MAJOR update to the boards

Round Nine

Seconds into the new round, Destryer has Bruiser on the ropes. A left, a right, an uppercut but wait, what's this? Whacker White appears from the ringside seats and jumps to the rescue!

The Worm is flung aside and Whacker steps between the two Titans! The Worm can do nothing - he is at the mercy of these three giants. The crowd are roaring. Warren doesn't know what to do!

But no! Rather than call a time out Destroyer launches a simultaneous flurry of left and righ jabs at BOTH the pugilist veterans! This is awesome! Seven replies in quick succession see Bruiser and Whacker reeling. Destroyer is on top now but will it last....

Disaster - while concentrating on opeing Bruisers eye even more, Destroyer fails to see an approaching Whacker who lands one a mighty fist on firmly on the Destroyer's chin. The crowd are aghast. What will the Worm do? Lord Queensbury must be trurning in his grave...

Whacker sees Destroyer falter. Ohhh there's the killer punch. Whacker is on fire and Destroyer is grasping for the ropes. A left jab, a right hook, a pole driver to the solar plexus... Destroyer is finished....

You can hear a pin drop. The Worm steps in... 10, 9, 8...

Will Destroyer recover from this? Will Bruiser and Whacker take the championship belt? Will a tag partner come to Destroyer's rescue...

Watch this space....

Will Destroyer recover from this? Will Bruiser and Whacker take the championship belt? Will a tag partner come to Destroyer's rescue...

Watch this space....

I think hes enjoying writing this commentary a bit too much

Al,

Once again you just cannot see past the technical specifications of the site, you're still stuck on css vs. tables debate. For the last time, I have no difficulty with CSS, but to say they have no drawbacks whatsoever is just false. I am speaking from experience, I have used both tables and CSS to create websites. From a DESIGNERS point of view CSS is not as easy to work with, precisely because the WHYISWYG editors have not caught up with the technology. It is FAR easier for a designer to tweak a tables based design. Using CSS is sometimes like using a command line interface to use photoshop. Does that mean we should abandon CSS? No. Does it mean CSS has an impact on the sites design? Yes. For example- box borders. The CSS genius who decided to include a number of stock border styles- dashed lines, dots, solid border- was actually limiting the design scope- not enhancing it.

As for those companies that are still using tables- it really is a bit naive to assume it's because they are stuck in the dark ages. They do it because in the real world projects are time bound and a number of disciplines are involved in the design process.

And for the last time Al, in your quest to reach personal programming nirvana you have completely missed my point. The first thing you define is not the technical specifications- it is the human ones. It seems quite clear to me it is technology driving this project. My very first post was constructive- it was a gentle reminder to forget about the technology for a while. I was told I was patronizing.

So again you are ascerting that no thought has gone into the design

I am certainly ascerting that not enough thought has gone into the design or the process for that matter. Unless the pair of you are hiding your expansive design knowledge I think it is unlikely you are even aware of all the factors. But you can still write technical specifictions in stone? Without understanding the entire scope? Now I wouldn't normally make such disingenuous comments but I'm getting quite sick of your condescending tone. I won't be packing the crayola away just yet.

Al, you have your blinkers on I'm afraid. You are a proficient coder, no doubt, but I have used every web tool available including CSS layouts. But I see the bigger picture. I see why people use Dreamweaver and Flash. I work with web programmers all the time and we all use similar methodology and products to bring the best possible experience to the user. The technology is just a tool. I'm sorry Al, but it is clear to me you have little web experience beyond web based applications, and just about zero experience working with other disciplines. The methodology you describe is wrong, wrong, wrong:

if you want a design discussion then keep it to 'thats the wrong colour', 'move block X to the other side of the screen its to cluttered'

Out of your depth from this statement onwards. A profound lack of understanding of web design methodology.

Bart, for the record this does not mean I don't appreciate the time and effort you put in. As for constructive contribution, I have offered to help out time and time again. I know when I'm out of my depth- heavy hand coding PHP, ASP or others. I'm quite comfortable with CSS, but it is not the holy grail. And it was not my original point. I do understand where you are coming from using CSS.

[/quote]

Once again you just cannot see past the technical specifications of the site...

And once again you manage to send a long tirade against other peoples abilities without a single constructive point about how a site can be designed better.

So for the last time, if you want to continue this discussion then please focus on what you claim to know about and enlighten us on how the site should look and feel, or be designed, or whatever it is that you are trying to make a point about. All you are doing at the moment is patronizing and practially insulting others for considering maintainability of the site _as well as_ the design.

Hmmm, it's worse than I feared in that case. I'll try to address them one by one...

Firstly, form and function are joined at the hip. The 'real' program which runs on the server has to interact with a real human being at some point. Guess what? Humans like to use attractive programs. And there are other very good reasons. Good GUI design can lead a persons eye to the information they require. It makes text easier to read (correct typography, justification, contrast of text on background, kerning) Navigation easier to use (tactile effect of clearly defined buttons, colour coding for weighting, correct graphical grid for eye to process information) and besides this can alter somebodies psychological humour (Did you know the colours Mc donalds employs in their interior design are designed to make you feel uncomfortable after 20mins?). It enhances the users experience and increases the chance of them using and returning to the site.
There are reasons companies spend a lot of money on corporate identity. Make no mistake, IFAS needs to consider these things- the site is not merely an information portall, it represents the organizations public face. I assume IFAS wants to expand it's membership and it's message, maybe even apply for funding some day. These days the first port of call for finding out about something is the web. A professional, friendly face on the site reflects on the organization. Are you still sure you have thought this through? This is the tip of the iceberg. There are methodologies and metrics that can help determine the impact of these factors.

All this I know, none of this is in any way in-compatibel with my design decisions.

now the others...

1) Why? A site can be a combination of a brochure and an information portall. Some pages need to change regularly, some dont. The ones that don't, well you can spend a little more time on the graphic design there.

A site should have a uniform design through out, otherwise it looses all identity, there is no point in having one design for one page and a different design for antoher!

2) There is no magic template that will cover all eventualities. Some pages by necessity will have to break the mold.

I'm not seeing your point here at all. Ever page will have the same basic style and if someting needs a "special case" that can be exceptionally easily done in CSS by importing second CSS file for just the exception that adds to the basic style. That is common practice even on this site ATM. There is one global style sheet that all pages use and then one jsut for the file section that augments the basic to give the extra styleing needed for the files.

I note no point 3 so I'll take that as a victory!

4) Even pages that appear to be heavy on graphics can be designed in an efficient manner. Images can be cached. No need to kill the whole look and feel of the site just because you feel it should be 5kb.

But no need for fluff either! Elegant designs use graphics efficiently and in such a way as to get maximum effect with minimum graphics.

6) Form and function are a marriage, there is even a place for eye candy. For example, sometimes an animation or a picture can explain something far easier than 1000 words.

That's content not site-wide design!

7) Ah, the old proprietary software debate... I don't think it is unreasonable to assume that there will always be a few professional web designers on the boards, and it's not unusual for those designers to have the industry standard software. Plus this completely rules Photoshop and Flash out- powerful tools when used appropriately. For graphics, nothing competes with photoshop. In fact it is possible that you are preventing many people who can use the industry standard software, but who aren't great with the code or free non industry programs from helping out.

I am a proffessional, I am the main maintainer of this site, I am the person who has to manage it and I do not own such software. I am not alone in that. I believe in openess and open formats. As long as I'm the webmaster that is just the way it will be. I'm not big on putting my foto down but this is one isntance where I do. I put vast quantities of my precious time into this site for free and without question or expecting any sort of pat on the back. The only thing I ask is that this site be run in an open and standards compliant way.

Too many rules too soon. BMW, Coke and other major brands used to write branding manuals- sets of rules designers had to follow for a consistent image. After 10 years of hardship they learned to throw the manual away- the result was more creative branding and new frontiers. The rules had become a dead weight.

It's not too many rules too soon! This is version 3 of this site. I have learned a lot from versions 1 and 2 and that is what has informed these decisiosn. This is not a blue skies project, it is a continuation of an existing project where time is not in infinite supply. I know this site like the back of my hand. I have been maintinting it for years at this stage and I am also intimately familair with the technologies it uses and with where I see it going in the future. All that has fed into these decisions. It is now time to stop chaning the specs and start DOING!

Bart.

Honestly you go away and have a migrane for a few hours and this happens

Bart what you have suggested out looks good.

I have only one suggestions, and its probably not one you have time for.
There should be an opendocument template for users wishing to publish documentation on the site. Rather than, for example, the observing cert page having some text that we wrote in an editor, it should be able to be written in openoffice using a site template. This would force things like, title, description, authors, abstract, main content, etc. to be correctly marked up and displayed on the website.

This is a lot of work, and really falls in the realm of a CMS. But perhaps its something to consider long term to enable and encourage content submission to the site.

Cheers,
~Al

Actaully, a CMS is exactly where I see this site going!