Feedback on my newly launched blog!

[Pazeh]

Launched it yesterday & already have some posts! For now, it is a photo blog, but I'm planing to ad some tips & tweaks (Pc / web related), rants, reviews .... pretty soon.

Have a look & let me know what you think about it. Any suggestion, hint, critics is more than welcomed.

www.Shant.me

Thanks in advance.

[Pazeh]

ok, I have done some additional posting. 8 visitors so far & no feedback so far!! come on gators, you can do way better than that

on the other hand, less than two days of launch, I already have google, yahoo & MSN bots visited my site & now waiting to see it in the searches!!

a general question too, how much time it usually has taken, for you, to be visited by this giants?? & usually how much time it has taken to index your site?

[softwarecandy]

Pazeh, the site loaded slowly. I believe this is due to the images. Perhaps you can place clickable thumbnails instead of the full size photos?

[Pazeh]

Thanks softwarecandy!! much appreciated.

I did run some benchmarking using Firebug, & it seems the lighbox / prototype plug in's files are the one that are taking some time to load!

with that plug in deactivated, the load time was cut to half!!!

now the Q for me is that, was it too slow that you would close the tab/window? or it was... ok!?

As I type this, the plug in is Active, I would like to hear your (and some others from other forums) to decide if its worth keeping Lightbox or... shall I say bye bye to it!!

thanks in advance

[softwarecandy]

I didn't notice much difference but answering your question it wasn't too slow that I would close the tab/window. Just an observation, like the next one:

The first thing that I needed to do when your home page was loaded was to... scroll down.

It would be nicer if at least the first loading of your home page would not force users to scroll down in order to see something.

[Pazeh]

thanks, but i didn't get what you mean when you said

The first thing that I needed to do when your home page was loaded was to... scroll down.

can you please explain?

thanks

[softwarecandy]

Originally Posted by Pazeh

can you please explain?

When the homepage loads, I only see the header and half a photo. If I want to see the entire photo I have to scroll down.

[Pazeh]

i see, thanks for the input. can you please tell me whats the screen resolution you are currently using??

[softwarecandy]

Originally Posted by Pazeh

can you please tell me whats the screen resolution you are currently using??

1600x1200.

[Pazeh]

thanks, I'll address that issue!! Any other comments? suggestions? tips? are welcomed.

btw, more posts were added to the blog!!

[Pazeh]

5 days & my site is now indexed on google & bing!! waiting for yahoo!!

[ValueRays]

I love it! Thanks for sharing!

[Pazeh]

Thanks ValueRays!!

More & more photos are being added to the blog, here is the latest!

[Domainsforsale]

Really nice pics I would have looked if there were more.

Slow loading for me as well. I would work on that if I was you.

[rayminator]

great site it loads just fine for me

[ValueRays]

Originally Posted by Pazeh

Thanks ValueRays!!

More & more photos are being added to the blog, here is the latest!

Excellent. Whose the person in the photo? I wish I took photography as a hobby when I was younger. I think it would've been fun and an excellent source for freedom of expression.

[Pazeh]

Thanks for the review guys, the site should load a bit faster than what it used to be, I'm still insisting on having the lightbox, I'll try to find some "tinier" version of it too.

@ValueRays, this is not a "real person", it is a bronze sculpture of a women on her knees who is looking to the sky & calling out the world for mercy & justice. The sculpture, located in Bikfaya, Lebanon, is one of 100s of commemoration statues of the Armenian Genocide found around the globe. It was built in 1965 while the Armenians were commemorating the 50th anniversary of the genocide.

More info on the monument http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bikfaya & http://www.armenian-genocide.org/Mem...ls_detail.html

[striddy]

Originally Posted by Pazeh

I'm still insisting on having the lightbox, I'll try to find some "tinier" version of it too.

Try Lightbox Plus from http://www.23systems.net/plugins/lightbox-plus/

[Pazeh]

thanks striddy!!

Although I read this on the page

Lightbox Plus DOES NOT work with WordPress’ built in gallery feature.

I'll install it & have a look, maybe a small manual modification in the post will work.

Thanks again

[Pazeh]

UPDATE: installed the plugin, it is faster than the Lightbox 2 & saving about 0.13MB on the front page which is good.

On the other side, I'll need to manually edit all the current posts, which are not too too much, & manually insert the rel="lightbox[xxxx]" to the link of the image...

I'll do some more benchmarking later & keep you updated on my choice.

[striddy]

Originally Posted by Pazeh

UPDATE: installed the plugin, it is faster than the Lightbox 2 & saving about 0.13MB on the front page which is good.

That's why I use it.

Originally Posted by Pazeh

On the other side, I'll need to manually edit all the current posts, which are not too too much, & manually insert the rel="lightbox[xxxx]" to the link of the image...

Um.... after refreshing my browser, your images show up fine. I've never had to add "rel..." to any of my posts manually. Why do you need to do that?

[Pazeh]

strange, some of the posts (on the main page) are working fine with the lightbox plus (like yellow sky), others are not (like genocide commemoration memorial)...

[striddy]

Originally Posted by Pazeh

strange, some of the posts (on the main page) are working fine with the lightbox plus (like yellow sky), others are not (like genocide commemoration memorial)...

If you are using a caching plugin, try clearing the cache.

[Pazeh]

Originally Posted by striddy

Um.... after refreshing my browser, your images show up fine. I've never had to add "rel..." to any of my posts manually. Why do you need to do that?

Maybe you refreshed while I had the lightbox 2 back on. or maybe on the posts that have the lightbox plus working

[amki]

Just left a comment about one of the pictures on your blog. I like your photography style.