text as graphic (roll-overs) heeeeeeelp!

i would really love some help on this one.

if you take a quick look at my web site (link below) you will notice
that a major part of my navigational concept is to use roll-overs.
Anything that turns red as you roll the mouse over is a link. This can
be seen on index pages as well as the bookmarks which appear in my
text sections.

Now the question(s)! I have read that Google etc cannot read such
pages because there is no real text. This seem true. My site has been
up for months and google will barely find me, even including my name
and stuff in quotation marks in the search, So, if I want to keep the
look I presently have, is there any way for google to find me????

Also, is there some way to have this roll over effect, or something
similar, but using text????

Finally, even though each gif is tiny and the first page is less than
50k, when I tried to connect using a modem (various locations and
computers) it would take forever. And I mean forever. 1 gif would
load, then it would think about it for a while, then another etc etc.
So it seems to me my original plan using roll overs for links was a
very bad one.

Any comments and ideas greatly appreciated.

www.waddo.net

keef

On 24 May 2004 18:59:01 -0700, keef <keithatkin300 (AT) hotmail (DOT) com> wrote:

i would really love some help on this one.

if you take a quick look at my web site (link below) you will notice
that a major part of my navigational concept is to use roll-overs.
Anything that turns red as you roll the mouse over is a link. This can
be seen on index pages as well as the bookmarks which appear in my
text sections.

Use CSS.

a:hover {
color: red;
}

Now the question(s)! I have read that Google etc cannot read such
pages because there is no real text. This seem true. My site has been
up for months and google will barely find me, even including my name
and stuff in quotation marks in the search, So, if I want to keep the
look I presently have, is there any way for google to find me????

Nope, unless you use a CSS version to style text. There is NO text in your
page. It's utterly useless to any non-graphical UA. That's a damn shame,
and you MUST correct this.

Also, is there some way to have this roll over effect, or something
similar, but using text????

Read up on a:link, a:visited, a:hover and a:active at
http://www.w3.org/TR/CSS21/selector.html#link-pseudo-classes and
http://www.w3.org/TR/CSS21/selector.html#dynamic-pseudo-classes

Finally, even though each gif is tiny and the first page is less than
50k, when I tried to connect using a modem (various locations and
computers) it would take forever. And I mean forever. 1 gif would
load, then it would think about it for a while, then another etc etc.
So it seems to me my original plan using roll overs for links was a
very bad one.

With images, yes. With CSS, no. It's great.

Hi Neal

thanks for your reply

the links you provided are a but over my head! I may be able to figure
the stuff out if I scratch my head a few thousand times. Before I do
that, do you know a page that shows an example of this? I assume it
is the "hover" one that I would use.

Thanks again.

www.waddo.net

Keith


Neal <neal413 (AT) yahoo (DOT) com> wrote

On 24 May 2004 18:59:01 -0700, keef <keithatkin300 (AT) hotmail (DOT) com> wrote:

i would really love some help on this one.

if you take a quick look at my web site (link below) you will notice
that a major part of my navigational concept is to use roll-overs.
Anything that turns red as you roll the mouse over is a link. This can
be seen on index pages as well as the bookmarks which appear in my
text sections.

Use CSS.

a:hover {
color: red;
}

Now the question(s)! I have read that Google etc cannot read such
pages because there is no real text. This seem true. My site has been
up for months and google will barely find me, even including my name
and stuff in quotation marks in the search, So, if I want to keep the
look I presently have, is there any way for google to find me????

Nope, unless you use a CSS version to style text. There is NO text in your
page. It's utterly useless to any non-graphical UA. That's a damn shame,
and you MUST correct this.

Also, is there some way to have this roll over effect, or something
similar, but using text????

Read up on a:link, a:visited, a:hover and a:active at
http://www.w3.org/TR/CSS21/selector.html#link-pseudo-classes and
http://www.w3.org/TR/CSS21/selector.html#dynamic-pseudo-classes

Finally, even though each gif is tiny and the first page is less than
50k, when I tried to connect using a modem (various locations and
computers) it would take forever. And I mean forever. 1 gif would
load, then it would think about it for a while, then another etc etc.
So it seems to me my original plan using roll overs for links was a
very bad one.

With images, yes. With CSS, no. It's great.

keef wrote:

the links you provided are a but over my head! I may be able to figure
the stuff out if I scratch my head a few thousand times. Before I do
that, do you know a page that shows an example of this? I assume it
is the "hover" one that I would use.

http://tranchant.plus.com/

My menus and links all have hover changes defined, all done with CSS.
Look at the "personal" URLs of the other regular posters here - most
will use this.

--
Mark.

On 25 May 2004 03:47:22 -0700, keef <keithatkin300 (AT) hotmail (DOT) com> wrote:

Hi Neal

thanks for your reply

the links you provided are a but over my head! I may be able to figure
the stuff out if I scratch my head a few thousand times. Before I do
that, do you know a page that shows an example of this? I assume it
is the "hover" one that I would use.

Here's a bit more detail. Not sure what you know about CSS, but I'll
assume you know some basics. Consult a CSS tutorial and read through the
c.i.w.a.stylesheets newsgroup for further info.

The a selector can be styled alone and you can also style some
"pseudo-classes" of a.

a:link { these styles affect the basic link only }
a:visited { these styles affect links which have been visited only }
a:hover { these styles affect links over which the cursor is hovering }
a:active { these styles affect a link which has been activated }

Put them in this order in your stylesheet. These styles accomplish similar
to what you have now:

..nav a:link, .nav a:visited {
color: black;
background-color: transparent;
text-decoration: none;
}
..nav a:hover, .nav a:active {
color: red;
background-color: transparent;
text-decoration: none;
}

Of course, your bullet changes opposite to the text, and there's no
universally supported way to replicate this in CSS except something like:

..nav a:link span, .nav a:visited span {
color: red;
}
..nav a:hover span, .nav a:active span {
color: black;
}

and markup like this:

<h3>Humour</h3>
<div class="nav"><a href=""><span>•</span>short stuff</a></div>
<div class="nav"><a href=""><span>•</span>long stuff</a></div>
<div class="nav"><a href=""><span>•</span>cartoon stuff</a></div>

(I'd actually use list markup myself, but that's a little more involved
for our purposes here.)

Brian wrote in
<10b6pseg0tv7j51 (AT) corp (DOT) supernews.com>

keef wrote:

i would really love some help on this one.

if you take a quick look at my web site (link below) you will notice
that a major part of my navigational concept is to use roll-overs.
Anything that turns red as you roll the mouse over is a link. This
can be seen on index pages as well as the bookmarks which appear in
my text sections.

Now the question(s)! I have read that Google etc cannot read such
pages because there is no real text.

At least some search engines can use the alt value in place of the
text; and that's what the alt attribute is for. You are using it,
right?

Just thought I'd mention that Google indexes the alt attribute when the
image is used for a link but not otherwise - not that it should put anyone
off using the alt attribute.

--
PeterMcC
If you feel that any of the above is incorrect,
inappropriate or offensive in any way,
please ignore it and accept my apologies.

Brian wrote in
<10b7bs9sgnni9d5 (AT) corp (DOT) supernews.com>

PeterMcC wrote:

Brian wrote

At least some search engines can use the alt value in place of the
text

Just thought I'd mention that Google indexes the alt attribute when
the image is used for a link but not otherwise

I'd noticed that Google was not indexing the alt text of pages I'd
written; it's good to know exactly what it does.

In case you're starting to speculate about alternatives - the title
attribute doesn't seem to be indexed whatever use is made of it

--
PeterMcC
If you feel that any of the above is incorrect,
inappropriate or offensive in any way,
please ignore it and accept my apologies.