I have definitely learned a lot in this class, not only about website design itself but about other internet topics & issues. Something that has resonated with me is what I learned about browsers. As strange as it may sound, whenever I have a problem online the first thing I think about is if it has something to do with the browser I'm using (I used to assume it was the individual website I was using, or my computer having issues). For example, when I use some Ebsco databases in Google Chrome, I can't view full-text PDFs. It gives me an error message. But, if I try the same thing with Internet Explorer, the PDFs work just fine. I might just not have the right applications and such downloaded for Chrome, but first trying with another browser saved me a lot of time and frustration!
At the beginning of this class I thought I was a step ahead just because I knew a little HTML already. Well, after learning XHTML and CSS I now know I wasn't really that far ahead of anyone else in the class! Sure, I recognized the very basic elements and how to use them but everything changed about halfway through the semester and I had to "forget" what I originally knew and start fresh without any of that previously-learned HTML causing me to make assumptions.
At first this was kind of frustrating, but once I went along with it, I started to understand WHY CSS is used and how nice it actually is (while at the same time being so fussy and detail-oriented!)
Even though it was a lot of work and my site ended up being probably more "simple" than websites of the other groups, I am glad I chose to do this project by myself. At the mid-point of the semester when I decided to change the entire look of the site, I was glad I didn't have to get approval from anyone else. Not to mention, I operate on a slightly "non-traditional" schedule (late nights and late mornings) so getting together with group members all semester might have been challenging--and frustrating for the others in the group.
In the end, I'm basically happy with my website. If I were doing this "for real" it would be a site that is constantly updated and revised...Some things I might have included if time & technology allowed would have been podcast and/or video lessons. I've seen some video presentations given at online writing conferences that were great. Not to mention, hearing the instruction might resonate more with young adults than having to read it all.
A few other things from the class that have stuck with me are: the info on cloud computing (I'm glad I understand it now that there are commercials on TV about going "to the cloud"!), and the copyright law info. This is something that will always come to mind when I'm viewing or downloading content online.
I have a huge amount of respect and admiration for professional web designers now that I know how much time, effort, and frustration go into creating websites! You certainly can't learn everything about web design in one semester! (although we got a very good introduction. I can actually hold a conversation about web design with some professional designers now!)
Thursday, December 9, 2010
Thursday, December 2, 2010
Learning Blog 12
Big thing I learned this week: linking a CSS style sheet (rather than writing CSS on each individual page) makes everything SO much easier!
I spent last week updating all my pages to the new style and having the separate CSS file really helped.
This week I'm working on adding images & boxes with writing quotes. Also embedded a YouTube video on one of my pages (cut & pasted code supplied by YouTube). Some things I wanted to do probably aren't going to be possible because they require JavaScript code. Even when a website provides the code, I don't understand it enough to get it to work. (one thing I'd been thinking of was having hover or mouse-over pop up text boxes for vocabulary words. Code for this is very long and confusing!)
Another thing is being able to click on an image to enlarge it without leaving the page it's on. I've seen this online, also, but again, don't understand the JavaScript.
So, with those "interactive" things not being really possible to include in my site, I'm not sure what else to do to make the site interesting...I guess that's my major challenge this week.
One thing that worked out was adding the "submission form" on my Contact page. I took the code directly from the textbook. It won't work, though, because that code requires a link to a .php file (which I don't think I can create...) That might affect the validation of that page.
I do have one question about the submission form: In my "textarea" box, the title of that box ended up beside the bottom border instead of the top, so it looks a little weird.
I spent last week updating all my pages to the new style and having the separate CSS file really helped.
This week I'm working on adding images & boxes with writing quotes. Also embedded a YouTube video on one of my pages (cut & pasted code supplied by YouTube). Some things I wanted to do probably aren't going to be possible because they require JavaScript code. Even when a website provides the code, I don't understand it enough to get it to work. (one thing I'd been thinking of was having hover or mouse-over pop up text boxes for vocabulary words. Code for this is very long and confusing!)
Another thing is being able to click on an image to enlarge it without leaving the page it's on. I've seen this online, also, but again, don't understand the JavaScript.
So, with those "interactive" things not being really possible to include in my site, I'm not sure what else to do to make the site interesting...I guess that's my major challenge this week.
One thing that worked out was adding the "submission form" on my Contact page. I took the code directly from the textbook. It won't work, though, because that code requires a link to a .php file (which I don't think I can create...) That might affect the validation of that page.
I do have one question about the submission form: In my "textarea" box, the title of that box ended up beside the bottom border instead of the top, so it looks a little weird.
Thursday, November 11, 2010
Learning Blog 10
This week I started re-working my website. I'm creating a banner with CSS, instead of just using an image, I am also using "auto" margins and putting the content & sidebar in the middle of the page (I don't remember exactly what that is called). I'm also changing the color scheme :o)
One thing that I was having trouble with is the "allcontent" or "wrapper" div. Because it has a different background color than the "body" (the page margins) I want to be sure it stretches to the bottom of the content or the bottom of the sidebar--whichever is shorter. I don't remember how to do this and I can't find anything in the book. I'll ask about this in class tonight.
The privacy readings are interesting. I was looking at the one about Facebook, too, since I'm an avid Facebook user. My opinion on the subject comes down to: ultimately you are the one responsible for what information you share online. If you don't want anyone to have your phone number, don't include that on your profile information or use a fake number. Don't post anything on a social networking site that you aren't okay with other people knowing. My husband was telling me about a news story this week about someone who got fired for posting on Facebook that she hated her boss. Well, it appears that this person had their privacy settings set so anyone could see their status updates. That's not smart! As a rule, if I don't want some people to know something, but I do want others to know...I use email, not Facebook.
One thing that I was having trouble with is the "allcontent" or "wrapper" div. Because it has a different background color than the "body" (the page margins) I want to be sure it stretches to the bottom of the content or the bottom of the sidebar--whichever is shorter. I don't remember how to do this and I can't find anything in the book. I'll ask about this in class tonight.
The privacy readings are interesting. I was looking at the one about Facebook, too, since I'm an avid Facebook user. My opinion on the subject comes down to: ultimately you are the one responsible for what information you share online. If you don't want anyone to have your phone number, don't include that on your profile information or use a fake number. Don't post anything on a social networking site that you aren't okay with other people knowing. My husband was telling me about a news story this week about someone who got fired for posting on Facebook that she hated her boss. Well, it appears that this person had their privacy settings set so anyone could see their status updates. That's not smart! As a rule, if I don't want some people to know something, but I do want others to know...I use email, not Facebook.
Thursday, November 4, 2010
Learning Blog 9
The issue of copyright is really interesting when you start thinking of everything that is being put online these days. Part of it is scary (people can so easily steal your creative ideas), part of it is reassuring (that once an idea/content is put online, it is copyrighted--at least from what I understood from the readings).
Open access is another one of those issues that has some major pros and major cons. What I'd be most worried about is the incentive to create anything new if you're not going to get paid for it. I understand that a lot of journal articles don't generate income, but scholars will still write articles to aid in their tenure tracks (which, in its way, is a payment of sorts). But for creative writers, it's a different story.
Open access might be good for non-copyright eligible materials (like factual information, per the readings) or materials that would't be paid for anyway. I get that Open Access is one of those things that's supposed to be good for humankind and promote a community of shared ideas. BUT...I'm not sure this would work, realistically. For a lot of people, there'd be no incentive to put the time and effort into research and creation if everyone could access it for free.
But that's just my opinion!! I'm interested to hear what people have to say during the table talk tonight.
For this week's Head First chapter, I was glad to see answers to my questions about my page's footer--about how to position it. I'll have to play around with the sidebar and footer positions to get everything looking right :o)
Open access is another one of those issues that has some major pros and major cons. What I'd be most worried about is the incentive to create anything new if you're not going to get paid for it. I understand that a lot of journal articles don't generate income, but scholars will still write articles to aid in their tenure tracks (which, in its way, is a payment of sorts). But for creative writers, it's a different story.
Open access might be good for non-copyright eligible materials (like factual information, per the readings) or materials that would't be paid for anyway. I get that Open Access is one of those things that's supposed to be good for humankind and promote a community of shared ideas. BUT...I'm not sure this would work, realistically. For a lot of people, there'd be no incentive to put the time and effort into research and creation if everyone could access it for free.
But that's just my opinion!! I'm interested to hear what people have to say during the table talk tonight.
For this week's Head First chapter, I was glad to see answers to my questions about my page's footer--about how to position it. I'll have to play around with the sidebar and footer positions to get everything looking right :o)
Thursday, October 28, 2010
Learning Blog 8
(Note: as I'm writing this I feel a migraine coming on so I might not make it to class tonight.)
The Net Neutrality readings this week were really interesting. I've never quite understood what it all meant but I have a little more of a grasp on the meaning now. "The Skinny on Net Neutrality" (and especially the comments on the article) helped as did the "Nuts and Bolts of Network Neutrality". This PDF did a really good job of explaining the technical aspect. I get what they're talking about with high and low priority packets and delays.
I understand the point of net neutrality but like one of the comments on the "Skinny on Net Neutrality" article pointed out, it's not always best to get government involved in something they might not completely understand. The "Nuts and Bolts" article agrees that regulations shouldn't be made at this time, as competition between service providers seems to be working.
At the same time, I can understand how service providers could implement delays of certain packet types in order to discourage customers from using some applications (the example of internet phone services helped me understand this. I thought of services like Vonage phone and how that works if your internet provider is Comcast--who also has an internet phone service).
There are a lot of good arguments on both sides of the issue so I'm not totally sure what side I'm on yet. Although, this might be an issue where you don't have to be "all or nothing". I don't know...
On the webdesign/textbook chapter side of things for this week, it was kind of a review for me since I studied this chapter when I was creating divs for my website. My site can certainly use a little more style so I'll be working on that in the weeks to come.
Since I might not make it to class tonight I'll go through tonight's class session & lab pages.
The Net Neutrality readings this week were really interesting. I've never quite understood what it all meant but I have a little more of a grasp on the meaning now. "The Skinny on Net Neutrality" (and especially the comments on the article) helped as did the "Nuts and Bolts of Network Neutrality". This PDF did a really good job of explaining the technical aspect. I get what they're talking about with high and low priority packets and delays.
I understand the point of net neutrality but like one of the comments on the "Skinny on Net Neutrality" article pointed out, it's not always best to get government involved in something they might not completely understand. The "Nuts and Bolts" article agrees that regulations shouldn't be made at this time, as competition between service providers seems to be working.
At the same time, I can understand how service providers could implement delays of certain packet types in order to discourage customers from using some applications (the example of internet phone services helped me understand this. I thought of services like Vonage phone and how that works if your internet provider is Comcast--who also has an internet phone service).
There are a lot of good arguments on both sides of the issue so I'm not totally sure what side I'm on yet. Although, this might be an issue where you don't have to be "all or nothing". I don't know...
On the webdesign/textbook chapter side of things for this week, it was kind of a review for me since I studied this chapter when I was creating divs for my website. My site can certainly use a little more style so I'll be working on that in the weeks to come.
Since I might not make it to class tonight I'll go through tonight's class session & lab pages.
Thursday, October 21, 2010
Learning Blog 7
Whew! Done. Finally! What a busy week. Between the website and the table talk I did a LOT of work for this class in the last couple weeks.
I'm ready for the table talk and hoping I don't have TOO much to talk about :)
My "simple" website is basically done. I don't have all of my content done, but enough to meet the simple website requirements for this week. It's pretty time consuming to write up the lessons and exercises...but I'll definitely have everything completed by the final due date! I'm sure some editing and revising will need to be done, as well.
My "ah-ha" moments this week all had to do with CSS. I have to admit, CSS almost out-smarted me a few times, but I managed to get things worked out the way I want them (for now). When I originally planned my site with the left-side navigation bar, I didn't think about how I would get my content into the center of the page without using the old "(center)" tag. So...I flipped through the textbook until I found the chapter on creating "(div)"s. It was certainly a learning experience! But I feel like I have a good intro understanding of how CSS works.
What I learned about webdesign this week...that it is VERY time consuming!! I spent about 4 hours last night making sure all the links on all the pages were valid, then uploading and validating all the pages as XHTML. This is in addition to the 3 or 4 hours I spent on Sunday figuring out how to create my sidebar with CSS.
It's all very detail-oriented work! I have a lot of respect for professional web-designers!
I'm ready for the table talk and hoping I don't have TOO much to talk about :)
My "simple" website is basically done. I don't have all of my content done, but enough to meet the simple website requirements for this week. It's pretty time consuming to write up the lessons and exercises...but I'll definitely have everything completed by the final due date! I'm sure some editing and revising will need to be done, as well.
My "ah-ha" moments this week all had to do with CSS. I have to admit, CSS almost out-smarted me a few times, but I managed to get things worked out the way I want them (for now). When I originally planned my site with the left-side navigation bar, I didn't think about how I would get my content into the center of the page without using the old "(center)" tag. So...I flipped through the textbook until I found the chapter on creating "(div)"s. It was certainly a learning experience! But I feel like I have a good intro understanding of how CSS works.
What I learned about webdesign this week...that it is VERY time consuming!! I spent about 4 hours last night making sure all the links on all the pages were valid, then uploading and validating all the pages as XHTML. This is in addition to the 3 or 4 hours I spent on Sunday figuring out how to create my sidebar with CSS.
It's all very detail-oriented work! I have a lot of respect for professional web-designers!
Thursday, October 14, 2010
Learning Blog 6
Social software, Web 2.0, and Library 2.0 really interesting topics that I've studied for previous classes. I think Web 2.0 technologies are important to libraries, especially as a way of engaging the community in library activities, etc (I did a paper/presentation on Library Teen Services and Social Networking for my Intro class).
I never really thought about 2.0 technologies as a part of journalism so I'm interested to hear what the panel has to say about that tonight. Although, I should have thought about this topic because my husband is always saying that blogs give him more political info than newspaper websites do...
My biggest challenge this week has to do with the Table Talk next week. I emailed my group members yesterday (since no one has said anything to me yet about our presentation...) suggesting what we can talk about (3 different aspects of the digital divide). I have not received a response yet (as of 3:30 Thursday afternoon). I will bring all the articles I collected for the Table Talk with me to class (I have a few more that I emailed to myself that can be accessed in class if needed). As for the abstract...if my group mates haven't thought about it yet, I'll just go ahead and write up the idea I put in the email yesterday.
Other than this, things are going fine with my website. I'm eager to get some CSS on the pages to make them look a little less one-dimensional.
I worked quite a bit on content this week but I don't want to add it to the pages until I figure out how to get everything aligned how I want it on the pages.
I don't see any problems having everything done (with the website, anyway) next week.
I don't know if I really had any "ah-ha" moments this week. Maybe a small one as I read chapter 7 of the text and got the explanation of how XHTML is different from HTML and why we should use it.
I never really thought about 2.0 technologies as a part of journalism so I'm interested to hear what the panel has to say about that tonight. Although, I should have thought about this topic because my husband is always saying that blogs give him more political info than newspaper websites do...
My biggest challenge this week has to do with the Table Talk next week. I emailed my group members yesterday (since no one has said anything to me yet about our presentation...) suggesting what we can talk about (3 different aspects of the digital divide). I have not received a response yet (as of 3:30 Thursday afternoon). I will bring all the articles I collected for the Table Talk with me to class (I have a few more that I emailed to myself that can be accessed in class if needed). As for the abstract...if my group mates haven't thought about it yet, I'll just go ahead and write up the idea I put in the email yesterday.
Other than this, things are going fine with my website. I'm eager to get some CSS on the pages to make them look a little less one-dimensional.
I worked quite a bit on content this week but I don't want to add it to the pages until I figure out how to get everything aligned how I want it on the pages.
I don't see any problems having everything done (with the website, anyway) next week.
I don't know if I really had any "ah-ha" moments this week. Maybe a small one as I read chapter 7 of the text and got the explanation of how XHTML is different from HTML and why we should use it.
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