BBC News is looking extremely sleek today. At first I thought I was on the wrong page! I always read their Health News pages and today was pleasantly surprised by the vibrant and modern new look. The BBC have decided to remove the old fashioned left sidebar and now have all their navigation along the top of the page. The right hand side shows features, most popular news of the week and also has relevant links to video material on iPlayer. They have provided a guided tour of their new layout which helps to explain where things are and why they have moved. The design aims to be cleaner and provides more space for better quality pictures and videos. Alongside each story they now show other relevant stories. Each video page displays a better quality and larger video with links to other videos. This will possibly revolutionise the way the BBC share its news content. They are now provide social networking links to that we can share the news easier with friends and family. Well done BBC! Right, now time for a Webologist.co.uk makeover! Suggested Reading:BBC Starts Sharing Video with Commercial NewspapersGoogle Plus + Google Circle In The NewsThe Times [...]

An interesting discussion has been kicked off by Kim over at Cre8asiteforums.com – what types of website should be emotionally engaging, which should be minimalist, clean, “professional”? And what is meant by “professional style” in web design? A site for Children will look very different from one for stock brokers, but both will surely be “professional”. Personally I prefer clean, minimalist sites. I think that the web template should be just like a frame to hold navigation, advertising (annoying at times but essential) and little else. The flair and passion should be in each article. Using images and other media within articles is the simplest way to add passion to a website, without changing the entire theme. This of course allows for a website to be have both serious and more playful sections without risk of upsetting and readers. Grumpus makes a very good point for the web designer that works alone: Playful and amusing are one way to go. Appealing to my sense of logic is engaging as well – which your articles do, in spades. For every right brained user you turn off by being “boring” you have a left brain user who you have turned on by [...]

I was just reviewing some old contributed articles on one of my sites, and noticed that the URL provided by one author was no longer active (just a domain holding page). This surprised me, as the author produced some good work. The author in question is Tracie Johanson. According to her bio on Associatedcontent.com, “Tracie Johanson is the founder of Pick Up The Pace, a 30-minute health club for women. She has owned and operated a gym for 5+ years. Recently, Tracie has also started a new company exclusively for health club owners. You can check it out at www.cuecd.com”. While Cuecd.com is still active, the domain letspickupthepace.com is not, and this has a lot of links directed at it. So why just leave it to die? Why not at least 301 redirect pages to the new site? This is typical of many small business start ups. They employ web designers, but have no clue about SEO (search engine optimization) and therefore see a lot of hard work wasted. Her content is still being used on many sites, yet she is getting nothing back for her efforts. A true waste. At least she still has an online presence. However, many [...]

I have recently been experimenting more with Linux (Ubuntu distribution) and have recently discovered the power of running Virtual Machines. I started investigating after it was suggested that the safest way to run Windows was inside a Virtual Machine running on Linux, as this helps to stop and contain viruses and Trojans. However, virtual boxes have many other advantages, such as testing different operating systems, different software in the same operating systems, or just keeping your most sensitive data totally separate from general use. Whether to run multiple OS’s for website testing, for increased security, or to run software dependent on OS without having 100 computers, everyone needs a VM or two running on their PC. So, how is it done? By far the easiest method is to install VirtualBox OSE in Ubuntu (a popular windows friendly Linux distribution). VirtualBox OSE can be installed using Ubuntu’s Synaptic Package Manager, which simply means, no command line required for the installation. You will need the command line to set it up, but just one line required. One it is set up, you simple create a new virtual machine, then chose what you are installing. All Windows are available from 3.1 to Windows [...]

We are proud to announce that we have been chosen the host the MotleyHealth.com logo competition. MotleyHealth.com has decided that it is time to upgrade their current logo, and have decided to search for a new logo by way of a competition. The logo should be on the theme of Fitness, Strength and Weight Loss. It should be a similar size to the current logo, and fit in with the site colour scheme. Jon Wade from MotleyHealth.com has scribbled his idea for a new logo, which is based on an image of a man bench pressing, while another spots. This is the doodle that Jon produced earlier while going through some ideas: The name MotleyHealth.com and the tag line, “Fitness Strength and Weight Loss” should both be present in the logo. The Prize So, what is the prize? The prize is simple – the winning designer will be awarded free advertising for life (or the life of Webologist) for their web design company on the sidebar of Webologist. Advertising can be by way of a suitable text message or a banner (either a 125px square or a 234px by 60px half banner in the side bar). Entries should be emailed [...]

Making websites is easier than ever. With free web editing tools such as NVU, an adundance of code shared online and free FTP tools and cheap webhosting, building and publishing websites is easier than ever. Here are a few of the main tips I have used over the years. Open Source Templates – The easy way to start building your own Web Pages I have been dedicating the last month or so to setting up a home LAMP server, to host PHP/MySQL sites and static sites and blogs using FTP. Now I need to get back to the busines of creating web pages. By far the easiest way to build a site for the first time is to use a ready made template. Many blogging services such as Blogger and WordPress provide simple templates ready to use with a Blogspot or WordPress hosted blog. These same templates can be used on your own domains, however they are often lacking a little in design and style, and of course, a unique template is essential to make you site stand out. So, how to start? Open Source of course. There are many sites on the internet that collect and distribute offer open source templates. [...]

Well, finally realised where I was going wrong with NVU and my pages. Needless to say, loads of work to do. I was building pages in Strict HTML which should have been transitional. Lots of faffing around, but getting them sorted. At least much fewer errors on each page. Suggested Reading:FTP finally set up on Ubuntu, using ProftpdHow Google Has Changed In The Last 14 YearsRock and Roll! .htaccess is runningJoomla Installation Using Putty / SSh to Linux ServerHow to Redirect all pages in a directory to a single URL