If it’s in visibible then it’s there for all to see. The software used by spammers does not “look” at a website as a person. All they see are the sourcecode. And they are specificly tailored to rip emails from forms of different kinds.
My server reives many hits for these contact-form-type things that doesn’t even exists on the site – that is how I know some spammer-software is crawling and going with the trial-and-error approach.
It’s really annoying.
I’d have to go back and read Response-o-matic’s technical informtion, but I think they route it from my server to their server then back to my e-mail account.
They give you all the code to put on your page, so (assuming you more than I about this, and that’s easily possible) you can see how it works.
They do add advertisements to the form you get back, but I haven’t found them obnoxious enough to make me want to learn more about coding web forms. 
M
That’s true. The perl mailing script resides on R.O.M’s server, so when a visitor clicks the ‘submit’ button on the form, the details are routed to the script on R.O.M’s server, which processes the form’s input, adds advertising, and then a) sends the email to form’s host (M in this case) and b) redirects the user to a ‘Thank You’ page (with advertising) on the R.O.M server.
The benefit of the script residing on the R.O.M server is that your own server doesn’t get hammered by spambots attempting to hijack your own mailing script for the purpose of relaying the spam. I’ve no doubt that the R.O.M server gets floods of spambot attempts though! (But that’s their problem, and I suspect the spammers wouldn’t like the idea of their own spammy messages going out with someone else’s advertising in it!).
Using this CGI script redirecting method doesn’t stop a spammer harvesting your email address from your form though. But as long as you’re sensible and name the form something obscure like “ahdgdye8.htm” and not something obvious like “email.htm” or “contact.htm” (and especially NOT “formmail.htm”) they likely won’t be bothered looking for it. They have too many other (easier) automatic means of sending their junk.
Another tried and trusted way of divulging your email address to the public without giving it to spambots is to make it a ‘graphic’ and add the picture to your page as a .gif or a .jpg (just as Dale has done on the Chiff main website). But this won’t stop a spammer who stumbles on the site adding it to a list manually.
I’m still looking for more suggestions/raffle entries about how to improve my new website. So far, I have
Why not have the recent-feedback stuff on the website?
Me clicked the “Click here to read what recent buyers have written.” and i’m being direected to a RichText file? It asked me if I wanted to save it and what not but I just clicked cancel. I’m too lazy to go through the whole process just to read the feedback, and chances are other ppl are too!
http://www.obrienwhistles.com/feedback.wps.rtf <<< what i’m talking about.
I did not read this thread, but I recommend some more info on that little shifty link to the pipe tune in the bottom right. Maybe some details on the set, the name of the song (Mahone’s?), a link to the music to that song that it appears you already have on the site. You know. Maybe even a background on that page. Or heck, even a picture of the pipes as a background. Or just a solid-colored background, if you’re short on webspace. Make it periwinkle or lavender to impress the girly-men.
edit: Or you could put the music to that tune right slap bang on the “click here for a pipe tune” page, too. My point is that it looks funny as a wee bit of text on a very, very, large, empty, white space.
I always feel awkward making suggestions about other people’s sites, but since you asked:
When I’m purchasing a whistle the sound of the instrument is the most important consideration. So the more sound files you can get on your site, the better.
What I like when comparing the sound of different makes or designs of whistles is to hear the same song performed by the same person in the same key. This way the only variable I’m hearing (ideally) is the different whistle. I would also suggest listing who’s playing, in what key, and what tune as well as what whistle.
I’d also say that the more sound files you can put up by different players, the better. That may seem to contradict the point above, but I listen for a couple of different things. If I’m deciding whether to choose lucite, copper or oak I want to be able to focus on how these materials affect the sound. If I’m choosing between your whistles and that of another craftsman, then I’m more interested in hearing different people play different tunes.
Now seeing the whistles being played would be particularly awesome, but, you know, I understand if that’ll have to wait a week or so (O’Brien 2.0!). I guess even then you’ll still want to have sound-only files available for those poor wretches afflicted with connection speeds out of the last century.
Oh! And the background on your main page makes the text a bit rough to read. You may want to put the text against a solid background to help give it better contrast.
These details aside, I’d say you’ve got a nice, clean & well organized site. It’s easy to find your way around, everything seems at hand or only a ‘Back’ button away. It may be worth while to put a ‘Home’ button or navigation bar at the bottom of your pages, but I for one will usually use the browser ‘Back’ button anyway.
Just cosmetic things
*Not crazy about the counter
*The page seems kind of awkward, jumbled together. Could you maybe try to clearly seperate The Reviews, Ordering and Prices. How about putting the “what buyers had to say” under the reviews heading?
Love the pipe tune hidden away in the corner
Its a cool background, though. Maybe just make the text bigger/bold. Or change its color. Whatever.
edit: Speaking of backgrounds… the “my guarantee” page seems to still be clinging on to that neon-green color of past. Unless it is your favorite color - maybe change it?
Edit #2 "I accept Paypal and international postal money orders. "
Make paypal a link to the paypal site.
A picture of you would look nice. Or pictures of others with your whistles. Maybe with descriptive captions, i.e., this is so-and-so, been whistling for however long. Just a thought. Have any well known friends? Or just ordinary folks, enjoying their O’Brien whistle.
edit: Or pictures of your shop or work area, with you working on a whistle? I think it’s nice, overall. I hadn’t seen it until you made updates the others suggested, so I have no idea how far it’s come.
Worth mentioning. (Is that referring to you in the third person?)
Edit: The lead-free solder would look good to mention, too.
Double-edit: Sorry for all the edits, but I have nothing better to do.
A music file going up the scale (both octaves) with a little bit of time on each note would be nice.
I was going to suggest changing the text size as an option, but I’m viewing at 1920x1200, so text that looks small to me may not to most people. On the other hand, the text on his page appears the same size as the text at O’Brien.com and I have no trouble reading this page. It’s the background. If the background color for the text were solid and the same color as the light green in the current background design, it should flow quite nicely while maximizing legibility. I agree the current background design is cool and worth preserving.
You can find an extreem version of what I’m suggesting here. Coloring individual table cells or rows would probably look better than coloring the whole table, but I’m at work so don’t have time to play with it much.
BTW, I will of course be deleting the copy of O’Briens site before the weekend. Or sooner, upon request.
Is there a way to make it (the green bkgd box you added) semi-transparent in HTML? My knowledge is very little and about 4 years old.
Also, bigger text can solve anything. With big enough text you can read black on a chekerboard background. The question is whether that point comes before or after it looks stupidly gigantic.
No, I suppose there isn’t. I think it looks fine if you up the text size from 14 to 18. (Looking at all this HTML is making it all come back to me )
My monitor is washed out though, so the background might not be as sharp or contrasted as you see it.
Even if the table background is the ultimate solution, I do like the look of the main passage of text in larger font.
EDIT… And the titles on the picture and guarantee pages are still page2 and page3
`Click here to get reviews’ should lead to an html page not an rtf file. I have to wait for my browser to ask how to view the rtf file then wait some more while …
I appreciate the continued suggestions to improve my site, in spite of the raffle ending three and a half weeks ago.
I have now figured out how to get the feedback to appear in a text window that does not have to be downloaded. I plan to add more sound files soon.
Out of the goodness of our hearts! [pets self on head]
Sweet! delrin fipples! My, oh my you do keep busy.
And a new display pic! WHERE do you find the TIME?!?!?!
New features added today to obrienwhistles.com
-Scales played on whistles with four different fipple materials.
-The same tune, played with four different fipples.
-Graphs showing the differences in the overtones, with the four different fipple materials.
Any more suggestions?
The cloudy look sure is nice. May I suggest looking into a repeating texture to lose the seams? http://www.grsites.com/textures/ss001.shtml
It’s fine as is, but good to try out a lot of things.
edit: maybe I should leave this part to the PM’s
edit2: I’m rather partial to the one on page 10.
edit3: Well I’ll be, it’s already changed. Found my 2nd favorite in the lot, too
I think it would be a good idea to have the guarantee and the sample tunes page to have the same background colour, to make the page feel like it is one complete site (some might find the colour changes jarring)
Adding some detail of which whistles where used for the sound samples might be helpful to prospective buyers.
Something nice that I saw somewhere else (but don’t remember where) was some piccies of your workshop. Hardly critical, but it gives a nice personal feel.
Perhaps a link next to the prices to a conversion rate calculator so those of us in far flung places can figure out how much it would cost to get one of your obviously fine whistles.