Great Resources Elsewhere: July 18 to July 24

The always-informative mind(s) behind Six Revisions has compiled yet another excellent CSS-related roundup. This one is a little general in theme, namely “Exceptional CSS Techniques and Examples.” Normally I wouldn’t bother linking such a list, because it lacks the cohesion that makes the traditional roundup post useful. However, I saw some really cool things as I was going through this list, and it encouraged me to share it all to you. Plus, one of my articles made the list, so it can’t be all bad, can it? :)

Brian of Elite By Design has put together a nice roundup of 15 websites that took the time to design excellent comment areas. The comment area, I believe, often gets overlooked in site design (at least, I know I’m guilty of doing so!). And that seems shameful, really, considering the comment form is one of the few ways in which the user REALLY interacts with a website. But if you’re new to comment design, this would be a good place to start for inspiration.

And speaking of inspiration, WeFunction.com has compiled (this seems to be the week of roundups, doesn’t it?) a list of over 125 different non-web sources he uses for visual inspiration when designing for the web. All too often we simply look to other websites to see where we should go… but if we’re only ever looking at each other, we’ll never create anything new or exciting. Perhaps this list will serve as a source of inspiration for you, either by giving you inspiring visuals, or simply inspiring you start such a collection of your own.

Perhaps it’s because I have so little design background, that I really appreciate “fundamentals” articles like this one by Brad Colbow. Herein, Brad takes a new and popular web design that has been making the rounds through various design galleries and examines it according to a few of the fundamental tenets of graphic design. The result? Surprisingly, the site didn’t do so well on the fundamentals. If you’re a graphic designer by trade, the information Brad provides will probably be old hat, but it’s a useful analysis for those of us with non-design backgrounds.