PRIDE: Tweeks and alterations

The NTU Pride website has been playing on my mind a bit recently due to some little flaws in design and it not being graphically professional enough for my perfective nature!

So, I decided to do a bit of editing!

I've changed, on every page, the navigation menu from individual pictures to a simple text navigation, which has cut back on LOADS and LOADS of code but looks identical. The sub-menus still need converting, but it's starting to come together.

To make the NTU Pride brand more accessible, I decided to create the "badges" branding concept. This is where there are individual "badges" or "tiles" which indicate each sexuality or each different minority. These are refelected through the NTU Pride logo and pick up on each individual colour. This has also enabled me to create continuity throughout the website and printed media, especially as next year's fresher's fayre flyers encorporate this design.

In the realm of cleaning up code, I've also made the background image MUCH smaller and just repeated it on the Y axis, so that it loads much more quickly and can be repeated, meaning that text no longer over runs the end of the website, an issue I've been meaning to change for quite some time.

The auto-image changer has also been on my mind due it the images being quite old and dated, I've decided to remove those images and replace them with the "badges" idea to maintain continuity and it also gives the space to promote that NTU Pride is now officially sponsored by Propaganda.

To come: redesign of the committee section and ideas to cut down text.

LUCY: Website tweeks and development

I have gone through and tweeked various things throughout Lucy's website and added in a more secure login system to prevent hacking of the blog and gig updates etc.

Fixed various design flaws - including too much inconsistancy between headings and colours etc. Things are a lot more structured and userfriendly now, including headings, possitioning and other TINY little things in the code that usually wouldn't go noticed, but make a massive difference to the professional quality such as padding etc.

I've also made the add, edit and delete forms for the blog and gigs MUCH more user friendly by changing the text boxes to drop down menus.

You can now upload photos up the 3MB and the system will automatically downsize it to fit within the constraints of the website WITHOUT distortion, however the file size will remain the same.

The login procedure is now MUCH more secure. People can't edit the blog or gigs by accessing the individual pages, they MUST log in. (Which was previously a flaw in the last log in design)

I've added in a random image selecter on the home page so that it will randomly choose an image to display which is a photo of Lucy and a comment that someone has said about her. (Refresh the home page to see this working)

The alignment of the text is now justified so that it spreads evenly accross the page. (Small minor change, big difference!)

And finally, the MP3 player begins playing the first track when you load up each page.

I'm handing in my work on Thursday and doing my presentation on Friday... I think we're almost finished!!

I've talked to my brother about getting the website online at Lucy's own domain, and I hope to get that online by the end of March. Fingers crossed!

LUCY: Website complete!

Lucy's website has been one of the most exciting, rewarding and challenging projects I've worked on to date.

Not only has it been a great chance for me to express myself and my skills, it's also been great to create a website for someone I care a lot about and deliver something of high quality to the end user.

I've managed to create 2 flash MP3 players, video content, a banner, a gallery and an interactive side bar with links to twitter, facebook and myspace. Along side this, I've developed two databases where Lucy can update her own personal blog and a space where she can post up all her upcoming gigs. Not only can she do this, but she can also edit and delete every post and add a photograph alongside her blog entries - quite a brilliant accessory to keep herself and her fans up-to-date on her progress.

I've also included a Twitter feed onto her home page where fans can access the site and get an instant update without having to access her blog first.

This is the first website I've created which uses Flash AND PHP, MySql together. They have worked very well together and their seamless interaction benefits are going to be very beneficial to Lucy's promotion.

Overall, I'm overly happy with how this project has gone and I'd rate it the best website I've made, so far.

The next step is to create the login page and get Lucy to check over it all to make sure everything is how she wants it.

http://www.kidinacandystore.co.uk/lucyward/index.html