Of course a re-design is due, but I’m patient as I know the tremendous work involved in creating a quality and scalable template/skin system with all design elements sub-templated. Because that’s what it takes to ensure in the future the site can adapt, cosmetically, and look a little more relevant to the competition. I also suspect the display is statically generated, meaning Mr. Lemos might have to re-write the core code to implement templating and skin support. Once this is done he should contact volunteers, entertain contests and so on asking them to create new templates for him.

This means alot of development time up front, but in the long run the site can be updated much more easily. So during your “day job” I suggest you start creating a powerful templating system, don’t worry about the styles! If all the main elements and graphics can be interchanged via skins, and your skin system is well documented, a “beautiful” site in the eye of each beholder will come about.

What I’m getting at, folks, is the comments here have been mostly unhelpful – and technically alot of you don’t grasp that you don’t just change a few static files and graphics to “upgrade” the layout when you’re seeking scalability. Separating the presentation layer from other layers is the best long term solution.

This is my specific advice to the main developer, and notice it’s not design advice. To summarize, create a powerful template/skin system under the hood, document it, then get people like me others here to implement the design and even layout!

This is a lot of work now, but alot LESS work later for all involved, plus users love to contribute with skins – it keeps them coming back, and it will only be a positive impact on the site in the long run.

That’s my advice. Start templating, Mr. Lemos.

-jim

Personally, the design is butt ugly, but I can live with it. However, functionality — please at least make it work!

Instead of stay calling the site old-fashioned, you should give it a try. I doubt you stay more than 30 minutes there, but that is because of your layout impression. I agree that layout is not that good, but what you do not see if the content.

PHPClasses.org is a very good content site, it’s not a designer site and usually people that goes there are developers, not designers. I don’t care about layouts since it is not important to me. If the content is good, that is enough.

An old layout can be a reason for new users goes out, but give it a try, and be familiarized with site navigation, is the answer for that. That’s not look at the page and goes out. That’s not the fancy clean layout, with ajax features and nice smoothie link colors. It’s the content that interest me, and if it is good, it fits my needs.

So, for you that want a kind of cute style of PHPClasses.org, you need to rethink what do you do. Developers don’t like layouts, they care about content. If you more interested in layout that content, you’re in a wrong career.

Mr. Lemos, keep up the good work. I hope you plan to improve site features more, and do not care about layout guys.

PHPClasses suffers from the same problems sourceforge suffers from. 5 clicks to get anything done, a site architecture that you can get lost in very quickly, and basic visual hierarchy problems.

AJAX won’t fix that.

I know we’re completely sidetracking from the original conversation here, but this site should not be sucking up enough time for you to give up having a normal job. Administration should/could be divided among a few volunteers.

Colors, palettes, logos, titles, style, usability… I guess what a lot of people see in PHPClasses is just an outdated design. A style that was ok in 98, but that today looks very old. Gray background, blue links,

And yes, that search page has some nifty Ajax and a couple of visual effects here and there. But the look, the overall style is still old-fashioned.

As for the login link, as I said it shows in every page where the navigation bar appears. The navigation bar appears where it makes sense to me. It does not make sense to show the login link in the login page because you are already there. The same goes for the subscribe page, as you can only login if you are already subscribed. If you are have subscribed already it does not make sense to go to the subscribe page again.

As for the redesign suggestions, see my following comment to Ryan (if Ajaxian comment submission does not choke with me again).

The only way premium membership can fly is if you have some sort of quality control on the libraries published through phpclasses. Which, from some of the code samples that I’ve viewed (for the times where I couldn’t find anything else and remembered my login for the site) that doesn’t seem to be the case.

You’re blaming ads for slowness, however, riddle me this…if the ads are there to support bandwidth usage, why do you use mirrors and login requirements? If you use mirrors, why do you have ads? What’s the game here? Sure, it’s your site, but not only are you dragging down the speed (supposedly due to ads loading) but you’re also dragging down usability (registration requirements to even see a single snippet of a sub-par library).

PHP needs a site that champions the language, and in it’s current form, PHPClasses ain’t it. It’s a hotscripts.com with login requirements, not the CPAN style site that PHP deserves. It seems all we get these days from the more talented PHP developers out there is Rails knock-offs, and that bothers me more than a little.

It is true you have spent plenty of time doing things to the site, but what I mean is I feel these changes you have made are not really the most significant/important things… surely you can see the current design is like a 1990′s trainwreck??
That to me is the number 1 priority to fix!

A redesign does not mean changing a background color to grey.
Mate, its clear design is not your strong point – please go and buy a template or something and use that.
IMO – it is the single most popular reason why people dont like using your site!

There are far nicer, faster, and free sites out there, and while we applaud your efforts – there is much better out there i’m afraid.
Surely the goal is to please your current userbase, and attract and keep new users?

I do want you to succeed, and for years I have waited for that redesign that never came – which personally is the SOLE reason why i never use your site any more now.
Just PLEASE consider doing it – and doing it properly.. your site users deserve it before they are also driven away by poor design.

Again, I’m sorry if this sounds harsh, but it is my view.

Reading your post about ads, that might just be the space where a banner ad sits. I wouldn’t know as I use adblock and rarely see ads anymore. By the way, “masthead” is the horizontal block at the top of the page, not a column.

“criticism that there is no consistent site navigation is totally unfair.”

Randomly clicking through your site, please tell me where the navigation bar is on the subscription or login pages. You have many pages that are nearly blank except for the content. That is not consistency.

If you’re truly making a living off of this one website, you really should invest in a web designer, otherwise someone’s going to come along and build a better site that will eclipse yours.

The site is just so incredibly dated and difficult to use, I avoid it unless it’s my only option. It’s so bad that I actually considered taking the time to open a site just like it, but with some semblance of a standard design and thought towards usability.

If I were you I’d completely redesign the look of the site.
You can achieve something quite pretty with minimal HTML, using CSS and some images.

It’s a shame because some of the content is great.