere in this forum. AMATEUR: Thanks for your kind words, SharonJ I figure I'm a good amateur, but an amateur nonetheless. I know some HTML, a bit less CSS, and precious little about Javascript and PHP. It seems to me that a firm grasp of those is essential if one is to call oneself an expert. I have a bit of a flair for graphic design, but I compare myself to my daughter, who graduated from the San Francisco Academy of Art with straight A's. I use Xara Pro, Paintshop Pro, Corel Painter, a bit of Photoshop for my graphics. But it takes me a long time to complete these projects. I'm not ashamed to own up to my ignorance and am willing to ask questions and learn. Regards, Alan OldStudent The unexamined life is not worth living—Socrates Gracias a la vida, que me ha dado tanto—Violeta Parra |
Great! The other Google plugin I use regularly is Google Sitemap.
Google Analytics, Google Fonts Google Site Map I also use WordPress Backup to Dropbox and back up my site every 2 weeks and for the month of December I use WP Snowfall :) Also, Akismet and Bad Behavior for spam control |
Good ideas, Sharon.
I use the Duplicator plugin by Life In The Grid for backup. I maintain a WAMP on my local computer and back up every few days. I test the backups in the WAMP. I also have several other sites and use Duplicator on it. I developed the site you've been helping me out with on my WAMP and it took me 10 minutes to upload it to the web server at BlueHost. I use Duplicator because I have had other backups fail me, and I can test every backup pretty quickly. I'll be sure to check out the Google items you suggested. By the way, I think we live in the same corner of the world with just a wee border between us. Regards, Alan OldStudent The unexamined life is not worth living—Socrates Gracias a la vida, que me ha dado tanto—Violeta Parra |
What EVER made you call yourself an amateur??? I don't even do that!!!
Happy New Year, Alan. |
It's quite intimidating posting my little blog here, but I have loved this theme since I found it 4 years ago. I can change more things in Atahualpa than any of my other friends in their paid Genesis themes. I have learned a lot of html, very little CSS and that's all, but I'm still learning.
Here's my blog: http://teachingwhatisgood.com I'd love your thoughts and suggestions! |
I have nothing to suggest. It is a very friendly looking website, with simple, obvious navigation, font is easy to read. If I were a young Christian mum, I would be delighted to find you. Congratulations.
On the Beauty Series page, I would like to see the series broken out into the five you mention. I might only have time to watch or read one at a time. Otherwise you have one download link at the top and and a long, long white page. I also am impressed about how you stay on top of your comments and reply to many if not all of them. Way to go to engage your followers! |
SharonJ, wow, thank you so much!! I'm so glad you mentioned that about the Beauty series. I set that up before I really understood about setting up menus. I switched the menu link to the landing page I had already created on the series, this way the readers have the option immediately to choose which one to read.
Thanks again for your critique and help! Blessings. Kate |
I have used Atahualpa for two of my personal sites:
AnneTannes Tuin (AnneTanne's Garden) and Mindful ouderschap (Mindful Parenting) For a local society I made letsmol.be. And 't Rode Labyrint (The Red Labyrint) is the site for a small center for personal development owned by a friend of mine. I think that - although AnneTannes Tuin and LETS Mol have a similar setup - the four sites together show the versatility of the theme. |
Anne's Garden is lovely. Excellent photos. Lots of white space. The only thing I can advise is to go to Atahualpa Theme Options, down at the bottom and make Javascript and the CSS external, so that your content is closer to the top of the page.
Mindful Parenting, in my opinion looks rather gloomy. That is a matter of opinion, however. What is not a matter of opinion is the colour difference between the text and the background is too close for an accessible website. Enter your url here: http://www.accesskeys.org/tools/color-contrast.html and it will tell you where it needs improvement. Best wishes! |
Thank you for your advice Sharon...
I started working on 'mindful parenting' only today, so I'm very glad with your comments... (You were probably the first to see that site...) Ann |
You are very welcome. I am happy I found that site to which I sent you the link. I was looking for another site and found that instead. Much more helpful.
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I noticed that I originally posted these in June 2013.
Wholehearted, has had a few refinements since then but is substantially unchanged. Most recently font size tweaks, quote box widget added, new css for the block quote, social buttons added. While I have a few plugins I like, the hosting for this site disagreed with some of them and so I had to find different ones that worked with the hosting and provided required performance and functionality. My gallery is still using Atahualpa, however the style and gallery engine are completely different. eCommerce is part of this site but its not enabled. I'm fairly happy with it but it needs some new content and TLC. |
Nice and bright, Keith. I like that you have named the pages something more searchable. Caring is named community-clients. That is good, but cr-programs means nothing and that would not help you much. The only other thing I see is that your Javascript and Css is internal. Change that to external in Atahualpa Theme Options right down at the bottom.
My only other concern is that on my computer, anyway it is slow to load. The screen goes white between page loading. I checked it with Pingdom's Website Speed Test and it says your home page is 1.3MB and takes just over 5 seconds to load. Try it your self: http://tools.pingdom.com/fpt/ |
Hi Sharon and thanks for taking time to check it out. Its slow for a range of reasons but mostly I think its the hosting. Its pretty awful at some times. Many of the plugins I prefer to use don't work and making the JS and CSS external breaks the website.
How is the gallery performance at your location by comparison? Keith |
That is peculiar that external CSS and JS would break your site. You might post a thread about that and see what Juggledad says. All sites of mine are external. I have built easily a couple of hundred, 99% of them with Atahualpa.
The gallery on your other site works well and quickly. I prefer galleries that have the option of saying what the image is, but that is just my personal opinion based on nothing in particular. :) You are a good photographer. What city is this? http://gallery.heinrich.id.au/#gallery/1930/1707 |
Thanks for the kind words Sharon. The image shows the Story Bridge, Brisbane, Australia.
The gallery does have image titles, I've just been too busy (lazy) to go back and title and annotate them. One day for sure though. ;) As for Wholehearted, its with a budget host, with the server locked down for maximum security so far as I can see. I've tried to talk to the host about it and they aren't interested in troubleshooting. It really does stop the site working if you go external. |
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