Hi,

My name is Ray Li, and I am a 16-year-old high school student. For a
class in Critical Thinking, we are required to complete a semester-
long, independent-study project. For my project, I chose to finish and
market a board game which I have been working on for a while. The game
is called Lineage. It is a two-player, abstract strategy game.

My website is www.lineageboards.com. I would appreciate if you could
visit it and give me some feedback on what you think of the game and
the site.

Thanks

In article
,
    wrote:
> Hi,

> My name is Ray Li, and I am a 16-year-old high school student. For a
> class in Critical Thinking, we are required to complete a semester-
> long, independent-study project. For my project, I chose to finish and
> market a board game which I have been working on for a while. The game
> is called Lineage. It is a two-player, abstract strategy game.

> My website is www.lineageboards.com. I would appreciate if you could
> visit it and give me some feedback on what you think of the game and
> the site.

If you are being marked on the web site you should receive zero marks. Make
sure it degrades appropriately such that it can be seen with any correctly
working browser. It doesn't.

-- 
	John Cartmell	john@finnybank.com	0845 006 8822 or 0161 969 9820
	Owis magazine	FAX +44 (0)8700-519-527		www.qercus.com
	Owis - the best guide to RISC OS Black Sheep computing

On 5 May, 18:33, John Cartmell  wrote:
> In article
> ,
>     wrote:
>
> > Hi,
> > My name is Ray Li, and I am a 16-year-old high school student. For a
> > class in Critical Thinking, we are required to complete a semester-
> > long, independent-study project. For my project, I chose to finish and
> > market a board game which I have been working on for a while. The game
> > is called Lineage. It is a two-player, abstract strategy game.
> > My website iswww.lineageboards.com. I would appreciate if you could
> > visit it and give me some feedback on what you think of the game and
> > the site.
>
> If you are being marked on the web site you should receive zero marks. Make
> sure it degrades appropriately such that it can be seen with any correctly> working browser. It doesn't.
>
> --
>         John Cartmell   j...@finnybank.com     0845 006 8822 or 0161 969 9820
>         Owis magazine   FAX  (0)8700-519-527        www.qercus.com
>         Owis - the best guide to RISC OS Black Sheep computing

Ray,

You did a great job!! are you going to make it for online play?
or just keep it as a board game?

Christian

rl.invent@gmail.com wrote:
> Hi,
> 
> My name is Ray Li, and I am a 16-year-old high school student. For a
> class in Critical Thinking, we are required to complete a semester-
> long, independent-study project. For my project, I chose to finish and
> market a board game which I have been working on for a while. The game
> is called Lineage. It is a two-player, abstract strategy game.
> 
> My website is www.lineageboards.com. I would appreciate if you could
> visit it and give me some feedback on what you think of the game and
> the site.

It looks good, very slick and professional looking. One minor point 
though. In the rules you say what should happen. That leaves 
rules-lawyers some wiggle room. Game rules need to be dictatorial. In 
http://www.lineageboards.com/details.html Figure 5: "The red piece 
should be removed from play." should say "The red piece is removed from 
play."

In general game rules should be explicit, unambiguous and should cover 
every possible eventuality but in as few words as possible. Truly 
elegant games have few rules, simple rules, easily understood rules but 
offer game-play at various levels of complexity. Without actually 
playing the game I can't comment on game-play but it does look very 
promising.

-- 
bap@shrdlu.com

In article ,
   Bernard Peek  wrote:
> rl.invent@gmail.com wrote:
> > Hi,
> > 
> > My name is Ray Li, and I am a 16-year-old high school student. For a
> > class in Critical Thinking, we are required to complete a semester-
> > long, independent-study project. For my project, I chose to finish and
> > market a board game which I have been working on for a while. The game
> > is called Lineage. It is a two-player, abstract strategy game.
> > 
> > My website is www.lineageboards.com. I would appreciate if you could
> > visit it and give me some feedback on what you think of the game and
> > the site.

> It looks good, very slick and professional looking.

It still doesn't resolve in a basic browser - and I'm left looking at a blank
screen. You should *not* assume that web readers have any plug-ins so do
ensure that your web-site can be seen (even if it's only a simple text-based
version) by all would-be readers. No matter how could the game it's a crap,
boring game if all that's there to be seen is an empty page! ;-(

-- 
	John Cartmell	john@finnybank.com	0845 006 8822 or 0161 969 9820
	Owis magazine	FAX +44 (0)8700-519-527		www.qercus.com
	Owis - the best guide to RISC OS Black Sheep computing

John Cartmell wrote:

> It still doesn't resolve in a basic browser

For some values of "basic browser".  Face the Facts Time, whether we
like it or not, if it works in IE6 and 7 you've covered most of the
market (he types on his Linux box...).

I don't know whether it works on those, but it works in Firefox 2.0 on
Linux.

>  You should *not* assume that web readers have any plug-ins so do
> ensure that your web-site can be seen 

In an ideal world, no, but it isn't an ideal world.  If the job is
marketing, to be honest the sad fact of the matter is if it looks cool
(whatever that is these days) in IE6 and 7 that's probably a better
marketing job than looking okay in everything.

Pete.
-- 
Peter Clinch                    Medical Physics IT Officer
Tel 44 1382 660111 ext. 33637   Univ. of Dundee, Ninewells Hospital
Fax 44 1382 640177              Dundee DD1 9SY Scotland UK
net p.j.clinch@dundee.ac.uk     http://www.dundee.ac.uk/~pjclinch/

In message , John Cartmell 
 writes
>In article
>,
>    wrote:
>> Hi,
>
>> My name is Ray Li, and I am a 16-year-old high school student. For a
>> class in Critical Thinking, we are required to complete a semester-
>> long, independent-study project. For my project, I chose to finish and
>> market a board game which I have been working on for a while. The game
>> is called Lineage. It is a two-player, abstract strategy game.
>
>> My website is www.lineageboards.com. I would appreciate if you could
>> visit it and give me some feedback on what you think of the game and
>> the site.
>
>If you are being marked on the web site you should receive zero marks. Make
>sure it degrades appropriately such that it can be seen with any correctly
>working browser. It doesn't.

In the front page, there is no text, just images and some kind of 
embedded object.  This will make it difficult for some people, and 
impossible for search engines, to read the page.

It is not easy to find the rules, which is surely what will interest 
most first-time visitors.  The link to "official tournament rules" goes 
to a forum.

It would help to have one good big clear image of the board.  The page
http://www.lineageboards.com/details.html has lots of smallish ones, 
overlaid on a large grey one which makes them harder to understand.

As Bernard has already said - don't say "should be removed" when you 
mean "must be removed".  It leaves readers wondering whether the removal 
is compulsory.

Nick
-- 
Nick Wedd    nick@maproom.co.uk

Peter Clinch wrote:

>>  You should *not* assume that web readers have any plug-ins so do
>> ensure that your web-site can be seen 
> 
> In an ideal world, no, but it isn't an ideal world.  If the job is
> marketing, to be honest the sad fact of the matter is if it looks cool
> (whatever that is these days) in IE6 and 7 that's probably a better
> marketing job than looking okay in everything.

At a minimum I would expect a commercial web site to be compatible with 
IE6, IE7 and probably Firefox 2 on Windows. Anything else is nice to 
have but not essential. Wider compatibility would earn brownie points 
but I would expect any commercial organisation to look at how much it 
costs before putting that into the design requirements.

Similarly Flash is pretty much ubiquitous. There are people who don't 
like it and even block it. There are still sites that use it though. 
While it's nice to think that a site's owners would want to reach 
everyone if I was awarding marks for a project I wouldn't deduct any for 
using Flash. I would deduct marks from a candidate who failed to mention 
that there was resistance to it, and would also deduct marks if the 
candidate deliberately avoided Flash (or any other technology) without 
quoting some numbers about the effect it would have on audience figures. 
I don't know whether Nielsen have anything to say on the subject.


-- 
bap@shrdlu.com

On Tue, 06 May 2008 13:01:17 +0100, Bernard Peek  wrote:
> Similarly Flash is pretty much ubiquitous. 

Not true.  The iPhone doesn't have flash and I suppose quite a few other
phones.  Also it tends to make it difficult for search-engines.

> While it's nice to think that a site's owners would want to reach 
> everyone if I was awarding marks for a project I wouldn't deduct any for 
> using Flash. 

Well it depends on whether it is an appropriate use of Flash.  Is there
anything there which can't be done with just basic HTML and give the
exact same results?  I don't think so.  I am sure no one would mind if
the use of flash was for an animated (complete with commentary on potential 
moves) demo game.

-- 
Andy Leighton => andyl@azaal.plus.com
"The Lord is my shepherd, but we still lost the sheep dog trials" 
   - Robert Rankin, _They Came And Ate Us_

In article ,
   Peter Clinch  wrote:
> John Cartmell wrote:

> > It still doesn't resolve in a basic browser

> For some values of "basic browser".  Face the Facts Time, whether we
> like it or not, if it works in IE6 and 7 you've covered most of the
> market (he types on his Linux box...).

> I don't know whether it works on those, but it works in Firefox 2.0 on
> Linux.

> >  You should *not* assume that web readers have any plug-ins so do
> > ensure that your web-site can be seen 

> In an ideal world, no, but it isn't an ideal world.  If the job is
> marketing, to be honest the sad fact of the matter is if it looks cool
> (whatever that is these days) in IE6 and 7 that's probably a better
> marketing job than looking okay in everything.

This is uk based. There is a disability access law even if you are prepared to
ignore the international standards laid down to describe good practice in the
area - and pandering to a single foreign commercial company at the cost of the
law and good practice (and note that a properly designed web site will work
even with the bad browsers from Microsoft) is rather silly. I'm assuming that
it's simply a mistake and I'm waiting for the proper site to surface.

-- 
	John Cartmell	john@finnybank.com	0845 006 8822 or 0161 969 9820
	Owis magazine	FAX +44 (0)8700-519-527		www.qercus.com
	Owis - the best guide to RISC OS Black Sheep computing

In article ,
   Bernard Peek  wrote:
> Peter Clinch wrote:

> >>  You should *not* assume that web readers have any plug-ins so do
> >> ensure that your web-site can be seen 
> > 
> > In an ideal world, no, but it isn't an ideal world.  If the job is
> > marketing, to be honest the sad fact of the matter is if it looks cool
> > (whatever that is these days) in IE6 and 7 that's probably a better
> > marketing job than looking okay in everything.

> At a minimum I would expect a commercial web site to be compatible with 
> IE6, IE7 and probably Firefox 2 on Windows. Anything else is nice to 
> have but not essential. Wider compatibility would earn brownie points 
> but I would expect any commercial organisation to look at how much it 
> costs before putting that into the design requirements.

It costs no more to do it right than to do it wrong.

> Similarly Flash is pretty much ubiquitous. There are people who don't 
> like it and even block it. There are still sites that use it though.

And any web designer who uses it without an option is a web designer who
doesn't know his job. It is very rare for Flash to be essential. It is never
right for the front page of a web site to require browser content that might
reasonably be lacking or turned off.

> While it's nice to think that a site's owners would want to reach 
> everyone if I was awarding marks for a project I wouldn't deduct any for 
> using Flash. I would deduct marks from a candidate who failed to mention 
> that there was resistance to it, and would also deduct marks if the 
> candidate deliberately avoided Flash (or any other technology) without 
> quoting some numbers about the effect it would have on audience figures. 
> I don't know whether Nielsen have anything to say on the subject.

Jakob Nielsen has (rightly) made scathing comments about such sites.

-- 
	John Cartmell	john@finnybank.com	0845 006 8822 or 0161 969 9820
	Owis magazine	FAX +44 (0)8700-519-527		www.qercus.com
	Owis - the best guide to RISC OS Black Sheep computing

John Cartmell wrote:

> It costs no more to do it right than to do it wrong.

That's simply not true, because if it stays as it is there's nothing to
do and if he changes it to fit with your requirements there's something
to do.

I would prefer to see it your way, but I think you're overstating the
case to which what he has is borken.

Pete.
-- 
Peter Clinch                    Medical Physics IT Officer
Tel 44 1382 660111 ext. 33637   Univ. of Dundee, Ninewells Hospital
Fax 44 1382 640177              Dundee DD1 9SY Scotland UK
net p.j.clinch@dundee.ac.uk     http://www.dundee.ac.uk/~pjclinch/

John Cartmell wrote:

> This is uk based. There is a disability access law even if you are prepared to
> ignore the international standards laid down to describe good practice in the
> area - and pandering to a single foreign commercial company at the cost of the
> law and good practice (and note that a properly designed web site will work
> even with the bad browsers from Microsoft) is rather silly. I'm assuming that
> it's simply a mistake and I'm waiting for the proper site to surface.

Blimey... I'm fairly well acquainted with the web accessibility
standards, and it's a bit of a can of worms, but there are clear
differences between service providers and website operators.

That doesn't mean, of course, that it's not desirable that web sites
*are* accessible, but it remains the case that you're ridiculously
over-egging the pudding in your paragraph above.  Yes, the OP should be
encouraged to make a portable, accessible website, but I don't see what
you're doing (saying it's fundamentally broken, when it clearly isn't as
it's getting used and the originator can see it getting used so he can
see you're wrong, and going on about how it breaks the law, when the
originator can see no shortage of other sites that are at least as bad
in that respect that nobody does anything about) is in any way encouraging.

In other words, try using a carrot rather than a stick.

For the OP, http://www.w3.org/WAI/Policy/ is a good place to learn a
little more about webaccessibility.  It should be possible to make it a
feature of the marketing side of your project if you demonstrate an
awareness of it and adjust your site accordingly.

Pete.
-- 
Peter Clinch                    Medical Physics IT Officer
Tel 44 1382 660111 ext. 33637   Univ. of Dundee, Ninewells Hospital
Fax 44 1382 640177              Dundee DD1 9SY Scotland UK
net p.j.clinch@dundee.ac.uk     http://www.dundee.ac.uk/~pjclinch/

John Cartmell wrote:
> In article ,
>    Bernard Peek  wrote:
>> Peter Clinch wrote:
> 
>>>>  You should *not* assume that web readers have any plug-ins so do
>>>> ensure that your web-site can be seen 
>>> In an ideal world, no, but it isn't an ideal world.  If the job is
>>> marketing, to be honest the sad fact of the matter is if it looks cool
>>> (whatever that is these days) in IE6 and 7 that's probably a better
>>> marketing job than looking okay in everything.
> 
>> At a minimum I would expect a commercial web site to be compatible with 
>> IE6, IE7 and probably Firefox 2 on Windows. Anything else is nice to 
>> have but not essential. Wider compatibility would earn brownie points 
>> but I would expect any commercial organisation to look at how much it 
>> costs before putting that into the design requirements.
> 
> It costs no more to do it right than to do it wrong.

Having managed the budget for building commercial sites I know that this 
is incorrect. It takes quite a lot of extra testing to verify 
compatibility with additional browsers. That can get very expensive very 
fast. It also adds a lot more work in the final stages of delivery when 
the extra pressure can force mistakes that can't be fixed in time. 
Overall browser compatibility is always a nice-to-have but for a 
commercial site it's a feature that has to earn its keep.

> 
>> Similarly Flash is pretty much ubiquitous. There are people who don't 
>> like it and even block it. There are still sites that use it though.
> 
> And any web designer who uses it without an option is a web designer who
> doesn't know his job. It is very rare for Flash to be essential. It is never
> right for the front page of a web site to require browser content that might
> reasonably be lacking or turned off.

That's not always true. Commercial sites that use Flash on their landing 
pages sometimes do so out of ignorance, more often it's a conscious 
decision. It's entirely dependent on the target audience. If you can be 
certain that the visitor has Flash then you don't lose anything. There 
are places where that assumption is true, because it's the market norm. 
Someone who blocks Flash simply wouldn't be able to do their job because 
their job is to look at web sites, most of which use Flash.

How this will pan out is in the lap of the gods. One possibility is that 
HTML will develop to the point where it can do everything that Flash 
can. At the other extreme HTML could be relegated to the status of a 
boot-loader for Flash, in the same way that DOS was required for Windows 
3. It could be another Betamax/VHS type fight, it's much too soon to 
say. An of course there's Silverlight too.

> 
>> While it's nice to think that a site's owners would want to reach 
>> everyone if I was awarding marks for a project I wouldn't deduct any for 
>> using Flash. I would deduct marks from a candidate who failed to mention 
>> that there was resistance to it, and would also deduct marks if the 
>> candidate deliberately avoided Flash (or any other technology) without 
>> quoting some numbers about the effect it would have on audience figures. 
>> I don't know whether Nielsen have anything to say on the subject.
> 
> Jakob Nielsen has (rightly) made scathing comments about such sites.
> 
Sorry, I meant the other Nielsen. As in Neilsen ratings.

-- 
bap@shrdlu.com

John Cartmell wrote:
>

>> In an ideal world, no, but it isn't an ideal world.  If the job is
>> marketing, to be honest the sad fact of the matter is if it looks cool
>> (whatever that is these days) in IE6 and 7 that's probably a better
>> marketing job than looking okay in everything.
> 
> This is uk based. There is a disability access law even if you are prepared to
> ignore the international standards laid down to describe good practice in the
> area - and pandering to a single foreign commercial company at the cost of the
> law and good practice (and note that a properly designed web site will work
> even with the bad browsers from Microsoft) is rather silly. I'm assuming that
> it's simply a mistake and I'm waiting for the proper site to surface.

Good point. The US also has disability discrimination legislation (the 
Americans with Disabilities Act iirc.) If the site was published within 
the UK it wouldn't necessarily be in conflict with our own laws, but it 
is definitely something that a site designer must bear in mind. There 
are screen readers (Jaws is a popular one) that can read the contents of
many plain HTML pages. But that doesn't require a site owner to render 
all of their pages in simple HTML.


-- 
bap@shrdlu.com

Peter Clinch wrote:
> 

> Blimey... I'm fairly well acquainted with the web accessibility
> standards, and it's a bit of a can of worms, but there are clear
> differences between service providers and website operators.
> 
> That doesn't mean, of course, that it's not desirable that web sites
> *are* accessible, but it remains the case that you're ridiculously
> over-egging the pudding in your paragraph above.  Yes, the OP should be
> encouraged to make a portable, accessible website, but I don't see what
> you're doing (saying it's fundamentally broken, when it clearly isn't as
> it's getting used and the originator can see it getting used so he can
> see you're wrong, and going on about how it breaks the law, when the
> originator can see no shortage of other sites that are at least as bad
> in that respect that nobody does anything about) is in any way encouraging.
> 

I've just finished working on a web site for a company that has its own 
full-time accessibility consultant. We went through the requirements in 
some detail!

Essentially sites are required to make ongoing reasonable efforts to 
improve their site's accessibility. This has to be a continuous process 
which is why there are no standards that say "good enough." They key 
words there are /ongoing/ and /reasonable./

> In other words, try using a carrot rather than a stick.
> 

FWIW if anyone is considering a high-profile UK web site they could do 
worse than consult the RNIB (Royal National Institute for the Blind) 
about accessibility. They are very helpful. Of course accessibility for 
blind or partially sighted users are only part of the issue. Other forms 
of disability also need to be considered.



-- 
bap@shrdlu.com

In article ,
   Peter Clinch  wrote:
> John Cartmell wrote:

> > It costs no more to do it right than to do it wrong.

> That's simply not true, because if it stays as it is there's nothing to
> do and if he changes it to fit with your requirements there's something
> to do.

> I would prefer to see it your way, but I think you're overstating the
> case to which what he has is borken.

It would have cost no more to get it right in the first place. Appropriate
action would be to sue Microsoft for getting it wrong. ;-(

-- 
	John Cartmell	john@finnybank.com	0845 006 8822 or 0161 969 9820
	Owis magazine	FAX +44 (0)8700-519-527		www.qercus.com
	Owis - the best guide to RISC OS Black Sheep computing

In article , Peter Clinch
 wrote:
> John Cartmell wrote:

> > This is uk based. There is a disability access law even if you are
> > prepared to ignore the international standards laid down to describe good
> > practice in the area - and pandering to a single foreign commercial
> > company at the cost of the law and good practice (and note that a
> > properly designed web site will work even with the bad browsers from
> > Microsoft) is rather silly. I'm assuming that it's simply a mistake and
> > I'm waiting for the proper site to surface.

> Blimey... I'm fairly well acquainted with the web accessibility standards,
> and it's a bit of a can of worms, but there are clear differences between
> service providers and website operators.

> That doesn't mean, of course, that it's not desirable that web sites *are*
> accessible, but it remains the case that you're ridiculously over-egging
> the pudding in your paragraph above.  Yes, the OP should be encouraged to
> make a portable, accessible website, but I don't see what you're doing
> (saying it's fundamentally broken, when it clearly isn't as it's getting
> used and the originator can see it getting used so he can see you're wrong,
> and going on about how it breaks the law, when the originator can see no
> shortage of other sites that are at least as bad in that respect that
> nobody does anything about) is in any way encouraging.

> In other words, try using a carrot rather than a stick.

The whole lot was offered to us as a "please look and criticise". What I've
been offered is a blank page. As a blank page it's either a bad joke or the
originator has learnt an important lesson - and I've added bits to extend the
learning. I make no criticism of the individual - and plenty of the real
villains who are Microsoft.

> For the OP, http://www.w3.org/WAI/Policy/ is a good place to learn a little
> more about webaccessibility.  It should be possible to make it a feature of
> the marketing side of your project if you demonstrate an awareness of it
> and adjust your site accordingly.

Agreed.

-- 
	John Cartmell	john@finnybank.com	0845 006 8822 or 0161 969 9820
	Owis magazine	FAX +44 (0)8700-519-527		www.qercus.com
	Owis - the best guide to RISC OS Black Sheep computing

In article , Bernard Peek
 wrote:
> John Cartmell wrote:
> > In article , Bernard Peek
> >     wrote:
> >> Peter Clinch wrote:
> > 
> >>>>  You should *not* assume that web readers have any plug-ins so do
> >>>> ensure that your web-site can be seen 
> >>> In an ideal world, no, but it isn't an ideal world.  If the job is
> >>> marketing, to be honest the sad fact of the matter is if it looks cool
> >>> (whatever that is these days) in IE6 and 7 that's probably a better
> >>> marketing job than looking okay in everything.
> > 
> >> At a minimum I would expect a commercial web site to be compatible with
> >> IE6, IE7 and probably Firefox 2 on Windows. Anything else is nice to
> >> have but not essential. Wider compatibility would earn brownie points
> >> but I would expect any commercial organisation to look at how much it
> >> costs before putting that into the design requirements.
> > 
> > It costs no more to do it right than to do it wrong.

> Having managed the budget for building commercial sites I know that this
> is incorrect. It takes quite a lot of extra testing to verify
> compatibility with additional browsers.

Whilst that is commendable that is not required. You should follow the rules
- not the Microsoft variations - and the rules will produce valid code for
all browsers.

> That can get very expensive very fast. It also adds a lot more work in the
> final stages of delivery when the extra pressure can force mistakes that
> can't be fixed in time. Overall browser compatibility is always a
> nice-to-have but for a commercial site it's a feature that has to earn its
> keep.

> > 
> >> Similarly Flash is pretty much ubiquitous. There are people who don't
> >> like it and even block it. There are still sites that use it though.
> > 
> > And any web designer who uses it without an option is a web designer who
> > doesn't know his job. It is very rare for Flash to be essential. It is
> > never right for the front page of a web site to require browser content
> > that might reasonably be lacking or turned off.

> That's not always true. Commercial sites that use Flash on their landing
> pages sometimes do so out of ignorance, more often it's a conscious
> decision. It's entirely dependent on the target audience. If you can be
> certain that the visitor has Flash then you don't lose anything. There are
> places where that assumption is true, because it's the market norm.
> Someone who blocks Flash simply wouldn't be able to do their job because
> their job is to look at web sites, most of which use Flash.

It is always true. There may be good reasons to use Flash but there are never
reasons for making Flash an integral part of navigation through sites except
to Flash-only pages where there are also Flash-free alternatives.

[Snip]

> >> While it's nice to think that a site's owners would want to reach
> >> everyone if I was awarding marks for a project I wouldn't deduct any for
> >> using Flash. I would deduct marks from a candidate who failed to
> >> mention that there was resistance to it, and would also deduct marks if
> >> the candidate deliberately avoided Flash (or any other technology)
> >> without quoting some numbers about the effect it would have on audience
> >> figures. I don't know whether Nielsen have anything to say on the
> >> subject.
> > 
> > Jakob Nielsen has (rightly) made scathing comments about such sites.
> > 
> Sorry, I meant the other Nielsen. As in Neilsen ratings.

Surely to anyone with a care for web pages the name Nielsen can only mean
Jakob? The OP is advised to Google - and read.

-- 
	John Cartmell	john@finnybank.com	0845 006 8822 or 0161 969 9820
	Owis magazine	FAX +44 (0)8700-519-527		www.qercus.com
	Owis - the best guide to RISC OS Black Sheep computing

In message , John Cartmell 
 writes
>In article ,
>   Peter Clinch  wrote:
>> John Cartmell wrote:
>
>> > It costs no more to do it right than to do it wrong.
>
>> That's simply not true, because if it stays as it is there's nothing to
>> do and if he changes it to fit with your requirements there's something
>> to do.
>
>> I would prefer to see it your way, but I think you're overstating the
>> case to which what he has is borken.
>
>It would have cost no more to get it right in the first place. Appropriate
>action would be to sue Microsoft for getting it wrong. ;-(

I will also point out (again) how the current
http://www.lineageboards.com/home.html will be disliked by Google and 
probably by other search engines.  I believe the designer cares about 
search engines, as he has included a "keywords" metatag.  But he has 
done two things wrong, the first one serious.

He has failed to include _any_ actual readable content, i.e. text.

He has repeated words in the metatag: "board, game, board games, games, 
board games".  This is regarded as spamming, though here it's probably 
not bad enough to annoy Google.

Nick
-- 
Nick Wedd    nick@maproom.co.uk

Wow, sorry I haven't checked back here in a while... I probably should
have, seeing as this has degraded into an argument about web
accessibility...

Anyways, I thank all of you for your comments. I know accessibility is
an issue, but I am not a professional web designer and have only
rudimentary knowledge in HTML. I am much more comfortable using Flash
to build websites, which is why I have almost the entire site in
flash. This is a problem that I will have to work on later, but for
now, I think it works. Sorry for anyone who cannot read the site, if
you are interested in the game, please send me an email and I would be
happy to give you a brief overview of my game.

Again,
Thanks for the comments,
Ray Li

On May 6, 12:04 pm, Nick Wedd  wrote:
> In message , John Cartmell
>  writes
>
> >In article ,
> >   Peter Clinch  wrote:
> >> John Cartmell wrote:
>
> >> > It costs no more to do it right than to do it wrong.
>
> >> That's simply not true, because if it stays as it is there's nothing to
> >> do and if he changes it to fit with your requirements there's something
> >> to do.
>
> >> I would prefer to see it your way, but I think you're overstating the
> >> case to which what he has is borken.
>
> >It would have cost no more to get it right in the first place. Appropriate
> >action would be to sue Microsoft for getting it wrong. ;-(
>
> I will also point out (again) how the currenthttp://www.lineageboards.com/home.htmlwill be disliked by Google and
> probably by other search engines.  I believe the designer cares about
> search engines, as he has included a "keywords" metatag.  But he has
> done two things wrong, the first one serious.
>
> He has failed to include _any_ actual readable content, i.e. text.
>
> He has repeated words in the metatag: "board, game, board games, games,
> board games".  This is regarded as spamming, though here it's probably
> not bad enough to annoy Google.
>
> Nick
> --
> Nick Wedd    n...@maproom.co.uk

Hmm... I was not aware that repeating words in a metatag was
considered spamming... I thought that it was customary in order to
help search engines better interpret the website.

I will fix this as soon as I can, but I am VERY busy right now making
boxes and boards for my game.

Thanks for letting me know.

On May 6, 2:08 am, mindgammon  wrote:
> On 5 May, 18:33, John Cartmell  wrote:
>
>
>
> > In article
> > ,
> >     wrote:
>
> > > Hi,
> > > My name is Ray Li, and I am a 16-year-old high school student. For a
> > > class in Critical Thinking, we are required to complete a semester-
> > > long, independent-study project. For my project, I chose to finish and
> > > market a board game which I have been working on for a while. The game
> > > is called Lineage. It is a two-player, abstract strategy game.
> > > My website iswww.lineageboards.com. I would appreciate if you could
> > > visit it and give me some feedback on what you think of the game and
> > > the site.
>
> > If you are being marked on the web site you should receive zero marks. Make
> > sure it degrades appropriately such that it can be seen with any correctly
> > working browser. It doesn't.
>
> > --
> >         John Cartmell   j...@finnybank.com     0845 006 8822 or 0161 969 9820
> >         Owis magazine   FAX +44 (0)8700-519-527        www.qercus.com
> >         Owis - the best guide to RISC OS Black Sheep computing
>
> Ray,
>
> You did a great job!! are you going to make it for online play?
> or just keep it as a board game?
>
> Christian

No, I think that I will keep it as a board game.

On May 6, 3:53 am, Bernard Peek  wrote:
> rl.inv...@gmail.com wrote:
> > Hi,
>
> > My name is Ray Li, and I am a 16-year-old high school student. For a
> > class in Critical Thinking, we are required to complete a semester-
> > long, independent-study project. For my project, I chose to finish and
> > market a board game which I have been working on for a while. The game
> > is called Lineage. It is a two-player, abstract strategy game.
>
> > My website iswww.lineageboards.com. I would appreciate if you could
> > visit it and give me some feedback on what you think of the game and
> > the site.
>
> It looks good, very slick and professional looking. One minor point
> though. In the rules you say what should happen. That leaves
> rules-lawyers some wiggle room. Game rules need to be dictatorial. Inhttp://www.lineageboards.com/details.htmlFigure 5: "The red piece
> should be removed from play." should say "The red piece is removed from
> play."
>
> In general game rules should be explicit, unambiguous and should cover
> every possible eventuality but in as few words as possible. Truly
> elegant games have few rules, simple rules, easily understood rules but
> offer game-play at various levels of complexity. Without actually
> playing the game I can't comment on game-play but it does look very
> promising.
>
> --
> b...@shrdlu.com

Thanks, this is helpful advice. Are there any other things you found
in the instructions which you feel need correcting?

In article
,
    wrote:
> This is a problem that I will have to work on later, but for
> now, I think it works. Sorry for anyone who cannot read the site, if
> you are interested in the game, please send me an email and I would be
> happy to give you a brief overview of my game.

Send another notice when your site works and I'll look at the game. BTW Sorry
to have concentrated on the site (but that's all I had to comment on!) and I
do hope that you can get that right so that people can concentrate on the real
focus of your work.

-- 
	John Cartmell	"good manners are the best guide to good rules"
The news.newusers.questions FAQ http://www.plig.net/nnq/nquote.html
How to post to uk news groups   http://www.usenet.org.uk/ukpost.html
Proper quoting style explained  http://www.uwasa.fi/~ts/http/quote.html

On May 16, 3:53 am, John Cartmell  wrote:
> In article
> ,
>     wrote:
>
> > This is a problem that I will have to work on later, but for
> > now, I think it works. Sorry for anyone who cannot read the site, if
> > you are interested in the game, please send me an email and I would be
> > happy to give you a brief overview of my game.
>
> Send another notice when your site works and I'll look at the game. BTW Sorry
> to have concentrated on the site (but that's all I had to comment on!) and I
> do hope that you can get that right so that people can concentrate on the real
> focus of your work.
>
> --
>         John Cartmell   "good manners are the best guide to good rules"
> The news.newusers.questions FAQhttp://www.plig.net/nnq/nquote.html
> How to post to uk news groups  http://www.usenet.org.uk/ukpost.html
> Proper quoting style explained  http://www.uwasa.fi/~ts/http/quote.html

Yes, but, unfortunately, it may take me some time... as I said I am
very busy now. I will certainly let you know when the site is working,
though.

Thanks

Any other comments?


On May 16, 6:00 pm, rl.inv...@gmail.com wrote:
> On May 16, 3:53 am, John Cartmell  wrote:
>
>
>
> > In article
> > ,
> >     wrote:
>
> > > This is a problem that I will have to work on later, but for
> > > now, I think it works. Sorry for anyone who cannot read the site, if
> > > you are interested in the game, please send me an email and I would be
> > > happy to give you a brief overview of my game.
>
> > Send another notice when your site works and I'll look at the game. BTW Sorry
> > to have concentrated on the site (but that's all I had to comment on!) and I
> > do hope that you can get that right so that people can concentrate on the real
> > focus of your work.
>
> > --
> >         John Cartmell   "good manners are the best guide to good rules"
> > The news.newusers.questions FAQhttp://www.plig.net/nnq/nquote.html
> > How to post to uk news groups  http://www.usenet.org.uk/ukpost.html
> > Proper quoting style explained  http://www.uwasa.fi/~ts/http/quote.html
>
> Yes, but, unfortunately, it may take me some time... as I said I am
> very busy now. I will certainly let you know when the site is working,
> though.
>
> Thanks