As the second in my reviews of the Cowboy Code Marshal blogs, I’ve chosen American Truckers at War.

Style
My biggest problem with the style of American Truckers at War is that it needs more. The subject is passionately presented, and the blog theme needs to catch up. That may sound overly negative, but it shouldn’t be taken that way. Blog design should make a statement, and this design doesn’t speak loudly enough.

I like the red white and blue color scheme, it’s totally appropriate for this sort of site. This is one of the elements that I think could be pushed more. More red, more blue. It’s important with any design to present a balanced and unified color scheme, but with a red, white and blue palette, this is even more important. It’s very easy to let this color palette slip into disorder, which will significantly lower the site’s impact. The solution is to carefully control the range of colors used. By keeping the color palette carefully confined, the scheme becomes more unified, making the design feel more organized.

This is a three column site, with a lot of links and images. The site is using twenty one scripts, most of them blogrolls. This has the potential for wholesale chaos when it comes to site organization and structure. Chaos however, is held in check. While the organization could be improved, it is nowhere near as bad as could be. There is room for improvement though. Making an effort here to unify the format of the various blogrolls would pay off with a cleaner look and improved usability.

Most of these blogrolls come with their own image. This is another area that could be a horrible negative, but is at worst a neutral. Making an effort to unify these images in some way would go a long way to cleaning up the sidebars.

One of the things I like about the design is the unified look over all. A common error in this kind of web design is failing to keep the various parts of the site looking like they’re supposed to be together. This site doesn’t make that mistake. The whole site holds together nicely. Defining the sidebars a little more might improve the overall look, but care should be taken not to loose the unification that currently exists.

The sidebars are a too wide in my opinion. They are encroaching on the content a bit too much. While I can see the reasons behind this, a little more width in the content, and a little less in the sidebars would make noticeable difference. This could be done by removing or altering the wide elements which are forcing the sidebar widths. The left sidebar is being forced wide by a single image, which could easily be edited. The right sidebar is being forced by several elements which are more difficult to edit, but it might be worth it to either force this change, or remove those elements. An alternate option would be to move wider elements to one sidebar. This would allow for an increase in the content section, while also allowing for the retention of the wider elements.

Structure
Site structure is reasonable. While there are a number of validation issues which I personally would address, none of them are significant. Most of these issues are the result of a DocType which doesn’t match the HTML coding. Not too serious, but worth fixing. Another issue is some extraneous code that appears to be part of the blog design. This also is insignificant, but would likely be easy to fix.

This blog is powered by the Serendipity Weblog System. While I’m not familiar with this system, it is somewhat similar to WordPress in that it is a PHP based blogging platform which uses themes to control style. It should be a solid platform if executed properly.

This is also a site which uses frames. Not good from a search ability point of view. Frames are notorious for interfering with search engines. In this case it also must be interfering with the ability of other bloggers to link to this site. This is caused by the framset disguising the URL. If you go to the homepage, it shows the URL as www.americantruckersatwar.com. No problem there. If you go to any other page in the site however, it still shows that same URL. I don’t know whether the use of frames is utilized here because of hosting issues or the blogging platform, but I would give some thought towards rectifying this. Removal of frames should improve traffic from search engines, as well as other blogs. If for some reason this change isn’t possible, I’d make a few minor changes to the frameset in order to improve it’s functionality. My strong preference however, would be to dump the use of frames.

Content
Content is what you’d think from a blog called American Truckers at War. It’s always good to have a site’s content match it’s name, and this is the case here. Nothing annoying like a designer’s site called something silly like High Desert Wanderer.

What would I change
I’d unify and amplify. Unify the images, color palette, and blogroll structure, and amplify the style. The various unification schemes would simplify the overall site. It would improve readability, usability, and flow. I’ll clarify the unification points a little bit later, but here’s a short list.

1. Unify color scheme
2. Unify blog roll images
3. More clearly define sidebars
4. More clearly define content sections

A big part of the unification would be to get the various blogrolls with their associated images into some sort of consistent organization.

I’d increase the content section width. I’d do this by decreasing the width of both sidebars. While I’d attempt to keep them symmetrical initially, there’s nothing wrong with asymmetrical sidebars as long as they are neat, clean, and functional.

I’d consider reorganizing the sidebars. Ads on one side, blogrolls on the other is one option. Making the sidebar content more intuitive would be the goal.

I’d amplify the style by adding more red and more blue to the content section. I’d do this by adding color and graphic elements to the individual post template. I’d add more negative space between posts, and increase the size of the blog titles in order to improve flow.

The big change I’d make, would be to the header. This site needs a stronger header. It’s talking about and to truckers, it needs to make a strong and unwavering statement. Some sort of truck or trucking associated image seems obvious, but I’d work with site author to see what would be most appropriate. My first choice would be to use an almost abstract image of a truck. It could be an extreme close-up, or an unusually angled photo. You don’t want to go with a traditional or predictable photo of a truck here. Drama and impact are important, and this is the place for it.

Summary
This review may sound overly negative, but that’s not how I see it. I see the style of this site more as a blank slate than anything. The style current style isn’t a negative, but it’s not as much of a positive as it should be The site structure is much the same way, not a negative, but not a positive enough. This site needs to make a stronger statement.

In some ways this site’s style is being pushed too much by various blogrolls and associated images. They each make a statement of their own, and it confuses the overall style.

The key here is unifying the various site elements, and amplifying the overall style. Easy to say, not always easy to do. However, the improved usability, functionality, and dramatic effect that will come from an improve design will be well worth the effort.