Homepage Redesign Launch and New Features

Submitted by Richard Cave on Thu, 2007-08-02 18:05.

Last week, the Web team launched the Advanced Browse functionality and a link to a larger view of the Featured Image on the ToC (*) on all AP hosted PLoS journals. Today, the web team launched a revised 3-column layout of the Biology, Medicine, Computational Biology, Genetics, and Pathogens home pages. The main goal of this redesign is to increase the emphasis given to editorial contents. This redesign is a direct result of a collaborative effort between the Web and Editorial teams, with Celine leading the web design and development.

The main design changes that have been implemented:

  • The first/left column has been completely removed (the existing links were moved into the global navigation menu).
  • The weekly Editors’ Picks blocks are now wider (span over the old 1st and 2nd columns) and above the fold.
  • The Featured Image / About block has been moved to the top of the (new) second column.
  • The dimension of the monthly featured image has been increased from 120 pixels to 234 pixels.
  • The About blurbs were revised and now link to both the Journal Information & Open-Access License pages.
  • New links to RSS feeds, Readers' Responses & the PLoS Blog have been added to encourage users to both receive & contribute content.

The global navigation menu has also been enhanced:

  • New nav menu homes were found for the links that were in the first column.
  • Links for Email Alerts Sign-up and RSS feeds have been added.

From a web design and production standpoint, this launch also achieves a major improvement: we moved the web styles component back in-house! This allows the web team to be much more flexible in the future and implement iterative design changes as needed. Among the scheduled upcoming changes, we have...

  • (re)Insert a View Issue Link.
  • Change the "Most Viewed" titles list to full titles.

As usual, all feedback is welcome, as we will be working on refining each Journal's home page as needed.

(*) The "View Larger Cover" link will be changed to "View Larger Image" pending implementation by AP.

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Can you add abstracts to the "new articles" feed?
Submitted by Anders (not verified) on Fri, 2007-08-10 01:52.

Hi,

I just subscribed to the Plos CompBiol "new articles" feed. It seems that I only get the titles. Having the abstracts also in the feed would be a great improvement to me.

Thanks, and keep up the good work
Anders

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Abstracts in the feeds
Submitted by Russell Uman on Mon, 2007-08-20 22:58.

We are working with our vendor to add abstracts to the feeds for the journals that they host (Biology, Medicine, Computational Biology, Genetics, and Pathogens)

The journals we host (PLoS ONE and the soon-to-be-launched Neglected Tropical Diseases) have had abstracts in their feeds from the start!

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A definite improvement
Submitted by Michael Blix (not verified) on Sun, 2007-08-05 14:06.

Good work on the redesign, it's a lot better. Keep up the good work.

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