Quote:
"Neil,
since Chris is running the shatters.net site, its appearance or possible modification is largely his decision.
But as concerns myself (a longstanding Celestia co-author and developer), I am afraid I can't see any elements in your present design proposal that I would so far consider superior to Runar's proven design. Here is another significant example:
From the antique celestial grid background of the original design, you copied these four constellation names ,
Cassiopea Cepheus URSA Minor DRACO,
right underneath the main Celestia title line. In this form that line makes no sense whatsoever. This clearly indicates that your "relation" to Celestia must (still) be rather "superficial"... A good design, however, will significantly profit from a thorough understanding of what Celestia is all about.
Last not least: Since a long time, the plan exists to aim for a stylish, newly designed "facelift" of this phpbb forum, integrated into the shatters.net site. Like e.g. it was done already in case of our own CelestialMatters (CM) site and forum that were also designed by our Celestia friend Runar Thorvaldsen (Runar and myself are the hosts of the CM site).
http://www.celestialmatters.org/http://forum.celestialmatters.org/Fridger"
As they say - keep something old to make them happy. So I left that tagline and if you don't like it why is it still on the current website that Runar made after 5 years of no updating etc etc. Some links are dead and the design is nice that is all - nice.
Let me see if I get this right; Runar used an old map with the headline and tagline "Cassiopea Cepheus URSA Minor DRACO" which you tell me has no significance to Celestia. Why in the World did he put it there in the first place?
I like this one: "A good design, however, will significantly profit from a thorough understanding of what Celestia is all about.". A kid might like Celestia and would "understand" Celestia from his/her viewpoint - not the right viewpoint since there is absolutely no right viewpoint. An old man 110 years old would understand it differently. A science person would understand it differently. The web design can be made in any number of ways and to satisfy all we might need to do at least 10 different styles.
The current website is nice - as said. Not updated 5+ years which makes it not nice in itself.
I take criticism very serious and your critic is near no critic so I don't take it professionally serious. However to blow away some dust I need to reply and make a few points clear:
a) I understand Celestia as:
".. The free space simulation that lets you explore our universe in three dimensions. Celestia runs on Windows, Linux, and Mac OS X.
Unlike most planetarium software, Celestia doesn't confine you to the surface of the Earth. You can travel throughout the solar system, to any of over 100,000 stars, or even beyond the galaxy.
All movement in Celestia is seamless; the exponential zoom feature lets you explore space across a huge range of scales, from galaxy clusters down to spacecraft only a few meters across. A 'point-and-goto' interface makes it simple to navigate through the universe to the object you want to visit.
Celestia is expandable. Celestia comes with a large catalog of stars, galaxies, planets, moons, asteroids, comets, and spacecraft. If that's not enough, you can download dozens of easy to install add-ons with more objects."
b) A web design can never - I repeat never - satisfy all. Some like it hot - some like it not hot. But that is not wrong.
c) Keeping old elements are good like some of the stuff I left in there like the Hubble telescope and that old map. History, future and present depicted is a nice touch. Not necessary but nice.
d) Keeping the design looking fresh and "game"-like makes it accessible to most. Making it scientific... well, make it like Fracint -
http://spanky.triumf.ca/www/fractint/fractint.html - nice, yes? Boring, yes? I do not personally believe making it only scientific would appeal to most and I believe the "science" way is good but what is a scientific looking web site design?
e) I like this one: "Runar's proven design". Right, proven for 5 years non updated. It has proven its point as being standing there with no updates which is perhaps a record in Internet history. Might write to Guinness Book Of Records on this one.
f) I believe in competition but so far I see non. If Runar or you can provide some updates and/or better design I would love to see it.
g)
http://www.celestialmatters.org/. What has "Mona Lisa" (Painting by Leonardo da Vinci) got to do with Celestia and Space? Was Leonardo an astronomer? Was leonardo an artist? Almost any reference to Space can be made from any item or symbol. Space/Universe is everything hence even an ant could be depicted and give meaning.
h) I shall remove that old map which Runar probably copied from
http://www.lindahall.org/services/digit ... 20017w.jpgIs Fridger a name or an alias?
Kindest
Niels Ulrik Reinwald
