Menus, Menus Everywhere

[Hawk]

Looking for a few good opinions.

Which menu do you like better?

This one;

http://www.hawkdawg.com/

or this one?

http://www.hawkdawg.com/index-test.html

[thegrindre]

I like the first one best...

[Sugus]

I agree - the first one is it! Why "change a winning team"?

[Hawk]

I was thinking of the increased functionality of the second one. Did you notice it was a fly-out menu, or are you just looking at the colors? The colors can change.

[Hawk]

I'm also thinking of myself here a little too. The second one would be a whole lot easier to add new menu items to since I can have one page of it and use php to insert it into all other pages.
As it stands, if I add a new menu item I have to do it on many, many pages

[nedfumpkin]

I like the second one better if that matters at all. :)

[Blackhawk]

I like the visual look of the current version. (#1) But the utility/expandability of the "new" menu is nice as it saves time from having to load multiple webpages to get to the final location.

At first glance I didn't particularly care for #2 but looking at it for a few minutes, it's simplistic yet looks well. (I'm just not sure about green and red as the link colors and visited link)

And with that I suppose I'm no help as both have their perks.

I'm also thinking of myself here a little too. The second one would be a whole lot easier to add new menu items to since I can have one page of it and use php to insert it into all other pages.
As it stands, if I add a new menu item I have to do it on many, many pages

I'd go with #2 then and keep the website format more up to date rather than having to make a menu on each individual webpage. It makes the site more professional looking.

[Stoker]

My preference is for the new menu with pop up sub menus. It saves having to open full pages to navigate through the different areas. I think it might encourage folks to wander more and find new things because having menus "blossom" open instead of having to actually open a page lets you see all of the options.

[edbangor]

I like option two too, even if it is missing a Trainmaster section.

[Blackhawk]

I like option two too, even if it is missing a Trainmaster section.

TM is there, it's just in Railroad Tycoon, then under RT3, then TrainMaster Expert Ed. then map archive, and finally your own page, TM maps of other lands

[Hawk]

I like option two too, even if it is missing a Trainmaster section.

No it ain't. Look under Railroad Tycoon 3. The Trainmaster links are there.

Click on image to view full size

Edit 1: Well, ya' beat me to it BH.

[Blackhawk]

I almost thought about adding a screen shot myself. If I had, I fear you would have beaten me to it. A beer to the helpful hawk who puts pictures in his posts.

[Hawk]

BH. I think I'll drink that beer and go to bed. I didn't get my nap today because I had to keep an eye on the ham in the oven.

[WPandP]

Personally, I don't like fly-out menus, especially if they go more than two levels. They depend too much on mousing skills, and often I lose the last level by mousing off the flyout accidentally. I'm no slouch when mousing; I'm not a twitch gamer, but I think I have pretty good mouse control. Yet, if even I can get frustrated by such a menu system, I have to believe there's loads of people who are less frequent computer users, who would have significant difficulty.

I prefer links that just sit there, ready and waiting for you to click them. However, maybe there's another option that you haven't explored. What about a navigation menu that changes as you click upper-hierarchy links to reveal lower-hierarchy links? In other words, instead of flying out to the side, they show up inline in the menu (maybe it grows and shrinks, or maybe there is a space reserved), and they are invoked by distinct clicks rather than click-and-hold. A possible advantage of such a system might be that a RRT3 user, for instance, can click to expand the RRT3 menu, and it will stay expanded for that user as long as they are logged in. In other words, set a cookie for the nav menu and always expand to the hierarchy level that was last chosen by that user.

Maybe that's not as easy to code nor as easy to add new pages, I dunno. But I don't like the thought of having to navigate four or five levels of flyout in order to get to each and every RRT3 custom content page, every time I visit.

[Blackhawk]

BH. I think I'll drink that beer and go to bed. I didn't get my nap today because I had to keep an eye on the ham in the oven.

Hopefully you got to eat the ham and it was worth not getting your nap.

prefer links that just sit there, ready and waiting for you to click them. However, maybe there's another option that you haven't explored. What about a navigation menu that changes as you click upper-hierarchy links to reveal lower-hierarchy links? In other words, instead of flying out to the side, they show up inline in the menu (maybe it grows and shrinks, or maybe there is a space reserved), and they are invoked by distinct clicks rather than click-and-hold.

I don't think tree menus are that common anymore, but I could just not notice websites having them (as I did just notice a minor use of them on MLB.com team pages) Many websites seem to be the horizontal menu at the top, often where more options "drop down."

I don't mind the "flying out" links with the possible new menu, but for those that dislike having multiple sub-menus "flying out" it might be better to make the "Trainmaster Expert Ed." into a link directly to the TM main page rather than its own sub-menu, and then below that make a TM - Map Archive, TM - Extra Content. Similar to how RT3, RT3 Extra Content, and RT3 Maps are all there. This would then eliminate one more menu list from "flying out"

[Wolverine@MSU]

I have a problem with the second one, although I like the flyout concept, the flyouts go off the screen (see screenshot). If I go over to the scrollbar to move down the page, the flyouts go away. Also, some of the spacing on the multi-line titles looks funny (a minor point).

[Hawk]

What browser are you using? Looks like IE 6 or 7. Looks like you're running XP. What screen res do you run? Looks like something higher than 1024 X 768.
I haven't tested that css code in IE 7 yet (this whole idea is still in it's infancy) and I'm not concerned about IE 6, and can't test it in that version anyway.
I have tested it in IE 8, Opera, and - of course - Firefox 3.6. It should look like this.

Thanks for the report on this Wolvy. That's one of the types of feedback I was looking for.

Edit 1: I just checked it in IE 7 and it doesn't look anything like you show it. It looks fine, although at a screen res of 1024 X 768 it doesn't fit in the screen as well as the original nav bar, but that can be fixed with a little margin/padding adjustment.

[Hawk]

Well, playing continues. This time I mixed a little old and a little new.

http://www.hawkdawg.com/index-test2.html

BTW! None of the links work right now. This is a test. Had this been a real navigation bar the links would work.

[edbangor]

Now that new one I like with the drop down menus, and not just cos it puts Trainmaster on a level playing field with all the other RT versions instead of hiding it in a sub menu, of a sub menu, of a sub menu, where I couldn't find it.

[Stoker]

I think this new layout with the vertical menus is confusing, and does not allow a "tree view" showing all of the navigation options at once. I still like the first new layout the best.