Re: Ten Second Delays

Oh, caveat, of course -- I did these quickly and in minimal
time, so they're not as good as if I'd hired a graphic artist
to make something nifty.

At 08:49 p.m. 09/01/98 +0100, David Meadows wrote:
>And Kynn resonded with:
>>http://www.idyllmtn.com/
>>http://www.idyllmtn.com/splash.html
>2) Hmmm... a logo. Lets wait ten seconds... one two tum-ti-tum...
>six... seven...ho-hum... ah! Nice site, stylish but minimalist
>layout, not as quick to load as the last one I looked at ;-)

>Well, as I expected (and as Kynn intended, I'm sure), I found that
>this splash page did little to enhance my enjoyment of the site.

This one is typical of most poorly done splash pages -- it's simply
a big graphic for the sake of having a big graphic.  Obviously
this doesn't do anything for anyone, and these are the types of
splash pages to _definitely_ be avoided.

>>http://www.idyllmtn.com/~kynn/
>>http://www.idyllmtn.com/~kynn/splash.html

>1) Hmm... more of a personal page so I can forgive some of the
>annoying layout issues (sorry, Kynn ;-) )

Heh, that's fine.  But do I get extra points for using HTML 4.0
strict and CSS?  No tables on that page, and the background is
a square, not a rectangle. :)

>2) Yikes! Browser check. Let me think about this... Yup, ok, let
>me in...
>This one was interesting. The "splash page" actually served a
>useful purpose so I guess I can forgive it. If I had hit the site
>in one of older browsers I probably would have been grateful for
>the warning. But, I *wasn't* using one of my older browsers. Can't
>you check this transparantly at the server and re-direct me if you
>need to?

Probably, but of course that (a) adds extra server load, and (b)
can be a pain to maintain.  I still see sites these days that tell
me I need a 'modern' browser such as Netscape 2.0!  (And that's
really annoying when I'm using MSIE 4!)

>>http://www.hwg.org/
>>http://www.hwg.org/working/kynn/splash.html
>1) Nice layout. Were these pages updated recently? They used to be
>much more boring. I really must check more often.

Yeah, the layout was updated recently -- see the August 1998
HWG-News which went out over the weekend; email me if you didn't
get it.

Actually I thought the old pages _weren't_ boring and were in fact
more interesting; the new design has usability and navigation
advantages but to _me_ looks "boring".

>2) Well... that's useful I guess, but I already know what the HWG
>is for. That's why I'm here. And if I didn't know, well the main
>page tells me pretty clearly in the first two sentences anyway.

Yes, but this serves as an "intro" page.

>So here we say three possible uses of a splash page, although I
>think only the first example completely fulfils our criteria for
>being a splash page. Two examples were actually useful, but even
>these could have been handled in different ways.

No, they're all splash pages; but two of them attempt to do
something useful.  :)

A splash page is probably acceptable for under-age warnings for
adult sites, too.  (Says Kynn the former Hustler webmaster...)

--
Kynn Bartlett  <kynn(at)idyllmtn.com>             http://www.idyllmtn.com/~kynn/
Chief Technologist & Co-Owner, Idyll Mountain Internet; Fullerton, California
For your user-defined stylesheet: .GeoBranding { display: none ! important; }

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