Re: SEUL: Web Site Prototype

[Ian Bicking <bickiia@earlham.edu>]

On Fri, Dec 17, 1999 at 03:08:10PM +0100, malonowa wrote:
> I don't see why you can't have a just text page as the seul-edu home page
> with a little javascript which redirects the user to something more glossy
> should their browser be capable of it. We could easily check for instance if
> the browser is netscape/ie and then move straight to something a bit more
> graphical. The lynx users of course would remain at the text part.

JavaScript isn't synomonous with graphical browsers.  I don't think it
makes sense to use it for browser selection.

There are server-side options for this -- it seems like a terrible
pain to me to select pages on browser type, but just like other
design issues, it has the potential to work with the right
preprocessing system.


> The problem really is that one has to give the right impression. Whilst we
> need to support many different systems, volunteers are more easily attracted
> to something that looks pretty and well designed. A mostly text page to
> netscape/ie users may give the mental impression that the project isn't
> really all that good and may not be going anywhere. We need to market
> ourselves to the prospective volunteers. I know that we shouldn't judge a
> book by its cover but we do don't we!

I think we need to carefully think about what we want to look like.  We
want to look professional but we *don't* want to look commercial.

Most important is for SEUL/edu to look active.  More important than
any of the other stuff, it has to look like all of this is an ongoing
effort.


-- 
Ian Bicking         / 4869 N. Talman Ave. Apt. G, Chicago, IL 60625
bickiia@earlham.edu / http://www.cs.earlham.edu/~bickiia