I updated my site last night with a little something I’ve been dicking around with for the past couple months. After making that post where I complained about everything, I started thinking about what exactly I was unhappy with. A majority of my issues were easily remedied on my end. Here’s what I discovered:
My biggest issue (I think) was not having enough distinction between the homepage and the post page itself. Most blogs use a single template. The homepage is the same as the single post page, just with more posts. This works ok in most cases, but it doesn’t really do the posts justice.
I wanted the homepage to present the entire collection of posts equally. Everything is the same size, nothing is more important than the other. I don’t have to worry about making too many posts and obstructing others from view above the fold or making sure my latest post looks nice enough to keep someone around.
The post pages don’t rely on the homepage layout at all. They are presented in the best way for that specific post type. I’m able to display nice big images and video, longer text posts, and more post details without cluttering up or slowing down the homepage. Within there you can jump to older and newer posts in a more linear fashion without having to go back to the homepage. Which was something my previous theme was lacking.
Nothing I did was groundbreaking, there are tons of blogs that use thumbs on the homepage… we’ve been doing it on yay for years. It’s just something I had to discover on my own for my blog I guess.
All in all I am pretty happy. It’s so effing simple (like most of the stuff I make) but it’s really all I need. I went back and forth trying to ‘dress it up’ but what’s the point? More and more I feel like this is what a majority of the web should be. We [designers] use an excess of visual elements that don’t add anything to the overall experience or functionality and I don’t think anyone can really tell you WHY.
EDIT: Welp, that didn’t last long… On 10/11/10 I went back to a standard blog layout.
