Date Published: 2000-05-01

So you're getting killed in bandwidth fees, and advertising is barely making ends meet. You're stumped as to what to do to save some bandwidth. Consider designing a low graphic, yet high quality design. Many sites have gone that route, and it doesn't have to look as 1996 as Yahoo! to achieve it. This article will present some examples designed to help you get ideas.

• --Perl Archive: www.perlarchive.com - if you haven't looked around where you are now, I suggest you do. This site was designed with only one graphic (excluding ads) - the Perl Archive logo, and that's the same on every page - result? The image is cached, and page loading times are impressively fast. The site is also clean, easy to use, and very nice. Remember, CSS and other useful tools can help with adding a little more oomph without graphics and not that much more file size.

• --INPursuit: www.in-pursuit.com - I use my site as an example of low bandwidth because it's something I have to do - bandwidth has to be as tight as possible for my site. You can see that there's a maximum of 2 graphics on the page (excluding ads), and I've been finding ways of classing up the graphics while bringing them down as small as possible. This site uses a lot of tables to give it the lined effect, but it makes the pages quick loading with the absence of graphics.

• --CGI For Me: www.cgiforme.com - With the one top graphic, the site's loading times are nice and quick. One other thing this site does is attempts to keep page sizes as small as possible, so that there's less text to load and therefore less bandwidth.

• --Genealogy Pages: www.genealogypages.com - This is a great portal for Genealogy, but it also shows how few graphics doesn't mean a bad look. The site's look is clean, easy, and the colors complement each other well. The site doesn't waste any bandwidth.

When designing a site, remember the costs of bandwidth. As your site grows, you'll appreciate the steps taken now to keep graphics low but keep design nice. It's also great practice in becoming an excellent designer. Just about anyone with Paint Shop Pro or Adobe Photoshop can design a site with nice graphics, but the true designers can paint a picture with mainly HTML.  

Written for the Perl Archive by Joshua (JJ) O'Connell. Joshua has 2 years of experience in website creating, design, and maintenance and is the creator and webmaster of INPursuit and JJO Webpages.