User Lookup Spotlight Questions

Sun Aug 21, 2005 8:50 pm

I've got a few of questions to ask before I enter with my userlookup...

First of all, do we know what browser TNT uses to judge the lookups? I guess it would be best to assume it's IE? (I'm hoping Firefox...)

Second of all, is it just me, or does IE do an aweful job of rendering/loading my lookup? I'm having a problem where the sidebar and supersized banner don't load. Is that due to the fact that they're both hosted by Photobucket, while the background image on the right is hosted on my dad's server? (I still have to do the top bar and put all the pics on my dad's server...)

Third of all, how do you like it?

Sun Aug 21, 2005 9:13 pm

Hi there

I was reading another thread there, and someone was saying that TNT check with all browsers. Theres also a site mentioned in there that can validate your code.

heres the thread:

http://www.pinkpt.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=19556

Heres what I see on IE6... It took about 2 mins to load this on a 728/128 DSL connection

http://home.iprimus.com.au/rwebber/image1fff.jpg

Im not sure what is meant to be in that large white box, I tried to refresh and it was still a large white box.

I use the Maraquan sidebar and the only part of it that came up was a line about 5pix thick above my User name /NP details etc. The white section down the side still has the neo links on it, if I mouseover but its completely blank.

I also cannot downward scroll smoothly, it freezes. I have a crappy slow computer, ( P3/600) Not sure if you need to know that or if Neo are going to judge you on that, but I thought Id mention it.

I love the Mootix Drop BG., the blue color really stands out, If mootix are meant to be over on that blank white side bar, they would look awesome there....

Good luck with winning..

SS:)

Sun Aug 21, 2005 9:29 pm

Thanks for the help

The images are all correctly located.

I hadn't considered people using resolutions less than 1024 by 768 though.

So people know, the two missing images (in IE) are
http://i3.photobucket.com/albums/y92/Ge ... OLOGO4.gif
and
http://i3.photobucket.com/albums/y92/Ge ... OTXSB1.gif

*goes to browse the linked thread*

Sun Aug 21, 2005 11:06 pm

My tips, being a former userlookup winner months ago.

If you go by each rule that TNT puts out related to userlookups you'll notice it says make sure that your lookup is correctly viewed by both browsers, not just IE.
This is extremely important, and not too difficult to do!.

When I view your lookup in Mozilla I notice that the top part (Neopets.com header) is still visible and completely offsets the page. To get rid of this, insert the following..

Code:: <style>td background {display: none;}</style>

Another thing is that the text colour used in the box with the black background is blinding; red on black begins to get harsh on the eyes once you start reading it for longer than a few seconds. Try white, which blends in with the bulleye's board.

Sun Aug 21, 2005 11:41 pm

I suggest that you not submit your userlookup until you are able to figure out how to get the images to show up. Like others, I just see white boxes, in both my IE and AOL browser. In FireFox, I can see it fine... but there are still many people who use IE, and Neopets will most likely not accept your submission until every browser can see it properly.

When I looked at your coding, I noticed you started with <body style=... --you should have it just start with a regular style tage. <style> body{ is how it should begin, if memory serves me correct.

Mon Aug 22, 2005 12:19 am

soymimi wrote:I suggest that you not submit your userlookup until you are able to figure out how to get the images to show up. Like others, I just see white boxes, in both my IE and AOL browser. In FireFox, I can see it fine... but there are still many people who use IE, and Neopets will most likely not accept your submission until every browser can see it properly.

When I looked at your coding, I noticed you started with <body style=... --you should have it just start with a regular style tage. <style> body{ is how it should begin, if memory serves me correct.

I personally think reading red on black is easier than reading white on black... But asking my dad, he agreed that red on black is harsh. So I'll change to white *srhug*. I might change the hole table color anyways.

I haven't submitted it yet, and I still plan to do graphics for the top bar (as i already stated).

What difference would that coding you mentioned make?

Mon Aug 22, 2005 12:25 am

No no, I meant changing the black background to white, and leaving the red text as it is. It matches with the red and white bullseye.
Also, my IE doesn't even load some images. Like everyone I just see white boxes.

The majority of younger computer users that aren't savvy with IE's spyware issue use it; so having it load in a primary browser is important.

Not to sound harsh, as I'm just trying to help, more content would be a plus. Mine was submitted only once and I was accepted shortly after because of what I believe a major add-on. I added a small tag of poetry, and discussed the importance of the theme I was using.
Depending on the style you're going, it can add a lot. The one I was using showed that there was a human behind the lookup, it wasn't just an infortmative page. Am I making sense?.

And just to note, a black background with white text is also mildly blinding. I still prefer light backgrounds (white or tinted) with dark text. Makes it simple for everyone!. (:

Mon Aug 22, 2005 12:27 am

ProjectDreams wrote:No no, I meant changing the black background to white, and leaving the red text as it is. It matches with the red and white bullseye.
Also, my IE doesn't even load some images. Like everyone I just see white boxes.

The majority of younger computer users that aren't savvy with IE's spyware issue use it; so having it load in a primary browser is important.

Not to sound harsh, as I'm just trying to help, more content would be a plus. Mine was submitted only once and I was accepted shortly after because of what I believe a major add-on. I added a small tag of poetry, and discussed the importance of the theme I was using.
Depending on the style you're going, it can add a lot. The one I was using showed that there was a human behind the lookup, it wasn't just an infortmative page. Am I making sense?.

And just to note, a black background with white text is also mildly blinding. I still prefer light backgrounds (white or tinted) with dark text. Makes it simple for everyone!. (:

Thanks for clarifying that, lol. I'm thinking of taking a big target and turning it into a blog *shrug*.

Like I've said, I think the image problem is due to using Photobucket. (same account as my avvy/siggy here, so it's not bandwidth, i think). I'll be ditching photobucket soon enough anyways.

Mon Aug 22, 2005 1:10 am

Duke of Earl wrote:What difference would that coding you mentioned make?

The difference is that may be why no one using IE can see your graphics. I hate to say it, but your lookup will not be accepted if people can not see your graphics. :-\

I'm just saying you should fix your coding so that your images will start showing up. They are only visible in Mozilla FireFox for me, and none of my other browsers.

Mon Aug 22, 2005 1:37 am

soymimi wrote:The difference is that may be why no one using IE can see your graphics. I hate to say it, but your lookup will not be accepted if people can not see your graphics. :-\

I'm just saying you should fix your coding so that your images will start showing up. They are only visible in Mozilla FireFox for me, and none of my other browsers.

I know it won't be accepted until I get it working in other browsers. I've also said twice that I will first be moving the images to the same server that the background image (that's working, right?)

I did try the coding alternative, didn't make a difference. It was also perfectly legitimate coding. However, I do thank you for the suggestion as I realized that using that method, I could make my code more concise in general

*Wanders off for a few minutes*

Hmm I guess it is a code problem after all. I tried switching around various images' urls (i.e. putting the bg image in the banner spot) and I still have that problem with the image display in IE. And I got the code for those from CSSHelp which is IE oriented, last I checked. (it uses filter:glow effects that only work in IE)

Edit:

WHEE. I fixed it

Found the offending code.

<style type="text/css"> body {background-color:#3397FF; background-image: url(http://www.osagesoftware.com/~eric/imag ... SideBG.jpg); background-position: top right; background-repeat: no-repeat; background-attachment: fixed}
i.banner{background:url(http://i3.photobucket.com/albums/y92/Ge ... OLOGO4.gif); height:221;width:481;position:absolute;top:47;left:227;}
td,p,a,body{color:white;font:8pt verdana;filter:shadow(color:black, direction=135, strength=1)} #mymenu{position:absolute;left:0;top:44}</style>

It didn't like the double body declaration. I'm not an expert with CSS and its semantics, but it smelled bad to me.

There are still a few problems though. In IE, the small flash ad and language dropdown menu still show through o_O

What would be the best way to fix that?

Mon Aug 22, 2005 2:00 am

Hm. Try adding this. I can't remember what worked for me.

Code:: #myFlash {display: none;}

Obviously that's CSS. (;

Mon Aug 22, 2005 2:35 am

I'm glad you fixed the CSS coding. I can now see the proper images. :-)

Good luck with submitting your site!

Mon Aug 22, 2005 8:56 pm

ProjectDreams wrote:Hm. Try adding this. I can't remember what worked for me.
Code:
#myFlash {display: none;}

Obviously that's CSS. (;

That works

.

Nonetheless, I did some digging in source and found a few more tags to test and the #n tag got rid of both the flash and the languages menu.

And now I'm almost done... there's just one thing (besides perhaps doing the shield). I simply can not get a working blog and color change for all text to work at the same time.

My goal: To get my blog to display in IE. To have all the text to be white, EXCEPT for the blog text which is red.

Like I said, I can get one to work, but not the other at the same time. I'm pretty sure that it's due to the fact that I have to include td in style when I define the text color for the page.

I have both of the examples on my two accounts (the other one is an unused nothing if you were wondering).
http://www.neopets.com/randomfriend.pht ... ke_of_earl
(Works in Firefox, but not IE)

http://www.neopets.com/randomfriend.pht ... g_von_graf
(Table works in both, but text is not acceptable.

As far as I can tell, the order in which I put the code in does not matter. I've also tried using official Neopets blogs and their coding and got the same results. o_O

Edit: I fixed it

The solution was to limit the table's code to one td, and use multiple div tags. The problem with IE, at least in the past, is that td is not always transparent, so the background image, if defined for the table, may not work.

Another solution would have been to break the image up into separate files, but I really didn't want to do that...