Note: This post is over 14 years old. I was 21 when it was originally posted. I stand by my old posts but bear in mind my opinions may well differ now.

The New Design!

Posted on: 31 January 2010

The new design has finally arrived. And it took longer to implement than I thought it would. I will update this message tomorrow when I'm thinking more clearly. There are a few things I'd like to introduce about the new version. There are a few bugs I need to iron out, so if you catch one - please give me a shout (leave a comment). Thank you!

Here is the rest of the post. I just thought I'd briefly highlight a few of the changes I made; some more obvious than others, and some you probably will never notice.

Tag cloud - Firstly, what was previously known as keywords is now known as 'tags'. I just prefer the term more, and it seems a little more relevant. You'll probably recognise the tag cloud design from other blogs. It follows the simple functionality of - the more frequent the tag, the larger it appears in the cloud.
Individual blog styling - Not so apparent yet, but each post has a custom stylesheet associated with it, allowing for more individual looking blogs. When I'm feeling particularly creative, this feature will hopefully become more apparent.
Search - The search function has moved, so it now appears on every page. This just makes sense, really. Still works in exactly the same way, fire a word in the box and you'll find all the blogs that contain that word, in relevance order.
New commenting system - I go into more detail about this in the new Frequently Asked Questions section, however to summarise, it's a stripped back version of the old one. I'm not sold on it visually yet, so you may see small modifications to it in the near future. The idea behind it is to encourage more comments. I love comments, it makes me feel special :)

Unless you're of the technical mind, feel free to skip this next section.

Timeline - this is essentially what the new design is based around. I liked the idea of a timeline, plus it gave me a chance to experiment with some AJAX coding. Again, more on this on in the FAQ section.
More cross-browser compatible- When designing version 1 of the site, I wasn't really aware of cross-browser issues, however since then it's something I've learnt to consider. In building version 2, I made a conscious effort to increase compatibility across all browsers. As far as I'm aware, version 2 is free of any visual quirks and oddities that ~~Internet Explorer~~ some browsers like to throw up.
Javascript Improvement - This was a tough one, but I'm proud to announce the Javascript used on the website is now completely non-intrusive. I am not sure if this is the correct word (it escapes me at this point in time), but what I am getting at is all the Javascript is now contained in a seperate file, with the HTML file containing zero Javascript. Not even a tiny bit. This is a good practise to follow, and something I will be implementing in all future projects.
Whole backend recoded - Not anything that the casual reader will notice, but the whole backend of the website has been recoded. Although not really necessary, I like to keep things fresh and running as efficiently as possible. As well as keeping my skills in check and up to date!

So there you have it. Version 2 is out and I'd love to hear what you think of it. Drop me a comment below.

P.S. I'm 22 tomorrow!