Dilbert had to go, and not because of the recession. But due to the fact that this is a website about excel and charting, but the title says Pointy Haired Dilbert and the url is http://chandoo.org/wp/. It is too much of disconnect for anyone visiting the website.
So, over the weekend I have started the process for firing the Dilbert. This website is now called Excel @ Work. Rest assured that only the words Pointy Haired Dilbert are gone, not the sense of humor or passion for keeping both management and technology eyes open.
While at it, I have also improved the look and feel of the site. Please take a look at the new improved version of Excel at work: Charting and Excel tips blog. The key changes are,
- The home page and category level pages are easy to skim and click through
- New and bold menu bar on the top (with a clear subscribe button)
- Home page now shows a featured post on the top
- New logo (of course, now that PHD is no longer there, we need a new logo)
- Side bar features lot of exciting stuff
- Some minor changes to CSS
- More downloads on our free excel downloads page.
Please take a look at the site, read a post or two and tell me if you see something funny. I havent updated the sections like About etc. I am yet to update the RSS feed logos, email news letter logos. but rest of them seemed fine on both firefox and IE on my windows machine
10 Responses
Hi
It looks nice.
And as the content keeps its hi quality you won’t see me complaining.
I’ll miss the Pointy Haired Dilbert logo though……….
govi
I agree, the previous name was a bit non-descriptive for new visitors.
The colours and flow make for easier readability on-screen. I miss the old logo though – there was something quirky about it that set the tone for the blog.
This new look is nice, but I definately would like to see the date of the post – now there’s none both on the frontpage or in the post itself.
Keep up the good work.
A rose by any name…
I understand your rationale. Keep up the good work!
Nice job on the updates. I will miss the old logo, but at least the favicon has not changed so I know you’re still there (^:
Keep up the good work Chandoo!
@Govi, Sam, Andy: I didnt know so many of you loved that logo… 😀 Yeah, I will keep the favicon for dilbertsakes.
@Gerald: that is very lovely. Thanks 🙂
@Miodzio: I thought finding the date should be simple, since they are part of the URLs. But you have good point. I will include them.
Love the content! Best explanations I could ever find on the net!
Design, on the other hand, needs comments.
The changes are certainly welcome, but I think the site lost much more than it gained with those changes.
1. The biggest loss is of course the logo: it was original, attractive and actually caused me to take a look at the website in the first place. The new logo… don’t want to offend you Chandoo, but it is a generic piece of goo. There are millions of logos like this one, which never had and never will attract attention or help to distinguish your website. Drop it and announce some kind of competition among readers for the new logo, that might give some great ideas! But best, keep the old logo.
2.1 “Excel @ Work” against “PHD”, hmmm, I vote for the latter. Reasons are exactly the same as above. Besides, combination of “chandoo.org”, “PHD” and Excel makes just a slight bit less sense than “chandoo.org”, “E@W” and Excel, but sounds ten times more involving.
2.2 “Pointy Haired Dilbert” sounds like a marketable brand, while “Excel @ Work” sounds like another reminder of that overdue dashboard update from three months ago, which my salary is about to be cut for.
3. Please, work a bit more on the colour scheme, too much diversity and unmatched tints.
4. Those “Ads by Google” in the main menu on the homepage drive me crazy, but that might be just me 🙁
Again, content is priceless! Design can be matched!
The title was, indeed, non descriptive. But it was fun and it sounded to me like “it’s my hobby and I’m good at it”.
Now, “Excel @ Work” sounds like “it’s my job, I’m going to promote some stuff now”. A lot less appealing if you ask me :/
As for the layout, it lacks consistency I’d say. Too much white space, not enough proximity between elements that need to be read together (example: post title and post excerpt). The “easy to read RSS title” look like it’s the default unstyled font in Word.
Well, all in all, nope, don’t like it very much I have to say. Not that this is going to stop me from being a RSS reader though.
@Ozh… understandble. I will work on the spacing issues sometime next week.
Also, you can rest assure that it is still “it’s my hobby and I’m (hopefully) good at it”. But as with any hobby (or passion, which is most correct word for me), it develops over a period.
I have changed the blog titles, logos umpteen times till now, but never the tone. If you read the very first post on this blog, it says “welcome to modus indoramus”… 😉
@All… I didnt know so many of you loved the earlier logo… Even I miss it 🙂 I am thinking of bringing the dilbert back.. to hell with the disconnect, I am sure when they read a paragraph or two, the new readers will know what this is all about… 😀
What do you think?
@Dennis: I am sorry to know that the home page ads are driving you crazy… commercial breaks are necessary to keep the program running 🙂 I have tried to keep the ads to bare minimum. Most importantly post pages have very few ads (and in right locations hopefully)
I have once tried an wordpress plugin that would not show ads to regular visitors. But it took too much cpu power to run that I had to drop it.
I would be very happy if you can email me with any suggestions on how we can best show ads and still not annoy regular readers like you.