DEV Community

Just launched my personal website and I need your honest feedback

Ady Ngom on June 05, 2019

Visit the new blog - adyngom.com Just about couple months ago, I've decided to really get back into writing and share the different bits and craz...

Read full post

Prahlad Yeri • Jun 5 '19

Your design skills are really good, the card layout of post titles is smart thinking.
I observed that your site is mostly composed of blog posts, you don't really need wordpress. You can use a static site generator like Jekyll or Pelican and bring down your hosting costs dramatically. In fact github-pages allows you free hosting of static sites.
Remove that "copyright. all rights reserved", people hate gate-keeping of knowledge in the digital age. Use the creative commons CC-By license instead which allows people to share your content but only by attributing you to it. The more they share, the more people will know about you!
Do you have a product to sell or a portfolio to show to your users? Why do you think people should subscribe? If you intend to make serious money through your website (not just adsense pocket change), you should work towards these goals.

Ady Ngom • Jun 5 '19

Hello Prahlad thank you so much for such a thoughtful response. I really appreciate it. Let me respond to your list real quick:

I wish I could claim that was my design but that’s not the case. It’s a theme that I purchased after literally looking at hundreds of them. I personally picked it because of the card design
Yes I have tried the Jekyll toute before, Ghost and I even looked at the React based one recently. The plugin ecosystem is what brings me back to WordPress but that might change at some point. Cost is manageable for now since it’s on a Digital Ocean box
Yeah not a big fan of it. The intent is to share not to close doors. An artifact of the theme. I’ll adjust it
Yes I have two products. A book and a series of online courses. Subscribers will get sweet deals of that type of content is of interest to them. More on that soon.

Really thanks again for taking the time

Cheers

AdhipathiPandiyan • Jul 9 '19

I'm new to Web development, For me the design looks really good. The things i didn't like are when i open the sliding navigation bar, i cannot close it by clicking on any parts other than the specified (X) close button(It's hard in mobile devices). And I also didn't like the margin around the corners of the site(but that's personal preference). Other than that the site looks really good and responsive.

Ady Ngom • Jul 9 '19

Thanks for the feedback. Yes good call on the inner margin. I will add some CSS tweaks on it. Mobile is the most important since many visit the web via mobile and is the most challenging. I’ll definitely look at how to improve the experience there.
Thanks again so much for taking the time.
Cheers

Theo • Aug 14 '19

@adyngom A couple things I'd add on to AdhipathiPandiyan and Prahlad Yeri's comment, I too love the design, it looks really clean and modern but a couple bug bears.

When you scroll down to the bottom you find quite a lot of empty space especially the bottom right, a whole square.

Instead of having the "No more Posts" as a small text at the very bottom, almost like an afterthought. Maybe use it productevly to fill in that empy square with some colour saying there are no more posts and to check back soon?

The side bar which pops out on the left. Two slight issues,

i) The scrolling, The standard scrollbar really sticks out there.

Consider either making a custom one or just make it so there is no need for the scroll as from what I can see it could easily be removed.

ii) Something @adhipathipandiyan already touched on, the X button.

For exiting maybe allow users to press away from the side bar to remove it. This removes the hassale of the x button for computer and laptop users and little touches like that really help a product or site.While for mobile users consider making a swipe action to remove and/or add it.

Hope this is of some help! Great site!

Ady Ngom • Aug 21 '19

Thanks buddy will certainly act on those. Really appreciate you taking the time 😀

Bennett Dungan • Jun 6 '19

Hey I really like the concept.

One thing that I noticed was the side search/subscribe portion of the website on the homepage kind of felt funky when scrolling. So on my screen (Macbook Pro) it has a very short scroll distance so it feels strange since its only scrolling a little to reveal the 'copyright' footer, which is unimportant.
It would be a better experience if that side section was fixed and possibly a bit smaller, since it is not the focus of your site. Just my 2 cents!

Ady Ngom • Jun 6 '19

Rightfully noted Benett. The side scroll worked best on my tests when the main content was taller with more posts. I can fortunately control the CSS so taking care of the wide or simply hiding the sidebar should not be an issue.
Will make the proper adjustments.
Thank you

William Moore • Jun 8 '19

It looks nice and professional. I like the color scheme and your photo is complimentary. I watched the CSS video, and enjoyed it. Learned something, too. I would say you are off to a good start.

Ady Ngom • Jun 8 '19

Thanks for the kind comments William. I’m glad you enjoyed the content. More to come 😀 Cheers