TidBITS Inside TidBITS: Known Issues with Our Redesign

Inside TidBITS | 13 Sep 2007 | Print

Known Issues with Our Redesign

We'll be updating this page with known issues and fixes; please don't feel the need to report anything that's here.

[To Do] TidBITS Talk is not currently exposed in the redesign. [Fixed] We've temporarily added a "Forums" link in the nav bar that links to TidBITS Talk. This is a stopgap measure until we find the time to integrate the (now working!) glue code between Web Crossing and the new design.

[To Do] There's currently no way to browse to an issue that doesn't appear in the Issues tab; we're looking into adding scroll arrows to go up and down in the list. This would seem to be a very low priority, since you can search for a specific issue in Refine Search, every article in an issue has a headline widget that links to its issue, and you can always edit a http://db.tidbits.com/issue/567 URL. We don't believe many people want to browse issues more than two months old very often.

[Fixed] Articles in the RSS feed are updating repeatedly because of the sponsor banners.

[To Do] The Comment links associated with articles are currently just mailto tags unless we've manually associated a TidBITS Talk discussion with the article. Eventually, we hope to have closer integration with TidBITS Talk.

[Fixed] HTML and CSS should meet W3C validation checks.

[Fixed] Front page of the site is messed up when viewed with Opera. Thanks to Daniel Goldman of Opera for his unsolicited help on this one.

[To Do] Right now, www.tidbits.com is redirecting to db.tidbits.com. Since we have a lot of old pages on www.tidbits.com that can't move over easily, this was the easiest method of bringing the redesign online without breaking older URLs. Eventually we'll figure out how to get the two systems communicating better.

[To Do] When you do a search, the Refine Search link is currently inactive. [Fixed] The Refine Search link works now, and displays a set of fields for advanced searching.

[To Do] If you click a Listen link to hear an audio version of an article, the QuickTime audio player opens in the current window. We hope to have a small new window appear with the audio player.

[To Do] If you click an image in an article to see the full-size graphic, it loads in the same window. We hope to use a slick AJAX-based image zoom utility eventually.

[To Do] Internet Explorer in Windows can't handle standard CSS that's fine in Safari and Firefox. We believe it's mostly better in Internet Explorer 7, but we're still working on Internet Explorer 6.

[To Do] TidBITS Talk doesn't yet use the new design. Since it's run through Web Crossing, converting it to the new design will take some time, and we don't want to embark on that until we're sure the design is finalized.

[To Do] Some pages, such as Manage Mailing List Subscriptions, also still use the old design. We'll be moving them over slowly.

[To Do] We haven't finalized a version of the page that's optimized for printing. It's on the list, and the Print link will reappear soon.

[To Do] We're working on a form-based system to enable spammer-proof sending of articles via email. It will also enable readers to send email to authors directly without exposing author email addresses to spammers.

[To Do] Not all URLs are currently appearing appropriately "shortened." It's best to bookmark or redistribute only "short" URLs.

[To Do] Articles written before the last few months lack section data and thus won't appear in particular sections. We hope to go back and re-categorize older articles eventually.

Designing a Modern Web Site for TidBITS (10 Sep 07)

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