History dug out

5 August 2007, 4:47 pm. View comments. Filed under Miscellaneous, Site-related, Web-related.

When you look back at your old design works, do you feel proud about how much you have improved?

Fortunately, thanks to Internet Archive, I've found one of my favourite designs from the past. And unfortunately, I think I like it more than this current design. I shall enlighten you with a little snapshot: Version 12. How bad does it feel? To think that you designed better three years ago than now? But I'll comfort myself by the fact that I have certainly improved in terms of layout accessibility and coding. By the way, Version 11 had 46 header slices. I crown myself Queen of "Optimisation".

So what were you like several years ago? According to Version 4, I was quite a little brat. You know, that type of attitude many 13 or 14-year-old girls roaming on the web has (I'm just being stereotypical here), which a lot of us probably despise of. The following proves self-explanatory:

Splash page:

Requirements :+: CSS :: PHP :: 800 x 600+ :: IE 5.5 :: Sign Guestbook!

I then greet you all with a "Would you like to vote for my site at DNW Top 100?" pop-up. Surely, that earnt me a lot of votes! I mean really, it did. I also had a changing title bar! How cool is that? But the post on 14 July 2003 was "teh biatch":

Watch out people... You skip the splash page I kill you...

Reason? I placed my OKcounter on the splash page. I wanted to see the numbers go up so skipping was a no-no! Attention-seeker. And I also had a "Wall of Shame". Hee hee heee.

Forgive me, I was 13. I really want to know what I had on my ancient "Wall of Shame" and how I constructed my "Rules/FAQ"; but those pages were gone.

A while ago I also dug out my childhood diary and this was on the front page: (excuse the poor English, it was during my first year in NZ)

Date: 15.9.98
... some people get some letters from me. The letters inside, I had write somethings about Jenny was so bad, when after holidays, she came back to NZ, she didn't have any friend can play with her, Ha! ha! because I'll writing letter to everybody about she was very very bad...

Hey, how cool was that? Miss eight-year-old egghead. Incredibly cute though, the last pages of the diary were filled with my personal "love stories" from 2001. I wonder what I'll think of myself now in a few years' time?

26 Comments »

Lene. 5 August 2007, 5:36 pm

That old layout was very pretty, it somehow reminds me of Belinda's (from immortalised.net) style from years ago (you'll notice if you see her layout archive

I lolled so hard at your version 4 splash page, it reminds me of my own old splash page, but I can't find it on web.archive.org. I did find however, my header sliced in 64 pieces! Beat that!
http://web.archive.org/web/20020601034556/www.liquid-firefly.com/

LOL
Lene. 5 August 2007, 5:43 pm

Holy crap, sorry for commenting twice, but I did found my old splash page:

Requirements: 800 x 600 resolution | Amaze font | Verdana Font | Happiness

Now I'm addicted to web.archive.org and it's all your fault =P
Rilla. 5 August 2007, 6:15 pm

@Lene: Can't find Belinda's layout archive. Lol I think all splash pages were something similar like that. But hey, you actually do have some proper requirements i.e. resolution and fonts but damn you for beating my header slices.
Elissa. 5 August 2007, 7:01 pm

Oh wow, so cute Wow, your layouts are always so nice!!! *admires your talent* Aww, love stories. That's so cute =)
Chien Yee. 5 August 2007, 9:53 pm

Lol, I'm addicted to this too and it's your fault
Rilla. 5 August 2007, 10:37 pm

Hey, blame Jem. She posted her site at Internet Archive from years and years ago on Snark Forums.
Jordie. 6 August 2007, 1:44 am

Oh, I remember that butterfly layout! I thought it was gorgeous.
Belinda. 6 August 2007, 3:59 am

Wow I didn't expect the random mention above (is here from the Snark forums link)! My layout archive is at http://primeval.immortalised.net *plug!*

Ah I love reminescing. I remember having a gigantic splash page once only because I liked designing it before realised that there's little room for text, so I kept it and made it one huge, useless splash image instead. And the days of splicing images to little bits! I remember being told once that it would save on loading time.
Vera. 6 August 2007, 4:53 am

Aside the fact that they weren't centered, I've always admired your layouts (I think I discovered appassionato some 3 and 1/2 years ago) and remember having been so envious of you being able to design so well - yet you were so much younger than me .
Oh I remember version 11, I used to amuse myself trying to count the images while they loaded *hehe*

My old site? geocities.com/salvia_18/intro.htm
If you view it in IE (or the IE tab) you can also hear music *wags eyebrows*
And I was 18 to boot But in my defense, 5 years ago background music was all the range *grins*

Regarding my old diary, I remember having use a lot of onomatopeia...but rather badly ... as pronouncing them didn't really sound like anything, least of all like what I had initially initially.
Hev. 6 August 2007, 9:32 am

Brat! Who said you were a brat? Oh wait, ok it wasn't me. Whew! *breathe Hev* lol I still say I like your current version better then 12 but I like simplicity. Do you realize I have haunted that stupid site all day today! It is your fault!!!!! See I am not the only one that stalked you for over 3 years *gives off an evil laugh* ha ha, talk to you later Rilla.
Hydora. 6 August 2007, 1:37 pm

Version 12's actually pretty good... though I first stumpled upon this site, I think at version 14. I've never really been one for flowers and butterflies but the format of the layouts are nice

we probably all went through that stage.
Lisa. 7 August 2007, 2:07 am

If I want to stay up so long, I do that.
I've never used photoshop, so I don't know. But it's much more better and advanced than photoimpact.

My old designs and graphics are CRAP! haha, so I deleted them all. Your's are pretty good
Anna. 7 August 2007, 3:01 am

Hmm, I remember that back in the days, I used to really admire your designs and such. But I also looked back on what I made before (most of them are deleted, but a review site was nice enough to have captured an image), and I guess I never realized that I've improved like crazy (:
Shawna. 7 August 2007, 3:36 am

Let's see, two years ago I had a splash page that was only useful for allowing people to pick a theme. I think my default theme was the Wicked one at the bottom of this page: http://www.eruantale.net/site/past-layouts/2/

My font was too small, I had a huge amount of crap on my sidebar, I had one of those dumb paragraphs with a bunch of single words that supposedly described me at the top of my sidebar—-oh, and everything was justified. Ick. Also, can you say... TABLES!
Eina. 7 August 2007, 2:32 pm

Oh wow, I love that yellow-butterfly theme. I used to browse around at your designs and whatnot with what my dial-up modem can handle. Haha.
Amber. 8 August 2007, 9:48 am

While that layout is beautiful I'm almost certain that the mark-up on this one is better! It's always the way. As it goes, I like this one too. You're quite the designer. Whereas I just slap a few colours together, do some CSS, and call it a theme.

As for my old layouts; they're best left unmentioned!
Rilla. 8 August 2007, 6:51 pm

Testing strong, em, a url and another one http://wildx.org/.

Now let's have a pretty little quote.
Menelya. 9 August 2007, 6:50 am

Oooh that is fun! I did mine too, lol all those old layouts.
Angela. 9 August 2007, 8:14 am

You were blogging at EIGHT years old?! Holy cow.

Anyway, I don't know if my layout design (in the image sense) has improved or not since I've been blogging. Definitely better than when I first started out, but I think it's been on the same level for a couple years. I get lazy now and then, of course. But with coding, oh man, I've improved DRASTICALLY. Mainly in the past six months. I got off my lazy butt and redid my coding to make it easier and neater. And I'm so thankful for it!

I look back at my old layouts now and then, too. I like to reminisce.
Rilla. 9 August 2007, 9:07 am

@Angela: Um. Where did you get the impression that I was blogging at eight years old? That was my diary, not blog.
Frankii. 9 August 2007, 9:59 am

Hmm, it's certainly strange to look back at your old diaries / graphics, and I certainly HOPE I've changed since then...
Having said that, I'll probably regret some of my actions of late when I'm older and (hopefully) wiser.
Rilla. 9 August 2007, 12:46 pm

Test again and a ~~strike text~~
Emma. 10 August 2007, 12:10 am

Awww you were sweet. I wouldn't want to look at my old layouts lol they were really bad the ones I have now haven't improved much lol.
Heather. 10 August 2007, 9:54 am

oh myy
when I was 13, I had a splash page very similar to that..
haha, I'm so glad I don't run my website the way I used to..

your version 12 is gorgeous, though :]
heather. 10 August 2007, 9:58 am

I Now Pronounce you CHuck and Larry
you havent heard of that?
oh mann, well, its good, haha

and yea, usually i dont like going to the movies with my parents, but my and my mom had planned this for a very long time

and i got some good stuff outta it :]]
Jenny. 10 August 2007, 4:15 pm

I actually have improved a lot, but I think that's only because I used to really really really suck at graphics. I like your stuff now, but your stuff then was still pretty cool.