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15 Key Elements All Top Web Sites Should Have

freelancefolder.com — There are a lot of details to consider when designing and developing a web site. In reality, it can seem like an endless list — but if you look carefully you’ll see that there are certain elements that are more important than others, elements that are used consistently among the most successful sites.

Who dugg this? Made popular Oct 29, 2008

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  • iamstudip, on 10/29/2008, -2/+106An animated Under Construction gif.
  • wifirewire2, on 10/29/2008, -2/+58don't forget the shaking banner that informs you of your *Free iPod
  • taketheleap, on 10/29/2008, -8/+43did you just congratulate yourself on your post?
  • jorisb, on 10/29/2008, -4/+36A bit ironic that he should mention page validation with 283 validation errors on this particular page.
  • MediaCrisis, on 10/29/2008, -5/+29Thorough, but hopefully obvious.
  • Davidins, on 10/29/2008, -4/+24...and 100% uptime server
  • aolshove, on 10/29/2008, -4/+21*sighs* Meaningful Content is #5. Shouldn't that be the top of the list?

  • billbugger, on 10/29/2008, -2/+16Digging with a shovel and the siren anigifs too.

    *blink*blink*blink*
  • UnFriendlyFire, on 10/29/2008, -2/+16taketheleap is taking about your post here on Digg not the article. You said great post...congrats. It implies that you were congratulating the Digg poster, which is you.
  • catwoman2970, on 10/29/2008, -14/+28This is the most obvious list I've ever read.
  • Twice, on 10/29/2008, -2/+15If you learned something after reading that article, you shouldn't even be in the webdesign business.
  • JohnCoyote, on 10/29/2008, -1/+13"no *****, Sherlock" pretty much sums up my reaction to the article
  • harrydeforest, on 10/29/2008, -3/+14I'm all for clean design, but there are 2 points here I disagree with:
    1) Footer navigation.
    Does anyone use this? Wouldn't that space be better served with links to feature/related articles?

    2) Validating markup.
    Yes, in a perfect world all your code will validate. In reality, you'll drive yourself batty trying to please the validatorbot when there is really nothing wrong with your site. If you need to throw in a table here and there or a "target=_blank" to go along with your CSS, go for it. Most great sites don't come close to validating.
  • inactive, on 10/30/2008, -0/+9http://www.dokimos.org/ajff/ is in my humble opinion a perfect example of awesome website design.
  • mecharabbit, on 10/29/2008, -14/+2316. Boobies.
  • itwas, on 10/29/2008, -3/+11... if anyone actually needs to read this article to figure out all these things, should they really be in this business? i dig the colored pencils though.
  • billbugger, on 10/29/2008, -3/+11Good article for the noobs getting into the field!
    For the rest that have been in it for longer then a year or two; If you don't know these by heart, change career paths.
  • eltrev, on 10/29/2008, -1/+9that's what I thought.

    it made me snooze a little.
  • elementop, on 10/29/2008, -0/+7She.
  • HeyBob, on 10/29/2008, -3/+10My pet peeve of things missing from most web pages:
    Time/Date Created, Time/Date Last Modified
  • skinjester, on 10/29/2008, -0/+6me too. I'm adding them to every site from now on
  • chrishirsch, on 10/30/2008, -0/+6Amen
  • MtheoryX, on 10/29/2008, -4/+10I love colored pencils.
  • Jhonka, on 10/30/2008, -0/+5I want to burn everything now.
  • Catgofire, on 10/30/2008, -3/+8It may as well have included

    16. HTML markup
    17. Text
    18. Maybe some graphics
    19. A midi that autoplays when you load the page
    20.
  • Malnilion, on 10/30/2008, -0/+5My eyes will never be the same
  • binchaud, on 10/30/2008, -5/+10Welcome to 1997.
  • afx1, on 10/29/2008, -1/+6http://validator.w3.org/check?uri=http%3A%2F%2Ffre ...
  • phatfiend, on 10/30/2008, -3/+8This should really be called "15 Key Things Anyone Who Has Done Any Amount Of Web Design Already Knows"
  • Ravatar, on 10/30/2008, -0/+5I totally agree man, some people are so dumb.
  • MtheoryX, on 10/29/2008, -1/+5lol, wut?
  • eltrev, on 10/29/2008, -5/+9Run-of-the-mill snooze material.

    I'd think more interesting / original insight would be required to get this Digg Mained. Guess not.

  • Ravatar, on 10/30/2008, -0/+4I laugh every time I see that cat running backwards. Thank you sir.
  • uncoolcentral, on 10/30/2008, -0/+4She posted this to a third-party blog. Her site is valid xhtml, FYI.
  • darkened, on 10/30/2008, -0/+4I completely disagree with you it is absolutely mandatory that Contact is in the top bar main navigation, and preferably atleast 2 other places so it's always immediately visible. The about is kind of optional depending on the site and can generally be merged with contact for a company.
  • collution, on 10/29/2008, -1/+5Next freelancefolder.com article: 15 Key Elements All Top Comments Should Have
  • Falldog, on 10/30/2008, -3/+7Attack of the Digg bots?
  • MtheoryX, on 10/29/2008, -2/+6The list isn't quantified to imply importance of each item.
  • collution, on 10/29/2008, -1/+4It means that almost all of your top websites aren't validated. To be frank, it's about impossible to do on dynamic sites. Just make sure your initial design when coded is valid and usually you're ok.

    This guy should have made that plain and clear in the article, but well.. he didnt. He should be more concise.
  • PiRATE7, on 10/30/2008, -2/+5It should also be hosted on geocities, or angelfire, and have lots of flashy gifs
  • Ravatar, on 10/30/2008, -0/+3@taketheleap: Of course he isn't, doing so would be pretty obvious and deserving of a bury. Surely he's referring to the article.
  • 5urr3al5am, on 10/30/2008, -2/+5ImJustCreative == weak .. besides the article sucked.. no, ..well it was good IF you've NEVER done any work on ANY website EVER.. I suppose, for the noobs out there.. you need to cover the very-very-very basics.
  • greentimes, on 10/29/2008, -2/+5i like how there is no website w/ compliant code : http://digg.com = 4 Errors
  • Ellsass, on 11/05/2008, -0/+2"Footer navigation. Does anyone use this?"

    Yes, although she didn't mention the main reason. I use it (very occasionally, mind you) when I've scrolled down to the bottom of the page. It also provides a nice frame for the content and a cue that the page has ended -- without it, the content just randomly stops and you're wondering if the page finished loading.
  • jimv1983, on 10/30/2008, -0/+2I agree if you don't have #5 the other 14 are pretty pointless.
  • Ravatar, on 10/30/2008, -0/+2One reason why it's fun to browse with AdBlock disabled. Sites that associate with ad providers who provide that stupid ***** iPod/iPhone flash ad get an instant entry into my hosts file. No ad revenue for you.
  • idesignstudios, on 10/30/2008, -1/+3Thanks for all the diggs and comments! I'm the writer of the article - and I'm a SHE (not a he). :)

    Just wanted to clarify a few things about the post... I'm just a contributing author, not the site owner (or designer) so I have no say in the design and validation of the site itself that the post was published on. My own main site validates (I admit my blog doesn't - sidebar ad codes and old posts, etc - something I'll be going through soon and trying to fix).

    This web site (Freelance Folder) is also one for freelancers of any sort - not necessarily web designers alone. There are lots of brand new web designers, graphic designers, writers, etc who may not be aware of these things. It's just meant to be a starting point for the general population who has/wants/needs a web site and wants to improve upon it (and isn't a seasoned web designer who knows these things inside and out like we do).

    Of course there are more items not on the list, but these are some of the basics. Oh, and the list is not in any particular order, either.

    Anyway just had to comment in my defense a bit. Otherwise though, I'm overwhelmed by the support and amount of diggs. Overall it seems to have been a successful post.

    Thanks to you all! :)
  • tripmaster, on 10/30/2008, -0/+2Additional generic cop compliment, Brian!
  • Biks, on 10/30/2008, -4/+6Feels like someone scraped this content a few years ago, page spun a few times and posted it to an article site..then THAT was re-scraped, run through the Google translator twice and posted on the site via an RSS feed.
  • PimNL, on 10/30/2008, -0/+2So the interface of Digg for example should have a contact button at the top?
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