Looking For Design And Branding Suggestions
- Thread starter dflemstr
- Start date
dflemstr
It's a ball.
What do you mean, exactly? That the font hasn't changed or that the rendering is still the same? Because the font must have changed; it's a completely different file.SomeGuy99 said:
If the rendering is the same, then tell me: If you don't enable anti aliasing settings in your OS, how do you expect to get anti aliased fonts?
This is how it *should* look with anti aliasing:
And this is how it *should* look *without* anti aliasing:
Also, a pagination option is coming.
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milkshake
Advanced Member
Hi I havent redesigned it completely I will prob have a play in the next few days to re-theme it so to speak but in the mean time how about this mockup of what you could add to make it better.
the name of the game is to make it simple.
I was thinking those 4 options could change or there could be maybe 5 options depends on how crowded it looks but the ones I though would be best would be:
New - would display 10 most recent apps
Top Rated - would display top 10 list based on votes
Most D/L - would display 10 most downloaded apps
Categories - would display all categories (of current ones uploaded of course not the entire list as per pnd format)
All - self explanatory
what do you think?
the name of the game is to make it simple.
I was thinking those 4 options could change or there could be maybe 5 options depends on how crowded it looks but the ones I though would be best would be:
New - would display 10 most recent apps
Top Rated - would display top 10 list based on votes
Most D/L - would display 10 most downloaded apps
Categories - would display all categories (of current ones uploaded of course not the entire list as per pnd format)
All - self explanatory
what do you think?
dflemstr
It's a ball.
Wait... you mean that all other sites are anti aliased? Just not this one? WHAT?SomeGuy99 said:
Anyways, don't fret over it, the design is getting a major overhaul soon anyways. I'm not currently using anything funky, but there might be some small detail that Windows just doesn't like about my site; I still find this surprising though.
@milkshake's design: A couple of questions:
- Will the "Catagories" aka "Categories" button display the categories the same way they are displayed on the front page? Or should there be a different visualization?
- The "Top Rated" button will actually just add "orderby:ratingdesc" to the search field, right? And "New" will just add "orderby:timedesc"... Or I might hide the ordering and use separate listing pages, hmm..
- What should "All" display? All views (either using pagination, or using lazy loading) will eventually display all apps when you browse through them.
Also, I do like that you're using a button-focused design, but I think that it should stay consistent, e.g. the user menu is still a menu for instance, and the search bar at the bottom looks like it's waay too complicated compared to the rest of the page.
@Spirit, those are issues with the current layout, but I'll add them all as TODO list entries if the theme isn't getting completely overhauled.
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dflemstr said:Wait... you mean that all other sites are anti aliased? Just not this one? WHAT?SomeGuy99 said:
Anyways, don't fret over it, the design is getting a major overhaul soon anyways. I'm not currently using anything funky, but there might be some small detail that Windows just doesn't like about my site; I still find this surprising though.
I would just like fonts which look normal without anti-aliasing. You are of course free to implement what you wish.
More than an aesthetic thing, it's just plain hard to read. Didn't mean to sound antagonising or anything, so sorry if I did.
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mali
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I'm using XP on my Netbook and fonts are smooth in Firefox. I'm using XP default settings. Never thought about changing anything regarding fonts.
milkshake
Advanced Member
thanks, I mean I love Pandora's Box vs the official app store, it just needs to be simple to use/navigate i think this would represent an easy to navigate option.
milkshake
Advanced Member
dflemstr said:@milkshake's design: A couple of questions:
- Will the "Catagories" aka "Categories" button display the categories the same way they are displayed on the front page? Or should there be a different visualization?
- The "Top Rated" button will actually just add "orderby:ratingdesc" to the search field, right? And "New" will just add "orderby:timedesc"... Or I might hide the ordering and use separate listing pages, hmm..
- What should "All" display? All views (either using pagination, or using lazy loading) will eventually display all apps when you browse through them.
Also, I do like that you're using a button-focused design, but I think that it should stay consistent, e.g. the user menu is still a menu for instance, and the search bar at the bottom looks like it's waay too complicated compared to the rest of the page.
lol sorry about my spelling, yes you could just add a filter nice and simple.
The ALL would display all the apps - we probable dont need an "all" option; I had it in there in case you limited other options to maybe 10 or 20 apps, of course then when you choose "all" all the apps would show up
in regards to the search bar at the bottom i think it could stay for those people that like advanced search's.
also Im thinking you should/or could have a larger search box like google - then when you start typing an application it would bring up apps based on the first few letters you typed in for example you start typing M then all apps that begin with the name M come up then when you enter your second letter the list gets smaller based on the letters you have typed that match a name - this is easily accomplished with javascript onkeydown and Ajax.
and finally the use of Tags might come in use for searching in case people dont know that name of an app but know what they are looking for example "amiga emulator" would bring up UAE4ALL and PUAE if tags are set up correctly.
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dflemstr
It's a ball.
Yeah well that's not how I roll B)milkshake said:The ALL would display all the apps - we probable dont need an "all" option; I had it in there in case you limited other options to maybe 10 or 20 apps, of course then when you choose "all" all the apps would show up
Sure, but maybe it shouldn't be at the bottom constantly and be in the way for "less advanced users"milkshake said:
It's not that easy - you couldn't use "onkeydown" because of the latency, and jQuery's "$('foo').change()" would also be too slow. The problem is that I don't have the list of applications loaded in the browser already, so I have to use AJAX to load the completion alternatives. Google can afford to do that because they have 100's of servers that are in the same country as you are (yes, they have 100's of servers per country) but I don't. But I'll see what I can do.milkshake said:
That's on the roadmap; there are already Categories, but Tags would be useful, too, to add free-form tags.milkshake said:
Anyways, I don't want this thread to become a feature request thread; there's the thread in the Developer's Corner for that. I'd like to have a solid design for the site before trying to integrate more features.
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milkshake
Advanced Member
dflemstr said:
ok cool how about this? this would also go with the google style search I mentioned.
dflemstr said:
I understand I have tried this myself and the only way I could stop it from timing out my server from too many requests was to load the data into a cache first then search the data locally - maybe use a cookie or past an array into a hidden <input> element? and search that.
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vadsamoht
Well-Known Member
Personally, I like the name `the box', ut if you want to change it, I would suggest not using the word `pandora' in the title simply to avoid confusion. If you wanted to keep within the mythological framework you could try something like Pallas or Plutus.dflemstr said:
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fusion_power
Advanced Member
Looks good. I recommend to add a alternating BG colour sheme as "line seperator" so you can see even better each game.milkshake said:
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milkshake
Advanced Member
the whole point in the name pandoras box is that the name pandora happens to be the name of our console so it would sit well with people in there mind its logical, also i dont really think there would be any confusion as it doesnt use any official logo or claim to be an official site for openopandora ltd
@fusion_power
I like that idea alternatively he could put more prominent separator lines like so.
@fusion_power
I like that idea alternatively he could put more prominent separator lines like so.
dflemstr
It's a ball.
@fusion_power Yes that would be a one-liner for me to add *today* but:
@milkshake: You are going in the right direction, imo, but:
@both: I'd really like to see a radically different design. You are both talking about adding this and that detail here and there, but what I'm looking for is a new way to browse the applications in general.
To make some (maybe bad and crazy) examples, I mean stuff like:
I'd also like input on my current choice of colors, the current art direction (the page is very abstract atm) and the current layout and alignment (the page is *very* linear right now)
@milkshake: You are going in the right direction, imo, but:
@both: I'd really like to see a radically different design. You are both talking about adding this and that detail here and there, but what I'm looking for is a new way to browse the applications in general.
To make some (maybe bad and crazy) examples, I mean stuff like:
- Displaying the applications in a grid instead of in a list with on-hover information bubbles
- Making the whole page into a zoomable map, where categories are like continents with lots of small dots around them, and when you zoom in on the dots, they become the applications
- Making the experience like a wizard, e.g. "Which kind of application are you looking for? (Choices: amusement, serious, tool, ...)" and then "What kind of dog do you like the best" (or something less stupid etc) and you finally end up with a list of apps to choose from
- Letting the applications be displayed in a cube-like matrix, where you add constraints on the x-axis (representing category), the y-axis (representing version) and z-axis (representing remaining lexical alternatives)
- Just revamping the list view completely, so that you get a new intuitive way of browsing the list (Like the current AppStore for example: you click on a tab multiple times to change the application ordering... a good idea but maybe not very logical)
- Just changing the way applications are browsed completely... I could add nothing but a Google-like search box, and not have an application list at all etc
I'd also like input on my current choice of colors, the current art direction (the page is very abstract atm) and the current layout and alignment (the page is *very* linear right now)
milkshake
Advanced Member
hmmm I understand what your saying we could make it exciting, as I said earlier ill look into a new theme in the next couple of days - but I have to say the way its evolving now with the additions people are suggesting i.e the mock-ups iv been doing in photoshop is imo the way to go, let it evolve into a simple easy to use website, I mean look at the google homepage - how simple is that and they got it right because it works.
p.s. also some of the stuff you have suggested would take some serious coding unless we used a pre built script i.e. zooming in and out it would be nice and fancy but is it needed?
p.s. also some of the stuff you have suggested would take some serious coding unless we used a pre built script i.e. zooming in and out it would be nice and fancy but is it needed?
dflemstr
It's a ball.
Yeah well some of the ideas I listed are plain crazy, but I just wanted to make it clear that just because I've used a certain thing in my template (because it *is* a template - you can switch to a different template if there is one) it doesn't mean that new templates have to use that thing. the current design is just an example of what you can do, and not anything defining the app's limitations.
Well I have an idea.
When you find an app, it will display it in the centre of a mind map in the centre of the page.
This app is connected to other apps that it shares the same tags with?
Like, the user could choose the tag to associate with and then lines point away from the app you're viewing connecting to apps that share the same tag that the user has chosen?
And the user could choose more than one tag? To refine the search?
Just a brief idea I had. You can probably expand on it to make it better.
I got it from a music site I saw once, the song you were listening to was in the middle and then lines pointed away from it connecting it to "songs/artists you may like".
When you find an app, it will display it in the centre of a mind map in the centre of the page.
This app is connected to other apps that it shares the same tags with?
Like, the user could choose the tag to associate with and then lines point away from the app you're viewing connecting to apps that share the same tag that the user has chosen?
And the user could choose more than one tag? To refine the search?
Just a brief idea I had. You can probably expand on it to make it better.
I got it from a music site I saw once, the song you were listening to was in the middle and then lines pointed away from it connecting it to "songs/artists you may like".
