zerorubbish.com

[supertrucker]

I need a few beta testers to beat the tar out of my mobile site. Although it is designed as a mobile site, you can also view and load it from a desktop computer as well, and get the same content. Please create an account, and mess with as many of the features as you possibly can! There is a built-in suggestion box that may be used to report problems/errors/unexpected actions/improvements, etc.I would like as much feedback as possible to correct any possible problems before I open the doors!The address is http://zerorubbish.com or http://zerorubbish.mobiThanks,ST

[Jesdisciple]

Someone go to my profile and make sure you can only see one bookmark.Where ever the user is invited to "create an account" (the top of the page), a link to the registration page is conventional.

Welcome to ZR, Guest! <a href="http://zerorubbish.com/signup.php">Create an account</a> today [...]

Why is the menu at the bottom of the page? And why are some menu items bold?Before I received my verification email, I clicked back to the home page and was invited to register again. This redundancy could be avoided via cookies.An AOL email account will not render the link in the verification email; it will only render an HTML link. A certain forum package (I think IPB) resolves this by wrapping the HTML link around "AOL users click here." below the URL. Other email providers will show the HTML link as plain text, but that's not a big deal.Users are normally given the option to reply to the verification email rather than clicking the link. This is important if, for example, your validation page gets a bug.Your chat rooms display all messages ever sent; the convention is to only display those sent since the user entered the room. I wouldn't want to try finding the beginning of my conversation in your chat room a few days after it went live.On a positive note, I see you escape the chat messages to avoid SQL injection.After I sign in, go back to the homepage, and click the link that asked me to sign in, I'm asked to sign in again if I didn't click Remember Me. A site is supposed to have a longer default memory than that (using a session I believe).Why don't you have a *nix (UNIX, Linux, Solaris, BSD, etc.) forum?You have a category field for bookmarks; I have a feature suggestion: Allow the user to create a category from the "Add a bookmark" page (or a popup). This is a very common feature and will prevent the single-tab user's frustration when he has to go back to the bookmarks page (losing his form data), add a new category, and then add a new bookmark to that category. (As a multiple-tab user, I wouldn't be as frustrated.)What's the Change button for on the bookmarks page?When I go to create a category, why do I see a dropdown menu of categories? I think a category can be added to another category; if so, what happens if a category's parent is deleted?

Edit bookmark categories .

There's an extra space before the period.What does # have to do with Home or * have to do with Bookmarks?I think "Who is online?" should link to user profiles. Also, the tags (from the site registration page) and their items should be listed somewhere for the users.

Don't select more than necessary or I won't even review your site.

Most sites like yours never say "I" even if only one person is managing everything.The FAQ has questions very snugly wedged together; I think you should give a bit of vertical padding.

[supertrucker]

Ok, thanks for taking the time to do this!1. Thanks for the tip!2. It'll get ugly, but I could probably do this.3. Not all messages ever sent, just the last 10. Also customizable under "My Account". This is something I have thought about activating (only since entered room), but as of right now, for slow traffic, I'm not to concerned, but maybe in the future here.4. This will ultimately be removed, as cookies are mandatory in order to log in, so the temporary log in is fairly useless, really, especially if the user wants to frequent their bookmarks. I meant to do that today, and somehow it missed the to do list!5. No one suggested it yet!6. Pop-ups are evil, and are a no-go for mobile devices, which is the target audience. But you're right, all I would have to do really is include another text field that they could write in the new category.7. If you create categories, they show up in the drop down list. You have to click "Change" to switch to the chosen category, I guess I should put some form of instruction on the page, I'm just trying to put as little text on the page as possible to avoid using precious screen real estate (again, mobiles are the audience).8. Ok, this is to edit the categories, everything is sort of jumbled together I guess, though. If you want to add a new category, you don't have to worry about the drop down list, just make sure the radio button is on ADD and type in the new category. If you wish to edit (rename), or delete a category, then you need to select it from the drop down list, select the appropriate radio button, and either type in the new name for this category, or press submit and it would be deleted.9. I'll fix the period.10. The #, * and 0 are mobile accesskeys, i.e., <a href="index.html" accesskey="#"># Home</a>, they are for mobile only.11. Another thing that slipped my memory! I was going to do that today as well, and forgot!12. Why not say I, I am the only person managing the site? I know other people that manage their own sites, and I know very well that they do it alone, and they say "we", when you find out, it makes you wonder if they have multiple personalities. Just trying to figure out the logic behind this one, but I think I'll stick with, "I" for now.13. Good idea with the FAQ, thanks for the tip.I'll await further response! Thanks for the input!

[Jesdisciple]

Come to think of it, I should have ordered my statements to avoid confusion like you did.I think you missed my edit; here's one thing I added:

Also, the tags (from the site registration page) and their items should be listed somewhere for the users.

Also, I think you only responded to one of my two comments about cookies.12. "I," "my," "me," etc. are considered unprofessional when you're acting as "Doe Incorporated" rather than "John Doe" (who happens to be the sole member of Doe Inc.). (You followed this when you signed the validation email.) Other members might come on board; then you have to change every occurrence. And users generally prefer to think that more than one person is managing a site (that's not like a blog) because they don't want to bother the same person a whole lot, they think more people are more capable of such an undertaking, etc.

[Synook]

From going on that site, I had no idea what it was about. No "About" link either! :)Some description would be good.

[supertrucker]

Also, the tags (from the site registration page) and their items should be listed somewhere for the users.

This is confidential information used only by me, I thought I posted that on the page, but I might have forgotten. The "My Account" stuff is all confidential, the stuff under "User Profile" is all of the public stuff, that other users can view.

Also, I think you only responded to one of my two comments about cookies.

Whoops! The other issue, for preventing the invitation to sign up, should be fairly simple to implement, I'll add this as well.As fer the I, we, etc., I get it now. Everything here should be fairly easy to fix, I think I only referred to myself as I in a couple of the scripts.

From going on that site, I had no idea what it was about. No "About" link either! :)Some description would be good.

Why I forgot to put that on there I have no idea! I put it in the meta, and forgot the main page! I'll add it to today's to-do list.Anymore questions? Did you guys load the site on your mobile or in a desktop browser?ST

[Matpatnik]

I know that you are still on your beta testing but the design style is not appealing there is a lot of work to do on this part.My 2 cents worth

[supertrucker]

Ok, all of those changes have been implemented:1. Allow to add category from "addbookmark" page.2. Added clear instructions for adding/editing/removing bookmark categories.3. Fixed the period thing.4. Changed all occurrences of I to We in the emails, page headers, etc.5. Added padding to the FAQ to space things out better.6. Added an "About" page.7. After registration, and after login, a cookie is set so that if the user goes back to the home screen, before they sign in for the first time, there is no offer to sign back up. I really don't care if they create more than one account, so security is pretty lax on this right now, although that may change in the future to prevent abuse. What do you think, is this a big deal?8. Removed the bold from the main menu.9. Added an HTML web link under the plain text link in the verification email.10. Added *nix (UNIX, Linux, Solaris, BSD, etc.) to the forums.11. All the users listed under "Who's On-line" are now click-able and will take the user to the clicked-users profile.12. Clarified what the "Change" button does on the "MyBookmarks" page.Thanks for the ideas and testing. If you'd like, you could beat the tar out of it some more and let me know if there's anything else that needs attention.ST

[supertrucker]

@matpatnik, Are you referring to the CSS style, or the overall layout in a standard desktop browser? If you are referring to the overall layout in a standard desktop browser then you are doomed to be disappointed, it's a mobile device web site.If you want a real quick idea of what this looks like on a mobile, shrink your browser to a really skinny size, maybe an inch or two, two and a half - wide, that's approximately how pages will render on a mobile. There's also various links all over the place to various cell phone/pda emulators, but I don't know where they are at off hand.

[Matpatnik]

will it only be for mobile device? if so I suggest that you expend to stationary device too :)more accessibility, more people.edited: It doesn't show everything under 3" wide (wrap)

[supertrucker]

will it only be for mobile device? if so I suggest that you expend to stationary device too :)more accessibility, more people.edited: It doesn't show everything under 3" wide (wrap)

Yes, it is for mobiles only. Users visiting this site from a standard web browser would be sadly disappointed, as the site serves them no real purpose. The primary function of the web site is the huge mobile link directory, I can't foresee many people even wanting to visit the site from a standard browser, as it has nothing for them. The other functions of the site, i.e., chat, forums, etc., maybe down the road I will design a chunky computer version, but what it entails is a lot of headache, including figuring out what mobile device the user is using/not using, and properly rendering a page for their specific browser. The solution I went with here is a one-size-fits-all, as the only traffic I see coming in is from mobile devices. The advertising I will be using will be aimed at Google AdSense For Mobile, Yahoo for Mobile, AdMob, and possibly a couple others. I found a site where you can view what the site looks like on a mobile, it's the one I use for validating my pages. Visit ready.mobi, and where it says "Page Check" enter my site's address, http://zerorubbish.mobi or http://zerorubbish.com <-- they are the same. An applet will load showing what the site looks like in various mobile emulators, really nice.Edit: I didn't see your edit! The browser shrink issue is just a quick preview, you'd have to use the emulator I linked to above to see what it actually looks like in a mobile browser.Thanks,ST

[Jesdisciple]

Did you guys load the site on your mobile or in a desktop browser?

I opened it on a laptop, so it looked ugly for me too. I just don't care about that as much as most people do. :)The Bookmarks and Chat links don't show in the ready.mobi emulators.