By Jeff Johnson (2002):
Women's Health Specialists
(also see Jeff's insightful GUI Bloopers book)
By Lydia Forbes (2000):
Airline Ambassador
Birth Network
Cal-Pep
Sahara
CharityFocus
Web site Review for Airline Ambassadors www.airlineamb.org/index.html This site definitely appeals to the average person because the layout is so simple but very VERY effective. It is a clean site with a flawless look, and someone without any technical background would definitely appreciate it. The layout makes anyone feel comfortable because it is so well done and clean looking. You feel as if you are in good hands and you know that you will be able to find anything you need on this site. The design is very professional and well done. I love the washed-out image of the globe on the left behind the links. The site feels great. I suggest that you change the fonts to Arial, a more rounded font, to go with the professional feel of the site. There are minimum graphics, and the graphics there are small and fast-loading. The colors of the images go together nicely. It is easy to navigate this site because all of the links are right there on the left hand side, and people without image-loading browsers can access the links via the text at the bottom which is very handy and essential for a good site. It is a good idea having a highlights section right in the middle of the screen because it is obvious, and all important information can be accessed by the reader easily. The two color scheme is good but try adding one or two more colors. Orange/yellow and blue go well together, and the purple color of the accessed links is nice. Maybe a turquoise color somewhere would be good. The content flows very well and is well written. All of the information is in the appropriate place. The only thing with content is the amount of it on the front page! Try cutting down a lot of that information and placing the cut out bits in the About Us section. All you need on the front page is some interesting information to get the viewer in. The design is very consistent throughout all of the pages- clean and easy to read. Well done! The load time of the page is quite fast, even with the moving link buttons. I did not find any typos or broken links, just very well written information! There are sufficient meta tags on the pages. The CharityFocus logo is present on the main page but not on the sub pages. Overall a great site with not only great design but excellent content as well. Great job to everyone involved. Web site Review for Birth Network http://cf1.netmegs.com/birthnet/ This site would appeal to anyone, technical background or not, because it is simple and very effective. The washed-out image tiled in the background is very welcoming and would appeal to anyone. The layout is very nice- I especially like the purples which create a comforting feeling for the reader. Plus it is simple, and there is not too much text on the first page which also comforts the reader. The way it is written is great, it actually feels as if the writer is talking to you in a friendly way. The design is excellent- simple and to the point. There is just the right amount of graphics on the site. It is great the way there is a "last updated" icon on the navigation bar, every site should have that. That way, the reader knows exactly how up-to-date the information is and will want to explore if it is newly updated. The only thing with those icons is you have to keep updating regularly if you want to keep a good reputation! It is easy to navigate because all of the links are arranged appropriately on the left. The only thing that could be changed with the links is the size and color of them. They are too small and do not stand out very much from the rest of the text. Try using that bold pink/purple color with your links and perhaps make button graphics out of them. The colors are great, the purples are an excellent choice for this site. But perhaps you should add more color to the banner/logo up the top because it kind of merges in with the rest of the page- you should make it stand out. The design is consistent throughout which gives the site a sense of completion and wholeness. The site loads quite quickly which is great. I did not find any typos or spelling mistakes within any of the pages, and I checked all of the hyperlinks and found that they all work well. There are no meta tags so they really need to be added. Technical branding is done on each page as directed, and the CharityFocus logo is present. Web Site Review for Cal-Pep www.charityfocus.org/host/calpep/. This site would appeal to the average person in the way that it is very simply done, and everything is very easy to find. There is no messing around here, just the information that they want to convey presented in the simplest way possible. People with no technical back ground would definitely appreciate the simplicity and ease of navigation in this site. The layout is very clean, but also kind of bland. It makes you feel comfortable with the site because you don't feel overwhelmed by information, but the presentation of the site needs to be worked on a bit more. The design is classic- but like I said before a bit too bland. You should think about adding more colors and graphics to the site to liven it up a bit. Perhaps make the link buttons move or light up, or have some kind of animation on the page. Perhaps you could animate the site logo! It is extremely easy to navigate this site because all of the links are right there on the left, which is excellent. One thing with the navigation is you should have an alternative form of getting around. If someone has a browser which doesn't load graphics, it would be difficult for them to get around this site, so you should have the links in text form at the bottom of the page. Other than that, the navigation is perfect! The color scheme is effective but should be used more around the site so you can show it off and also liven up the site. The content flows well because everything is in the appropriate place and it is very easy to read- the less huge chunks of text, the better! The design is very consistent- the simple yellow, green and black is used on every page on the left, and the font size and face are the same throughout. Well done! The site loads extremely fast because the only graphics are the small welcome logo and the link buttons. Fast load time is always a 'great site factor'. I have read through the whole site and I did not find any spelling or typing errors except one on the main page: "and peer threatment advocacy" you should remove the H in 'treatment'. I have checked all of the hyperlinks and all of them are working fine. There are no meta tags, so that needs to be fixed. The main page is linked to CharityFocus, but there is no logo. All in all this site is very informative and easy to navigate, but the presentation needs to be worked on and there are a few little glitches. But very well done! Web site Review for Sahara www.charityfocus.org/host/sahara Because of this site's simple layout, it would appeal to someone who didn't have any technical background. There's no high-tech stuff here, just all the information you need in a great design that's easy to understand and read. It's great the way on the main page there are all of the links right there up the top. Having all of the contact information up the top of the main page is handy and useful also, because you don't have to go to another page. The layout makes you feel comfortable with the site because as I said it's very simple- title, links, text. Very well done. The design is very effective. I like the way you added the little tab at the top for the links to sit in, it's a very clever idea and I don't think I've seen it before. The animated logo is great because it adds some more life to the site, and because it stops moving after a while it is not annoying in the least. Graphics are kept to a minimum which is great because the load time is cut down. The graphics there are significant and very effective. It is very easy to navigate through the site because you know the links are going to be at the top of the screen no matter what. The consistency of the links really adds to the ease of navigation. The color of the links makes them stand out a lot from the rest of the text which is great- they are easy to see. But I suggest you make the link text slightly larger, to make them stand out even more, or perhaps just make them bold. The red, white and yellow color scheme goes together very well. The contents of the pages flows nicely, and is very well written. I can tell that a lot of heart has gone into the creation of this site. The design is very consistent. The only thing with the overall design is the headings for each page. I think an image should be put in place of the words, in the same style as the "Sahara" title, to liven up the pages a bit. Because of the small amount of images the page loads very quickly. The only thing that slows down the load time is the animated title, but I would leave that just the way it is because it really adds to the site. I have found no typos except for a missing period at the end of the text on the main page. All of the hyperlinks are working fine. Meta tags are present, but there is no technical branding on the main page. The main page is linked to CharityFocus by text but there is no CF logo present. This is an excellent site, simple in design and very informative- great work! Web site Review for the CharityFocus Site www.charityfocus.org The site would appeal to the average person because the colors are warm and inviting. When I first entered the site I could tell that a lot of thought had gone into making it an excellent one- I can tell that it has been worked on for a while and has been polished until the creator was satisfied. Someone with no technical background can easily see all this. The layout makes you feel very comfortable, especially the boxed-in idea of the pages. The soft and warm colors and minimum text on the main page are great; a big chunk of text on the main page always freaks the reader out, which is not what you want. The design is very fitting for the sites purpose, as I mentioned before the boxed-in layout makes you feel comfortable. The graphics are kept to a minimum which is good because the load-time is cut down significantly. The mouse-over idea you have with the links on the left hand side is good, except the mouse-over image doesnt really go with the flow of the site. A black shadow is a nice idea, but try doing something like making the text on the buttons light up in a warm shade, or make the shadow a different, softer color. The site is mostly easy to navigate, except the links seem to be all over the place a bit- on the main page there are more links on the left hand side than there are on the rest of the pages. Try to keep it consistent. On the main page there are links on the left, the right, the bottom, and the top. I said that the boxed-in thing was good, but this is a bit too much. It is confusing for the reader to have to search the first page to find what they are looking for. The sitemap is an excellent idea for any site, but I suggest you put the link in a more obvious place, like with the navigation bar perhaps. The main colors are perfect, they are very warm and inviting. The contents of the pages flows very well, and all of the writing is very well done and easy to read. Once again you can tell that a lot of heart has gone into this site. The design is mostly consistent except for the changes in the fonts- on the main page the font for the middle section is Times while on the About Us page the font is Arial/Helvetica. The load time is very fast, which I know everyone appreciates! I did not find any typos, and all the links that I checked worked fine. Great job! Meta tags are present on all of the pages that I checked. Since I only have Netscape on this computer I cannot compare the views of the site with Internet Explorer, sorry! Overall, excellent page with lots of heart. I just love the warm feel of it. Beautiful work! The only touch ups are minor and do not effect the average persons experience. Oh and one more thing, it seems like Y2K has effected the date counter!