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Site Name: Doxycide
Owner: Shlesha and Susanna
Reviewed by: Georgina
Reviewed on: 22nd March 2009
Site Name
‘Doxycide’ is definitely unique. I haven’t heard it before. It’s quite easy to remember and it’s short.
Coding and Validation
Your coding has 62 errors and 21 warnings in HTML 4.01 transitional.
You’re missing a doctype. This is something you need at the top of every page to show it’s an HTML document. It is the best doctype for your coding:
<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01 Transitional//EN"
"http://www.w3.org/TR/html4/loose.dtd">
Later you might want to consider converting to XHTML because FanUpdate automatically writes your entries in XHTML, and will naturally cause errors.
From now I’ll tell you how to fix your coding in HTML.
You are missing a character encoding, which needs to go in your head section:
<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=utf-8">
All images need an alt tag. Even if you have no alternate text, it needs to have the attribute. This goes for ALL images.
You’re centering your ads and various things in your sidebar but at the same time using h4. Use the h4 instead to center it. You shouldn’t be using center for a header – you should be customising the header to be centered.
You don’t need the following coding before your ad rotation JavaScript – it’s superfluous and there’s nothing in it:
<style type="text/css">
</STYLE>
Speaking of your JavaScrcipt, it would be better to use PHP code to make a rotator. Try this script. It will load faster and will stop errors in your validation 
After your site information, you have a random bit of code:
</tr>
</table>
<!-- End Users Online -->
You’ve added two quotation marks instead of one, at the end of one of your domain competition buttons.
Going through the W3C markup validation service will show you what parts of your coding need to be corrected.
Your CSS has 2 errors and 1 warning.
The two errors are caused by x-index in your divs. That property doesn’t exist at all.
The warning is caused by you using the same colour for the background and font colour in your h3 and a:hover.
Browser Compatibility & Usability
Looking in Browsershots.org, your layout looks the same in most browsers.
The navigation is easy to see, though I don’t like imagemaps too much. Some people turn off images when browsing so it would be wise to include alternate navigation somewhere.
‘Doxycide’ would be better as ‘Site’ – less confusing that way.
I notice you’re trying to create a hover effect with the links. There’s a delay when I hover because the image has to load all over again. You could try something different like semantic or horizontal CSS block navigation.
The text is easy to read and isn’t too small. The links though, could be a different colour on hover instead of white. Maybe a different green, or making them underlined.
I am attacked with popups almost every time I click a new page. You might want to look into that.
Layout
I like the layout colours. You’ve chosen quite a nice selection of green.
The person featured in the layout is rather odd. Unusual. I like the way only her head comes out of the “photograph”. The overlapping “photographs” are quite a neat effect.
I like the choice of font for ‘Doxycide’ and for most of your CSS. The colours you’ve chosen are fairly good. The CSS overall looks quite clean and fresh.
Overall, it’s a clean layout, very simple and unusual.
Content
The sidebar is quite organised. I don’t see much difference between ‘elite’ and ‘top’ affiliates though. You need a bigger gap between your last supporter button and “reviewed by”. Same for “disclaimer”.
Doxycide
As I mentioned, this would be better as ‘site’.
On your advertising page, it might be better to sort by the ending date so you know which one ends first.
The button for Immortal Kiss is a dead image.
You link your affiliates with a custom button, it seems. It would probably be nice to write their name or site name. From an image we can’t really tell who owns the site or what its like without clicking it.
It’s fine to do this sort of thing with your sidebar though.
On the affiliate application, capitalise MySpace, Facebook and Neopets.
have claim something made should be have claimed that something made
Thats should be That’s.
It’s nice you accept any type of site. Most fansites I know don’t accept anything but fansites.
You only have one form of contact! Perhaps a contact form would be good – alternate emails maybe? An MSN address if you don’t mind giving it out?
It would make more sense if you credited by typing the entire URL as the anchor text, not just using http://.
You need to credit where you got your layout image from and any other images. You also need to credit FanUpdate.
When I saw ‘links’ I thought this meant links to websites. You should say ‘link buttons’ or something similar.
On your page about the staff, this part doesn’t quite make sense:
mainly because of Edward Cullen and her horrible writing
It would be better phrased as:
mainly because of Edward Cullen and Stephenie Meyer’s horrible writing
I’m not sure why you put a question mark after Co-owner.
Staff positions! Interesting. Many people aren’t usually looking for co-owners. You need a period after a few of your statements here.
Competitions
On the blend challenge page, there’s no need to capitalise “fun”.
The calendar rules are a bit unclear. What is it supposed to look like exactly? Just an image with the month on it? Or does it have to have all the dates? How big does it have to be?
On your fanfiction competition:
do it should be do is.
You’ve got some very creative competitions here! The only thing I don’t like is that it’s Harry Potter related and I don’t like it all that much!
Graphics
The icons you have are a bit plain – no text or anything. I like the effets though. It would be nice if you credited where you got the original images! Using celebrity images is also a no-no. It’s actually illegal. But I understand you are a fansite and there is the need for those graphics. Personally I just deem it unoriginal.
The signatures are nice but I don’t see people using them often – I think people just make their own.
The second last closed sign is a dead link. And the last thumbnail doesn’t match the sign.
For the last two closing signs, the thumbnails and the signs don’t match.
All these signs are useless. A lot people make their own signs, and some people just use normal text. “Enter” signs are extremely old and useless and no one uses them anymore.
Fun
You have too many subpages here. It would be better just to break it up into headings on the one page, instead of just having navigation pages with one link.
Did you write all these interviews? I’m guessing you did, because you mentioned ‘your fans at Doxycide’. Maybe a little information on the band or on the interview at the beginning would be good.
These interviews are a nice, neat addition for a fansite.
Originality & Creativity
I haven’t seen many fansites before, but in my opinion your site wasn’t a big bang for me; it seemed like an ordinary, clean, informative fansite.
You showed some creativity in your graphics but they weren’t very thoughtful graphics – signs are generally useless. Layouts are a better option.
Organisation & Errors
Well organised and not too many errors.
A few broken links and images, but otherwise, spelling and grammar were fairly good.
Overall Comment
You have a clean site that’s well organised. For a fansite though, there didn’t seem to be much to me. I think the things you could improve on are your coding and adding more content.
You have good graphics – but a lot of the types of graphics you make aren’t useful. Layouts would be more interesting.
Overall you have a clean, well-kept site that’s just in need of more content. Your coding can be cleaned up a bit, and opt for a simpler navigation by just using links. CSS block navigation can be simple but effective.
