Space top ten lists

[KaptainZap]

I just viewed part of the "top ten new things about the moon" or whatever and would like to express what I am sure everyone feels - that it is a terrible, ungainly, awkward and difficult to use format, with the scrolling up and down the page to view text and the next subject etc. Also having to scroll the text to read it when it is a short paragraph is absurd.

Surely someone can design a better more user friendly page/way to view something like that.

 

[doublehelix]

I just viewed part of the "top ten new things about the moon" or whatever and would like to express what I am sure everyone feels - that it is a terrible, ungainly, awkward and difficult to use format, with the scrolling up and down the page to view text and the next subject etc. Also having to scroll the text to read it when it is a short paragraph is absurd.

Surely someone can design a better more user friendly page/way to view something like that.

Thanks for the feedback, KaptainZap. I'll let our team know about this.

-dh

 

[a_lost_packet_]

I've had the same feelings about all the Top Ten lists from SDC's mainpage. They're just not easy to use.

First of all, it looks like they're hard coded for 800x600.. or something like that. Everything is scrunched up on the left-hand side of the screen and nothing is set to autofit or autocenter. Why? Even the mainsite autocenters. So, you end up with only a fourth of the screen being used on some monitors and a itty bitty text window you have to scroll through in order to read the accompanying article. The click on "link text" requirement to get to the next subject isn't too bad, but how hard would it be to put in navigation buttons? This is the 90's right? I mean the 10's.. /whatever.. who keeps up?

But, autocentering the main sections to make it more monitor-space friendly and providing some dynamic autofitting to the actual article text box are the two biggest improvements that need to be made. Whenever the scroll button takes up 7/8'ths of the height of the text box, you know there's a problem. Back/Forward arrows or even a 1-10 button list along with a "home" button would be nice. If they're there now, the fact that I didn't notice them needs to be considered as well.

Since I recently got a "big boy" monitor like the other kids, instead of my old faithful CRT, I'm noticing a lot of pages that need some work to get up to speed with new tech. The old "Optimize Web Pages for 800x600" mantra in Web Design is dead. Though, I do agree that it should be done for some pages.. just not all.

However, on the plus side, I DO enjoy the Top Ten lists. Especially when they're presenting new information and "little known factoids." So, the idea is a definite winner. It's just the presentation that needs to be improved.