For this review I chose to check out the DreamHost website at www.dreamhost.com. I chose DreamHost as this is the hosting service I have heard the most about from various sources so this is the first one that came to mind.
I ran the URL for the site through both the W3C Markup and CSS validation tools. The HTML returned 6 warnings and 61 errors. However, the last error came back as "Fatal Error. Cannot recover after last error. Any further errors will be ignored." I don't recall seeing that on other sites I ran through the validator so found that interesting. The CSS validator returned 61 errors of which the majority were for "auto not a valid value for the property padding". Another was "none is not a valid value for margin-bottom". This was a good reminder that the syntax rules are specific and why the html and css cheat sheets at the back of the text book are such a good resource to have at hand.
As for the website itself, it is not a flashy website. It seems they are putting their emphasis on what benefits going with them can offer. One design feature I liked was their use of icons along with the names of the different topics you can research as a visual clue to the topic subject. They also make use of a "dreambot" for answers for simple questions which I thought was a fun feature.
Even though the design aspect of the site is simple, I found it to be a great resource. They give a detailed step by step explanation for setting up a website with them which will be very helpful for doing the discussion part of this weeks project. The only thing I did not like from a usability standpoint was that they only use a nav menu icon for the drop down navigation menu except on the home page. While the topic area used both icon and text title, the navigation was icon only. I had to hunt for the menu as it wasn't obvious, at least to me. I would rate their design as average and except for the menu issue, their usability factor very good.
As you can obtain a domain name through them, I did check availability of some names I had thought of. As I don't have a business in mind as of this time, the names reflect a more fun vibe, possibly to showcase crafts or a blog.
The names I entered are:
- lazycatstudio.com
- purrfectlyfunstudio.com
- franklyfelinestudio.com
- felinefinestudio.com
- smilingmoranch.com
Except for lazycatstudio.com which is taken, the rest are all available. I could get lazycatstudio with a different extension e.g. ".art" or ".us". As it would not be a business website, the less familiar extensions would not be an issue if I would decide I really wanted that name.