Looks good. Not too sure about the news links in the middle of the page - its not clear why they are in seperate blocks and you can't see where the links are taking you as they are popups. If they are sourced from different sites maybe use the sites logo to make them stand out?
What's all this stuff at the bottom of the page for? Edit the file and add the following lines to your host file. # [Google Inc] 127.0.0.1 adwords.google.com 127.0.0.1 pagead.googlesyndication.com 127.0.0.1 pagead2.googlesyndication.com 127.0.0.1 adservices.google.com 127.0.0.1 imageads.googleadservices.com 127.0.0.1 imageads1.googleadservices.com 127.0.0.1 www*googleadservices.com 127.0.0.1 apps5.oingo.com Ewww! Pop-ups! Ewww! Ewww! Sorry but I'm just trying to emphasise the point. I realise you're pulling in feed to generate the stuff on the frontpage but since you're using Joomla (which you don't credit, btw), you do have the option to pull in a framed page and still retain it within your own site so I don't see the point of them. The pop-ups don't work for me at all. You maybe want to think about throwing a little table border around those feeds just to break up the whitespace a bit.
Hi, I actually have a site that I just started that might be considered a competitor to you. So I dont want to give you too many suggestions lol jk I've never been a fan of left side justified pages. I would try and center at the least. For a new site you have ALOT of pages indexed in google. More than me Nice job on that. Did submitting RSS help you? Are you a CCIE? edit: I also noticed the YPN but they are showing ad's that are not related to your content. I would look into that. just looked again and they were more relevant now.
That is a tip on how to block google ads from appearing in your browser for folks that run google ads on their own site and don't want their kids clicking on them. I wrote that one based on a question that someone asked here. I pull these from lots of different sources and then aggregate the links to the frontpage for fresh content daily (seo). I use a javascript for the popup such that the info doesn't bleed page rank. I realize I could iframe the stuff but then the actual content wouldn't appear on the page to the search engines like it does if I use a php include. You probably have a popup blocker blocking the javascript pops. As far as crediting joomla, I donate to justgiving.com/joomla and I only removed the branding which is fine per Brad, all the copyright info in the source code is still in tact. I tried that at one point and it made it look sort of cluttered.
The site is setup for 1024X768 so I justify it to the left in case I get a viewer running a lower resolution. As far as the indexed pages, thats because of the amount of coop weight that I pointed at this site from my other site. So much for the google sandbox theory, this site is about 3 months old. and yes, I am a CCIE.
Ah. Gotcha. It seemed such a random bit of information as does the current one about rundll. Without a better title and a more indepth description, these tips will be lost to about 90% of readers, I would've thought. Yeah, I get that. I was talking about the built-in framing that is available with Joomla (I won't get into the whole 'bleeding PageRank' thing just now since it's a thread on it's own). No, I viewed the pop-up window that opens to the source of the newsfeed when a title is clicked on. I just hate them if they are generally unnecessary and on your site, I'd say they were unnecessary. Y'see, here's my problem with the pop-up windows on your site -- for one, the window opens up bottom right of my screen. I then have to drag it to the middle to read it. I also have to adjust the window size because it's just a little too big and then I also must scroll. Who needs that? Particularly with a news source generated by a feed. My first inclination is to break the pop-up window and just head to the news source. Fair enough. btw, what's a CCIE?
They just randomly rotate down there at the bottom, essentially another attempt at changing front page content. The primary focus of my site would be the articles I write. Believe it or not the stories of mine that have been posted on digg by users that did pretty well always ended up with several smart comments from people about my tip for blocking google ads but me serving yahoo ads, so I guess some people are seeing them... I guess I'm not familiar with the technique, I'm far from being an expert at Joomla. Like I said, I was told that the javascript technique would stop "page rank bleeding". Wether or not there's any truth to that I have no clue. As far as the popups are concerned the window should open in the center at 640X480 initially. What browser/os are you running? I seem to be fine with XP and IE/FF. Cisco Certified Internetwork Expert http://www.cisco.com/web/learning/le3/ccie/index.html I appreciate all the tips, perhaps I should drop the feeds entirely?
Well, nice site overall. My only comments would be regarding the logo. You may want to use maybe another font or space the text from the logo a little bit.
I believe it. I read digg I think you have the focus of your site set up in the wrong order. By that I mean you are placing your content at the bottom of the page, below the fold and kind of like an afterthought, and using feeds as a central component, whereas, it really should be the other way around with your own content as the central component, above the fold, and the feeds as an additional group that people can read if they choose to do so. If you look at a standard installation of Joomla prior to any modifications you will see in the side menu an item called 'Wrapper' -- click on that and you get a framed page. That component allows you to set up framed pages. Not worth the bother. If you want to stop the search engines following a link, use the 'nofollow' attribute. Better yet, forget about search engines and just build the site for the users. PageRank isn't something you should be too concerned about. Personally, I don't give a hoot about PR and just let it flow as freely as it was intended to when the concept was conceived. I didn't know anyone still used that configuration. Minimum 800x600 Ah, got you. I don't see why you should. As a sidebar, they are a nice addition but as I said earlier, I think the focus of your site needs to be changed around to make your original content central and the feeds as a useful extra.