I'm a senior in university who is looking for a full-time software engineering role.
Is there anything unintuitive about the flow or layout of the site? Is any of the content lacking?
Here is my website: genohta.com
Ask HN: How can I improve my personal website?
1–10 of 21 posts
Re: Ask HN: How can I improve my personal website?
#2It tries to be both technical and conversational while committing to neither. On first glance it looks like a terminal bot but I don't think it speaks towards your potential skills.
For example it says "Why don't you say hello?" - my first instinct was to say "hello" but it responded with "do you need any help?" to which I replied "yes." Nothing happened - a net negative interaction.
Throw out the frills. Sell yourself and your skills - if you want to be hired. Demonstrate what someone would expect from your work. Generic and accessible goes a lot further than quirky obfuscation. In many circumstances, the terminal expert is not the only one looking at your portfolio.
Re: Ask HN: How can I improve my personal website?
#3It tries to be both technical and conversational while committing to neither. On first glance it looks like a terminal bot but I don't think it speaks towards your potential skills. For example it says "Why don't you say hello?" - my first instinct was to say "hello" but it responded with "do you need any help?" to which I replied "yes." Nothing happened - a net negative interaction. Throw out the frills. Sell yourse…
Mobile friendly would be a major point too especially if someone is looking you up on the go. That way you at least have a working fallback.
Re: Ask HN: How can I improve my personal website?
#4It tries to be both technical and conversational while committing to neither. On first glance it looks like a terminal bot but I don't think it speaks towards your potential skills. For example it says "Why don't you say hello?" - my first instinct was to say "hello" but it responded with "do you need any help?" to which I replied "yes." Nothing happened - a net negative interaction. Throw out the frills. Sell yourse…
Thank you for your feedback.
When you replied "yes." and nothing happened, do you mean that no reply was rendered on the page? Or do you mean that the rendered reply wasn't meaningful? What would make this interaction more positive?
I agree that I can definitely be selling myself and my skills more.
Re: Ask HN: How can I improve my personal website?
#5It tries to be both technical and conversational while committing to neither. On first glance it looks like a terminal bot but I don't think it speaks towards your potential skills. For example it says "Why don't you say hello?" - my first instinct was to say "hello" but it responded with "do you need any help?" to which I replied "yes." Nothing happened - a net negative interaction. Throw out the frills. Sell yourse…
Mobile friendly would be a major point too especially if someone is looking you up on the go. That way you at least have a working fallback.
Thank you for your feedback! Yes, a mobile version is in the works. I definitely agree.
Re: Ask HN: How can I improve my personal website?
#6Personally, I don't like it.
As for positives, I think you achieved your goal with the design and interface. It's clear what you were trying to accomplish, and aside from a couple of minor issues, it works, and you executed the concept well.
Now, the negatives. During my first visit I closed the page within a second, and I was going to visit another post on HN instead. I saw the page, figured it was another gimmicky 'terminal' site, and didn't want to go along for the ride. However, I gave in after I closed it, and thought I'd make an effort to leave feedback. So, I revisited and typed 'hello'. The site then asked if I needed help. I typed 'no' because I just said hello, didn't need help or a tutorial, and I wanted to see the content. Well, apparently 'no' was an invalid command, so I typed 'yes', and that caused the navigation to display. In short, skip the help step completely, it's annoying and serves no purpose. Either go from 'hello' to the navigation, or go straight to the navigation when the site loads.
My only other feedback is to scrap the idea and setup a normal website. If I'm visiting your site, I'm looking for your qualifications, and I certainly don't want to jump through hoops and waste time playing a terminal game. In my opinion, it seems amateurish. I'd much rather prefer a one page website that starts with your photo, name, a one line introduction, a few sentences about yourself, a list of qualifications, projects you've worked on, and contact information. I want to scroll down that page in about 5 seconds, and know if I want to contact you.
Re: Ask HN: How can I improve my personal website?
#7Perhaps you could consider, as another poster suggested, that you're talking to two different audiences. One is technical.. a 'terminal expert'. And one probably isn't.
Have you ever had a simple ping command running on your terminal and had someone exclaim "Wow! That looks technical!" with a hint of fear in their voice?
Perhaps you should offer the user a chance to explore this terminal interface of their own accord? "Click here to see my technical portfolio" - which then takes the user to a page of different apps, this one included. And otherwise default to a less technically demanding interface to start with.
You may get lucky, and the recruiter may be totally technical. But even if they are technical, and your page isn't immediately a terminal, allowing them an opportunity to easily get to it may be a good compromise.
Hope that helps!
Re: Ask HN: How can I improve my personal website?
#8[deleted]
Re: Ask HN: How can I improve my personal website?
#9Hey,
just a couple of ideas:
- arrow keys are not moving the visible cursor (although they are moving the cursor position, backspace removes different character than from the visible cursor position)
- why not a command for opening a pdf from the command line?
- provide a page for non technical people, so they can see something without the command line
- add more help info
- why not pdf in console text output?
- a the beginning there is a question "do you need any help", when I just answer it with 'no' I get error
Re: Ask HN: How can I improve my personal website?
#10Not a major issue, nor does it deal with your website but - your resume should be in LaTeX!
How to:
- Copy the source code from a .tex template[0] you like.
- Create an account at ShareLaTeX[1].
- Start a new blank project, name it 'firstnamelastnameresume' (always save your resume with your first name, last name, followed by the word resume).
- Delete the code in the main.tex file and paste the code from the .tex from the template you would like to use.
- Edit the file with your content.
- Recompile to preview resume.
- Then download the PDF.