By now, many of you have noticed that Lazy Man and Money has a new look. It even has a logo for the first time in history. There are some things that need fine tuning, but for the most part, this is close to the final product. Some of you might have liked the old design and question what the new one has to offer. We’ll get to those in a minute.
There’s a bit of a story behind how this theme came to be. I was on Blogging Away Debt, and I noticed a button on the site that advertised the site was designed by 1955 Design. I asked Tricia, the owner of Blogging Away Debt, about the design and working with David Zemens. She was glowing about her redesign. So I ended up contracting him for the design – at a very reasonable price. Anything that might seem off about the site is most likely do with my tinkering after the fact. I highly recommend him. If you visit him, let him know you heard about him here.
There are a lot of enhancements behind the scenes that the average user might not notice. Some of these include:
- Better browser compatibility: The old theme had some problems in Internet Explorer 6. I’ll take this opportunity to request that everyone get Firefox. You’ll be 10 times more productive with it.
- Better monitor compatibility: The old theme had problems unless you had 1024 or 1280 pixels of monitor width. This one works significantly better in small sizes (800 pixels) and larger ones 1400+. If you have extra pixels it will use them and not give you white space.
- Better source code: The source code was delivered to me as XHTML strict compliant. Unfortunately all the enhancements, tweaks, and non-compliant advertisers have caused some problems with that. I’m still working on it, and at some point in the near future it should be good again.
- Optimizations for Search Engines: Mr. Zemens knows quite a lot about search engine optimization (SEO). Lazy Man and Money should benefit with expanded readership.
Let me know your thoughts in the comments – and feel free to be critical. I’ll get back to the financial contact tomorrow.
As I stated before, the new site looks great. If you don’t mind asking, what does it cost to get a custom theme from 1955 Design?
It varies by the project. Mr. Zemens is very easy to talk with. I just gave him a list of ideas of things that I’d like in the theme and he went to it. My list was rather specific and detailed, but I’m weird that way.
I like the new site. Doesn’t look to much different than the old on, but it does look more updated. Upgrades that make your job easier though, will ultimately benefit the readers.
I have been working on my own redesign, and it is turning out ok. I am having a lot of IE6 and 7 compatibility problems though. I hope as I learn CSS better they will clear up. I just need to find some more time to finish the design up. That is one benefit to having someone else do it.
Thanks for the kind words, Lazy Man. I enjoyed working with you, too. We will get all the final kinks worked out before too much longer, but I am pleased with the how the site looks.
@Million Dollar Journey: Please get in touch with me if you are interested in a blog design. I am sure we can work out a satisfactory arrangment.
@The Happy Rock: Internet Explorer is tough to work with because it is a non-standards compliant browser. The more I learn about CSS the more I have to hack my code to work correctly in IE 6.0 and below. The newest version is a bit better, but still needs constant tweaking to display correctly.
Looking good.
I like the new design except for the font used in the posts. Not sure what it is (but I assume I don’t have it or something), but it comes out looking like it’s a bitmap that’s been resized. This is on Windows XP on IE.
@Dong: The font used in the post paragraph text should rend in the following order: Lucida Sans, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif. If a users computer does not have Lucida Sans, for instance, the CSS code will then look for Arial, then Helvetica and as a last resort sans-serif.
Your computer must have Arial, doesn’t it? I am curious about what you are seeing. Any chance you could take a screen shot of it and email it to me?
@Dong: The font used in the post paragraph text should render in the following order: Lucida Sans, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif. If a users computer does not have Lucida Sans, for instance, the CSS code will then look for Arial, then Helvetica and as a last resort sans-serif.
Your computer must have Arial, doesn’t it? I am curious about what you are seeing. Any chance you could take a screen shot of it and email it to me?
I like it.
Sweet setup, I really like it. :)
(constructive criticism – take it or leave it): You could consider changing the Adsense column in the upper left corner. It might blend better if you make the headings the same green color as your post headings, leave the text black, and make the bottom URLs the same blue as your links. Of course, this is coming from a blogger whose site could also use a little work. ;)
And apparently, the smiley faces show up a line blow and to the far right of the text where they are inserted! ;)
The site looks good but something about the font is a little “off”. I think the RSS feed button is a little overwhelming, but if it gets people to click it I guess it’s worth it. I would be interested to know if that helps or not.
Looks sharp overall, though, definitely worth it!
It is content that matters and this guy only discusses the folks on the blog roll. So if you want only “his friends” – who do not believe in sustainable living – that is what you’ll get.
I gave this guy a way to make great alternative income streams and he blows it off – do you want info from him?
Finally, my blog doesn’t need all this constant tweaking, my service does it for me so I can concentrate mon contyent.
This guy is bad man with no money!
To clarify Cheapo Groovo wanted me to join Subvert and Profit (not giving a link, Google it if interested), a company that attempts to subvert social bookmark networks and pay you to do it. He spammed a bunch of personal finance bloggers with his affiliate link for the service.
He’s stuck on the fact that my wife has an SUV and thus doesn’t believe in sustainable living. He doesn’t the truth which was that she works with the Public Health Service and needed the vehicle to get to work in Boston blizzards. The indirect pollution of one SUV, or the direct deaths of a few people.
And finally he attempts to insult my desire to improve your experience with this blog – with many spelling errors (“mon contyent?”) and horrible grammar (“This guy is bad man with no money!”)
You be the judge of who you want to read.
Hot new look, lazy guy! I was looking back through to see where you mentioned it, so I could tell you that I like it!
I think the new design is great. 1955 Design did a great job. Very easy on the eyes…