Website Review of Musescore.org & Musescore.com
In this website review, I will compare two websites which offer music solutions to their target customer. The sites are so similar, actually for the same product, yet the functionality of both websites are clearly different. The first one, Musescore.org, provides the visitor with access to a powerful platform for any and all musicians, regardless of skill level. Musescore, in short, is a free, downloadable sheet music creator with playback function. This website offers the free download, handbook, tutorials, forum, FAQ’s and so much more. With all this free and powerful software available here, why would anyone need more from Musescore? This next website answers that question by providing users with a Musescore community. At Musecore.com you can find more tutorials, forums and a complete online course to learning the massive interface of this application. You’ll also find a wonderful social media community for sharing your work, enjoying others’ compositions, and for collaborations.
Musescore.org
This website has a wireframe page layout with horizontal navigation (complete with search bar), images, and columns. As a visitor scrolls down, the content is separated by key points and links until reaching the footer at the bottom. Although the home page has a minimalistic quality, the quantity of content inside the website itself is quite large, yet organized to be very user friendly. When flexing narrower, this site behaves well. It does not create horizontal scrolling and the content simply shifts for the screen size. It also provides a hamburger menu located on the upper left-hand corner and performs well on tablets and phones. When flexing broader, although the webpage fills my 15-inch Macbook; on my 27-inch iMac, the site does not continue to fill the screen. The blue and white ribbons stay consistent all the way to the edge, yet the content stays in the middle with a balanced/centered content viewport. It appears to me that this site is a fixed or “jello” page layout.
Musescore.com
This website has a wireframe page layout with both a horizontal navigation (complete with search bar), and a vertical navigation for filtering content. Interestingly (and quite brilliantly thought out), it is actually designed like most store/shopping websites with boxed selections in the main viewing section. Just like you would when shopping, you can make your selection, except you’re not buying anything, rather you’re choosing to experience someone’s uploaded music. At the bottom of the page, right above the footer and just like a shopping website, there are additional numbered pages that you can navigate through. When flexing narrower, this site does not create horizontal scrolling and the content simply shifts for the screen size, however, at its narrowest it does not provide a hamburger menu. All of the top menu options simply disappear, leaving only the search bar; yet when testing the site on my phone, it contains both the search option and hamburger menu. When flexing broader, on the 27-inch screen, the content continues to fill the viewport all the way to both edges, filling the entire 27-inch screen and frankly, it is impressive! It appears to me that this site is a fluid or “liquid” page layout.
In closing; although both of these websites are the same in product, graphics, color scheme, and header/footer appearance; designing two websites with separate domain, purpose, and layout makes a lot of sense. A visitor can access both sites from the other, but there is no confusion about the principle use of each separate component. The designers did a fantastic job to prevent one website from becoming too large and cumbersome. In doing this, they created each website to function quite well for its’ own individual goals. If a visitor decides to simply download the application and learn through the information provided on Musescore.org, there is plenty of resources available there, but if they want to dive in deeper and make some friends among the Musescore community, they won’t be bogged down by an unfriendly website.