Birthday Presents!
Thursday, 20th April 2006 by Alex Turnbull
Like lots of things bought on the internet, our birthday present was a little late in arriving... however, 2 weeks after our first anniversary, we are proud to unveil the brand new Google Sightseeing design! So if you're reading this in your news program, come take a look already, as we have several cool new features too.
Obviously it's not finished yet (yes, this is a beta) – but have a wander around, kick the tyres, and let us know what you think.
We look forward to another great year!
About the author
Alex has decided that his title will be Senior Vice President of Stuff.
good: Lovely design – like the postmarks – any time you turn metadata into decorative contextual elements like that is a real plus. The navigation is clean as a whistle – well done!
bad: don’t like the ads at the top, but I guess you need to pay the bills somehow… even more mystified by the four images above the ads; altogether way too much screen real estate given over to this. I’ll be using GreaseMonkey to make it go away!
Not thrilled by the spaced out layout on the category page, and in Firefox on my Mac, the FAQ page is badly busted because of a long URL.
Altogether a great start!
Thanks woowoowoo, we’ll take all that on board.
If anyone’s only seen a blank white page for the last 8 hours please accept my apologies – The theme file went randomly missing while I was asleep.
I dont know what is going on, but it looks really messed up in firefox under windows XP. There is this massive amount of empty space up the top. I can send you an e-mail with a screen shot if you want. I also ran the page through the w3.org validator, and it came up with a bunch of problems, mostly it seems to be to do with the way you are escaping links: http://validator.w3.org/check?uri=http%3A%2F%2Fgooglesightseeing.com%2F
The way you seem to embed the actuall google map in the page, looks promising. It would be cool to see comments show up in the bar on the left.
I liked the old one better. This one is too busy for my liking, and I liked the simple graphics as it was much more simple. Sorry to be against the effort you have put in.
Maybe it isnt sooo bad…. just without the ads it would be much better. I like the stamps! they must have taken ages, unless you are just doing them in photoshop?
Yeah for customized maps!! I confirm the 4 images at the top are a bit strange and make the ads waste more space than needed; i can bear the ads as long as they don’t take too much place…. and confirming the strange (if not wanted) gap below the ads, too… Other than those few things, everithing else is great! …and the postmarks really awsome!
I like a new clean design, but I must admit that I liked the old one better (for now!) – Bar at the right is too wide in comparison with the width of the posts. – Borders (left, right and top) too wide – Don’t like pictures above the ads. – Colors are a bit dull. – Picture in banner above the maps is too narrow. But this is still Beta of course! 😉
I tell you what would be brilliant- A Vb forum so that we can discuss our own contributions, instead of having to put them in a queue. Then the editors could pick out contributions from the forum that they like and put them in the main page…anyone else like this?
I have loads of sites to contribute! But probs not good enough for the main page.
Also a sighting of the year award! Or a poll for the best sight…im just rambling!
I’ve got the same huge empty space between the images and the map at the top in Firefox on Windows XP. Sorry. I bet it works fine on the mac at home.
Ouch… Big display problems with lastest Firefox browser + Adblock on *.googlesyndication.com
I’m using firefox on xp (1.5.0.2), could somebody email me a screenshot of this huge empty space? alex@thedomainnameofthissite
Thanks!
ah, Franck I got it now. Never mind about that screen shot, thanks 🙂
looks good. There does seem to be a alot of wasted space. That gap everyone’s on about is the same in IE 7.
How about some fluidity depending on browser size.
The New York Times and CNN news sites have recently been redesigned to cater for 1024×768 and upwards. I just found this article:
http://www.webdesigntimes.com/article/is-designing-for-800×600-dead
From the comments I guess 800X600 isn’t dead.
i’ll shut up.
NB. The stamps idea is terrific. How does that work?
As the comments to the 800×600 article say, although many people use a higher screen resolution now, they are starting to use the browser in windowed rather than full-screen mode. (Using everything full screen is MIcrosoft’s fault as that’s what Windows traditionally encouraged).
Designing the page to change with window width is tricky. It needs to be done carefully so that the spacing changes. What you don’t want is the main column of text to be any wider as it becomes unreadable if there are too many words on a line. (There’s a reason newspaper articles are in columns!) So really there’s little gained from designing a wider site – you may as well let people use a smaller window.
It’s beautiful. Pay no mind to the naysayers… as a frustrated web-design hobbyist with no free time, I’ve been pulling my hair out trying to make my site look decent. I don’t have “the knack.” But THIS… this looks great. Very professional. I didn’t know you guys had it in you!
I really like the new design, especially the postage emblem, it makes me feel like a real world traveler! I did prefer the old “banner” image at the top, as it was more … realisitic… but the funky textured almost-looks-like-construction-paper design is overall quite interesting. Happy Belated Birthday!
Thanks Parker 😀
As for fixed/liquid layouts, we decided to go with a fixed for the moment as (which Jonathan mentioned) line-lengths can get very long if you’re not quite restictive about which columns can change size. And ggss only has 2 columns, so…
I’ve fixed the huuuuge gap some people were getting when they were blocking our ads, and I’ve tried to make them a little less intrusive whilst also decreasing the amount of space they take up. However as woowoowoo points out, we need to pay the bills, and he also offers a solution if you really can’t stand them. Unfortuantely they’re not going away!
I’m aware of lots of outstanding minor layout issues in various browsers, but we thought it was best to get the new design online and get some feedback. If you spot a major error then let us know in this thread, and I’d be keen to hear any feedback from people who can view the site in IE7.
Thanks everyone for the feedback so far, some of the suggestion we’ve already considered and may well appear here soon. Others… well we’re always open to suggestions 😉
I’ve decided it’s top and looks loads better now i’ve had a good butchers on me lunch. Just sort out those categories. They looks a bit weird.
Old one looked like an off the shelf blog package but this is much more individual.
Top idea, decent design you got it all.
Great design !! Congratulations.
Enrique (from Madrid – Spain)
The Google ads everywhere make it feel a bit claustrophobic and cluttered, in my humble opinion. And I have to say, I chuckled when I read the “Not affiliated with Google” banner and directly above it “Ads by Google” 🙂
Mmmmmm, Nice!
I forgot to add – it looks fine in IE7.
IE7 BETA 2 is far better than BETA 1 (which was frankly frightening) Microsoft fans (do they exist?)
Still not as good as Safari though Bill.
P.S. Post some sights now!
I was gonna post Mount Etna but it looks wank.
Awesome design !
Aside from the ads at the top that look like photos, it’s pretty good. I’m not a fan of big whitespaces though, and blank sides on my 1024X768 screen make me feel like space is wasted, but I know how hard it is to use space without cluttering things up.
I would like to add a YES vote for Rob at #8…a forum where we can all add the amazing locations we have found instead of waiting in line. Keep up the good work!!
I agree with Patrick and Rob, a forum would be nice. Either that or post more sights, I don’t quite understand why only a few sights are posted each week when other websites similar to GSS often post 50-100 really good sights per week. It would also be nice to have a section with “most popular” and “highest rated” sights. Another nice feature would be to have the option to view the sight in Google Maps, Win. Live Local, or Yahoo maps. (You may recognize these sudgested features from somewhere else) 😉
Also, I’m still having a few glitches with the comments section and the adds getting mashed together, refreshing seems to solve it though. (using Firefox, XP)
Anyways, keep up the good work and Happy belated Birthday!
hmmm….babaganoosh…what would they call it if they started using other maps as well? I think Google is the best in terms of usability, and it terms of the added work of having to put in links for all the other map makers, it would make the suggestion of “50-100 posts a week” even more unreachable! 😉
I suspect that the sites that add many more arent put in with as much care, or maybe dont have the added information. As well as the fact that you dont want the site to be saturated, because then people dont have time to mull over a sight and add comments.
A rank feature would be nice, something akin to what you see on zug.com where you have a 5 star rating system.
Rob, see Alex’s post (#9) here… https://www.googlesightseeing.com/2006/04/12/white-sands-national-monument/#comments
Also, I’m not suggesting GSS start posting 50-100 posts per week, but they could easily double output (5-10 sights per week), I’m sure. I know I for one have submitted several (quality, imho) sights in the past months that have never been posted. As a result I’ve basically stopped submitting sights to this website, and I know for a fact I’m not the only one. I understand the added info and links in the posts take extra time, which I appreciate, but I don’t think 1 or 2 posts per day is asking too much. If so, maybe an extra “moderator” or two could help with that. Besides, I know of one site ( http://virtualglobetrotting.com ) that seems to have no problem maintaining all of the suggestions I’ve made.
Just come online and as ever the first site I visit is Googlesightseeing, just like to see if there is anything new and low and behold there is. The site looks great to me, it has a real travelly feel to it, I would imagine that was the general idea. The only downside for me is I will have to re-design the widget to match. Keep your eyes out for it on the Apple site in the next few days!
Sorry Pete, we had it written down somewhere to warn you of the impending re-design but it must have got lost! Thanks for keeping the Widget up to date.
Nice! Happy belated birthday GGSS!
I agree with Rob about the forum, it sounds like a great idea for sharing your sights, rather than submitting them and hoping that sometime several months from now you may see them again. But seriously, no offense guys, I know you’re swamped 🙂 But this is a good solution I think. As long as it too doesn’t get overwhelmed…
While I like the design, I do think the colors are a little lacking – so I have a suggestion. The green on the little banner at the top (well, under the ads) looks nice, esp. with the construction-paper background. Maybe you could do something with that? Also, I’d like a big banner at the top like before – it’s very easy to visually miss this new one. But if you make a bigger banner keep this design, it’s very nice.
Great job guys!
Thank you all for your birthday wishes btw!
Tim, We’re not “swamped” with submissions, see FAQ #8.
Rob, I couldn’t find a rating thing on zug.com, but I did waste about 3 hours reading the site, thanks for that 😀 We’ll look into a rating system, or perhaps a “best sight ever” poll.
BM of M, The stamps are automatically generated using imagemagick from the locality name – It would take forever to create them all by hand!
I like some of the aspects of this design. The design looks professional, but, sorry to say this, it isn’t very functional. I liked the old design, where you had all the buttons on the bottom of the post saying who posted it and to see it on Google Earth, etc. Those were really helpful to me and I am sad that they are gone. I also liked the old logo better; the new one looks old fashioned. I am sorry that I don’t really like the outcome, but it’s the content that counts. I am still happy and glad that you are still providing great information.
Sheesh… I knew this redesign was a bad idea! Users huh?! 😉
Babaganoosh, we unfortunately don’t run GSS full-time, we all have day jobs – and some of us have wives, second jobs,
mistresses, social lives, and babies on the way! However we do appreciate that it would be great to have more posts on a daily basis, and this is something we are determined to tackle on way or another.However, one of the reasons that even we don’t read sites like virtual globetrotting on a daily basis is the sheer volume of new sights. On the Wikipedia page about Google maps GSS is described as a “Showcase site of interesting views” – we don’t intend to post everything there is to see (that would probably be impossible anyway), but rather point out some of the best and most interesting things. Perhaps even more importantly, we try really hard to provide you extra information about a sight, which is what we think keeps all of you guys coming back!
There’s loads of other sites out there that have already archived more than we could ever hope to catch up with, and there’s also lots of forums which already deal with this subject. I think this site is great for the community it has built, so if the majority of our users really do want to get together in a GSS forum, then that’s something we should consider.
Maybe we should have a poll… 😉
As for WLL and Yahoo posts, we’re happy to post them if they’re good (even though I agree with Rob that Google Maps is the easiest to use), however we actually get very few submissions for these services. We are prepared for change however.
Thanks again to everyone for your suggestions and thoughts, we’re going to take them all into consideration – then hopefully we can provide you with an even better site. 😀
Now, lets get back to the serious business of sightseeing shall we?
Now that I’m really looking into the design, I think The Google Sightseeing people have made a great choice.
Well, thats a fast turnaround time. I log on in the morning and the layout issues in firefox are fixed. The design looks very nice. Happy birthdya google sighseeing, and a bix thanks from all your users!
Oh, hey now, hold the phone. Babies on the way, Alex? Am I missing something?
Hey Tim, I didn’t announce it here, but I did on my own site. Baby is due on the 19th July 😀
The new integrated maps look great, and I’m glad they don’t include the annoying overview that Google have recently added to the bottom right-hand corner, which it is impossible have minimised by default.
However, I think some people will miss the scale that is on the standard maps, which is regularly used to determine the size of things (length of trains, size of lettering, etc.)
Jonathan,
There’s no need to miss the scale as now I’ve added it to the embedded map. Thanks for pointing it out.
Guys,
Technical issue here: my guess is that you changed the image links from links referring to google maps, to links referring to your own pages with embedded google map content. For some reason, they don’t render on my system (I’m using a Mac); I get your page, your background, your inside header, your ad bar on the left, and a big empty space in the middle.
I’m not sure what the rendering issue is, but until it can get fixed, could you offer alternate old-style direct-to-google-maps links also?
Happy Birthday!
Cool new layout, but you can’t view the places directly in Google Maps (if needed), can you?
yes you can al cahole. Simply replace the URL googlesightseeing,com/ with maps.google.co.uk/ or .com/
I hate this new design.
I’m sorry you feel that way Gabe. What is it particularly that you hate so much?
Is it just me or is this new design really slow? Especially scrolling around images. Bring back the old design
It’s just you. Please don’t bring back the old design!