Week 5 - The Project Timeline

A few days ago, I came up with the idea to embed some of my project deliverables into these blog posts. The idea is that my Honors Chair can view some of these planning documents as I go and not have to wait until the project's build phase to see them.

I'm a little concerned with my Honors work being "out there." It's not that I feel shy about others seeing it, even though these are still early days yet. It's because I don't want anyone stealing, using, taking credit for my work for their own purposes. One way to prevent that is to make this blog private and assign viewing permission via specific email addresses. This would require people to log in. I'll have to think about whether that extra step is worth it.

In the meantime, here is one of my workhorse documents, the Timeline. I'll be updating and modifying the Timeline throughout the duration of this project, but it gives me an overall picture of what I will do, how long it will take me, and the amount of work remaining.

This timeline was created with Microsoft Excel spreadsheet, and meant to be viewed horizontally. I saved the file as a .pdf which changed the layout a bit. I'll have to do some research to see if saving documents as a .pdf protects the content in any way.

Week 4 - Plan, Plan, and More Planning

I am finally starting to see the shape of this project. I didn't realize the amount of planning that goes into a new website--before any design or coding even begins.

Thanks to the reading I did last week, I was able to complete a Design Document and a rather lengthy Project Plan, both with Microsoft Word.

The Design Document provided a brief audience analysis, project scope and purpose, and some high- and mid-level goals for the project.

Among other things, creating the Project Plan enabled me to define the scope of the project, establish a list of deliverables, and begin creating some tools I'll use throughout the project, like a timeline and a content inventory log. I will use these last two continuously during the project to keep on schedule and to keep tight control of the content before it has a chance to get out of control (where is that image stored, what is it called, where is it used in the website?)

The Project Plan required me to think about site architecture, which are two words I've never used together before, and site design. As I begin the design phase of the project next week, I will be able to fill in more of this data on the Project Plan. The omissions to these sections, now, reflect my inexperience with website design and development, but it'll get completed soon enough in the next few weeks.

Both the Project Plan and the Design Document will eventually end up on the Development page of the website, but sometime next week I will try to figure out how to add these documents to this blog for quick reference.

Week 3 - A Week of Reading

I devoted this week to reading. I have never created a website before, so there was a lot of fundamentals I needed to learn--and quick. Here are a few of them.

Sitemap: A sitemap is created early in the planning process. It is a map of every page, category, and subcategory in the website. They are used to inform search engines about the pages on the site available for crawling. Though I am not hoping this project will be "found" by search engines, a sitemap is a good tool to use to plan and build the inter-connectivity within the site.
Source: http://www.sitemaps.org/

Wireframes: A wireframe is a guide to the site structure and are the foundation on which to build. They are created after sitemaps and can be made with Microsoft Visio, or with any number of free wireframe creation tools. Wireframes are black and white layouts of boxes and labels that specify size and placement of page elements, site features, logos, and navigation; however, they are devoid of color, fonts, graphics or other design elements.
Source: http://www.orbitmedia.com/blog/7-reasons-to-wireframe

And most importantly...

Project Management and Project Planning: This took up a huge part of my week. I have no prior experience with project planning. I've had the luxury of structure provided to me in all my previous classes, including my internship. This is the first project that I am working independently and without the framework of a set timeline or syllabus. My only deadline is "finish before graduation--or I won't graduate!" I know I'll have other deadlines and milestones as the project gets further underway, but reading about project planning has provided me with valuable tools and concepts to structure this project, get my ducks in a row, consider all factors, and establish a timeline for the semester.
Source: A Practical Guide to Managing Web Projects by Breandan Knowlton

Week 2 - Getting Started

For this project, I am creating an interactive, multimedia website. I'll use Adobe Dreamweaver, an HTML editor, to create the site and various other applications to take it from boring to awesome!

Before I could play with the fun stuff, like backgrounds and images, I spent the past few weeks learning Dreamweaver. I watched a over 13 hours of training and tutorial videos. Let me just say, this material fairly dry and should be absorbed in small chunks, but by the time the semester is over, I should be a Dreamweaver pro!

There's a bunch of design elements I hope to incorporate. A rotating carousel on the font page would add visual interest, some maps with roll-over spots are definitely on the list, and some little Flash extras throughout the site could add some "movement" here and there.

I found some websites that gave me inspiration. Here are a few that are very fun, though I can't say this project will grow up to be anything like them:

http://www.nike.com/jumpman23/aj2012/ (I like the way things "move" in this site, sideways, diagonally, vertically)
http://www.kinetic.com.sg/main.html (I like how key little bits and bobs jiggle about on their own)
http://www.darc.ro/minichallenge/ (fun to watch)
http://www.moma.org/interactives/exhibitions/2012/centuryofthechild/#/ (beautiful, bright, clean)