GeeKs Blogging @ dotCOM

Changes to the Oracle Homepage?

by Nitin Jain

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Just browsing through the Internet, particularly the Oracle Homepage, http://www.oracle.com, I noticed it to be a little different than the way I had seen it in the past. The changes are subtle, but, in Web Designing, it is these subtle changes which bring about a big difference!

Googling it brought up this beautiful post from Tim Bonneman from Oracle outlining the changes. See if you can catch all of them!

The top has some menus. I see the menus have been reorganized. They have become a little more classy, and the text easier on the eyes.

For a change, I see the banner is now bigger, and the entire flash banner towards the top of the page has been turned into a hyperlink. This practically means, instead of scrolling out mouse especially to “Learn More”, clicking anywhere on the banner will take us to the relevant article.

From the concept I feel similar to Video Advertising by Google on Youtube, News from 3 special categories, Customer Spotlight, Special Events and Innovation Showcase is now shown in a translucent space, just below the large flash banner. Links to more news are also easily accessible through a single click.

There’s a new News Ticker, something like a Java Applet being refreshed continuously, just below the banner. More News! Well, a company the size and diversity of Oracle is expected to have lots to share after all. There are new developments happening at Oracle everyday!

Something peculiar I noticed as a flaw, the News Ticker item doesn’t stay on the Mouse Scroll above the News Item. It continuously refreshes itself irrespective of the Mouse Cursor position and you have to wait for the News Item to appear again in case you miss it the first time. A small Javascript could fix this. Too difficult for a better Customer Experience, eh??

The refresh interval also seems to be close to 3 seconds. My personal feeling is that it is more to draw attention to the News Ticker, than actually extract value out of it. Just one of the many differences the gurus claim between a FLASHY website, and a USEFUL website. Subtle, yet important!

A new Quick Links applet has been added to the bottom right. My question, “Can I customize it to show only the links I want to show, as per my personal usage?”. If it is not my own Quick Links, then it may be quick for others, but not that quick for me!

Nice little tweaks! I am sure the competition can also learn a lot from the Oracle Website on how to keep it simple, yet intuitive, and useful. A couple of things here and there may be discounted as personal choices. Let’s wait for the customer reactions on this one. What’s your take? Leave a comment..

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