Greg Edwards has posted an interesting piece of research, tracking where people actually look on a couple of different CSS Zen Garden designs.
It's a good comparison, because the content is exactly the same - it's just has different visual treatment.
And the first thing I noticed is that the wider column on the original design was read less than the narrower column on design 145. Is this a convincing argument for fixed width designs? I think it's hard to ignore - it will be interesting to see the results of future comparisons!
Thursday, March 10, 2005
Thursday, March 3, 2005
Website Project Management Part 2 : Principles
(If you haven't already - see Part One - An Introduction to Project Management)
When dealing with project management for website development, there are really on two things to juggle.
Sounds simple, right?
Tasks
Tasks are fairly obvious. They are the things you have to do. I have found it useful to group your tasks into phases - it helps to get a better overview of where you are (instead of looking at a great long list of unrelated tasks) and it's also easier to set up a template of standard tasks that you then simply customise for each job. We generally use the following phases:
Tasks near the beginning and end of a website project tend to be repeated, so make a template out of these at least. And look for the things that you generally do in the middle phases, and write these down as well. You can easily customise your list if the individual project warrants it.
Once we have our list of tasks together, we now need to make them happen!
Resources
In project management, resources can be anything from people to equipment to buildings or meeting rooms - anything you need to get the tasks done. Relating back to web design, we're really only talking about people, or manhours more specifically. Time. If you have 80 hours of tasks to be done, and George has 20 available hours this week and Mildred has 15, it ain't going to get finished this week!
Another point to consider - people aren't productive 100% of the time. We're not robots. So if you employ someone for 38 hours per week, you're wasting your time allocating them 38 hours worth of tasks. Never going to happen. I work on allocating 4 hours out of every 5. If they happen to get finished earlier than expects, then good! Get a head start on tomorrow's work. But you need to allow time to get coffee, visit the loo, chat about the movie you saw on the weekend or whatever.
Okay, that's enough theory. Next installment we'll start getting our hands dirty!
When dealing with project management for website development, there are really on two things to juggle.
- Tasks
- Resources
Sounds simple, right?
Tasks
Tasks are fairly obvious. They are the things you have to do. I have found it useful to group your tasks into phases - it helps to get a better overview of where you are (instead of looking at a great long list of unrelated tasks) and it's also easier to set up a template of standard tasks that you then simply customise for each job. We generally use the following phases:
- Planning
- Content gathering and editing
- Design
- Programming
- Construction/Assembly
- Testing
- Post Launch
Tasks near the beginning and end of a website project tend to be repeated, so make a template out of these at least. And look for the things that you generally do in the middle phases, and write these down as well. You can easily customise your list if the individual project warrants it.
Once we have our list of tasks together, we now need to make them happen!
Resources
In project management, resources can be anything from people to equipment to buildings or meeting rooms - anything you need to get the tasks done. Relating back to web design, we're really only talking about people, or manhours more specifically. Time. If you have 80 hours of tasks to be done, and George has 20 available hours this week and Mildred has 15, it ain't going to get finished this week!
Another point to consider - people aren't productive 100% of the time. We're not robots. So if you employ someone for 38 hours per week, you're wasting your time allocating them 38 hours worth of tasks. Never going to happen. I work on allocating 4 hours out of every 5. If they happen to get finished earlier than expects, then good! Get a head start on tomorrow's work. But you need to allow time to get coffee, visit the loo, chat about the movie you saw on the weekend or whatever.
Okay, that's enough theory. Next installment we'll start getting our hands dirty!
A New Office
We've been struggling with this for some time now, but the time has finally come - we're moving to a new, real, office!
After 8 years of home-based business, we've just outgrown it. So we're moving from 30sqm to 150sqm. Take over the lease on April Fool's Day, of all things!
It's funny looking at the empty room, then imagining where all the desks will go, the printer, the vinyl cutter, the server. And the more we look at it, the smaller the room gets!
Here we've got Janelle, Yolinda and Michael figuring out where everything will go. The reception area is behind them, and the lunchroom is behing the camera. New carpets are being laid, the paint is fairly new, so it's all good.
We didn't really want to have to move into a daggy office, and this is somewhere we will feel quite comfortable inviting clients to come and see us.
So we have some data cables to sort out, a new phone system to install, ADSL to connect, and about 4 weeks to get everything ready. Then there's insurances of course.
Have I forgotten anything? Probably! ;)
After 8 years of home-based business, we've just outgrown it. So we're moving from 30sqm to 150sqm. Take over the lease on April Fool's Day, of all things!
It's funny looking at the empty room, then imagining where all the desks will go, the printer, the vinyl cutter, the server. And the more we look at it, the smaller the room gets!
Here we've got Janelle, Yolinda and Michael figuring out where everything will go. The reception area is behind them, and the lunchroom is behing the camera. New carpets are being laid, the paint is fairly new, so it's all good. We didn't really want to have to move into a daggy office, and this is somewhere we will feel quite comfortable inviting clients to come and see us.
So we have some data cables to sort out, a new phone system to install, ADSL to connect, and about 4 weeks to get everything ready. Then there's insurances of course.
Have I forgotten anything? Probably! ;)
Thursday, February 10, 2005
Sorting HTML Tables
En excellent little piece of javascript courtesy of Stuart Langridge that enables users to sort the data in an HTML table by clicking on the headers. No reloading of pages or anything - it all happens straight away.
Easy to implement, unobtrusive... Very nice.
Easy to implement, unobtrusive... Very nice.
PageRank Plugin for Firefox
Quirk have released an extention for Firefox that shows you the Google PageRank of every page you visit.
"Big deal," you might say, "I've already got one!"
So did I, but this new one offers a few extra features:
Handy tool - get it here.
"Big deal," you might say, "I've already got one!"
So did I, but this new one offers a few extra features:
- It also shows you the Alexa rank (not that that means much, but it's there anyway)
- You can also display backlinks and indexed pages for Google, Yahoo and MSN. That's handy.
- It is also customisable - you can shoose it's location as well as what it shows you.
Handy tool - get it here.
Saturday, February 5, 2005
Don't Be All Things To All People
John Allsopp's latest article, Tipping Firefox Across the Chasm covers some very good ground that hopefully will be read by those at Mozilla.
He comments that:
Many of us have already switched to Firefox, and if you're like me, you'll never go back. But what about the average Joe?
I think increased Firefox takeup among the mainstream really needs a positive, specific message. Hopefully Mozilla will take John's advice on board!
He comments that:
If I had any advice for the Mozilla Foundation when it came to marketing Firefox it would be that they really separate out the two very distinct groups of user they currently focus on - visionary early adopters, and the mainstream - rather than lumping them together when promoting the application.
Visionaries largely want complicated, complicating (and wonderful) stuff like plugins, toolbars and the like. The appeal to mainstream users of Firefox is almost the opposite - simplicity, security, ease of use, and maybe even a little fun. A bowser that "just works". Taking back the web. There you go Mozilla, you can have that one.
Many of us have already switched to Firefox, and if you're like me, you'll never go back. But what about the average Joe?
I think increased Firefox takeup among the mainstream really needs a positive, specific message. Hopefully Mozilla will take John's advice on board!
Monday, January 31, 2005
Misconceptions About Teenage Visitors
The stereotypical teenager is a myth, according to Jakob Neilsen's latest Alertbox.
According to his research, teenagers in general are not all the wizz-kids they are portrayed as. So rather than teenagers being able to use any website thrown at them, many found websites more difficult to use than adults, due to poorer reading skills and less patience.
Assessing your website's usability on "the average user" is a dangerous game (as there is no such thing), but if you're going to generalise it's handy to know some researched facts about your potential audience rather than basing your decisions on misconsceptions.
The internet wasn't invented when I was a teenager, and my kids aren't that old yet - so I have nothink to test these findings on... So any teenagers reading this: What do you think?
According to his research, teenagers in general are not all the wizz-kids they are portrayed as. So rather than teenagers being able to use any website thrown at them, many found websites more difficult to use than adults, due to poorer reading skills and less patience.
Assessing your website's usability on "the average user" is a dangerous game (as there is no such thing), but if you're going to generalise it's handy to know some researched facts about your potential audience rather than basing your decisions on misconsceptions.
The internet wasn't invented when I was a teenager, and my kids aren't that old yet - so I have nothink to test these findings on... So any teenagers reading this: What do you think?
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