A sitemap would be too much in a 404 page, while most of the other information (as well as a search box) is already in the sidebar.

But I’ll keep thinking about something to put there, because I don’t like the huge emptiness of 404 pages. :-)

Congrats on the new version of Simplish (2.1.2).

I don’t disagree that it can be helpful to present some navigation on a 404 page; I think a sort of top-level index or directory of the site is better suited; maybe the main categories, recent posts, tags, and meta info. Once I narrow the list of requirements down to that, I find it’s mostly already there: in the sidebar. Which is why, for example, I decided not to have Simplish repeat the search input form on a 404 page, and instead let the sidebar serve.

On a smaller site, or a site without a sidebar, or a sidebar containing non-navigation content, maybe you could dump an archives (by month, by category, by tag) template, instead of the whole site map?

I agree. The important points are the first two. The rest (the “tweaks”) was just me playing with Firebug and a theme I like, :-) and they are more of a matter of preference.

Now, how about another tweak! :-p

I was thinking the other day of adding a sitemap to the 404 page of op111.net (I have already a sitemap, so the code is ready) — but I have no idea if it is a good idea. I’ll research the matter a bit, and get back to you.

I’m bringing this up because Simplish is one of the few themes that come with a sitemap, so it would be an easy tweak for Simplish, if it is a good idea, that is.

Cheers,
Demetris

* Fonts sized in pixels are not resizable in IE6.

How odd. But you’re right, they aren’t.

I find 12px for the body text too small, but this is probably just personal preference…

I happened to be using a Mac frequently when I picked up this code and I’m happy with how Lucida Grande comes out there at 12px; but I’ve been using Linux more lately and might agree that the body font is too small. I will probably move to relative sizing to address both your first point and this one together, after I experiment with the font size(s) a bit.

Body background color: good point, suggestion applied, and background-color will be specified in the next version.

Agreed on improving fall-back fonts for headings; I’ll add Cambria and probably take a closer look at fonts on Linux, too.

Out of that list of tweaks:

#3 & #4 – I will probably just use one of the two fonts for all headings.

#5 – I like the existing alignment of site title and tagline, which is also the alignment from Hardy’s Scribbish, of which Simplish is a more-or-less faithful port. So I can always fall back on saying “It’s like Scribbish!” instead of admitting that I’m lazy and won’t change something. ;-)

#6 – I’m still not sold on the superiority of using a border -vs- plain-old link underlining. However, I do see your core point, which is that we distinguish links only with the underline, and not with color or emphasis or any other attribute. I can see how that’s a borderline issue. Right now I’m inclined to keep things as they are in Simplish, but experiment with different ways of presenting links in sp, where faith to Scribbish is of no concern.

It’s cool I can always see some Greek text in Simplish on op111 with the theme switch, and as always thanks for helping make the theme better.

Now, some remarks:

* Fonts sized in pixels are not resizable in IE6.

* I find 12px for the body text too small, but this is probably just personal preference — in general, for paragraphs, I don’t enjoy text smaller than 14px (87.5% + 1em in relative sizes, given that browsers have 16px as default for normal size).

* When colours or background images are set in the stylesheet (in general, when any colour is specified that is considerably off the HTML defaults), I find it is alwasy a good idea to specify background colour for the body too. Most people will not see a difference, but some will see: not all backgrounds are set to white. (I usually set mine to the Windows Classic gray, because white backgrounds kill my eyes in some cases, in some programs, in large screens.)

* Since a C font is used for paragraphs, you can use a serif font from the same family for headings too (Constantia or Cambria — see screenshot).

op111.net in Fx3, Simplish 2.1.1 original

http://op111.net/files/op111net-simplish-211-fx3-original.png

op111.net in Fx3, Simplish 2.1.1 tweaked by demetris
Main tweaks:
1. Body font set to 14px
2. Sidebar font set to 12px
3. Headings set to Constantia
4. h1 heading set to Cambria
5. Site description aligned with site title
6. Link underlining changed to 1px dotted black border (which changes to 1px solid #bbbbbb border on hover)

http://op111.net/files/op111net-simplish-211-fx3-demetris.png

op111.net in IE6, Simplish 2.1.1 original
The background colour is not specified by Simplish; so, it follows system settings.

http://op111.net/files/op111net-simplish-211-ie6-original.png

Last, I have Simplish always installed in op111.net — if you would like some extra content to check anything, just add ?wptheme=Simplish to any URL.