Ryan Doom

Making a better 404 page

Ryan Doom — Sun, 15 Mar 2009 20:16:00 GMT

I just ran into a 404 page on a website, and realized that it should be a standard practice to customize your websites 404 page to make it more useful to users. The standard...

Getting rid of the admin area of your application

Ryan Doom — Thu, 08 Jan 2009 07:40:00 GMT

One difference that I have always liked about DotNetNuke versus Drupal and Joomla is that the admin interface is built into the website not a separate area. When Kevin and I researched all of the top Content Management Systems three years ago we decided ...

Error indicates that IIS is not installed on this machine

Ryan Doom — Mon, 01 Dec 2008 16:48:00 GMT

“error indicates that IIS is not installed on this machine” when running “aspnet_regiis -i” but you do have IIS installed? This happened to me recently on my new laptop that is running Vista 64bit and IIS 7. The issue

Top 5 3rd party DotNetNuke modules

Ryan Doom — Sun, 05 Oct 2008 21:11:00 GMT

After delivering over 100 DotNetNuke sites we have used dozens of 3rd party modules and have custom programmed even more. I was trying to assess what 5 3rd party modules would be the top on my list for delivering a solid website with DNN. In no particular order...

Installing Python and Google App Engine on Windows

Ryan Doom — Sun, 28 Sep 2008 21:58:00 GMT

Getting Python and Google App Engine SDK Installed was much easier than expected, but I decided to document this in case anyone was having any trouble getting it running. Google App Engine is a new lab project by Google that will allow you to build and essentially host your application on their servers using their processing power and distributed database architecture. It’s a brilliant idea. Right now only Python is supported, although they claim that they will be working to support other languages in the future as well. I assume we will see PHP next. Good news is that it does support Python’s Django framework. Anyways onto the instructions:

Installing Python on Windows & Installing Google App Engine on Windows

These steps can help you Install Python on Windows as well as get Google App Engine Installed

Download Python 2.5.* from python.org http://www.python.org/download/
Run the downloaded MSI and install it, the default is C:\python25
Check to make sure Python works. Open up the command prompt by clicking on the Vista Icon, and in the Start Search area type cmd
Once the cmd prompt is open type “cd c:\python25” that will take you to the python directory

A few usability items you may consider with your cart

Ryan Doom — Wed, 18 Jun 2008 21:22:00 GMT

Outlined are some things you might now have considered when building your last e-commerce system.

Top Website Usability Tips

Ryan Doom — Thu, 17 Jan 2008 02:57:00 GMT

Usability is a measurement on how easy a website or user interface is to use. This term is also used to refer to how to improve the overall ease-of-use when designing an interface.
The core components of usability are:

Learnability: Can users accomplish basic tasks on their very first visit? Is it intuitive?
Efficiency: Once the user has learned the system can they do the tasks quickly?
Memorability: How easy is the system to use after not using it for a period of time?
Errors: How many issues did the user run into, how severe were they, and how easily can they recover from them?
Satisfaction: Is it fun and easy to use?
Utility: Does it do what the user needs?

General Website Tips

Use a descriptive tagline of what your website does

Have you ever been frustrated by a website after searching high and low and still cannot find out what they do? Consider starting a practice of having a one line descriptive slogan of what the business does on the homepage or every page. Not some lame marketing jargon but plain easy to understand English of what the site is for; if your parents could read it and get it you should be all set.

Using the Window <TITLE>

The number one factor to how your page is indexed in search engines is the description used in the pages title. Start getting away from the old “Company Name > About” style and move to “KEYWORD PHRASES RELEVANT TO THIS PAGE | Company Name” and excluded the company name if you feel it is not necessary.

Search Box Tips

You do not need to add the text “Search” in front of a textbox if there is a button that reads “Search” to the right that the user is supposed to click on. People have caught on, this is now intuitive behavior and it’s ok to remove that redundancy.
General rule of thumb, make your search box 27 characters wide.
Definitely include search on your site if it has over 100 pages

Having a Home link on the homepage

If you are on the homepage you don’t need to have the Home button in the navigation. If you have a consistent navigation on all pages that includes the Home page that at least make sure that the navigation element is highlighted differently when they are on that page.

Name and Logo

Include the name of your site and the logo on every page; link the logo to the homepage.

Links go to new pages, Buttons perform actions

As a general rule of thumb text links should take you to a new page when you click on them and buttons should submit some type of information or take you to the next step in a process.

Using PDF’s on your website

As a general rule of thumb you should try to avoid using PDF’s on your website when possible. They break the natural flow of website browsing. Often users will click on a link and not know it was a PDF link, it then opens up and they have to wait for it to download and for acrobat to start running within the browser and then often times they close it immediately and end up closing their entire web browser. Plus a PDF is just a mass of content that is very difficult to navigate through. Use PDFs if you are distributing large documents that the user needs to print, or documents that must be formatted in a very specific way.

Avoiding Banner Blindness

Studies show that users now understand what banners and advertisements look like on websites and often look right past them. This means it is very important to ensure your content and images do not look like banners. Avoid creating images the size that banners usually are, avoid blinking or animated images, and definitely avoid using traditional pop-ups when at all possible. Text only ads are now proving to be the most successful banner ads because users are still reading them.

Don’t open new browser windows

When you think about building websites you must always be thinking what is intuitive and what is consistent. You don’t want to break many of the normal browsing norms because you want users to feel at home on your site and have little to learn. If you program your site to start opening windows up in a new browsers as users clicks you open up a world of issues. The first and most important is that the back button does not work on the new window; and this button is extremely popular and critical when navigating the web. The second is that different web browsers handle new windows differently. In one it may be a new window or perhaps a new tab, and if it’s a new tab and then moves the user to that page they have to scan their tabs to get back to where they were. Remember, the user always has the option to make the decision themselves if they want the link to open up in a new window by right clicking or CTRL clicking on a link on your site.

Restrictive Form Behavior

Rethink your website forms. Remember that each field that the user has to fill out is some burden to them, so if you don’t need or use the salutation don’t ask for it, and ask yourself that question for each form field. When asking for phone numbers don’t split it into three separate boxes when one will do. Don’t require the user to type the phone number in a specific format or their credit card in a specific format if it doesn’t really matter. Is that field REALLY required or do you just feel it would be nice to have? Think about your forms a bit more, make them easier for your users, not just easier for you.

Splash Screens and all Flash Sites

Don’t do it, they give the impression that the website is more concerned with its own image then that of the users actual needs and their time.

Think about your Typography

You can achieve more with choosing the right fonts, sizes, colors and placement then you can achieve with large graphics and bloated designs.

Website Supplements

Email Newsletters

Your viewer is engaged in your information while they are on your website, but once they are done you have lost that connection. They might not ever come back. Enticing users to sign up for an email newsletter can help you maintain...

ASP .NET MVC vs Monorail Castle Project

Ryan Doom — Sun, 09 Dec 2007 03:52:00 GMT

Microsoft is releasing their own ASP .NET MVC platform that will create a development environment similar to Ruby on Rails and the ASP .NET Castle Project Monorail.

I have tried to start a list of some thoughts I have comparing the two at this point, but I feel Microsoft’s ASP.NET MVC will be a better choice over the Castle Projects Monorail.

Where does the users eye go on a webpage?

Ryan Doom — Sun, 25 Nov 2007 14:57:00 GMT

Eye tracking studies involve using cameras and pattern recognition to track where the user's eye travels on a web page. They can then take this camera data and create heat map overlays of the web page and get an accurate measurement of what really draws the users attention.

Here are 20+ lessons learned from a recent study.

Ads in the top and left portions of a page will receive the most eye fixation.
Ads placed next to the best content are seen more often.
Bigger images get more attention.
Clean, clear faces in images attract more eye fixation.
Fancy formatting and fonts are ignored.
Formatting can draw attention.
Headings draw the eye.
Initial eye movement focuses on the upper left corner of the page.
Large blocks of text are avoided.
Lists hold reader attention longer.
Navigation tools work better when placed at the top of the page.
One-column formats perform better in eye-fixation than multi-column formats.
People generally scan lower portions of the page.
Readers ignore banners.
Shorter paragraphs perform better than long ones.
Show numbers as numerals.
Text ads were viewed mostly intently of all types tested.
Text attracts attention before graphics.
Type size influences viewing behavior.
Users initially look at the top left and upper portion of the page before moving down and to the right.
Users only look at a sub headline if it interests them.
Users spend a lot of time looking at buttons and menus.
White space is good.

Found from Seth Godin based on Tim's study

Do I need a computer server?

Ryan Doom — Thu, 11 Oct 2007 16:17:00 GMT

Many small businesses start off with buying a couple of computers, connecting them to the Internet and then they operate completely independent of one another. That means that the computers are connected to a network but nothing is shared between them. A common next step is to do some simple file sharing between the computers so user A can access files and data on user B’s computer and vice versa...

What's new in Adobe Fireworks CS3

Ryan Doom — Thu, 16 Aug 2007 03:04:00 GMT

The new Adobe CS3 Suite is pretty awesome. As many of my designer and programming associates know I am a diehard Fireworks fan. The first art application I started using was Photofinish on Windows 3.1. This tool really had a lot to offer, nothing vector but you could get just about everything done with this tool. It had excellent gradients, smudge tool, cloning, it was packed full of goodies. I eventually converted to Photoshop around version 3 ...

Response to the use of logins

Ryan Doom — Mon, 04 Jun 2007 02:16:00 GMT

In response to an article on CodingHorror

Although I am extremely turned off by many sites that require logins to see what appears to be ‘trivial’ information I would not use API documentation as a way to degrade them on how ‘brilliant’ they are...

Windows Vista Review

Ryan and Kevin — Thu, 01 Mar 2007 19:36:00 GMT

I installed Microsoft Windows Vista on my Table PC Laptop this week, here are my thoughts thus far...

Microsoft Image Resizer

Ryan and Kevin — Tue, 13 Feb 2007 19:34:00 GMT

Ever wish you could just right click on an image file and resize it? Well you can with the Microsoft Image Resizer PowerToy. Download and install this application to get a new feature when you right click on any image with your mouse. I use this a few times a week to resize JPG photos from my digital camera to a more appropriate size for emailing and uploading to friends.

Cropper Screen Capture

Ryan and Kevin — Tue, 13 Feb 2007 19:30:00 GMT

Cropper is a free, easy to use Windows application that allows you to capture specific areas of your computer screen. It is an application that you can drag and resize to put over a section of your screen, then hit enter and it will automatically save a picture of what is under the Cropper application to your computer. It is great for taking screen shots of websites, areas of a PDF document, cropping an area of a photo or sending a picture of your screen in an email to an associate. It is far better than ‘print screen’ and you can download it for free. I used Cropper to make the screenshots in this newsletter.

Search Engine Optimization 101 - Part 1

Ryan and Kevin — Tue, 13 Feb 2007 19:12:00 GMT

Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is an extremely complex subject because Internet Search Engines such as Google, Yahoo and MSN do not openly publish all the factors involved with calculating how they rank a website for particular keywords. It is up to the SEO specialists of the world to try different techniques, see what works and publish their findings to others. Here are a few simple “on-page” factors we have identified that can help your website tremendously in Yahoo, MSN, and Google. There are also a significant number of “off-page” factors that have an additional impact on your ranking, but we will cover those at a later date.

How To Make Web Videos

Ryan and Kevin — Tue, 16 Jan 2007 17:01:00 GMT

Here at Web Ascender we made all of our own online videos. We primarily have two types of videos we make:

· Computer screen capture with voice over

· Digital Video of a persor with voice over