[Web4lib] need some free design advice

[Robert L. Balliot]

It seems that there would be a real benefit to 
extricating the site from the design/hosting service
and using a standard commercial host.  Perhaps they
did not have a tech person of Sharon's ability before and
decided to outsource design.  Many, many libraries
did that and are stuck with designs they cannot change
without external permission and lack control 
over their primary external marketing tool.

I think the site looks nice, but it is missing many
parts and has tables nested in tables, in tables, with
divs and very hard to modify.  Since they hired Sharon,
they could now benefit from internal control over design 
and features.

It always bothers me when I see a hosting/design link
in the footer of a library page. That is simply an
SEO/Marketing tool for the designer and IMO should be not be
included in any paid design work.

*************************************************
Robert L. Balliot
Skype: RBalliot
Bristol, Rhode Island
http://oceanstatelibrarian.com/contact.htm
*************************************************

-----Original Message-----
From: web4lib-bounces at webjunction.org
[mailto:web4lib-bounces at webjunction.org] On Behalf Of Graeme Williams
Sent: Wednesday, September 30, 2009 8:02 PM
To: web4lib
Subject: Re: [Web4lib] need some free design advice

Sharon,

It *is* possible to edit the style sheet from Javascript, although the code
appears to be browser dependent.

As an example, the following will display a randomly-chosen picture each
time the page is refreshed:

r = Math.floor(Math.random()*4) ; // 0-3
imgs = new Array("images/chess-565x228-text.jpg",
                 "images/library-night-cropped-whiteedge.jpg",
                 "images/opera-565x228-text.jpg",
                 "images/homegrown2009.jpg") ;
 cssRule = "td.main-photo-cell { background-image: url(" + imgs[r] + ") }" ;
 x = document.styleSheets[0] ;
 x.insertRule(cssRule, x.cssRules.length) ;

This (lightly-tested) code only works in Firefox.  To put this into
production, you'd need to add code to detect the user's browser, and add the
code for IE.  IE uses addRule instead of insertRule, and the arguments are
different.

This isn't a full-blown slide show, and no doubt the best long-term approach
is to redo the whole page, but if this approach is sufficient for your
short-term needs and you'd like help with the next steps, let me know.

Graeme Williams
Waltham, MA

On Wed, Sep 30, 2009 at 4:39 PM, Sharon Foster <fostersm1 at gmail.com> wrote:

> Dear Collective Brain,
>
> Here's my library's website:
>
> http://www.ryepubliclibrary.org/
>
> The first large image (it may not be for the art reception by the time
> you see it) was implemented (not by me) as the background image for
> the div titled main-photo-cell. It's defined in the style sheet so
> can't be changed on the fly. The lower left quadrant of the town seal
> is painted over it. I would like to convert from having the image in
> the background to having it in the foreground so that I can make a
> slideshow. I could *try* to incorporate the seal into every promo I
> make, or I could move the seal, or eliminate it from the front page,
> or narrow the image area and fill in the empty space with _?_.
>
> What would you do if you were me?
>
> Thanks,
> Sharon
>
> Sharon M. Foster, JD, MLS
> Technology Librarian
> http://firstgentrekkie.blogspot.com/
> "Have you tried switching it off and on again?"
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> Web4lib mailing list
> Web4lib at webjunction.org
> http://lists.webjunction.org/web4lib/
>
>
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