It seems every couple months I get completely fed up with this website and vow to redesign and refactor it. Well, it’s happening again. I think this is the third rendition of the site, and while it looks half decent, there’s really no structure at all. That’s got to change. Until I decide what I really want out of the site, I’ve installed Twenty Ten (which I am loving) to tide me over. Couldn’t deal with the old theme any more. Anyways, read on to see some of my thoughts for the next sagalbot.com update.
Make it readable.
This is a blog. You should be able to read stuff easily. New design is going to be greyscale and pull lots of the same typography that I already have in place. I honestly like the look of this text in the MCEditor more than on the actual page. I’d say that’s a bit of a red flag.
Media Viewer.
Well sagalbot.com/category/media has been completely empty for months. I guess that’s what you get for going from idea to photoshop to deployment in a night in front of the TV. With too much else going on, I never had time to set up some sort of media viewer. I’ve got lots of photos and videos that I haven’t put up because I haven’t had anything in place.
Ditch Disqus.
As nice as it is to have nicely formatted comments for any theme with a few clicks, it’s the easy way out. I got lazy (read: I built the theme in a couple hours) and decided to use plugins to do stuff for me. Not having full control over my markup really grinds my gears, so this time around I’ll be doing it all myself.
Full HTML5.
I guess that should read full HTML now that WHATWG has decided to confuse everyone and drop the 5. I’m keeping it. Anyways, I’ll be marking up the site in full HTML5. I’ve used the doctype for ages now, but haven’t taken advantage of the new semantic markup.
Give people a reason to come back.
To my surprise, people actually visit this site – even when I don’t add content for months. Not only that, but it a great referrer for the other sites that I manage. This means adding blog entries, tutorials, photos and other excellent things. Give the site some interactivity and dynamism.
Those are just off the top of my head. There’s definitely more to add and think about, but I really just plan on keepin’ it simple. I’ll be adding to this list as I think of new stuff. If you’ve got an idea or criticism, let me know!