Working on the System Plan

Time flies too quickly for my liking and it has been a while since I put entries to this blog. I have to admit I'm not very diligent on writing in this blog. I guess I'm not used to it and I kept forgetting to write! =(...Oh well I should do better from now on.

The vacation break is almost over already!=( During the break, I've started working on my System Plan. I've got my draft personas and user scenarios. I'm not sure how I'm supposed to do this but I'll find out from the feedback I suppose. I've never built personas before and it's actually quite hard. You really need to put yourself in the user's perspective and try to figure out their goals on coming to your site. Then, think about how would "you" as a user will accomplish that goal. It's sounds simple but it takes quite an imaginative and creative minds to write the narrative stories.

I also started sketching the site map for the website structure. Again, there are a few things I'm not so sure about such as: does site map include the functionality task flow? or would that make the sitemap too complex? If anyone has any advice on this, please let me know.

I have started sketching the visual design layout as mentioned in the previous entry. This will help me to start with the CSS to design the website. The design will no doubt will keep evolving as I'm going through it and learning new things.

I haven't done wireframes yet. Yes, I know! it's weird I should've done the wireframes first before visual design layout! What I meant was I've done the wireframing on my head and sketches on my sketchbook. But only me can see that clearly and know what's going on. So what I need to do it to translate that into a more understandable format so other people can see what I'm planning to do.

There are clearly a lot more things to do before I can finish my System Plan. I'm planning to do them this weekend so I can receive some feedback on Tuesday.

Week 9 - MySQL Database

We have our introduction to the My SQL database tonight. It's a shorter lecture this week and straight on the practical exercise. I didn't find it too difficult only when I need to figure out what syntax I need to use for the queries. We haven't go into too much detail on building and creating data modeling ourselves. There are more lectures on this in the coming weeks.

For once, I finished the practical exercise early!!! YAY!! That's a little bit more encouraging after the last few weeks of what I can probably called a coding meltdown. I have a feeling this is going to be harder later. I hope not.

Start the visual design

Last weekend, I've spent my time to do the visual design of the website. The client I am building the website for has their own logo that the would like to use on the website. I spent time to consider the graphical elements and the layout of the pages.

Overall the website would have several static pages and dynamic pages. The static pages would be pages for about the company information, company profile, etc. The dynamic pages would be layout like a blog entry page. I haven't decided if I'm to incorporate any forms in the website yet. However, while I'm doing the visual design, I decided to have a think about the style for the form page. Basically, I'm trying to finalise all the elements I need for the website. I've created my "desired" design on photshop mock-ups. The next step is to actually build them using CSS.

I have fun designing the visual layout. Once I decided the "look" that I want, everything just flows from there. I hope realising this on the website using CSS is not going to be that difficult. I can be a little pedantic about visual design. It is because that's what I do for a living =). However, I have to be careful that I didn't ignore the functionality of the website as well.

Week 8 - JavaScript

This week is week 9 already!!! I felt like I kept falling behind =(. Last week's lecture on JavaScript wasn't too bad. I manage to do the exercise by doing a little bit of searching on google. I found out that JavaScript interpret your calculation in milliseconds!!! I found that a little bit weird. Anyway, it looks like there are certain amount interactivity you can achieve by using CSS rather than JavaScript. JavaScript probably more useful in more complex interactivity such as google map, validating forms, etc.

I haven't got a chance to look more into JavaScript after the lecture. I think I might have to just dwell in and learn it as I go with the project.

WordPress saga begins...

As mentioned in the previous post, I'm also considering to build my site using WordPress as CMS site. I was a little bit concerned about it at first as I wasn't sure whether it was a good idea to change my original plan half-way through the course. I was worried that I wouldn't have enough time to do the research. However, I realised this is necessary and I just need to do it.

I've spent my weekend to install WordPress on my Mac. I also installed MAMP (Mac Apache MySQL and PHP), so I can set up a web-server locally on my Mac.

Installing the WordPress was pretty straight forward. I followed the video tutorials of how to install WordPress site from Lynda.com. It's really helpful. I played around with it, downloading themes, set up a blog, creating pages. etc. I couldn't believe how many really beautifully designed WordPress themes out there. It's quite exciting!

I planned to create my website using WordPress. It means I would need to modify the themes to suit my design. There are still a lot things I need to learn about WordPress, which I need to go through at some stage so I'm able to build my website project. Luckily, WordPress has extensive documentations and support. There are a lot of resources in WordPress topic. I'm convinced that I would be able to find something that I need amongst those resources. The problem would be to pick which one is suitable for my needs. I think I just need to get on-board and use it. Hopefully, I will learn more about it as I go.

If anyone can point me to a good WordPress tutorials, please let me know. I'd love to hear from you.

Peer Feedback for Macro and Micro Analysis

Last weekend, I've spent my time to review other students draft version of the Macro and Micro Analysis. It was interesting to see what other people are planning to do with their project.

Giving feedback is harder than I thought. It's a good practice. I think because I don't know much about the technology myself to be able to give effective feedback. I felt like I was letting them down by not giving them the kind of feedback I would have been able to do if I've know more about the technology they have chosen. So, apologized to those in the group with me, if my feedback didn't really help you to make your report better.

On that note, I was also put in a group with a student name Shi Chen. However, I couldn't not find his/her Macro and Micro Analysis. Therefore, I wasn't able to give my feedback. If you're Shi Chen, and you are reading this post, please let me know if you still wants me to give you my feedback. I'll try my best.

Finally, thanks to those who gave me their feedback on my Macro and Micro Analysis. It's really helpful. Some of the comments are exactly right and I know I need to refine the areas of how the I would use the technologies together in my project. So thank you again!

Considering CMS

After analysing the client's and user requirements, I'm considering adding some content management systems in the website I'm going to build. The client I'm going to build the website for would like to be able to update articles and content periodically. Therefore, I'm now considering to build the website using wordpress as the content management system. I need to do further research on which one is more suitable for my client's needs. It has to be easy to use and user friendly.

I'm starting to get worried that I may not have enough time to do the research and build the website at the same time. I wish I have realised this earlier, I would've been more prepared.

Anyway, I've updated the draft version of my Macro and Micro Analysis to include WordPress as one technology consideration.

If anyone has any suggestions, please let me know. All your input would be greatly appreciated.