Huge Design Flaw

[jamescheema]

Hi everyone, i think the caps in the title pretty much sum up how i feel right now. Angry/grumpy

http://www.ukdesignermenswear.com/acatalog/index.html

This works fine in firefox (the browser i designed and tested the site in), but after trying the url in internet explorer i discovered a huge problem. There's simply a huge area of gray, with the site content located somewhere in the middle. I don't really know how else to explain it. Please do try it in your own browsers and see what happens.

I'm not sure if anyone will be able to help with this (although i hope so), and i'v attached the act_primary file which to me, provides no easy explanation. Look forward to your views, James

[wjcampbe]

Have a look at this bit of your actinic.css file

.actlogout{font-size:x-small;color:#009999;}.border {
border-top: medium solid 173915;
border-right: medium solid 173915;
border-bottom: medium solid 173915;
border-left: medium solid 173915;

If you separate the .border down onto its own line, and reduce the 173,915 to 1 - you might just see the site again.

[animal dreams]

First glance shows some very strange table widths

<table width="102%" height="96" border="0" cellpadding="5" cellspacing="0" background="palette2bg.gif">

and later.

<table width="226%" border="0" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="2">

I haven't checked it all but this could be the main problem

Good luck

[Hat]

I'll pick another one out to keep you going.

Link to the paypal logo image is to a file on your hard drive rather than on the webserver.

file:///C|/Documents%20and%20Settings/elite/Desktop/paypal_logo.jpg

________________
From Hat with kind regards
www.pcrescue.co.uk

[jont]

If you separate the .border down onto its own line, and reduce the 173,915 to 1 - you might just see the site again.

The 173915 is (I think the color) and should be preceeded with a "#" to function correctly ... the size is coming from the "medium" command

[jamescheema]

Thanks guys, having tried some of your methods it hasnt been successful, so i'v decided to start a fresh. I'm now constantly testing in internet explorer to see if i can narrow down the problem. Really grateful for all the help

[wjcampbe]

jont said:
the size is coming from the "medium" command

and was, as usual, correct.

I think you might benefit from using Opera as your development browser. It has two menu options InFF and InIE which allow you to open the page you are currently viewing in Opera on each of those other browsers for comparison/checking.

[jont]

James - try turning all the (many) table borders to 1 and preview to see what is happening.

Also worth removing the CSS link to see what happens to the layout as it is primarily table based.

That kind of distorted layout in IE often comes from the "float" command in the CSS but could not see any in yours

[RuralWeb]

99.99999% of the world use IE so its a good idea to design for it!. When ever you do a change, even a minor one, preview in IE and if possible upload to check it works live. If it looks ok then have a quick check in FF.

It adds a little to the design time but it will save you making multiple errors and having to start again.

[jamescheema]

Yeah, i agree with designing primarily in IE. Thanks for the advice too wjcampbe, i'v downloaded opera and am currently using that. And yeah jont, i definitely think it was something to do with borders. Probably because of me trying to create custom border css styles, but anyway i'm working away on the new template which i'll upload ASAP for you all to (hopefully) constructively critisize!

[clefty]

Another really useful program for checking page rendering is the latest Netscape (8.1)

It's based on the FireFox (Gecko) rendering engine but has a nifty button that swaps out Gecko with IE's Trident rendering engine - no need to open IE even; just switch quickly between the two engines whilst viewing the page you want to check.