YouthPastor2000

By James C. Moberg

This month's Design Tips cover practical design issues that affect speed and readability.

1. TABLES won't display until fully-loaded in the browser. Netscape Communicator is not as forgiving when it comes to tables as Navigator 3.0 was as broken tables are not displayed at all. Try using <DD> and <Blockquote> to handle minor paragraph indents.

2. Always define HEIGHT & WIDTH in the <IMG> tag.

3. Place banners at the bottom of your page (Add HEIGHT & WIDTH tags so the rest of the page can be displayed.)

4. Create a seperate page for awards. Copy award graphics to your website because you can't always count on someone else's website to be operational and their graphic may take a LONG time to load.)

5. Don't use graphics on other sites. This has caused some really nice websites to be closed because of the excess server demand. Always copy the graphic to your webspace for display on your page. Provide info on where you found the graphic as a courtesy.

6. If your graphic has few colors, try converting it to a 16 color GIF. B/W or apparent 2 color graphics can be saved as 16 color images to soften (alias) the edges.

7. If a graphic requires transparency, animation, or if you are using a detailed background, save your graphic as a GIF and reduce the colors as much as possible (16, 32, 64, 128, or 256 colors). Otherwise save it as a "Progressive JPG". This format holds the darker detail better and the compression is a little better.

8. Saving large GIFs as GIF89A INTERLACED will allow your graphic to quickly load every other line and continue filling with a raster effect.

9. Create multiple versions of your logo (if you use a graphic). Provide ways for other sites to link back to your website. Some standard sizes are the Micro-Button (88x31) and the banner (400x40 or 468x60).

10. If you are a ministry, please list youe name, address, email, and phone number. It's ridiculus to say "Come and visit our church" or "Please send us a donation" and then not provide any contact information.

11. Provide ALT parameter for all the <IMG> tags. This aids the visually impaired and assist in the case that the graphic does not load or if the visitor is using a text browser.

    James has personally designed over 50 websites and still has time to eat with his wife.

12. Place at least one link to your main page on every page in your website to eliminate dead ends.

13. Don't use a lot of Java unless required. I've visited places where I've brought up some killer websites with java only to be disappointed because their browser doesn't support java. Some other issues are that the java slows down the perceived loading of the page and sometimes crashes the browser. (I still prefer Java to ActiveX though.)

    Please notify me of any broken links and I'll immediately and gladly correct them. Email your questions, ideas, review requests and comments to .

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