This is a web page • Hacker News Board

Re: This is a web page

#381

Post by lmm » Fri, Jun 21, 2013, 10:40 AM UTC

pnathan wrote: post #134

kragen wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's unfortunate that the article doesn't try to actually make the case for the primacy of linguistic communication, and I'm not going to take the time to do it here either. I'll just say that while I agree with you that a diversity of media is better than just one medium, I spent my childhood, before the Web was built, reading books instead of watching TV on purpose, not by accident. Books without pictures. And it's…

Do you have a good citation for the primacy of linguistic communication? I have become profoundly convinced over the last 15 years that words (& to an extent, text ), is the generally best mode of communication of meaning, beating out things such as video, images, smells, etc. But I've been generally unable to articulate that idea cleanly and persuasively.

Maybe you should try expressing it with a picture :P

Re: This is a web page

#382

Post by lmm » Fri, Jun 21, 2013, 10:43 AM UTC

mixedbit wrote: post #92

adventured wrote: post #69

"At it's heart, web design should be about words." No. The web is not just a place for text / words, that is not its heart and soul, and therefore neither is that the case for web design. It really never has been. I see no great argument in favor of words being the core over any other form of expression. Today's bandwidth more than allows for beautiful video, animation, high quality graphics and photos, etc. Or low k…

On the other hand, yesterday there was a discussion on HN of Steve Jobs remark that his legacy won't survive long, because technology quickly becomes obsolete: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5906202 Words have much better chance of survival than other elements of web design. What was considered a decent design 10+ years ago, is today often laughable.

Sites made ten years ago with a design that focuses on the text still look good. Sites with a more "visual" design, even one that was very well regarded at the time, look far more dated.

Re: This is a web page

#383

Post by Mithaldu » Fri, Jun 21, 2013, 10:45 AM UTC

rkuykendall-com wrote: post #59

This was a bit of an obsession of mine ever since I saw Coding Horror a few years ago. I had seen a lot of extremely minimalist designs, but they were all doing things to accomplish that minimalism. As a developer though, you have a nagging feeling in the back of your brain saying "that's a lie, it's not simple, it's very complicated, it just looks simple." Coding Horror is complex, but it was plain enough for me to…

Sadly you chose a font that only works when it's gauss-blurred.

https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/10190786/bad_font.png

Re: This is a web page

#384

Post by brazzy » Fri, Jun 21, 2013, 10:47 AM UTC

soundgecko wrote: post #348

petercooper wrote: post #239

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because other people have given good answers, I just wanted to add.. the Web was so much better linked together back then. Prior to Altavista made searching useful most of the time, it was common to rely on jumping from one site to another through plentiful link pages, web rings, and lists of resources that people had put together. There was also Usenet which people often posted links on and which was sorted by topic…

I wish there was still a curated list of categorized websites.

http://www.dmoz.org/

Re: This is a web page

#385

Post by lmm » Fri, Jun 21, 2013, 10:52 AM UTC

zevyoura wrote: post #298

leephillips wrote: post #233

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"not everyone can produce [...] responsive design" Notice that the page is automatically responsive, and is perfectly usable on a phone, tablet, or anything else. If your page has no CSS styles it will be perfectly responsive. If it's not, you've messed up that nice feature of the web with your stylesheet. Now you probably think you need to learn about media queries to make it work again.

I would actually argue that raw text is not 'responsive,' because column widths that are as wide as a large monitor are incredibly difficult to read.

I've never understood this attitude. If your monitor is too wide for comfortable reading, don't maximize your browser. Why would you ever want a window that was 2/3 white margins? Site makers: please please please let your text expand to the width of my browser. I made my browser that wide because I like it that way.

Re: This is a web page

#386

Post by DanBC » Fri, Jun 21, 2013, 10:59 AM UTC

derleth wrote: post #352

hobs wrote: post #331

Earlier quoted context omitted.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eternal_September What should we do about it?

Implying we should 'fix' Eternal September is pretty close to implying we should keep important technology out of the hands of those the current users deem unworthy. That prevents both spam and the Arab Spring, both 4chan and Wikileaks. Keeping the Internet as it was prior to 1991, when commercial access was first allowed, means keeping it a small, controlled entity with obvious choke points that make it trivial to c…

I don't know - you can try to be inclusive and also set some standards. That doesn't have to be for the entire Internet.

The future people will have fun comparing and contrasting different reputation systems and online communities. Assuming enough information stays for them to study.

Usenet was archived by Deja, which got bought by Google. It's in a sorry state, but at least it's stil there.

Who's archiving Reddit, or HN, or 4chan, or all the rest?

Re: This is a web page

#387

Post by lmm » Fri, Jun 21, 2013, 11:00 AM UTC

rkuykendall-com wrote: post #59

This was a bit of an obsession of mine ever since I saw Coding Horror a few years ago. I had seen a lot of extremely minimalist designs, but they were all doing things to accomplish that minimalism. As a developer though, you have a nagging feeling in the back of your brain saying "that's a lie, it's not simple, it's very complicated, it just looks simple." Coding Horror is complex, but it was plain enough for me to…

IMO: The logo mouseover is the one giant blaring loud thing on a page that's generally softer, more muted. I'd suggest you make the transition a bit more subtle, from dark grey to grayish blue rather than solid black to solid blue.

Re: This is a web page

#388

Post by lmm » Fri, Jun 21, 2013, 11:03 AM UTC

md224 wrote: post #98

Slightly off topic, but if we're talking about simplicity... why are people still using this doctype: " rel="nofollow">http://www.w3.org/TR/html4/loose.dtd"> instead of the beautifully simple HTML5 doctype: I get that people might use the old doctype out of habit, but it's such an ugly, unnecessary habit, and it would probably be smart to work on discarding it. At the very least, we should be making sure that new dev…

Better compatibility with old browsers? This seems like the kind of site and attitude that wants to be accessible to as many people as possible.

Re: This is a web page

#389

Post by DanBC » Fri, Jun 21, 2013, 11:05 AM UTC

I strongly agree with this post.

Please, when creating content, concentrate on the words first. There are some obvious exceptions, but almost always the words are most important.

You can then add the markup, and the css, and the javascript, and all the other stuff.

But having great copy means that your visitors will always have good quality content even if they turn all that other stuff off.

Re: This is a web page

#390

Post by lmm » Fri, Jun 21, 2013, 11:09 AM UTC

kombine wrote: post #362

"I didn't need a Content Management System, a graphic designer, or a software developer." The guy is arguing that we don't need software then, since it is possible to create every page by hand.

I agree with a lot of his position, but HTML is so tiresome to write by hand (all those angle brackets) and the tools to manage it already exist. My blog (http://m50d.github.io) is all about text like the OP, but I still use strapdown so that I can write markdown rather than html.