Tuoi Nguyen MIST 5990 BLOG

Thursday, April 24, 2008

Overview of Directed Study 5990

Information Architecture:

After my research of information architecture, I learned that this information architect plays an important role in the development of the organization development process.
One of the main functions architecture deals with supporting the development of interfaces that facilitates the flow of useful and relevant information to the user.
IA deals with the structuring, the relation, the connectivity, the consistency, and logical organization of the website.
Also, IA process is a sequential process. IA is very similar to waterfall prototype. One step at a time but IA process can be altered after proceeding to a new phase.

Site Map

A site map is the first representation IA uses to define how the website connects. I feel that the sitemap is very helpful with the understanding of the linking between pages. It also simplifies the web designer life. It allows the designer to see which pages are needed and which can be condensed or deleted. Sitemap facilitates the navigation structure of a site

Color and Background

Website colors and layouts are very important to the user perception. Whether the website is too distracting or inviting all depends on the color combination.
The layout and background designs must be united and congruent within the page.
Achieving unity in web designing can be done in many ways.

Paper Prototyping

A variation of usability testing where representative users perform realistic tasks by interacting with a paper version of the computer interface
The interface is manipulated by manipulator (supposedly acting like computer brain)
Manipulator does not explain how the interface intended to work

Purpose: To get quick feedback from users while design is still on progress.

· Hand-drawn or printed-out screen shots

Benefits:

· Usability Issues: aid in the findings of confusing concepts, poor terminology, layout problems, lack of feedback, etc.

· Missing functional requirements: aid with understanding the user needs that the development team is not aware of è understanding the roots of user’s needs

· Preference for one design alternative : Finding which best alternative function is best fit the user’s expectation

· Priorities: Keep the development team on the same pace what resources are needed and what are not

· Save money: Identify some risks and allow for mitigation

· Improve User experience: most important factors of building a website è building a workable website

Friday, April 11, 2008

Dreamweaver Notes:

What is Dreamweaver?

· Coding and development tool

· Integrated with Adobe Photoshop CS3 applications

· Has built-in file transfer capabilities between a server and local machine, reusable objects

Important step before creating the webpages.

Defining the Site:

· It is important to define where the root folder is located. It recognizes all of the site files that will be used for the webpage so that images or features will be broken or not functioning properly.

· All files must be saved in one folder for accessibility.

Wednesday, March 26, 2008

Wireframe continue.....

I believe that I have almost come to the end of the wireframe process. Images from these wireframe can be modified later, but for now images from these serve as visual aid purposes. These images will be substituted with well-designed images.