Advice and Guidence Needed with Javascript Website Options

[Sanitarium]

Hey guys,

I am in the process of designing a website and I need to know what would be the best way to approach it. I can describe it for you so you can get a better idea of what is needed and how I would be able to tackle it best.

There is going to be a large res image as a background, but when you first access the site, you will only see a small portion of the full image. i.e. The edges of the image will be hidden, but pre-loaded.
Then there will be a menu, where when you press one of the buttons, the image pans to the relevant section of the background image which will be like a new web page for the menu item you selected. Also, a back button to go back to the main menu will also be needed.

If you don't understand that I can try and make it clearer for you.

Any tips or pointers to get me started? I have no idea how to approach this but I am pretty advanced in graphic design and website design, its just the coding of it which lets me down.

Thanks a Million,
Colm

[Darin McGrew]

It sounds like you're trying to make multiple pages out of a single URL.

If so, then I recommend just having multiple pages with multiple URLs.

[Sanitarium]

Thanks for the reply, but I don't think you fully understand what I need.

Picture this:

You go to the website, and you see a wall with picture frames hanging on it, and each picture is a menu item (CSS rollover images) and you click on one. You see the page (or 'wall') elegantly slide to a different section of the 'wall' which is what you wanted when you clicked on the picture frame. Then you click a back button and it brings you back to the main 'menu'.

Any clearer? I am thinking the prototype script is going to be a big help.

Thanks alot.

[pandy]

Like this?

http://web.archive.org/web/20021208084351/...pple/index.html

[Darin McGrew]

You go to the website, and you see a wall with picture frames hanging on it, and each picture is a menu item (CSS rollover images) and you click on one. You see the page (or 'wall') elegantly slide to a different section of the 'wall' which is what you wanted when you clicked on the picture frame.

Can I email someone the URL of this "section of the 'wall'" or do I have to tell them how to navigate to it? Can I bookmark the URL?

Then you click a back button and it brings you back to the main 'menu'.

What do you mean by "a back button"? Can I use the back button, can I use my browser's normal back function? Or will that take me entirely out of the gallery site?

[Sanitarium]

You go to the website, and you see a wall with picture frames hanging on it, and each picture is a menu item (CSS rollover images) and you click on one. You see the page (or 'wall') elegantly slide to a different section of the 'wall' which is what you wanted when you clicked on the picture frame.

Can I email someone the URL of this "section of the 'wall'" or do I have to tell them how to navigate to it? Can I bookmark the URL?

No, it will stay as the same URL, so all the info on the website will have to be pre-loaded.

Then you click a back button and it brings you back to the main 'menu'.

What do you mean by "a back button"? Can I use the back button, can I use my browser's normal back function? Or will that take me entirely out of the gallery site?

I just mean a button what will bring you back to the menu. Since the URL of the website will stay the same, the back button will bring you back a page, like it is supposed to, and not back to the menu.

[Darin McGrew]

I recommend that you redesign the site.

[Brian Chandler]

It sounds to me as though you want to make a "presentation", something where you are totally in control, and the vic_ I mean visitor views your creation at your pace. Why not just make a Flash presentation, since it is designed for that sort of thing? But it's better not to call it a "website", which has other connotations.

[Sanitarium]

I'm probably gonna go with the idea of a flash website. I really wanted to try make it out of javascript or AJAX but I guess it will be too hard.

Thanks for the advice guys.

[Darin McGrew]

Is there a particular reason to make the site with Flash/AJAX/whatever? If you've got an online app that uses Flash/AJAX/whatever, that's one thing. But the site itself can (and IMHO, should) still be accessible HTML.

[Brian Chandler]

But the site itself can (and IMHO, should) still be accessible HTML.

This website is about "... Making the Web accessible to all." and within that context advice should and will be about making the site "accessible" (in the very peculiar sense that that word is used here). But is your claim that it "should" be "accessible HTML" supposed to be more absolute than that? If someone wants to make a Flash presentation (I agree it's better not called a "website"), then why shouldn't they?

[Darin McGrew]

If someone wants to make a Flash presentation (I agree it's better not called a "website"), then why shouldn't they?

Many user agents won't be able to access the Flash content. HTML content should be accessible to all user agents. In many situations, this is a legal issue (e.g., accessibility for the disabled). In others, it is merely a practical issue (e.g., traffic from search engines, which cannot index Flash content).

[Brian Chandler]

If someone wants to make a Flash presentation (I agree it's better not called a "website"), then why shouldn't they?

Many user agents won't be able to access the Flash content. HTML content should be accessible to all user agents. In many situations, this is a legal issue (e.g., accessibility for the disabled). In others, it is merely a practical issue (e.g., traffic from search engines, which cannot index Flash content).

Yes, of course a "Flash presentation" is not (in the usual sense) a website. Are you saying it might be illegal to make a Flash presentation? (I know the legal world is there to give us something to laugh at, but it would be nice if they could be consistent: if a Flash presentation were illegal because some people couldn't access it, so would be anything encumbered with DRM nonsense, whose only purpose is to prevent some people from accessing it.)

[Darin McGrew]

IANAL, but there are services that are legally required to be accessible, and content in Flash presentations is difficult/impossible for some disabled people to access.