diff --git a/content/images/jared.png b/content/images/jared.png new file mode 100644 index 0000000..2c48ca6 Binary files /dev/null and b/content/images/jared.png differ diff --git a/content/making-this-site/pelican_07_design.md b/content/making-this-site/pelican_07_design.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000..83db1e2 --- /dev/null +++ b/content/making-this-site/pelican_07_design.md @@ -0,0 +1,126 @@ +Title: Making This Site, Part 7: Design Improvements +Date: 2017-02-28 15:30 +Tags: programming, web-dev, pelican, jinja2, css + +While the site looks pretty good at this point there are few changes I would like to make to improve the general readability and flow of information. I would also like to make a few things look slightly better. + +### Improving Readability of Code Snippets + +A few posts back I added a margin to improve the readability of code snippets in these articles. I found that this wasn't enough tho. Much like `img` I am going to add a `box-shadow` around code snippets to make them stick out a little more and not blend in with the text of a post so much. + +In `jaredandrews.css`: + + .highlight { + padding: .25em 1.5em .25em 1.5em; + margin-bottom: 2em; + margin-left: 1em; + box-shadow: 0 2px 4px 0 rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.2), 0 2px 8px 0 rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.2); + } + +This adds the same `box-shadow` to a `.highlight` as is used with `img`. I also added a bottom and left margins. I felt the code snippets looked better this way. + +### More Margins + +While the `h3` and `h4` tags used in the posts help guide the flow of informatin I noticed that when looking at a page it all seemed mixed together. I looked at a lot of other websites and found that adding left margins to body to push it out a little bit really improving readability, especially on mobile. Thus I added: + + p { + margin-left: 1em; + } + +I previously increased the `margin-left` of `li` as well. I need to increase it again to line up with `p` correctly. + + li { + list-style-position: outside; + margin-left: 2em; + } + +This manual management of these values is a good argument for adding something like [SASS](http://sass-lang.com/) to my workflow. I'm pretty sure this is easy to do with Pelican but I haven't gotten to the point where I feel the complexity of my custom css file is great enough to introduce another dependency and step to the bulid process. I may do so in the future though. + +I also added a small margin at the bottom of `container`. I found the post navigation at the bottom of the page was a little hard to see when it collided directly with the end of the browser window. + + .container { + margin-bottom: 2rem; + } + +### Font Changes + +Since importing Skeleton into the site it has been using whatever the default font Skeleton provides. I wanted to switch things up and use one font for headers and another font for all other text. A friend recently showed me [fontpair.io](http://fontpair.io) which shows you [Google Fonts](https://fonts.google.com/) that go well together. I spent a while on both websites and eventually setted on using [Poppins](https://fonts.google.com/specimen/Poppins) for headers and [Roboto](https://fonts.google.com/specimen/Roboto) for everything else. + + @import url(http://fonts.googleapis.com/css?family=Poppins); + @import url(http://fonts.googleapis.com/css?family=Roboto); + + body { + font-family: 'Roboto'; + } + + h1, h2, h3, h4 { + font-family: 'Poppins'; + } + +You might notice I don't indicate any fallback fonts, if these fonts don't load I am comfortable falling back to whatever Skeleton provides or really, whatever the viewers browser decides to use. I think this site will work with any font that isn't crazy. + +### Putting a Greeting on the Index Page + +The index page of this site is looking a little bland. Looking at a lot of other personal sites for programmers, hackers, artists, etc I see a common pattern of including a small "greetings" box on the home page of a site. I decided to do something similar. + +I basically wanted a picture of myself and a brief text greeting next to it. In `index.html` I added a new row and put image and text inside it: + +
+ Greetings! My name is Jared Andrews, I am a location + independent, freelance software + developer. This website is a place where I put technology and + writing projects that don't belong anywhere else. If you are + interested in learning more about me, check out the + About page. +
+ +
+ Current Location: {{ CURRENT_LOCATION }}
+
+
+
+ If you are nearby and want to get together and
+ talk technology, motorcycles, DIY music or really anything, get
+ in touch!
+
+
+ Greetings! My name is Jared Andrews, I am a location + independent, freelance software + developer. This website is a place where I put technology and + writing projects that don't belong anywhere else. If you are + interested in learning more about me, check out the + About page. +
+ +
+ Current Location: {{ CURRENT_LOCATION }}
+
+
+
+ If you are nearby and want to get together and
+ talk technology, motorcycles, DIY music or really anything, get
+ in touch!
+
+