I’ve finished my portfolio site in hopes of using it to get a job. It’s built using React, Styled Components, and I’m hosting in with Netlify. The form page is also using Netlify. At some point, I’ll change the project page so it loads directly from a database and not from a JSON file. I’ll do this so I can implement a grid of projects for easy navigation. It’s not done for sure, but I finally feel like it’s getting closer.
Any helpful opinions on what needs improvement or I’d love to hear that being able to build this project (and the projects it showcased) show that I’m ready or not ready for a development job.
Here’s the link https://www.dougluce.com/
Thanks!
Hi Doug,
After clicking through the “projects” section on your portfolio, I the biggest thing that’s missing for me is… Links to your projects!
If you could make the picture on each project page link to the project, and maybe also include a “View project” button/link on each page, it would make it really easy for visitors to your site to experience what you are capable of rather than just taking your word for it.
A picture is worth a thousand words, but I think a link to a functioning piece of software hosted online is worth a million words.
Hope this helps, and best of luck in your job hunt!
Thanks for the advice! I agree and I’ll get this done. The concept I built for this page actually has the project load in an embedded Codepen with a view live button. I should also have the link to the Github repositories.
I should work on this sooner than later.
Hey! nice portfolio
however your project fitnes101 links to your calculator project
In the about section:
“I currently work as an IT Manger”
Manager is misspelled.
“perfectings a cup of coffee”
Should just be “perfecting”
Those are some minor thing’s I noticed.
Thanks so much! I didn’t catch these. Fixed now.
1 Like
Ultimately I want to do this. I want to also have the first page be www.dougluce.com/projects be a gallery, then once you click a project have the option to toggle between them. I’ll have to figure out how I would get those projects to work in my domain, as they all use different technologies.
Thanks for the suggestion.
I would agree with what randell said, Codepen does not seem very professional, even GitHub would be a better option.
I would also suggest to show only real life projects, to be honest recruiters don’t care about projects like Simon Says, because they don’t understand that, and projects like the calculator make you seem like a beginner and you don’t want that. You have nice projects like fitness 101, but that’s almost at the very end, a recruiter might not have the time to go through all that.
The project section shouldn’t be scrollable. The prev and next button should be within the screen viewport, preferably right below the laptop icon . I found it very painful having to scroll down every time I wanted to click one of those buttons.
As developers we can tell that you have skills, It seems like you know what you are doing, but recruiters are not developers, you have to target them with your portfolio.
Sorry if I sound negative with my critic, but I am sure you want to get hired, so I am just trying to help you improve your portfolio.
I don’t think this is negative at all, I really appreciate the feedback. I wasn’t really thinking of Codepen not being professional, I figured it would be easy for recruiters to see the code and the project. I have pretty much all my projects in Github, so I’ll work on switching them over. I do have the arrows right under the laptop but it looks like at one breakpoint they are too low so I’ll adjust it. I thought because Tic Tac Toe and Simon says we’re more complicated I would show those first, but I’ll move my more realistic projects forward and add more of those to the list. Thanks again for the advice, I’m currently applying for jobs and want this to be solid.
Hey Gilbert, I moved all of my projects around to showcase my more professional projects first, and I switched all of the project links over to Github. What do you think now? I also moved the arrow buttons to be under the project image.
Hey @Doug-Luce, went through your website…it’s nice…just found one thing…
I think the “Project Name”, “…Type” and “Description” should come before the corresponding text:
More like…
Project Name
Project 1
Project Type
Freelance
Description
Lorem Ipsum Lorem Ipsum Lorem Ipsum Lorem Ipsum
Hope this Helps 
Thanks for the feedback. 
I’m going to mock this up and see what it looks like.
1 Like
I think it looks better now. To improve a bit the design of your projects section you can do the following:
- Give some side padding to the container of your text to make some space between the content and the image, it’ll look better.
- Looks like you need a container in this section, the laptop image is on the edge of the screen.
Again, this is just to make it look better.
Good job. Here are somethings that I would change.
Layout
• I would not have your website extend endlessly. You need to have a max width.
• Your social media icons in your footer need to be vertically centered between your horizontal rule and the bottom.
• Your Contact me should be in the footer.
• I would add a picture of you to the main page.
Font
• Your 2 paragraphs on the Main page need to be a smaller font.
Projects Page
• Turn your projects into just images. Then have the info pop up when you hover over them.
• Your titles should be on top and not underneath.
• Using anything marquee-type is now a no no.
Contact Page
• The image and text should be closer together.
• NEVER NEVER NEVER put your email on your site. Google for anti-spam file, like this, that you can add without knowing php. It’s easy.
• Don’t use your phone number.
Hope this helps.
Hey Gilbert,
I made these changes and it looks much better.
Thanks for the suggestions.
I took your advice on the copy on the front page, and like it much better. Thanks for the advice.
