For too long now, my website has been a source of misery.
I mean, mostly for me, obviously, but I'm sure that anyone who ever found themselves trying to look at the thing felt much the same. In retrospect I almost wish that I'd kept it out there, just so I had a way of illustrating what an unholy shambles it was, what with its drab colour palette and boring fonts and inability to scale to the sort of resolutions expected of any computer manufactured since 1993.
Most of the blame can be placed squarely at the door of Streamline, my previous provider, who I lumbered myself with years ago when I didn't know any better and who I have no qualms about naming and shaming now, because they were unutterably and inexcusably terrible. Their software was bug-ridden, their tech support was non-existent, their interface was a decade out of date at least and all in all I don't think I've ever paid good money for so much misery.
So ... Streamline, here in this place of public rantery, I curse thy name to the heavens. May thy servers all turn to porridge and the soles of thy feet develop unpleasant rashes that defy all modern medicine. And know, in thy darkest hour that thy brought it all on yourselves, by being more rubbish than anything should be ever.
With that out of the way, I should probably admit that the other part of the equation was time; time and, I suppose, money. While I was working I didn't have the time to revamp my website, and I certainly didn't have the hundreds of pounds lying around that I'd have needed to pay someone to do it for me. At least one of those things changed in October when I started writing full time, and suddenly the tens of hours it would take to move my site to a new provider and redesign and reformat it from the ground upward seemed a lot more within reach.
To cut a short story that I've already made quite long a little shorter, this thing I have now done. And yes it did indeed take an unholy amount of time and work, but it was absolutely worth it; no longer do I wake up in the middle of the night in a cold sweat, terrified that somewhere a small orphan child may have deliberately gone blind rather than have to continue looking at my website. Now I would go so far as to say that's it's well put together, aesthetically tolerable, easily navigable and almost overloaded with content. Which is perhaps faint self-praise after the zillion and one hours I put into the thing, but I'm not, after all, a professional web designer, and I still only have so much time.
Anyway ... take a minute to have a look for yourself at the all-new, all-improved, not even slightly singing or dancing (because that would be dumb) davidtallerman.co.uk. And if you can think of any improvements or anything that I've missed, please do let me know in the comments.
I mean, mostly for me, obviously, but I'm sure that anyone who ever found themselves trying to look at the thing felt much the same. In retrospect I almost wish that I'd kept it out there, just so I had a way of illustrating what an unholy shambles it was, what with its drab colour palette and boring fonts and inability to scale to the sort of resolutions expected of any computer manufactured since 1993.
Most of the blame can be placed squarely at the door of Streamline, my previous provider, who I lumbered myself with years ago when I didn't know any better and who I have no qualms about naming and shaming now, because they were unutterably and inexcusably terrible. Their software was bug-ridden, their tech support was non-existent, their interface was a decade out of date at least and all in all I don't think I've ever paid good money for so much misery.
So ... Streamline, here in this place of public rantery, I curse thy name to the heavens. May thy servers all turn to porridge and the soles of thy feet develop unpleasant rashes that defy all modern medicine. And know, in thy darkest hour that thy brought it all on yourselves, by being more rubbish than anything should be ever.
With that out of the way, I should probably admit that the other part of the equation was time; time and, I suppose, money. While I was working I didn't have the time to revamp my website, and I certainly didn't have the hundreds of pounds lying around that I'd have needed to pay someone to do it for me. At least one of those things changed in October when I started writing full time, and suddenly the tens of hours it would take to move my site to a new provider and redesign and reformat it from the ground upward seemed a lot more within reach.
To cut a short story that I've already made quite long a little shorter, this thing I have now done. And yes it did indeed take an unholy amount of time and work, but it was absolutely worth it; no longer do I wake up in the middle of the night in a cold sweat, terrified that somewhere a small orphan child may have deliberately gone blind rather than have to continue looking at my website. Now I would go so far as to say that's it's well put together, aesthetically tolerable, easily navigable and almost overloaded with content. Which is perhaps faint self-praise after the zillion and one hours I put into the thing, but I'm not, after all, a professional web designer, and I still only have so much time.
Anyway ... take a minute to have a look for yourself at the all-new, all-improved, not even slightly singing or dancing (because that would be dumb) davidtallerman.co.uk. And if you can think of any improvements or anything that I've missed, please do let me know in the comments.
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