New ScoDal.com

[scottdallas]

I've never been totally satisfied with www.scodal.com so I thought really hard for quite a long time before redesigning it. This is most likely my final redesign for it. Just thought I'd put it up on the showcase. It showcases all the content from the old scodal.com while displaying many of my other websites and their content on the main page... plus it has a section for my personal blog, videos, music, etc... It seems organized much better in my opinion. Now you can visit www.scodal.com to find out what sites I'm running, working on, etc without having to try to scour the internet to find all my projects. Don't know why I didn't do it sooner.

[url=http://www.scodal.com]
Visit ScoDal.com? Yeah, do it![/url]

Oooh.. and all that random rotating image at the top is full of pictures I've taken from time to time. When I have more cool pictures from my digital camera I put them in there to keep things interesting.

[Ramon]

Looks great Scott. Rotating banner is definately a big plus, i'm glad it all works the way it's supposed to. I did like the previous design, but in comparison this one is so much better Great job, keep it up!

[scottdallas]

Thanks Ramon

I did like the previous design, but in comparison this one is so much better

I agree.. the old one just wasn't catching anyones attention. I think it looked too much like every other blog/media site out there.. this one will hopefully grab a little more attention. I couldn't get more than like 60-100 visitors/day on the old layout which drove me nuts. I knew it was cause it was kinda plain.

Well, I just downloaded a bunch of images from my cam.. so I'm about to put some more rotating pics WOOHOO! I find that very enjoyable.

[D72]

rotating images makes me happy! I use allmost on every site rotators in header images. Just great. Gives you a little simple interaction on a site. You could use also a rotator that is sliding and randomizing, even when the page is allready loaded. There are many light ajax scripts that can do this.
...you probably allready knew that.

But your site has a long loading time because of the many images in the iframes. Those loads are taking over sometimes the load of the random header image, wich i not visible in some cases untill the vid pictures are done.

Though really a nice site. The girl who smashed the car of her boyfriend Biaaatch!

[scottdallas]

Thanks D72

You could use also a rotator that is sliding and randomizing, even when the page is allready loaded. There are many light ajax scripts that can do this.

Actually, I didn't really even think about it.. I kinda like it simple though.

But your site has a long loading time because of the many images in the iframes.

Yeah you're right but I really like how it works lol.. perhaps I should load less news from each site? The other pages load quicker cause they don't pull news from 6 or some different sites

The girl who smashed the car of her boyfriend Confused Biaaatch!

Ha my girl didn't smash my car.. did your girl do that or something? Who you talkin about?

[Designer]

Looks great,
Loading is not problem for fast connections.

For speed, try to move Stat Counter and Google analytics JavaScript codes down - just before the end of body tag.

[D72]

Thanks D72
...Ha my girl didn't smash my car.. did your girl do that or something? Who you talkin about?

It's YOUR site man, you should know what you have in there haha
But it was a vid about a girl who was really mad about her boyfriend, she walked out of the lunchroom, grabbed a sledgehammer and started smashing his car... was funny to see...
And no, my WIFE never smashed my car. That would makes me reeeeally pissed.
On the other hand... if she did the smashing thing on my car i'd probably deserved it.

[scottdallas]

OH lol well I go through a lot of videos but yes I know what video you're talking about now. Yeah that guy probably deserved it too.

Loading is not problem for fast connections.

For speed, try to move Stat Counter and Google analytics JavaScript codes down - just before the end of body tag.

Good idea.. I always put it up at the top but thinking about it I realize now that my sites will load AFTER they secure a connection from those 2 sources first huh?

[Ramon]

It's interesting to see that you use Google Analytics. I used it for some time, but somehow the stats were all off. Also I did'nt like the long loading time, yes i did place it at the bottom of a page. But still, even if the whole page has already loaded it still has that freakin icon running rounds saying the page hasn't loaded yet because the google analytics thing has'nt come to an end

Ah well, I just use the Webalizer stats that came with my hosting package

[Designer]

Good idea.. I always put it up at the top but thinking about it I realize now that my sites will load AFTER they secure a connection from those 2 sources first huh?

Yes, exactly. If you wish to load Your site first, just move them to the end.

[scottdallas]

I haven't noticed it taking forever to load Google Analytics for me.. what I would say is that it's designed so confusing that I hate logging in. Statcounter is much easier. I wish Analytics had an email notification system and it would just plop a simple email that said something like:

Website #1 stats for xx/xx/07
Total Pageviews: 977345
Total Uniques: 928759

etc...

Or had options for you to check and uncheck for what you'd like to be email notified about..

I do notice that Google Analytics and Statcounter never match.. so I don't which one is wrong.. but Statcounter has a great reputation and I've heard many people say Analytics is inaccurate.

Also, the suggestion of putting stat counting codes at the bottom of pages is a great idea and I'm doing that with all my sites right now.

[FI-DD]

I wish Analytics had an email notification system

It has. At the top of each report there's a button saying "E-Mail". You can schedule those reports, too.

[scottdallas]

It has.

Oh lol .. well I'm off to create some of those

[Heya Im Me]

Scott, for your videos do you take snapshots on your own and put them up or do you have a script setup where it takes 2 pics of the videos and makes a rotating image for them?

Say like I wanted to add a YouTube video but before they click it shows a small snapshot from the video at some point (exactly as on Youtube.com). Is this possible to do with cutenews?

Thanks

[scottdallas]

I take the snapshots myself. I have a quick system setup to do so... mspaint & jasc animation shop open at the same time lol