17wings.net

This is a review of Jem's Jemjabella.co.uk.

Layout

Looks

Colors · I'm so glad that you reverted to this layout. It's classy and one of your best. Green is my favorite color; I love grays; there's nothing blinding about the way you've combined your chosen shades: I'm 99 (point 4) percent in love with the colors you've selected. I only dislike the red bars at the bottom of the navigation menu. They really stand out (which is good) but they also look Christmas-y on top of the green (I know that you like Christmas but still... Blue?). :)

The only other notable occurrence of red on your website is in your article on unsafe PHP scripts. There, seriously consider trading red (dark orange?!?) for convict orange. The red on dark gray combination is harsh on eyes.

General Positioning · Everything is sensibly positioned. Navigation? Check. Search Box? Check. Feed Links? Check. Sexy Sidebar? Check. Ninjas? Check. &c.? Check!

Compatibility · Jem, my screen resolution is 800x600 (let's pretend I'm not lying). :(

I'm not going to resize my screen resolution just to view your website. There are multiple ways to code for different resolutions so get off your arse and learn. (Hint: a fluid layout is always a good start.) - Jem

Your header image is 841 pixels wide. It's too big for my resolution! Don't you care about accessibility or us, your faithful visitors? (I daresay that we 800x600 users represent more than one percent of your ever-serving minions.)

I'm kidding (not funny, I know). Anyway, what I love about your layout is that while the header is too large for 800x600 netizens, everything else is fluid and will shrink to their size. Nice. That's the perfect compromise. ♥

Code

As expected, Jemjabella.co.uk doesn't die when I disable its style sheet. Your code is practically flawless. ♥ It leaves me with little to say. Thanks for not using capital letters; thanks for arranging your style sheet in an orderly fashion; thanks for placing your navigation items in a list...

In your style sheet, wrap Trebuchet MS in quotes (#sidebar h2).

Coding Errors

Articles · Add a </p> after you're free to suggest a topic if you have one in mind.

Alphabetti Word Generator · ($i=1; $i<=10; $i++) For < use &lt;. ;)

—Quirks · Sometimes the links to your blog archives yield 404s. For example, when I clicked on Politics in the subheading of the entry "Gordon Brown Says Nah," I got a 404. I also got 404s, on that page, when I clicked on any of the date archive links on the sidebar.

Content

About

About Jem Turner; the PHP Ninja · I am going to start by proving just how meticulous I can be. Okay—you've incorporated your identity as a PHP Ninja into your last two designs. I love it; I think that it's cute. And I think that now is the time to play it up. But when "marketing" yourself as a PHP Ninja, think about being more consistent. First, are you a PHP Ninja or are you a l33t PHP Ninja? The difference is slight, but if you wish to emphasis your eliteness don't forget to always add that extra term. Also, are you l-3-3-t l33t or 1-3-3-7 1337? The Ninja on the sidebar of your main page says 1337; text on the sidebar of your main page says l33t; the heading here doesn't say anything.

If I only read what is bold, I would have spent, literally, less five seconds reading the page. However, I would still have a fairly decent picture of you as a person. I would know that you're a web developer, that you have a sense humor, that you like coffee, that you like games, and that you've had the same partner for the last five years—I love how you've made the right terms bold.

Overall, your auto-biographical essay is short and fun to read. Lazy people can get the basics in less than five seconds. Everyone else can linger a minute longer, indulging in your humor and learning about your t-shirt fetish.

—FYI · After the term flat, you have apartment in parentheses. I'm assuming that you're doing this for Americans. So as an American (yay?), I've decided to go ahead and give you a heads up about something else that may cause some of us to get riled up in confusion. On "Family for Sale," you say My family are lovely. In the US, my family are is a grammatical blunder of huge proportions. In the US, it's my family is. I'm surprised that you haven't had any comments about that—ah, you probably have.

—Grammar Nazi · The sidebar: Use the links below to find out more about my website and I. I should be me.

Family For Sale · Like your family, this page is absolutely lovely. It's hilarious. While I imagine that you would not wish to sell Karl or Hex, they are family (or close enough to it). Perhaps they should be included? ;)

The "Terms and Conditions" ...

All descriptions accurate at time of publishing. Photographs intentionally poor quality to mislead you into thinking these people are sane. Smoking whilst covered in lighter fluid can seriously damage your health. Your home may be at risk if you live within ten feet of an active volcano.

The first two sentences, I get. The last two ... Well, what? :( They're supposed to be entirely random? You're mocking the instructions that normally come with things?

Ask Jem a Question · This is popular. I think that it's neat, a fun way for you to interact with your site's many visitors. And—:

You are so cruel towards shabana at pink-dust.com u idiot! Take a look at your site!

I only looked at a couple of your Q&A pages, but there seems to be quite a bit of perhaps amusing e-drama in there—I'm just going to say that it's nice of you to respond to things that are nonsensical and not even questions.

Internet History

I created a successful poetry site for teens and kids to read and submit poetry; the site is still associated with me since my move to hosting and a domain of my very own (Google took about 3 years to figure out I don't offer poetry anymore.)

This is unclear. I'm struggling a bit with this sentence because of the word since. You're using since to mean because? You're using since to mean since that time? Anyway/Also, is the site still associated with you? Your final aside about Google makes it seem as though it was for three years longer than it should have been, but that now that's no longer the case.

I have several tiny sub-sites which can be found under 'Other Projects' in my domain section.

No, you don't. :(

I enjoyed reading your internet history. For some reason, I pictured you as having been around before 1999 and ICQ (Uh Oh!).

—Grammar Nazi · I'd hold conversations for with him and with Mum's friends for hours.

Geek T-shirts · I'm no geek, but I like this page. It displays an interesting aspect of your personality and it's original. However and despite my non-geekiness, I believe that I have a t-shirt far geekier than any of yours. It's simply unparalleled in its incomprehensibility and geekiness.

Why are you in possession of a shirt that says, Nobody reads my blog? Lies are bad for your mental health.

Joined Fanlistings · I like that you don't have the images! But, I only see 50 of the 200. All of the ones displayed involve Food/Drink.

External Links · Consider separating "interesting blogs" with descriptions from "interesting blogs" without them.

Articles

Your worst article: "Internet Begging." I didn't find it bad, and I don't have a problem with it. I just think that it's the least amusing and the least helpful of the bunch. Un-amusing hyperbole:

The majority of these people when questioned, will quite flippantly discuss their hatred for walking past beggars on the street or show disregard for the homeless asking for spare change

How do you know this? Chuck in some evidence.

You have (or at least seem to have) strong opinions on issues regarding people who solicit other netizens for money. It would be interesting to see you write more on the topics of internet begging, ads on personal websites, &c. What doesn't constitute internet begging? How much online whoring for money is too much? For instance, A List Apart is a fabulous site, but they run ads and sell t-shirts... where do they fall? Hell, you kind of sell t-shirts:

Show off your geekiness and buy a t-shirt today (I get free t-shirts for saying that).

Bottom line: What are tasteful ways to bring in revenue via websites and what aren't?

Your best articles: "Copyright Violation," "HTML vs. XHTML," "No Validation Trend," "Promoting Your Website," the PHP articles, and "Jem's Top Traffic Tips." The other articles are good too, but the tips you give in the ones I've named are fabulous.

CAPTCHAs · This is an amusing rant to read. To be honest, I like CAPTCHAs. I find them highly entertaining; I love how they're becoming even more complicated... But everyone should use them responsibly. Anyway, in the third paragraph, CAPTCHAs isn't capitalized. have problems seeing captchas or getting.

Copyright Violation · I love this article because it's a great introduction to the copyright portion of IP law. Under the heading "How Can I Protect Myself From Copyright Theft," consider suggesting that people add copyright notices to their copyrighted works. The notice should include the copyright symbol ©, their name, and the first year of publication.

—Grammar Nazi · This is a common misconception and is not necessarily true. This sentence is on the confusing side because it's slightly redundant, but—also—if something is a misconception (wrong), how can it sometimes be true?

Internet Cliques · There's a slightly out-of-place looking link to dictionary.com under "Gothic." Think about removing it. None of the other sections contain links.

Top Traffic Tips · Under the heading "Comment on dofollow Blogs," think about adding a link to somewhere (like here) that explains what the rel="nofollow" movement is.

Unrequested Reviews · There's a broken link to your (non-existent?) book review project in the first paragraph.

PHP Security Tips & Promoting Your Website · Tip #5 in "PHP Security Tips" and Step 10 in "Site Promotion" are wretched, irrelevant, and self-serving. Delete them. ;) I'm kidding. Honestly, these two tips are cute and show off your sense of humor.

Most of the article seem as though they written a few months ago but others (like "Internet Cliques") seem to be several years old. Some sort of date on all articles would be nice. A few of them have dates, but "CAPTCHAs," "HTML vs. XHTML," "Internet Cliques," "Microsoft Frontpage," "No Validation Trend," "Personal Website Ads," "PHP Security Checklist," "PHP Security Tips," "Promoting Your Website," "Splash Pages," "Trendy Javascript," "Unrequested Reviews," and "Validation Trend" don't.

On a similar note, think of adding digg and stumbleupon links to your stronger articles. "CAPTCHAs," "Copyright Violation," "HTML vs. XHTML," "No Validation Trend," "PHP Security Checklist," "PHP Security Tips," "Promoting Your Website," and "Unrequested Reviews" would probably benefit from such links. ♥

Scripts & Hobbies

Yay! Free scripts &c.! These scripts are great; it's terribly nice of you to put them up for public download. ♥

Free PHP Mail Form · There's a weird sidebar here.

Guestblock · What is a Guestblock? Guestblock.com doesn't exist. :( Consider deleting this.

Secret Section (Reviews) ♥ There's a link to the distorted reviews section in your article on splash pages. It may be in your best interest to repair the layout here because these pages can still be accessed from Google.

Blog Entries

You blog often, and you blog very well. You're popular; I'm envious. Anyway, your best blog entries are internet-related criticisms (i.e. "Frozen Midnight: Defrauding Customers") or lessons ("Become a PHP Security Master - Part 1"). Produce more of those, and pants of course, everyone's interested in seeing some pants. ;)

Your individual blog entry pages would benefit from previous/next entry links. Also, think of adding a link to the main archive page on your sidebar. Consider listing "Become A PHP Security Master - Part 1" as an article in your article section.

On a final note, ultimately better than you? What's that all about? ♥

Conclusion

4.7 · To quote the grading rubric, Jemjabella.co.uk is great, almost OMG-amazing. Don't look at this and think why minus .3? ♥ I haven't been sweet in any of the reviews I've done—do I dare rethink 17wings.net's catch phrase and ruin my image?—Anyway, the grading rubric is here to inject a bit of spice into everything. So you get a 4.7. :)

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