Anogar's blog / portfolio is almost done... thoughts?

[Anogar]

So, my site is getting there. It's a collection of some of my recent work, as well as blog posts on AS3, Django, random Linux musings, etc.

Linky.

As I noted, it's still in progress, but I'd be interested to get some feedback from you guys. Here are some things that I'm not totally satisfied with - lemme know if you guys agree or disagree.

• Recent work column on the homepage. I'm just not totally happy with it.
• My site looks like poo on XP with the default jaggedy arse lookin aliasing. It hurts me.
• Not sure I'm happy about the styling of the 'search' form.
• I feel like the post titles on the home page don't really read incredibly easily. The one line titles are okay, but the longer ones just sorta muddle together. I'm considering having a shorter headline field and then a byline for description and SEO keywords and such.

There are some other small items, but those are the ones off the top of my head.

Thanks!

-Ryan

[Templarian]

Really nice work. Thought this day would never come. Since I'm not really seeing very many things wrong off the top of my head just a few praises.

• Your portfolio section is very nicely put together with some really top notch examples.
• The use of integrating the chat into the contact form was executed very well.
• Spacing around all the text makes thing stand out very well.

The only thing I didn't really like was the 2 column approach to the blog. I think it makes it harder to read since you do have quite a few posts with source code boxes.

[Timmytots]

sorry, but it looks awfully awesome, 1,000x better than mine! My privates are small!

[Syous]

Originally Posted by Timmytots

sorry, but it looks awfully awesome, 1,000x better than mine! My privates are small!

Really now, Timmy?

[Anogar]

Thanks! I'm glad you like it. The blog posts are something I'm kinda hemming and hawing about; I think the short lines make it easier to read, and it's close to the 'most readable' mark of ~11 words per line and ~50 characters. That said, it's very non-standard which is going to throw everyone off. I'll be interested to hear more opinions about that.

Oh, the other thing is that my site is really wide. I'm debating slimming it down, which would cut me down to a more standard 1 column layout. Right now at 1024 the site goes right to the edge.

Edit: haha I love you too Timmy. You're my favorite portly balding troll.

[nobody]

Looks great man, really. I'm not in love with the recent work column, however. Something about the size of the elements paired with the blue border is kind of awkward.

The rest is great, I love the two column blog posts.

The whole thing feels really clean and intentional, color me impressed. I also didn't know you were a django guy, so *swoon*

ps: throw some RSS on that badboy.

[Syous]

Overall I like it, but it's got too much blue for my personal taste. The actual blog entry pages look amazing though! The contact w/ chat feature is super cool and your portfolio is awesome. I used to play EQ / EQ2 / Vanguard so I guess you're sort of a web celebrity now in my eyes, haha!

I'll give a more in-depth review when I get some more time to thoroughly explore it.

[Pasquale]

I dig the two column thing a bunch, but I didn't love having to scroll allllll the way back up the page to read the subsequent paragraph on the longer posts. It works in movable type because you can easily dart your eyes across the composition of a page, but to having to physically scroll threw me off.

For the smaller entries it looks amazing, and your typesetting is swell dude

[shane-c]

I love it. I want to buy it a steak dinner and then just stay up all night talking.

I do agree about the middle "work" column though. I like the idea, I just think it could be pulled off a little better. I think Broshua was on the money about the balance/margins.

I'll definitely be a returning visitor

[Anogar]

Originally Posted by nobody

Looks great man, really.

ps: throw some RSS on that badboy.

Thanks! I added an RSS feed, you can get it here:

http://ragona.com/feeds/latest/

(Or just click on the RSS feed button on the bottom bar of the site.)

Originally Posted by Syous

Overall I like it, but it's got too much blue for my personal taste. The actual blog entry pages look amazing though! The contact w/ chat feature is super cool and your portfolio is awesome. I used to play EQ / EQ2 / Vanguard so I guess you're sort of a web celebrity now in my eyes, haha!

I'll give a more in-depth review when I get some more time to thoroughly explore it.

Thanks! I think the homepage is a little overwhelmingly blue due to the whole recent work bar. I like the concept, but I just don't think I pulled it off. I'm looking into better options now.

(And I've worked at Sony for about 3 years now - but this was my last week!)

Originally Posted by darkmotion

I dig the two column thing a bunch, but I didn't love having to scroll allllll the way back up the page to read the subsequent paragraph on the longer posts. It works in movable type because you can easily dart your eyes across the composition of a page, but to having to physically scroll threw me off.

For the smaller entries it looks amazing, and your typesetting is swell dude

Woot, glad you like it. The whole two column thing has been posing issues. I like it a lot, and I feel like it reads really well, but I need to put a "back to the top" button or something.

Originally Posted by shane-c

I love it. I want to buy it a steak dinner and then just stay up all night talking.

I do agree about the middle "work" column though. I like the idea, I just think it could be pulled off a little better. I think Broshua was on the money about the balance/margins.

I'll definitely be a returning visitor

Thanks! Dinner and a night spooning with its sexy HTML curves can be arranged. It even validates, so you know you're protected in case things get hot and steamy.

I just now added an RSS feed so you can come back when there's actually new content, heh.

[Anogar]

Updated. I'm pretty satisfied with the updates. Two of my main issues were:

1. Blog posts were really hard to read.
2. Recent work was too strong.

I think this alleviated both of those issues. The blog posts are now readable, which makes me want to click on 'em, and the home page is both less overwhelmingly blue and the 'recent work' section doesn't throw off my eye as much.

Improvement?

[nobody]

We're not good enough for full-text RSS feeds?

[Anogar]

Updated to include full text.

[DanontheMoon]

...so, it DOES exist!

//They made a kung fu hustle game?

[Anogar]

It's officially "coming soon", I'm not sure what the date is on it.

(Kung Fu Hustle that is, my site is here NAO. )