Critique: a Small agri-business website

Viewed at:
NN 4.05
800 X 600, 254 colours, 14" screen
24000 bps connection from Ottawa, Ontario, Canada
*************************************************************
(Attn: HWG members:  The opinions expressed are just that; opinions.  You
don't like them?  Tough.  Don't flame me, contribute to the list instead.)

Well, 1st off, in my opinion there are already too many choices.  I cannot
see a overwhelming reason to keep the frames version in either
language...I'd get rid of them.  If you are adamant in keeping navigation on
the left hand side, why not just set it up in a table set?

item 2:  Wavy American flag? (bye bye...) Canadians, British, Australians,
to name but three major English speaking groups populating the web today...
In my humble opinion, there is no need to include Nationalism into this
site, especially since it is a business site.  That plus the fact that it is
an animated gif (???).  (Same holds true for the Portuguese pages as well.)

item 3:  In the Framed version, your visited links are not changing
colour...confusing (but then again, I recommended eliminating the frames
anyway, right?)

item 4:  isca_home0.gif animated?  why?  If your are truly interested in
conserving bandwidth and speed of delivery, I'd re-think this, as having the
logo animated contributes very little...

item 5:  Site Details page.  Contributes nothing to the overall site.
Honestly, who cares whether you used LViewPro, Adobe Photoshop, Paint Shop
Pro, etc.  Authoring program...same thing.  Most visitors would be (I
presume) looking for a solution to their bug problems, not web page
authoring.  Bluntly, stay on topic.  I would put the referral info (This
page created and hosted by...) on the contact page instead.

item 6:  Validation.  I didn't run your entire site through validation; I
can tell you there was an error on the opening English non-frames page.  As
you specifically mentioned accessibility, may I suggest you run all of your
pages through a validator?  My personal preference is WebTechs
 http://www.webtechs.com/html-val-svc/ ), but there are others out there
(see the archives at HWG).  Also of interest in the accessibility arena is
Bobby ( http://www.cast.org/bobby/ ), which addresses the needs of
handicapped surfers, in particular (but not exclusively) the blind.

item 7:  You have indicated that you wish to add more graphics AND speed
things up.  Are you aware of Gif Wizard
 http://www.raspberryhill.com/gifwizard.html ) and Gif Lube

http://websitegarage.com/wsg/scripts/states/start.cgi?origin=wsg&page=/turbo
charge/gif_lube/index.html ), two services which aid in keeping image file
sizes to a minimum?  Also, as many of your images are photos, you might
think of saving them as jpegs instead.  With proper "tweaking" you may even
get the file sizes smaller than Gifs (not to mention better image
quality...)

Anyway, these are my thoughts and opinions.  In general a fast, clean
"no-nonsense" site, totally appropriate for the "business site" that it is.
You are definitely on the right track.

John Foliot
Another 4:00 AM Web Thing
Ottawa, Ontario, Canada

www.fouram.com
fouram(at)sympatico.ca

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