http://www.activia-training.co.uk

The above url has been submitted to DMOZ on three occasions in the last nine months. It's a geniune, informative site, but has never shown up. The category is :
http://dmoz.org/Computers/Education/Commercial_Services/Training_Companies/Desktop/Microsoft/
Where have we gone wrong ????
<img src="/images/icons/confused.gif" alt="" />

Your site is still awaiting review in the category with less than a dozen editors.

You also submitted to http://dmoz.org/Computers/Education/Commercial_Services/Training_Companies/Desktop/ but the editor was put off reviewing your site because your site enlarged/resized itself to take up the entire desktop: meaning that the editor couldn't look at your site and type a review at the same time - therefore they left it in that unreviewed queue where it is awaiting another editor to review it along with around 40 other sites.

Things like "link destination obscuring" (ie hiding the destination of the link when it should appear in the status bar), "desktop hijacking" (taking up the entire editor's desktop - meaning they can't look at your site and the editor window at the same time), "back button hijacking" (stopping the browser's "Back" button from working) and other similar things just make it harder for an editor to review your site. These things WILL NOT stop you from getting a listing, but they MAY make an editor more likely to "skip over" your site for another site that is easier to review.

WOW !
Totally unintentional bad practice - the trouble with getting "good ideas" from books !!!
We'll fix and re-submit.
Thanks for your prompt answer.

There's no need to resubmit, as I said, your site is still awaiting review in both of those queues.

The advice I gave you wasn't "official" ODP advice, more from an "ODP human editor" preference. Personally, if a site takes up my entire screen and the only way I can review it is by ALT-TABBING between windows, then I'll rather skip it and leave it for another editor to review. At the moment I've got 4 browser windows open (sometimes I have 8 or more), but they are all arranged so I can easily flick between them and that they are all visible (at least scrollbar/resize) at the same time - if they were all full-screen well...blarg <img src="/images/icons/frown.gif" alt="" />

It's all about usability - if an editor can't easily "use" your site then they, along with other users (visitors) to your site, will simply "walk away" to sites which are more to their liking.

I don't suppose you've considered becoming an editor yourself have you? At the very least it'll help you to see what people are looking for from a site (i.e. from a "visitors" prospective instead of a webmaster one) - plus, depending on where you edit, you'll get to see some awful site designs (some of them still make me shudder!)

I understand completely and will be changing the site anyway.

Become an editor ? Absolutely yes. Unfortunately I applied but was told there may be a conflict of interest, or some such. If you could help on this, well, I'm listening.

Bless you, username, for fixing that!

(I'm not the editor involved, but I'm sitting here with four carefully sized windows, cycling through edit and forum activities. I HATE it when my desktop gets hosed by some javascript expletive-deleted.)
And isn't there a LOT of bad advice available on the internet today?

So, I applied to become an editor again.
To a category that I know inside out, back to front, but have absolutely no commercial relationship with any more.
Rejected again - no explanation ...
Best to get on with my life instead, eh ?

I have now removed the Javascript which maximised windows and added messages to the status bar.
I have overhauled the site navigation to make it cleaner.
You will see that our site is user-friendly, informative, and we now have on-line skills appraisals for Excel, Word and PowerPoint. More applications will be added, and they will soon be automated and offered as a service to other web sites.
We also submitted to the "Microsoft" sub-category, but since we also cover Sage, Lotus and Personal Development courses, this is no longer appropriate.
I see that the category does not have an editor (as if you weren't busy enough) but would be very grateful if someone could review the site as we have been waiting an extremely long time now.

Many thanks for your attention