Final Notes

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By its nature, the Internet is transactional. The entire Internet experience, from logging on to Web browsing, is predicated on user requests and server responses in other words, transactions and interactivity

Push Technology is a Web delivery format that allows Web page content to automatically download to a computer at user defined intervals.

This goal can be achieved with a complex balance of well-planned design, high-quality content, and proper use of available media.

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A methodology usually specifies the steps and the order of steps that a project team will take to implement a project from its earliest stages through to completion.

Advantages of establishing a basic process methodology

Quality and deadlines can be more closely managed

Duplication of effort is reduced,

Planning and thoughtfulness are encouraged,

The most basic collaboration tools for Web teams are e-mail, meetings and telephone calls.

Examples of additional Web team collaboration tools include:

Intranets

Wiki sites

Online conferencing

Instant messaging

A Web site should communicate your client's central message.

You must identify the type of visitors you are trying to reach

Effectively designed pages:

Feature crisp, concise text (limiting the word count to half of what would be used in conventional writing).

Include one idea per paragraph.

Include search engine keywords in the main portions of text. Convey the central message using the inverted-pyramid writing style (that is, the

conclusion is presented at the top of the page, followed by supporting information)

An e-mail marketing message must convey the central message quickly and concisely.

An e-mail marketing piece should be brief aimed at a specific target professional.

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The phases through which a project progresses on its way to completion are collectively called the project life cycle.

The Project Management Institute (PMI), a non-profit

membership organization

Initiating phase

Planning phase

Executing phase

Controlling phase

Closing phase

Executing And Controlling

phases of a project

occur simultaneously.

Initiating Phase This phase starts

when a customer expresses a need for a Web site

Conducting a needs analysis

Determining project objectives, assumptions and constraints

Developing a Statement Of Work (SOW)

scope of the

project is

determine the goals of the Web site and the tasks

that need to be performed

Needs Analysis is The process of determining a customer's needs by acquiring information, processing and evaluating the information,

A Stakeholder

is a person or group with an interest in a project and the power to exert influence .

stakeholders must also discuss and

agree on assumptions and constraints.

The SOW outlines the

requirements for each project task to ensure that the objectives are met.

The SOW should

contain clearly defined goals and an agreed-upon plan to achieve them.

Project schedule is a document that

lists the planned dates for performing

tasks and meeting goals defined in a

project plan

during the executing and controlling phases the actual work of designing and

creating the Web site takes place.

Structure: The structure sub phase involves preparing the transactional, navigational and hierarchical construction of the Web site's content.

Evolution : Evolution Sub phase is the process of refining and updating the site design.

project manager is responsible for keeping

project participants informed in order to keep the project running smoothly. Regular

communication with the customer and all stakeholders helps to keep the project on track

and avoid unnecessary work.

During the executing and controlling phases of a Web development project, you should

document project tasks to provide a paper trail, or record, of the team members who

worked on tasks, and the dates they started and completed them.

The paper trail does not

need to be documented on paper;

Issue Log should be kept in which you document problems that need to be escalated

to managers or executives outside the Web development team for resolution

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Scenarios greatly facilitate the

process of developing a Web site.

A vision statement

provides a solid goal toward which to work. Vision statements are just as useful for a small

site as for a large e commerce

business because they help all developers focus on achieving goals

of any size.

Your strategy must be focused on persuading users to spend time on your Web site and

return to it in the future.

A widely used tactic is to offer

something in exchange for that information.

Specifications can be divided into four types:

Functionality specifications : indicate the functions or activities that the site should be

able to perform.

Content specifications : general types and topics of content that the site will

include

Architecture specifications : site will be structured and ways that

users will navigate it.

Design specifications : including the

fonts, colors and images that will be used.

PDA screens are small. Avoid using static page

widths, and keep in mind that users are paying for the time they are using their devices,

so use few words and small images so that your pages load quickly

The term "mystery meat navigation" describe a Web page or graphical user interface (GUI) in which it is difficult for the user to determine the destination of hyperlinks, or in more extreme cases, to locate the hyperlinks on the page.

A Web site wireframe is a sketch of the skeletal view of a site's architecture. Creating a

wireframe is the next step you would usually take after creating a mindmap.

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Clear and easy navigation is critical to a site's success,

Interactivity is a feature of Web sites that distinguishes it from other media types.

Layout refers to the visual components of a page and how

they are arranged

Navigation elements — control the user's movement through the site

Usability studies have shown that site visitors focus

on the site's content, rather than the navigation or user interface elements.

Visual consistency within a site helps users to understand your site. Using a limited and

specific color scheme throughout the site makes each page look like it belongs to the

whole.

Developers use XHTML tables to

distribute content over the entire browser display.

Users demand speed. You can fulfill this demand by designing pages of limited file size.

Pixel Short for "picture element." A unit of measure that

represents a

minimum amount of graphical information as a

single dot on a

display screen.

Each pixel

can display only one color at a time

Color transition describes the way in which adjacently placed colors blend together or

stand apart from each other

As the Web evolves, styles change as much as technologies. Two fonts are most commonly used on the Internet. The first is Times New Roman for the PC, which is equivalent to Times on the Macintosh platform. The second is Arial for the PC, equivalent to Helvetica on mac.

All Web browsers have a default font size

As a result, the default font size is usually

set to Medium, which is typically 12-point text.

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The International Organization for Standardization (ISO)

defines usability as "the effectiveness, efficiency and satisfaction with which specified

users achieve specified goals in particular environments.

The only way to achieve maximum site usability is to conduct a usability test.

WAI aims to ensure that core technologies used on the Web, such as HTML, CSS, XML

and DOM, are equally accessible to users with physical, visual, hearing and cognitive

disabilities.

Provide equivalent alternatives to auditory and visual content.

In 2001, the U.S. government implemented Section 508 of the Rehabilitation Act:

It states that all electronic and information technology developed, procured, maintained or used by federal agencies be comparably accessible to users with disabilities.

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functionality of Web browsers can be divided into the following three components, or layers.

Internet access layer — functionality that includes the protocols for communicating with remote Web sites, ranging from HTTP to various encryption types such as SSL.

Navigation layer — functionality that tracks locations that the user has visited on the Web, and helps the user go where he or she wants to go. This layer can include a history list, which lists the sites that the user has visited.

Presentation layer — the browser window that displays the page requested by the user.

single-browser technologies are the <blink> and <layer> tags, which were created by Netscape.

The rate at which users upgrade their browsers has actually decreased as more users have come online.

Most current users care about content, not technology or software

Recent browser upgrades have been less compelling than previous ones in terms of added features or improved usability

The download size (in megabytes) of upgrades has grown faster than available bandwidth,

Firefox was an early favorite among technical users because of its emphasis on security and because it is open-source

Firefox includes useful user-interface features such as tabbed browsing

Firefox is also easily customized through the use of add-ons.

IE8 includes following new features:

Web slices : allow you to receive up-to-date information from frequently updated Web sites

Tab groups : color-codes and groups tabs that contain related pages so you can quickly see which tabs contain related content.

Accelerators : reduce the number of keystrokes and clicks required t

Opera is also highly customizable and supports "skins," which are themes that can be applied to the browser interface to customize its appearance

Opera's features include built-in fraud and phishing protection, a digital certificate provider, a Web feed aggregator, a built-in e-mail client and chat client, and a BitTorrent client for transferring large files.

Opera has had limited success in the PC browser market, but has had more success on mobile phones, smart phones and personal digital assistants

Safari includes a built-in RSS and Atom reader, and also supports tabbed browsing, pop-up blocking and the latest Web standards

Google Chrome Features incognito mode :This mode provides the ability to surf the Web privately, leaving no cached information on the local system. This is a controversial feature, but one that has since been imitated by many other browsers.

Support for Web applications : The Chrome browser is designed to deliver sophisticated Web applications, most notably Google Apps, which are part of Google's cloud computing strategy.

Web browsers are available for specialized purposes.

Mobile device browsers :

The earliest Web browsers designed for mobile devices

Adaptive browsers/voice browsers : Web browsers that enable users with disabilities to use the Web are referred to as adaptive browsers.

TinyURL is a free Web service that provides aliases for long URLs.

A potential disadvantage to using TinyURLs is that they are subject to linkrot

A CAPTCHA is a method that attempts to ensure that a user is a real person and not a spam bot or crawler.

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Positional awareness includes understanding any parent, peer or child pages relative to the current

Limitation of using only headings for positional awareness is that they provide only the current location, not the relative location of parent, peer or child pages.

Images — Images provide useful indicators of positional awareness.

Do not use <meta> tags or scripts to prevent access to the browser history.

Note that the divisions between subdirectories in a computer file path are generally indicated with backslashes ( \ ), whereas in a Web address these divisions are indicated with forward slashes ( / ).

URLs can be used to determine location and depth.

After you consider the structure of the site as a whole, spend some time thinking about shortcuts through this structure. Shortcuts provide quick links and easy access to small pieces of content.

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All images on stock photography Web sites include embedded metadata that makes it easy to search for images based on keywords.

The specified number of times an image can be reproduced is often referred to as a print run.

Royalty-free license : allows the buyer to use an image without having to pay a royalty each time the image is used.

Rights-managed license : allows the buyer to "rent" an image through negotiation of a specific price for a specific use.

Advantages of stock images include saving time and money

Disadvantages to using stock photography are (in some cases) the cost associated with the licensing fees, and a reduction in creative control.

Microstock photography is an offshoot of stock photography. deal almost exclusively over the Internet

Metadata for photographs typically includes the date and time a picture was taken and the details of the camera settings. Many digital cameras record metadata in exchangeable image file format (EXIF).

The term "pixel" is short for "picture element." The pixel is the smallest unit displayed by a computer monitor

16-bit display can display 65,536 colors at once, and a 24-bit display can show 16.7 million colors at once.

Palette flash occurs when a significant discrepancy exists between the image bit depth or palette and the system bit depth or palette.

Unfortunately, dithering can alter the image's appearance in ways you might not want. In particular, a high-color image such as a photo can appear grainy when displayed on a computer that supports only 256 colors.

GIF (Graphics Interchange Format) is a platform-independent file format that is limited to a display of 256 colors.

GIF is considered a "lossless" format; this term means that as the image is compressed,no information is lost.

JPEG 2000 A newer JPEG format enhances the compression feature of standard JPEGs and improves scalability and editability.

PNG files are lossless and support transparency like GIFs. Partial support available in the various versions of Internet Explorer.

Graphic design is a collection of disciplines (from visual arts and age-old printing to pagel ayout methods) that are used in order to construct a piece of visual communication.

Composition is the placement or arrangement of visual elements, whether on a canvas, a printed page or a Web page.

When viewing any form of visual communication, the eye is attracted to the point of highest contrast.

A typographic grid is a two-dimensional structure consisting of intersecting vertical and horizontal lines.

The purpose of the grid is to help designers achieve coherency when organizing a page. As the vertical and horizontal lines of the grid intersect, boxes called grid units are formed.

Typography is the art of arranging and designing type and modifying type glyphs

measure is the name given to the width of a body of type.

One point = 1/72 of an inch

One pica = 12 points

One em (pronounced "em") = the distance horizontally equal to the type size, in points, that you are using. For example, 1 em of 12-point type is 12 points.

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Web designers should have a thorough understanding of the site's target audience before using the latest and most dazzling technology, because a user on a dialup connection with a standard browser cannot support it.

The most common types of basic animation are animated GIFs, rollovers and Flash files.

Adobe Flash offers

s media-rich content while conserving bandwidth

Microsoft Silverlight is a competitor to Adobe Flash. Silverlight is a browser plug-in that enables rich Internet application features such as animation, vector graphics and audio video playback. It is compatible with Internet Explorer, Firefox, Apple Safari and Google Chrome running on Windows and OSX platforms

Internet TV has not yet evolved into a solid, universally accepted means of connecting people to the Internet, but most experts believe it will. In fact, Microsoft acquired this technology, formerly called WebTV, as part of its strategy to increase Internet usefulness to the consumer.

Web professionals can deliver content through a number of acceptable models. The most successful seems to be the "spiral" concept and its three elements: interest, activity and resolution.

The most daunting task for the multimedia Web page designer is to manage screen space and select the most effective format for the media elements.

Remember that it is illegal under copyright law to use any published Internet material (text, art, music, code, etc.) without permission from its creator or owner.

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Ethics are a set of standards governing the conduct of members of a profession.

Spam filter An e-mail client program that identifies and filters out spam messages before they reach the e-mail Inbox

E-mail lists are generally managed using a mailing list server, which is a server that automates the distribution of messages to an authorized group of participants.

Mailing list server is an e-mail server that regularly sends e-mail messages to a specified list of users. List servers can also collect and distribute messages from an authorized group of participants, called a listserve group.

Privacy policies detail the ways that information is gathered and whether it is transferred to third parties.

A weakness of CAN-SPAM is that it prohibits recipients of spam from suing spammers.

A trademark is any word, name, phrase, sound or image that a company uses to distinguish itself from the competition — most frequently, a company's logo and slogan or catchphrase.

Fair Use : A doctrine that allows the use of copyrighted material for purposes such as criticism, reporting,teaching and research.

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Markup specifically designed to affect the appearance of a document is commonly called presentational markup or procedural markup because it instructs the computer how to render the text.

Markup was then created to describe the content of the page. This type of markup is called logical or structural markup. Structural markup is also called descriptive or generic markup.

Hypertext Markup Language (HTML) is based on SGML

Hypermedia System is an extension of hypertext. It includes images, video, audio, animation and other multimedia data types, which can be incorporated into HTML documents.

HTML was originally created to define structure, not formatting

The HTML standard defines the individual elements that make up the language.

HTML 2.0 includes all the capabilities of version 1.0 plus support for user input fields, which is necessary for forms.

HTML 3.2. As more browser specific tags were introduced, it became obvious that a new standard was needed.

Tables.

Figures.

Frames.

Mathematical equations.

Improved tags.

HTML 4.0 has

Style sheets.

Internationalization features (e.g., reading from right to left).

Accessibility features (issues involving Web users with disabilities).

Enhanced tables and forms.

Scripting and multimedia.

HTML 4.0 Strict recommendation was the first version of HTML to disallow the use of layout and style elements

HTML 4.01 includes a few minor modifications to the standard, and calls for support of Extensible HTML (XHTML).

proprietary features are called extensions because they extend the existing HTML standard, and they may or may not be included in the next HTML standard.

most browsers continue to support deprecated tags. If you use deprecated tags, you will be using the HTML 4.0 Transitional flavor.