First impressions of HowToUse.org are quite pleasant. It's clean, shiny, smooth and colorful with nice thumbnail images for each article and no obnoxious advertising to ruin it. Logo is a little simplistic, but still stylish and attractive, thanks to slightly different colors of the words displayed without spaces.

There is one little miss on the homepage; the second article displayed is missing its thumbnail image ("How to Use a Pressure Cooker"). Also, the three dots after each title seem unnecessary.

I have only a few minor additional complaints with regards to site wide elements. The "How to use WI-FI" link in the main menu on the topmost black bar seems a little out of context. I tried refreshing and going to other pages to see if it perhaps changes randomly to another article each time, but it stays fixed. Secondly, given that the main orange menu already displays categories, displaying them again in the categories area of the sidebar might not be necessary. At least it's something to keep in mind if adding anything extra to the sidebar in the future so as to avoid adding clutter.

Article pages look quite good and elegant except the size of the section titles seems a little exaggerated. They might look better if the font size of the h2 tag was reduced to around 18px rather than 27px as it is now. One other thing to be noticed on article pages is that the image that displays as a thumnail in teaser on the category pages don't display, yet they might add a little extra attractiveness to the article itself. I suggest adding the image to float top left or top right to the article content.

Design Rating: 9/10

Focus:

The domain name and site title are meant to convey the purpose of HowToUse.org directly. What is covered by these how to articles is shown in the main orange menu corresponding to categories of content as well as a sample of guides displayed on the homepage. All of this leaves pretty much no doubts and prompts the user to check out the content.

Focus: 10/10

Content:

HowToUse.org offers seven categories of nearly seventy articles most of which (around 50) in the computers category which currently make this site most attractive to those looking to learn how to use something on a computer. Second most filled category is "technology" which also contains a featured tutorial on how to use an iPod Nano. What's good about the articles here is that they're presented in a consistent outline of sections and use list form to present information. Sections are "things you will need", "instructions" and "do's and don'ts". This makes them quite easy to follow.

If there's anything to complain about it may be the necessity to fill out the rest of the categories better, but that's probably going to be done as the site grows.

Content Rating: 10/10

Almost black and white, but with a touch of green, HowToPlant.net's most redeeming feature is its header with a nice, artistic albeit black and white view of a tree in the field with birds in the sky. Nice, and relevant to the topic at hand. The whole site is designed to throw a shadow on its background making it seem like a realistic piece of paper held before you. Another nice tricks involves a main menu that is basically set in the grass. :)

Not bad, but there are things that could be better. There's something fishy about color choices of some elements. The search box lacks its own distinct background so it completely blends with the background of the sidebar. Just a simple white with a dark gray border wont hurt here. Furthermore, background color of info boxes with date and "posted by" info as well as category and comments info is still a little too close to the background color of the page. The simplest way to fix it is to have the border go around the entire box rather than just the top or changing the background color to pure white (#fff) or gray that is darker enough than the background of the page. Alternatively, there doesn't have to be a background color for these areas. Top border may be enough.

Everything else seems pretty decent.

Design Rating: 9/10

Focus:

I almost have nothing to say here. Everything is obvious. From the domain name, title, slogan to the titles of content. HowToPlant.net, indeed, tells you how to plant stuff that can be planted. Judging by categories we are shown how to plant fruits, trees and vegetables, how to make a garden and what are the planting techniques.

Focus Rating: 10/10

Content:

There is one category, "uncategorized", which is empty unless we can count a default wordpress "Hello World" entry. There is also an about page which is a default wordpress theme about page as well. It's probably clear what should be done with these. Remove the empty category from navigation (and the post) and fill up that about page with a nice pitch about the site.

With these little bloopers out of the way we can pay attention to what's great; 50 articles about planting (and I do assume this number will grow) in 5 relevant categories written in an usually focused, relatively brief articles split into nice sections. Articles also sometimes employ a more casual style that appeals to the reader and makes for a more relaxed while still enlightening reading. In fact judging from a sample (such as one about planting onion sets, and yes I'm among those who like onions), it's a pleasure to read (and I can almost smell onions).

Good work content wise, as usual, but with that little flop with the uncategorized category and the default about page which unfortunately tend to detract from the image of professionalism a bit. It's the only thing keeping it from a 10/10.

Content Rating: 9/10