WDD 252 – Adv. Layout Design

The goal for next week is to select a local business (West Michigan) that you’d like to either design/develop or redesign a site for. Simply select the company and we’ll review your URL at the start of our next class. -Careful who you select. You never know if they’ll be standing in the classroom later.

White boards notes…

…and there’s no homework. This time.

This is your official WDD 252 course blog. I’ll share a majority of the course information with you here (e.g. homework assignments, tips, prep material) so be certain to bookmark this site. Also, you’ll find contact information for me above along with the course syllabus.

…oh, and be sure to check out your soon-to-be-utilized development area.

The title says it all. From the site that gave us “101+ Places To get Design Inspiration” you’ll find “99 Sites All Designers Must Know About.”

It’s a common issue. How do you effectively display your in both an elegant and bandwidth-friendly way? Well, have a look through these various Flash Gallery solutions provided via Visual Blast.

One of the better lists I’ve crossed when it comes to “Free Mac Apps” aimed at freelancers. Check it out >

Fluid (OS X) allows you to create SSB’s (site-specific browsers). Enough said. Check it out.

Serial numbers for Adobe products are platform specific. Meaning if you try to apply a Windows serial number to a Mac installation it will not work (so Adobe says). The software provided by Adobe is dividing into Windows and Mac DVD for specific reasons. Beyond it being a profit issue, Adobe says it’s “…problematic at this point to bundle both platform installers on a disc. Before addressing the volume needed to store the data there’s also the possibility of market-wide capability issues with DVD’s…which are the  choice disc format right now. Those installers are larger than a lot of people know…when you think about how advance the applications have become plus the third-party gear.”

If you’d like to know more, simply contact Adobe. There customer service is quite helpful.

“…breadcrumb navigation can greatly enhance the way users find their way around. In terms of usability, breadcrumbs reduce the number of actions a website visitor needs to take in order to get to a higher-level page, and they improve the findability of website sections and pages. They are also an effective visual aid that indicates the location of the user within the website’s hierarchy, making it a great source of contextual information for landing pages.” Here’s Jacob Gube’s “Examples of Best Practices” via Smashing Magazine.

A nice overview on the rationale for including a home button in the main navigation from Imulus. The post is called “Is the HOME button needed anymore?” and from Dec 2008. Note the author and his Linkedin profile.