I found a couple issues with the “episode menu slider” on the “Watch Now” pages when viewing the site on a PS3.
The arrows to move the episode menu left and right do not work. I found the issue related to lines 18 and 28 in the following file: http://www.theanimenetwork.com/components/com_vods/js/vod.js The scrollWidth of the episode-menu div is calculated as 530 due to the width setting in template.css. The scrollWidth of its child div with class “slider” works perfectly because it is calculated server side.
The slider should only show 5 episodes due to the “overflow” and width settings. However, it continues to show additional episodes to the right of the slider and thus on top of the icon key area. This issue is related to the way the PS3 handles the relative positioning and can be corrected with some modified nesting. http://www.theanimenetwork.com/templates/tan_refresh/css/template.css Remove line 1049, which sets the li element to relative positioning. Add a div to enclose the “Watched” or “Star” div elements inside each li. Give these new container divs a class and set it to relative positioning.
With the above two fixes, the page displayed correctly on the PS3, FireFox 3.5 and IE8. Of course, I would recommend a little further testing before making the above changes, but so far, so good.
Thanks for the info Ultimate Mega Man X. I hope so too. However, it’s not just the PS3. The site should basically be usable by any browser that supports flash, whether it be on the PS3, PSP, iPhone, netbook, etc. However, it’s unfortunate that the only way to access the episodes is through that episode scroller, which is not as widely supported. I can understand if it’s not cost effective to put programming hours into supporting every possible device that has a web browser these days, but it also seems silly to limit their market just because there is no other link to the episodes.
The usability of site as a whole could be improved in my honest opinion. When I want to watch an episode I always navigate to the show, which defaults to the Play Now option. Then I navigate to the episode guide to figure out where I left off. Then back to Play Now. Then I have to scroll through the episodes again. If they just had a basic Link in the episode guide, it’d make the site more friendly to me as a user, and to my web enabled devices (including my PS3). Maybe there’s another way that I’m just missing?
I am happy to offer my assistance. Whether it be coding, testing, or simply a community based project. But then again, if it’s not even on the list of stuff to do, not even at the bottom… Would I be able to get permission to post a link to an external site, which simply allows PS3 owners to use this site? There’s a couple ways that could be done that come to mind right away… but I absolutely want to avoid lawyers knocking on my door because of it, if you get what I mean.
You know, when they’re not having catastrophic hardware failures, DVD trays that don’t open, or Red Rings of Death…lol[/quote]
Mine is as of now sitting in a box in the attic so its not sitting in my room giving me the RROD or in other words the middle finger. lol
At least the Extended warranty paid out and gave me back my 449.00 I paid three years ago just over the MS Warranty.
Really though everyone needs to email Sony , Apple , Nintendo , others , etc , and tell them to updated their browsers to use newer versions of flash and such.
I’ve never used the PS3 browser (but as a designer, I’ve heard horror stories), so I don’t have first-hand knowledge of how our site is rendering out for you guys. Can someone post a few screenshots and notes of what works and what doesn’t function properly, if at all.
Optimization for non-traditional & mobile browsers (especially the iPhone!) is on our long ‘to do’ list. No details yet, but rest assured that we do recognize your technical needs and wants.
They do all have their issues, but the 360’s failure rate is more than twice as high as PS3 or Wii. In fact, over 50% of people who bought the on of the first two generations of 360’s were likely to have a complete system failure requiring replacement.
I handle the junkout and recycling of game systems returned under a service plan, and I send out 6 or 7 360’s for every PS3 or Wii I send out.
I’m not saying the 360 is a bad system, I just feel Microsoft rushed it to market, and as a result didn’t have it thoroughly tested. The newer systems do hold up much better, though the red ring of death is still pretty prevalent.
[quote]I found a couple issues with the “episode menu slider” on the “Watch Now” pages.
The arrows to move the episode menu left and right do not work … The scrollWidth of the episode-menu div is calculated … With the above two fixes, the page displayed correctly on the PS3, FireFox 3.5 and IE8.[/quote]
I have occasionally seen a problem with the episode scroller with FireFox 3.5, where it takes 5 clicks to move over one episode; 40 clicks to get to the 13th episode, etc. This was happening about 1 time out of 10. Refreshing the page would consistently clear things up.
It appears that calculating “1/5th of the width of the scroller area” is being done dynamically, but should be done on the server side since the rest of the display has a static layout.
Seconded. Especially for shows with more than 26 episodes (like Get Backers, Kiba, Saiuki, YUA). Having just the episode numbers as clickable text links would not take up too much space and would be very helpful. And if the colors for ‘link’ and ‘vlink’ were kept distinct (as they should), keeping track of which episodes have already been watched would be easier.
Which brings up another complaint: The check mark for “Already Watched” is completely worthless. For my account, it is on for some random episodes that I have not watched, and is not on for the ones I have watched.
Is there a way for users to manually set or clear those check marks?
I should be able to get you some. Hopefully this weekend.
Actually, sorry to get your hopes up like that. iPhone doesn’t support flash, not officially at least. But I can rip my DVDs to play on my iPod touch and you guys already have anime available for download via the iTunes Store so fair enough.
I’ve attached a screen shot that shows the episodes displaying beyond the arrow, the fact the mouse doesn’t change into a hand when you hover over the arrow, and that the episodes don’t have icons over them. IMO, the small graphical issues are to be expected when using a browser like that on the PSP and PS3, but the fact the arrow doesn’t scroll the episodes when you click on it is important as that’s the only navigation the site provides to access them. http://www.theanimenetwork.com/media/kunena/attachments/legacy/images/Copy_of_02_02_10_1247.jpg
