typeZERO has undergone a design and concept change and you have helped it happen! I go into detail on some of the changes, and why they occurred.

First off, I’d like to thank everyone who’s reading this. Some of you have been with me from my debut at THAT animeblog to my theme destruction at residualmadness.com, and now you’re here at typeZERO. Others may have come later, but your dedication to constantly boosting my confidence and moral (whether a conscious effort or not) has been both consistent and amazing. You’re helping me tune my blogging chi.

Now enough with the emo crap and on to the UPDATES!!

typzero chronology of theme.

First there was the original theme, The Morning After. It was unmodified, and basically used so the site could look kinda pretty with no effort on my part. The came Stripped, the minimalist theme that lasted for all of a week maybe? It was also a premade, unmodified theme I used, mostly because I got fed up with some of the technical aspects of The Morning After.

Now you can say hello to the new, permanent (or as permanent as things on the internet get) layout for typeZERO. The layout is a heavily modified (by me) version of Almodovar +, and I’ve dubbed the current theme Rainbow Unicorn. Yes, you read that right.

Page design/layout

The front page features short post excerpts and information, along with an appropriate thumbnail. This is designed to maximize content exposure so you can get the gist of each post without having to wade through a homepage the size of Texas.

Click through a post on the front page and you’re taken to a single column post page. I like single column themes because they emphasize the content without doing something like Stripped did (make font 400 times bigger).

Page navigation is at the top of the site, and all of the pages have been filled appropriately with no BS. So go check them out, they’re the real thing now! (more on the blogroll below).

The Blogroll

I don’t see my blogroll as numbered figure that I should be trying to constantly raise higher and higher for e-peen purposes. It’s just my way of saying “these guys rock, I read them and you should too”. To that end, I’ve created a semi-unconventional blogroll.

I also feel like a list of websites should contain more than just titles…if someone is worth being on your blogroll, they’re worth talking about. I’ve always intended to do this on a website. However, since IKnight did beat me to it, I’d like to at least credit him for having an above-average, kickass blogroll.

I followed the idea of dasaku.net’s members page for a having a shot of the website included in the list. That’s not a blogroll, but pictures always help.

To top everything off, I even included a “Suggested Reading” section where I offer a favorite post of mine from the site. I’m trying to keep “favorite” within the limitations of a post that is the standard fare at each website.

As of right now Baka-Raptor is the only complete example, but I’ll be filling in the rest throughout the next week.

New Features

I’ve added a few more features (that you can see on this post) to make typeZERO a little more fun and user friendly.

There’s the “Blockquote Intro“. If I had to summarize what’s going on in the post in 1-2 sentences, this is what I’d say. It’s there so that you can quickly understand what the post is about and determine whether or not you’d like to read it in it’s entirety.

Next up, I added a highlighting feature that you’ve already seen in action. I don’t want highlighting to overpower the post, but let’s face it, we all scan articles. Hopefully highlighting will help to snag your attention as you drift down the page.

The Forecast, while not 100% official is just a heads up on what I plan on posting next.

And last, if you look below, there’s post ratings system. This isn’t so much of an e-peen rating system as it is a way to further discover what you like reading the most. Be honest because the feedback will help shape typeZERO (to a certain extent).

[The Forecast]
Disenchanted with anime? Me too. Look forward to a post addressing the reasons for my falling-out with the current spring offerings.

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