University of Aberdeen Web Team Mike McConnell. About the University web site 1 main central server holding 90% of content circa 500,000 pages central.

University of Aberdeen Web Team

Mike McConnell

About the University web site

• 1 main central server holding 90% of content

• circa 500,000 pages• central pages controlled by Web Team• departmental/sectional pages notionally

independent - historically maintained by large, devolved body of web authors

• non-mandatory corporate style for depts

About the University web site

• design and maintenance increasingly ceded to Web Team

• increasing uniformity of navigation and appearance

• loose/flexible corporate style established

• ever-increasing centralisation of data and joined-uppedness

About the Web Team

• 1 manager, 5 web developers

• 2 core, 4 paid for by income generation

• charged service for non-core activities

• range of skills – HTML, PHP, MySQL, graphic design

• over 2/3 of University are clients

• range of external clients

Our standard working practice

• XHTML 1.0 - Validation• proper use of structural tags• <META> information included where possible• server side includes (SSIs)• PHP and MySQL• open source, non-proprietary• minimum ‘A’ accessibility• (latterly) print-only style sheets

Central pages – where we were

• circa 350 central pages & directory services

• mixture of styles• nested tables• various ages of code: 3.2 – XHTML 1.0• lack of impact of news and events• navigational structure not always

apparent

Central pages – where we are

• standard (Dreamweaver) templates

• uniform navigation; uniform style

• CSS2; box model; SSIs

• XHTML 1 (Strict)

• minimum ‘A’ accessibility; mostly ‘AA’

• dynamic news and events content on home page

Corporate style elsewhere

• no mandatory web style per se, BUT

• specific logotype

• white/light backgrounds

• standard header and footer

• standard ‘University’ links

Supporting departmental maintenance

• Dreamweaver templates

• Contribute

• data separated from content; CSS flexibility

• extensive use of SSIs, both locally and globally

External clients

• commercial and non-commercial

• full-scale to part time support

• hosted externally and internally

Scope of work

• revised home page – 1 page• designs for main navigational pages – circa

25 pages• templates for departmental home and sub-

pages – 2 pages• additional pages including jobs, news and

alumni information – circa 3 pages• all associated graphic design, validation and

accessibility testing

Timescales

• Weeks 1-4: initial designs; validation, usability and accessibility testing

• Week 4: present initial draft designs options in HTML format

• Weeks: 4-7: amendments; preparation of templates; validation, usability and accessibility testing

• Week 8: testing of pages in native environment; launch of pages

Questions?

Technologies

• UNIX Apache 2.0

• PHP Version 4.3.7

• MySQL 4.0.20

• Dreamweaver templates

• Contribute 2.0 and 3.0