5 ms·

holy shit just write your web pages in html, not everything needs to be a crazy javascript abomination where the body text fades in slowly

Flimm 14y ago
Having the web page fade in slowly gives the impression of speed. It's not just a fancy gimmick.
- inetsee 14y ago
  I ran a website speed test on this page; it performed very poorly (load time more than 14 seconds). Personally, I'd rather see websites with real speed, rather than something pretty that just has the impression of speed. In my opinion, having a web page fade in is just a gimmick.
  - bmelton 14y ago
    In all fairness, running a speed test against a site that is currently on the front page of HN is a little bit of a stacked deck, isn't it?
    - hapless 14y ago
      Isn't that when it matters the most?
      - bmelton 14y ago
        Perhaps, but that completely misses the point. The HN effect completely crashes lots of servers. It's not at all unlikely that the page appears snappy most of the time and is simply so ill-performant at the moment because it was being hammered. Not saying that's true or false, mind you; Just that when something is on the front page of HN is perhaps the least likely time to gather a representative benchmark.
  - mnutt 14y ago
    What is the difference between real speed and the impression of speed? If it feels fast, is it not fast? Automated website speed tests aren't a good measurement the way you're using them. They're good for a site developer to find bottlenecks but can't tell you much else one way or the other. Perhaps most of the page load time is spent loading images below the fold. You're much better just loading the page by hand and seeing how fast the content shows up. And when you do that, the impression of speed is important.
- dpark 14y ago
  > fade in slowly ... impression of speed Surely you see the contradiction here. > It's not just a fancy gimmick. Right. It's a cheesy gimmick.
huhtenberg 14y ago
That's just mean. Comments like this ^ sidetrack the whole post from what-could-be an interesting discussion into a group bashing over irrelevant little details.
- dpark 14y ago
  These kinds of comments aren't necessarily inappropriate here. When someone's writing about "great interaction design", it's reasonable to point out the terrible interaction design of their site. If someone were discussing "great font design" on their blog and using Comic Sans, it'd be pretty surprising if they were not attacked.
  - huhtenberg 14y ago
    Well, if the top comment starts with "holy shit", it typically drags all other comments in the same direction. Also, questioning someone's font survey by attacking their use of Comic Sans is, bluntly put, retarded. You still need to account for the quality of the content to make a judgement.
    - dpark 14y ago
      Did you seriously complain about someone else saying "holy shit" and then follow it up by calling my comment "retarded"? And no, it's not "retarded" to question someone's expertise when they're presenting themselves as an expert and making critical errors. Your opinions on fonts are at best suspect if you use Comic Sans for the content of your blog. Likewise, your opinions on interaction design are at best suspect if your blog is rendered as pixelated jpgs, fades in slowly, breaks middle click, and is laid out more like an Apple product page than a page intended to convey meaningful information.
      - huhtenberg 14y ago
        No, not your comment, the ad hominem approach. There's plenty of reasons why Comic Sans could end up on the page talking about fonts. It can be a joke, it can be a fallback font, it can be some hosted template that got messed up. In this case, pixelated jpgs are probably the fasted way for him to publish the content, fading is likely inherited from the general site template, it is presented unconventionally, but I personally had absolutely no problem reading it. The actual content is thoughtful and it makes sense. So do tell me again why nitpicking on the text fading thing coupled with a holy shit drama is a good way to start the discussion.
tambourine_man 14y ago
If it falls back gracefully, why not? As pointed by others, the site just is a bunch of JPEGs, which is a very bad choice indeed (accessibility, search engine access, speed, etc). But aesthetics do matter. If done properly, you could just grab the content and use your favority reader with a click of a button in case you desagree with the author's taste.
- onli 14y ago
  >If it falls back gracefully, why not? It doesn't. Content doesn't load here on a FF with js disabled (not that i do this normally, disable JS, just tested it because of your comment). I think it kind of matters in this case. The "mail has to be repaired" is such an overused term, and seldom the people claiming that even try to give reasons for this ruling. Mail is an asynchronic system for letting people send messages (with attachments) and it works really well. If someone fails to see that, claiming something is broken which most probably isn't and is doing that from a technically broken site, it weakens his point even further. So mentioning the observation isn't totally out of place.
- dredmorbius 14y ago
  It doesn't. I had to switch browsers and start doing NoScript Bingo until the damned page rendered. I want those 60 seconds of my life back. It wasn't worth it.
- tambourine_man 14y ago
  Of course it doesn't. I'm not defending the site, I'm saying there is nothing wrong with a JavaScript intensive site, if properly done (this one isn't).
deleted 14y ago
[deleted]
frm1001xplrr 14y ago
I guess you didn't RTP where it said "if you're a developer[...]"? Guy's a designer :|
taybin 14y ago
Surprise! There is no body text!

Flimm 14y ago

Having the web page fade in slowly gives the impression of speed. It's not just a fancy gimmick.

inetsee 14y ago
I ran a website speed test on this page; it performed very poorly (load time more than 14 seconds). Personally, I'd rather see websites with real speed, rather than something pretty that just has the impression of speed. In my opinion, having a web page fade in is just a gimmick.
- bmelton 14y ago
  In all fairness, running a speed test against a site that is currently on the front page of HN is a little bit of a stacked deck, isn't it?
  - hapless 14y ago
    Isn't that when it matters the most?
    - bmelton 14y ago
      Perhaps, but that completely misses the point. The HN effect completely crashes lots of servers. It's not at all unlikely that the page appears snappy most of the time and is simply so ill-performant at the moment because it was being hammered. Not saying that's true or false, mind you; Just that when something is on the front page of HN is perhaps the least likely time to gather a representative benchmark.
- mnutt 14y ago
  What is the difference between real speed and the impression of speed? If it feels fast, is it not fast? Automated website speed tests aren't a good measurement the way you're using them. They're good for a site developer to find bottlenecks but can't tell you much else one way or the other. Perhaps most of the page load time is spent loading images below the fold. You're much better just loading the page by hand and seeing how fast the content shows up. And when you do that, the impression of speed is important.
dpark 14y ago
> fade in slowly ... impression of speed Surely you see the contradiction here. > It's not just a fancy gimmick. Right. It's a cheesy gimmick.

huhtenberg 14y ago

That's just mean. Comments like this ^ sidetrack the whole post from what-could-be an interesting discussion into a group bashing over irrelevant little details.

dpark 14y ago
These kinds of comments aren't necessarily inappropriate here. When someone's writing about "great interaction design", it's reasonable to point out the terrible interaction design of their site. If someone were discussing "great font design" on their blog and using Comic Sans, it'd be pretty surprising if they were not attacked.
- huhtenberg 14y ago
  Well, if the top comment starts with "holy shit", it typically drags all other comments in the same direction. Also, questioning someone's font survey by attacking their use of Comic Sans is, bluntly put, retarded. You still need to account for the quality of the content to make a judgement.
  - dpark 14y ago
    Did you seriously complain about someone else saying "holy shit" and then follow it up by calling my comment "retarded"? And no, it's not "retarded" to question someone's expertise when they're presenting themselves as an expert and making critical errors. Your opinions on fonts are at best suspect if you use Comic Sans for the content of your blog. Likewise, your opinions on interaction design are at best suspect if your blog is rendered as pixelated jpgs, fades in slowly, breaks middle click, and is laid out more like an Apple product page than a page intended to convey meaningful information.
    - huhtenberg 14y ago
      No, not your comment, the ad hominem approach. There's plenty of reasons why Comic Sans could end up on the page talking about fonts. It can be a joke, it can be a fallback font, it can be some hosted template that got messed up. In this case, pixelated jpgs are probably the fasted way for him to publish the content, fading is likely inherited from the general site template, it is presented unconventionally, but I personally had absolutely no problem reading it. The actual content is thoughtful and it makes sense. So do tell me again why nitpicking on the text fading thing coupled with a holy shit drama is a good way to start the discussion.

tambourine_man 14y ago

If it falls back gracefully, why not? As pointed by others, the site just is a bunch of JPEGs, which is a very bad choice indeed (accessibility, search engine access, speed, etc). But aesthetics do matter. If done properly, you could just grab the content and use your favority reader with a click of a button in case you desagree with the author's taste.

onli 14y ago
>If it falls back gracefully, why not? It doesn't. Content doesn't load here on a FF with js disabled (not that i do this normally, disable JS, just tested it because of your comment). I think it kind of matters in this case. The "mail has to be repaired" is such an overused term, and seldom the people claiming that even try to give reasons for this ruling. Mail is an asynchronic system for letting people send messages (with attachments) and it works really well. If someone fails to see that, claiming something is broken which most probably isn't and is doing that from a technically broken site, it weakens his point even further. So mentioning the observation isn't totally out of place.
dredmorbius 14y ago
It doesn't. I had to switch browsers and start doing NoScript Bingo until the damned page rendered. I want those 60 seconds of my life back. It wasn't worth it.
tambourine_man 14y ago
Of course it doesn't. I'm not defending the site, I'm saying there is nothing wrong with a JavaScript intensive site, if properly done (this one isn't).

deleted 14y ago

[deleted]

frm1001xplrr 14y ago

I guess you didn't RTP where it said "if you're a developer[...]"? Guy's a designer :|

taybin 14y ago

Surprise! There is no body text!