As you will know my name is Kamran Akhtar.
I am 17 years of age and doing an IT course. I will be sending blogs to other members of this weblog group about their website designs or other social matters.
I have completed my first year of my IT course and gained extremely a lot of experience, skills and distinctions from this year. The units that I have studied in the first year are such as: -
1. Language and communication
2. Business Information System
3. Computer System
4. Database Management System
5. System Analysis
6. Website Management
7. Communication and Networks
8. Software Applications
I am half way through the second year and doing the system support stream and learning all sorts of hardware, software and networks.
I will be mainly talking about the Website Development unit - uploading blogs such as what I have done during the website development lessons and commenting on the weaknesses etc. That's why I have created this blog to record the outcomes and tasks.
In the last two lessons we where given a brief introduction to website development unit in the first lesson and discussing what we are going to do in other next few lessons. The second lesson we have started to learn and create tables and learn all sorts of methods we can do in the table. This was the enjoyable lesson to learn tables, but I already knew all of this and html coding in my previous school course. I have also in that lesson started doing and uploading blogs about this unit. During the first lesson we have created our own homepage using html showing a image, what our first name letters stand for and a link to the next page and a favorite website link.
I have been given a case study to research, design and create a multi-link website for a client to meet their needs. The case study is shown below and I have started doing the research and design of the website. I have talked and described about the tasks to be done during the research design stage - shown below.
Background
Web Man Enterprises
Web Man Enterprises is an online company that specialises in web design from development and design to evaluating and marketing. You are currently employed within the company as a designer and promoter of web projects. Most of the staff within the company are employed on a temporary basis as freelancers who carry out and complete jobs acquired by Web Man Enterprises. These jobs are acquired through a bidding system where a job is posted and companies or freelancers bid on the job and provide their credentials and their solutions to the requirements given. The winning bidder then receives the job.
Case Study – Chicken Inn
The following job has been posted on the ‘Freelance For Money’ website:
The Chicken Inn is a popular local restaurant and hotel. They have decided that they want to have a web presence so that customers can primarily view their menu online, place room bookings online and find information on how to find the Chicken Inn. These are the essential requirements of the website, but the business is open to any other suggestions of information that could be provided on the website.
They have no specific designs, layout or colour requirements for the website and are open to all suggestions for improving the basic design and initial requirements. They have done a little research by looking at other restaurants that have an online presence and would ideally like something very similar, but unique to their needs to make them stand out from the crowd.
They would like you to create a template design for the website which would include designs for the menu, booking and how to find pages.
Task 1 – Ass1 and Ass3
I have researched on number of restaurant and hotels sites and given screenshots with its links. The file is attached below: -
The image below shows the logo of the Chicken Inn website that was created by me using graphics package as shown below: -
Using your research from task 1, design a website for the ‘Chicken Inn’ case study. This must include a storyboard, a mood board and a navigation diagram.
File attached below shows the storyboard (first draft) for chicken inn website and also the final copy of story board with implemented design and features for chicken inn website: -
Screenshot shows the first development of the storyboard and then the file link for the final storyboard:-
First draft -
I have implemented my original storyboard with new design and features shown above.(see attached two files.
Screenshot below shows the mood board: -
File attached below shows the mood board file for restaurant and hotel: -
Mood board for restaurant
Mood board for hotel
File attached below shows the navigation map for the chicken in website: -
Screenshot below shows the navigation map diagram: -
Task 1 and 2 – Ass2 and Ass3
FTP uploading -
File and folder structure screenshot is shown below with file attached: -
Task 2 – Ass2
Write an entry in your blog describing any problems you had with uploading your web site and files to a host and evaluate the final product?
The problems that I had with uploading my web site and files to a host where that when I have uploaded the webs site and files i was unable to The problems that I had with uploading my web site and files to a host are that I was unable to see my home page via my URL address and some of my images especially the logo. The first problem was due to me not naming the home page to index as the host was unable to access and read the home page website, so this problem was solved by renaming my home page - chicken inn home to index.html. The second problem was due to corrupted images files that I have uploaded - so this was solved by uploading the new images again but one at a time.
Overall, the final product of uploading the web site and files was straight forward and superb as it uploads the files as quick as possible using the FTP manager via the host server.
Task 3 – Ass2
The file attachment shows the updated security issuses and the chosen host below: -
Write an entry in your blog describing why you chose the web server and associated resources that you used for uploading your website?
There are number of benefits why I have chosen a web server and associated resources that I have used for uploading my website and files. The existing web server that I am all ready using is the 100webspace. The benefit of why I have chosen this is because I have used this web server previously for Website Management unit last year. Also, the other benefit is because it provides you with a free web host and includes fantastic colorful resources that you can access and use to upload your website. This web server is easy to use as it consists of GUI; it is colorful - easy to navigate – as the icons or tools are placed in columns and rows (shown in the image below). The associated resources that I have used include things such as FTP Manager, Email Manager, File Manager and much more. Also, the web server is password protected where it does not allows anyone to mess with your web files. The screenshot below shows the web server with its associated resources.
Explain what security issues and copyright issues are associated with using a web server?
It is important that only authorized users be able to add, change or delete Web content. Some components, such as Java applets and scripts, can present security risks. Another security risk occurs when Web users connect to a database to access information.
When using web server there are number of issues regarding copyright. These are that it is against the law not to copy data i.e. images or even text from another source without the consent permission of the author/publisher. Unless, if you are creating WebPages that containing images etc, then you should get permission from the publisher/author before using it or stating in the website - why you are using these images/data etc. - i.e. due to coursework.
Task 1 – Ass4
Review the website you have produced, and assess how closely the site matches those that you gathered research for in the first assessment and whether it meets the client need? Post your review on your blog.
As you can see I have designed and created a multi-linked website consisting of home page, menu, table bookings, hotel bookings, location map and contact us for Chicken Inn website by using the research gathered from other web pages and the from the case study - especially restaurant and hotel websites.
From the research gathered and the design of the Chicken Inn website - it closely matches the gathered research. (See the review researched document for more information). These are such as the background color from other researched Chicken restaurants/hotels is used in my website as it makes the atmosphere warm and blinds with my Chicken website. Also, I have slightly used the layout but alternating it using least four other researched websites.
Overall, I have been given the task to design a Chicken Inn website to meet the client requirement needs shown in the case study.
My overall conclusion is that it meets the client needs in number of ways, such as the client needs are outline below are met by my researched gathered, design and planning of the website and the final created website.
Menu
Table booking
Hotel booking
Contact detail
All of these needs have been met to the standard required - see the website URL. For example, they would like to have a menu list, table booking and hotel booking form and contact details so customers can make bookings and view menu etc. So the website I have created, planned and designed meets the standard of what the client wants and has been achieved by me to make the website to stand out from the crowd.
Task 2 – Ass4
Write a final evaluation of your website and post it on your blog. This must
Consider the following:
Which tasks were easy
Which tasks were harder
What could be done to improve the work if the tasks were repeated
How effective were the website plans in helping to produce the site
The tasks that were easy were creating the WebPages and linking them together. This is because you had the choice of either using FrontPage or html coding. I have mostly used html as well as FrontPage – this gave me a lot of practice in creating multi-link WebPages as I have done this kind of task previously in unit website management. Also, the other task that was easy for me was the research of the planning – this gave me ideas and tips on what layout I can design, what to include and what links they have and how these features can help me in designing the website. However, time to time my design has been changed with implemented features etc to allow my website to be attractive and to show the type of atmosphere the website is in. I have researched on numerous sites, made notes on what was good and bad i.e. the layout, color etc and used these notes and my ideas and I have created my website design.
The most difficult tasks were when uploading the web and files to a web server. First of all I had problems when the server did not allow me to upload large chunks of files at the same time as the server stop responding. Also, one or two of my images did not appear on the website home page when it was uploaded. This was due to corrupt image file. This problem was solved by re-uploading the images.
Also, the final most difficult task was when doing the design of the website. I had no clue on what design to do for my website case study. However, the main task when designing and creating a website is doing research on number of restaurant and hotel sites. This helped me and gave me some ideas on what design I can do to meet the clients needs defined in the case study. I have used my research from numerous sites and used their ideas and have designed a storyboard on how the website will look and also using this research gathered and design I have created a mood board and navigation map. Mood board consists of how the site will look and feel i.e. the atmosphere. The navigation map consists of how to navigate through the links of WebPages i.e. back and forward etc.
There are only few recommendations that could be done to improve the work when the tasks were repeated. These are such as when doing the research on other kind of sites – not just looking at the sites but also giving feedback to the website - webmaster on what ideas you think should be improved and also getting some ideas from their opinion on what you can include in your web design. Also, when researching - it should be broken down in steps i.e. researching on the background color, then the layout of the home page design and more.
Apart, from this task the other tasks that could be improved are when creating the WebPages either using FrontPage or html coding using notepad. This is because I have created each web page site by redoing the code for each web page. This could be improved by creating the final design home page and saving it as a template. This can be used over and over again and will improve the tasks when it is repeated. The rest of the tasks are seemed to be ok with no improvements to be made.
The website plans that I have created helped me extremely on producing the site. This is because it allowed me to design the website that I want using my thoughts and allowed me to change any features of the design to improve the effectiveness of the site and to meet the client needs. Also, the other plans including mood boards and navigation map helped me to producing the site. The mood board gave and allowed me to include certain images, text, color and the atmosphere using my thoughts on how the site will look and feel. Also, the navigation map allowed me to plan on how the WebPages will link and work to become a multi-linked WebPages, showing the forward and back arrows.