Along with the new redesign that ushered in a slick, one column layout, I decided to take a stride and get my code XHTML valid. I am proud to announce that this website now runs valid XHTML 1.0 Transitional code. Don’t believe me? Check it out for yourself at W3C. The next step would be attempting to go for XHTML 1.0 Strict but that’s a whole different kind of beast.
If you are considering getting your website or your company’s website running on valid code, here are ten compelling reasons from fellow 9ruler Roger Johansson. Also, Molly has a good article about the anatomy of an XHTML document.
In other news, finals start Monday and end Tuesday… I’ve got a few back-to-back, so I won’t be able to post anything for a few days. Wish me luck! In the meantime though, I would like to hear any suggestions you may have for upcoming articles as I will have plenty of time to whip up some great content during winter break.
PaulStamatiou.com runs on the Thesis Theme for WordPress
Thesis is the search engine optimized WordPress theme of choice for serious online publishers. If you’re a blogger who doesn’t understand a lot of PHP, Thesis will give a ton of functionality without having to alter any code. For the advanced, Thesis has incredible customization possibilities via Thesis hooks.
With so many design options, you can use the template over and over and never have it look like the same site. The theme is robust and flexible enough not only to accommodate a site like PaulStamatiou.com, but also to enable the site to run far more efficiently than it ever has before.
I used the Scribe WordPress plugin and service to optimize this blog post for SEO.
{ 14 comments… read them below or add one }
Paul, nice work on the validation. However, I’m not sure I understand why you got rid of the sidebar. You lose a lot of internal linking and a really useful navigational tool.
Your site was already well below the 800×600 minimum screen resolution for fitting on the page – any reasons in particular you decided to change?
I think it was coming from more of a design standpoint than anything… I just love the way it looks now. Simplicity is king. The “lost” functionality will come back soon. I found a new place for the search and that’s the only big thing. I would really like to implement a pop-out sidebar as the one found on FreakComics.com, but I’m afraid I don’t know enough about JavaScript to get that working. I have revamped the archives page a bit and added some of the sidebar elements in the bottom such as latest comments. The state of the site now is only partially completed. There are a few new things I’m hoping to implement once I have some time to stretch my legs over break.
Another thing that really got me wanting a single column layout was loading times. Before my loading times were appalling and the site took about ~180kB as well. I’m trying to make everything lightweight and simple. :-)
Looks great Paul!
Looks nice, though (don’t know if you are aware or not) this comments page doesn’t validate.
I know Henry, it’s Yahoo’s fault for the ads. Their code doesn’t validate. I’ve already emailed them about this, so we’ll see what happens. The fix is just adding type=”text/javascript” but I can’t alter the code in anyway or that voids the Yahoo TOS. Tsk Tsk Yahoo.
Finals week for me too, and it’s going to be crazy. For some reason I decided to take over 20 credit hours my first semester of college and it’s coming back to
bitekill me :(Paul, I have experienced the same problems with Ads by Goooooogle !
type=â€text/javascriptâ€is the correct way to do it…
The issue here is why a big company like Yahoo, or Google doesn’t validate their code !
I like the new look- congrats on the validation! I navegate the site really easily using the live bookmark feature in firefox.
Deviance: Invader-edition?
Hehe George, maybe. :-D
I’m not sure if everything you see will make it to Deviance, I might still develop the one with the sidebar as people probably like it more.
Hey Paul, site is looking great and amazing content as always. I was just wondering if you had been having any e-mail problems lately. I sent an e-mail to you a couple days ago and I just got the Mail Delivery Subsystem Unable to Deliver. Just wondering, thanks.
Eek really? Did you send it to paul (at) paulstamatiou.com? I’ve been using paul.stamatiou (at) gmail.com more often. Since I switched to a dedicated-virtual server from my shared server I couldn’t really get my webmail client for this site working correctly yet so I just use it for read-only stuff as it won’t let me send out. Anyways, shoot me that email again if you want.
I can help you with the pop out sidebar if you want paul, just email me :)
Great article, I found yours on accident. I just thought I would let you know that you can make money now for your articles. At SayItAloud you can post your articles like you already do, but you can get better exposure and make some decent money in the process when companies sponsor your article. I bookmarked your page and I look forward to your future articles.%d%a%d%aYou can check out our site by clicking on my name.