EXCERPTS of my comments from a conversation with Dora Scilipoti, Rob Myers, and Matias Croce over 28 August to 4 September 2012. The "ochre" colour referred to is more like "salmon". The "black" background referred to in paragraph 4 is actually a deep blue. =================== As I was learning a bit of html and css to rework C-Graph's homepage, I got to thinking what could be easily done to sharpen up the GNU website until the next time someone decides on a new design. I'd like to share some ideas for modest changes we could make for a bit of a facelift until you visit the plastic surgeon. The following do not amount to "eye candy" but are likely, IMO, to improve the readability of our pages: 1) MARGINS One of the first things I noticed about gnu.org was that there were no left and right margins. This is almost like trying to read a book without margins. The eyes seem to need some space to translate from the edge of the screen to the text etc.;the page instantly becomes more readable. See e.g., utoto.org, trisquel.info, libreoffice.org, and mozilla.org. 2) JUSTIFY the TEXT The line "text-align: justify;" in the css for paragraphs does wonders for a web page! 3) RED NAVBAR At the most popular resolution of 1024 x 768, the red navbar wraps round with "Join the FSF" below "Philosophy". I suggest moving the search box above the navbar so there is more space for the nav items. See debian.org and fedoraproject.org for examples. You could consider combining some of the line nav items into another using a dropdown menu - like the "more" in the black navbar at google.com. I would remove the text and sign-up box under "Sign up for the Free Software Supporter" and link the text to a page instead for sign up. The top of the page looks too cluttered. I would also remove the maroon border round the search box as well as the maroon background on hover for the nav items. The maroon looks muddy. I think no border for the search box, a less saturated version of the red on hover and a larger font size for the text might be better. See lilypond.org, ibm.org for examples. Instead of making the hover text colour yellow, try making the white text bolder on hover with maybe a slight shadow. Of course repeated gradient background images for the navbar would be nicer than the flat red band. And a repeated gradient image for the flat blue band below it too. Also, I think we could do without the black bottom border of the red band. Re the FSF red: My choice would be to preserve the hue rather than the shade of red. Then one could use a more interesting gradient image with gradations in the same red hue. The range of shades of the hue would be chosen to conform with the prescribed contrast ratios in the W3c accessibility standards. Re examples for New Navigation bar : With the current design, I would preserve the red and blue theme instead of introducing the ochre shade on hover. For this design, a limited palette seems most effective. Too many colours can introduce a cacophany distracting from the content. Have a look at the graphics for CNN. Their theme is also red and blue, but the variation of shades on two basic hues is spectacular. I think that reversing the gradient image if used, or simply changing the red background to white on hover (with black text) would be more visually appealing than the ochre in the examples. There would be fewer problems with the wrapround and overlap of "Join the FSF!" if you moved the search box above the navbar as I suggested. I'm happy that you had already noted that changes needed to be made to that red navbar. I suspect the white text against the current red is compatible with accessibility guidelines or it would have been swapped ages ago. It's not a matter of changing the red so much, it's barely distinguishable from the logo red. The gradient images, if used, could be designed so that the fsf red is the dominant shade. 4) SECOND LEVEL NAVBAR I think the second-level nav bar at gnu.org/education is a good idea. But I think we could make it more visually appealing. You need more space above and below the nav text so things will look less crowded, i.e., the height of the bars should be increased. As before, gradient images would give more interest and depth to an otherwise flat blue colour. The black background on hover is a definite NO NO. I would choose a lighter shade of the blue (w3schools.com colorpicker is useful ) or reverse the gradient image on hover if you use one. Another option you might consider for the second level nav bar (if you choose to distinguish navigation from the h2 heading) is reversing the colours: i.e., blue text and outlines against a basically white background. See, e.g., the bottom bars on the home page at intel.com. Of course, our pages would have the blue band on top. On hover you could make the background blue with white text, like the heading above. ========================