Slashdot Mirror
Web Design on a Shoestring
Bickner defines the audience for this book with four brief portraits of hypothetical individuals, all of whom need Web sites in a fairly low-key, resource-poor way. That is, something from the Web equivalent of an entrepreneur's business card to a non-profit organization's Web site. Although Bickner is apt to invoke "we Web professionals," this book is not really appropriate to Web creatives-for-hire (who would be better advised to seek out clients with the wherewithal to ask for something original, cool, and spendy). This book's broad scope is better suited to those with a more casual interest in Web sites, or those who have added Webmastering to other job responsibilities.
But the more I read, the more I was convinced Bickner's shoestring design theory went beyond financially embarrassed budgets. In a spirit of inquiry, I looked at two Web sites where skimpy budgets should not apply. Namely, the world's two richest persons and their employers. Microsoft's Web page is a well-wrought, complex assemblage of linked pages (though the splash page's security download du jour fairly shouts subtext). In contrast, Warren Buffett's Berkshire Hathaway's Web site is possibly more shoestring than even Bickner would advocate. The point being, even when the financial resources are bountiful, one can always, as Bickner says, "dare to do less."
One first impression of Web Design on a Shoestring is its excellent organization, an attribute librarians assume with famous pride (working in a library -- though not as a degreed librarian -- I've observed the species up close). Each chapter begins with a checklist preview. The text has ample sidebars covering budget gotchas ("Budget Threat"), saving opportunities ("Spinning Straw into Gold"), and special definitions. Plenty of screen shots (mostly from Mac OS X) and code listings visually support topics under discussion.
After the intro and first chapter set out the book's scope, Chapter Two, "The Pound Wise Project Plan," tackles how one might spec out a Web site project. This is the analytical, well-organized approach: a goal list, plus written documents for functional requirements and technical requirements. "Brainstorming," inspiration, playing with what a Web site might look like -- that's probably for another book, another author. In a book titled Web Design on a Shoestring, though, I did expect some definition, in real dollar ranges, of what constitutes a "shoestring budget."
Chapter Three, "Usability on the Cheap," is a once-over-lightly of several arguments made earlier in Steve Krug's Don't Make Me Think! One of the themes in this book, accessibility, comes naturally to librarians, who work in the public arena. Bickner offers brief, informed comments about how page navigation can work sans mouse and sans Java.
Chapters Four and Five are key to any Web site creation: copy and graphics, respectively. For the supposed target audience, I wanted to see a tutorial approach, but the book's ambitious scope appears to preclude anything other than summary discussion. "Why Good Copy Counts" covers writing style, appropriate voice, plus the need to chunk and headline text. Bickner correctly claims words are a powerful tool for elevating the status of a low-budget site. On words alone, the playing field among Web site creators is level. Moreover, words -- in digital format -- need minimal computing resources compared to other tasks like image processing.
The next chapter, "The Design: Looking Good With Less," continues with the basics of font selection and usage, the advisability of using Cascading Style Sheets for fonts and colors, and some tips on keeping graphics and artwork affordable. When it came to image editors, I thought Bickner's command to buy Adobe Photoshop (or the alternative Macromedia Fireworks) arguable: "... in the case of image editors, I am not going to suggest an inexpensive alternative; spend the money. If you skimp on image editors, your site will suffer."
Even a year before Web Design on a Shoestring's publication date, Adobe Photoshop Elements was available. I run Elements on a Windows partition--reputedly eighty-percent of the functionality of the professional version at a fraction of the price. Unfortunately, no mention is given to the open-source and cross-platform GIMP (which should not be ignored, given the shoestring premise). A major flaw of this book, for this reviewer, was the relative lack of dollar-based data to bring alive the shoestring strategy -- I need more than pictures of shoelaces to get in the spirit.
But Bickner warms up to open-source software in Chapter 7, the second longest chapter in the book. "Content Management on a Tight Budget," left me wondering, though, whether the book's audience had morphed. Yes, Content-Management Systems (CMS) have benefits, especially for concurrent authoring and version control, but I don't see individuals putting together Web sites on a shoestring budget worrying such issues. I'd speculate discussions of such CMS as Zope (Bickner uses Zope for one of her sites) had more to do with her work at keeping Web sites functional at NYPL than identifiable needs of the target audience proposed in the book's intro.
Chapter 8, the longest chapter, "Save Money and Time with Web Standards," is a fairly predictable plea for contemporary coding conventions to separate structure and presentation with XHTML and CSS. Evidently, Ms. Bickner has a personal interest in this advocacy. As she notes in the last paragraph of the chapter, "Jeffrey Zeldman is my personal favorite web standards evangelist ... his book Designing with Web Standards fills in where this chapter leaves off. I know that because as I write this book, he is sitting behind me writing his book. We don't get out much."
The last chapter, "Bang-for-Your-Buck Hosting and Domains," is a caveat emptor about finding a satisfactory host to serve up the newly created shoestring Web site. Predictably, low-ball rates do not guarantee long-term happiness.
At book's end, I concluded Web Design on a Shoestring's intriguing premise and ambitious scope made for good intentions. But the execution (spotty and thin discussions, with a paucity of dollar-based illustrative data) did not add up to a $24.99 recommended buy. (A library loan, maybe.)
If one really wants to design a Web site on a shoestring, go for the rifle, not the shotgun. Pick up Steve Krug's Don't Make Me Think! for usability and any book, new or used, by Robin Williams for Web design. I vouch for Krug and Williams because any page of their books shows the understanding and passion of a person in their gift. Reading these books generates enthusiasm the DIYer on a shoestring must have.
In contrast, rewards of reading Bickner often turn out to be, I hope, unintentional. The "easter egg" of reading Ms. Bickner's home address and home phone number in a screenshot figure showing Zope metadata. A "Definition: UNIX and Linux" I'm tempted to e-mail Richard Stallman. But it was the final paragraph that gave Web Design on a Shoestring a sweet finish:
"Shoestring design is not for the rich and famous, although shoestring designers have occasionally spun straw into gold and low-budget sites into fame and fortune. It is also not for the unmotivated or the easily discouraged. But if you keep at it, you will grow creatively and professionally in ways you never imagined. And that is something no amount of money can buy. See you in the discount rack!"
I trust Warren Buffett will never read these words.
Before joining Multnomah County Library, reviewer Charlie Dickinson was a technical writer for a publications group at Intel and elsewhere. His Web sites are "stories & more", first hatched in 1998; and "An American in Yaris" , a fledgling work-in-progress. You can purchase Web Design on a Shoestring from bn.com. Slashdot welcomes readers' book reviews -- to see your own review here, read the book review guidelines, then visit the submission page.
The most important thing you need to realize about a website is the color scheme.
I think this should, at most, be second most important. The most important part of any website is the content. With a long history of web design, the most troubling issue is trying to get content out of the clients. They worry about color, logos, font size, on and on. After a year, all I can get is a pretty page that says "Content will go here when the client pulls their heads out of their asses."
Another problem is having print-advertisers involved in the design. In print advertising, it is very important to catch the browser's eye. Be it a bulletin board or magazine ad, you want to get attention. On the web, people don't walk or drive past random websites. They do some sort of action that makes a website appear. Once they type in a URL or click on a google link, they want content. They don't want a 15 minute flash intro that makes the advertising department all hot and wet. So, again, the top priority is content.
The previous comment is purposely vague and generalized, but all of the facts are completely true.
FTFA: "eschews the nuts-and-bolts mechanics of Web page crafting for a comprehensive overview of 'project management..." yadida...
All well and fine. And I agree with the (book) author's general approach to things. But I don't see any treatment of the question that often makes projects unmanageable--namely, what will you and your neophyte web designers use to code the site?
The usual answer is the worst answer. Front Page, because it's there.
Dreamweaver and its kin can turn out nicer stuff, but there's a steeper curve to be learned.
Best of all is hand-coding, which brings us back to the regrettably eschewed nuts and bolts. Learning curve: steeper still.
Shoestrings are great, sometimes. And sometimes, you'd be better off investing in a decent pair of boots up front.
I seriously hope you're kidding. It's easy, and it's incredibly tempting. Some people might even be impressed by "your" handiwork. Then the person or company you ripped off will find out eventually. If they're a large corporation, they may send a pack of bloodthirsty intellectual property lawyers your way. Even if you get away with as little as a cease-and-desist order, you're going to wind up having to re-do your site, probably at great expense, unless you want to take your chances and copy another one. You'll also be mocked by creative types, who will be more than happy to send streams of irate emails (and possibly phone calls) your way. Then it begins to affect your bottom line, because by now your customers will have found out. Discouraged by your less-than-honest practices, will consider taking their business elsewhere.
In short: do it right, and do it yourself (or pay reputable creative professionals to do it for you).
I've always been of the philosophy that content is what makes a website. Yes, usability comes in, as well as visual appeal and all that wonderful stuff. However, if you don't have content (and purpose), any amount of eyecandy fluff isn't going to save you.
I've also always thought that web development/design is a service industry that for a long time have overcharged for what they do. (web devs, hear me out here before you tune out)
I'm not some artsy guy who can do killer tricks with photoshop...but for the most part, a lot of web stuff is fairly simple to do. Thus I've thought that rates for web work were waaay high.
Then I worked with the clueless. Folks who ask for a design, then change spec in the end. After a redesign, they want another a week later. People who, after you show them your detailed design document with goals and other specifics, suddenly get amnesia a meeting or two later. It's people like those who tend to drive costs up.
Don't get me wrong -- I try to clue them in. I'd walk them through the design process and stuff but they don't care for it. I present plans that they sign off on, and they don't care or forget they even agree to it. Then they complain when they find out it's going to cost more.
Other clients who send electronic versions of copy and images, ask for changes well in advance, and overall request (and respect) rather than obnoxiously demand are a pleasure to work with.
Shoestring budgets? That's easy enough to work with. Whatever "shoestring" means to you. Being a nightmare client, on the other hand, will eventually cost more. Not necessarily due to being a nightmare, but the extra hours of undoing plans, reimplementing changed specs, etc. will definitely add up.
Just because you can find the information on the web doesn't mean that's the best way to get it for everybody. A book is a good way to present information in an organized and always-accessible way.
Books also do something that almost all websites (including ALA) lack: information presented in the order in which it's easiest to learn. I use ALA all the time. It's a great reference, but that's what it's for - reference. Learning something from scratch is a lot harder when you have to glean your knowledge from sites that have unclear assumptions about your existing skills, or if you are unfamiliar enough with the subject that you don't know what to search for.
I wish that my inferiority complex were as good as yours.
-RenderHead
Once again people fail to understand that timespent equates to lost money lost in some way or other. The big advantage with CMS's is that all the basic functionality is already there for you to access. I can easily create a custom CMS for my own use, but I choose to use Mambo because it less work to harness something that already works and been tested. Unless you plan to build a better wheel, why bother? (Except for the love of doing it)
The most important part of any website is the content.
While I'm generally with you, I'm not sure you can make that generalization with perfect confidence. Playing devils advocate, I can think of non-trivial counterexamples.
For example, you are a small business on the web, let's say you're a health club. Chances are you are not all that interested in running a free excercise and nutrition service. You want to accomplish two things:
(1) Get the user excited about your business.
(2) Give the user your location and phone.
OK, arguably item two is content, but you aren't going to spend a lot of time wondering what they should be. You are going to give quite a bit more thought to the impression that you give.
Furthermore, the rubric "content" may be too broad, containing qualitatively different things. For example, I'm a business selling some product over the Internet. Now maybe I want to put all kinds of support information about my products on my web site. But it might not be my highest priority. My highest priority might be to make it convenient and easy to locate the item you want and order it from my on-line store. This, I guess, is "content-y", but really it's equally if not more a matter of good organization.
Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
My steps for web design/web server on shoestring budget (steps 4 and 5 are for those who just want a design).
1. Learn linux enough to manage a server--all the docs and how-to's you ever need are on the web, don't buy books (unless you want a standalone easy quick reference).
2. Buy a domain name from godaddy.com.
3. Get a VPS plan from rimuhosting.com or the multitude of other VPS providers. I prefer to have Debian installed in the VPS because it's minimal in disk space usage and packages can easily be installed with apt-get (i.e. you have have to muck around to try to find rpm's or tar.gz files)--you'll need to apt-get apache to get the webserver up. You'll also need to install a content management engine like wordpress, moveabletype, drupal, geekblog, etc.
4. With the money you saved by NOT buying books on how to design, purchase a web logo from The Logo Company or any comparable business that supplies you the logo for your site. They include full ownership of your logo (to file for trademark if you want) and all the vector graphics files you need to take it from there and build your own templates, CSS, etc. This is the most important part of the "design" process because you will use your logo to assemble your website -- it has the color palette that you want and the overall theme that will be persistent in your site.
5. Using the logo as "inspiration", create the CSS for the content management engine such as wordpress, moveabletype, geekblog, drupal, etc. Drop the CSS into your server.
Obviously, there are lots of in between steps I didn't care to mention, but the main steps are listed. Overall, for the startup cost and the first month of your web page going live, you shouldn't need to spend more than $105 USD ($75 for the logo, $20 per month for the VPS, $10 for a year's worth of domain name service) -- the price of 3 or 4 books.
Linux at home
Content is king - So let the advertising staff, tech writers, or even a manager (who can usually write better than we give them credit for) lay out the text. Besides, if you write it, they'll just re-write it into a hash by the end of the project anyway.
Presentation is Queen - Speaking from experience, most of us overestimate our artistic abilities. Fonts, colors, whitespace, branding etc. are both a science and an art. I have seen first-hand the difference a good graphics artist can make. For a few hours of consultation, you can get more good ideas that most of us will come up with in a year of fiddling around.
The Joker is in the Details A good nerd is the magic glue that makes it all happen. Sombody has to know the standards, be able to code, and make the decisions about which technologies to use. Some sites just require basic HTML and maybe a bit of CSS, but most modern sites require a whole lot more.
The point is that very few people can combine all of these skills at a professional level. The skills are orthagonal - being good at one implies nothing (or very little) about your abilities in the others. Ego aside, most of us would get far better results if we were humble enough to ask for help -- a brief survey of web sites should convince ANYONE that really good designes are few and far between (and no, slashdot is NOT a shining beacon of perfection).
wow $400 for a web browser and text editor, thats more than my computer cost me !!
There are places where the networks are not touching,and there are places where they are-Boeing's Lori Gunter
There's quite a big difference between being influenced by a design and copying the website in full before changing some text here and there.
Think of it like taking a sample from some music - which is something I do pretty regularly, being an electronic musician in my spare time.
If took a sample of (say) The Beatles and did something new and original with it (like mangling it beyond comprehension), that would be the creative process in action.
If I burned a copy of The White Album and released it under my own name, merely changing some of the song titles and dubbing my own lyrics over it, that would be akin to what's being exhibited over at Pirate Sites.
In my day job as a web developer, I regularly borrow a bit here and there from other sources (a CSS trick, bit of JavaScript, idea for a simple background pattern and so on), but that's a whole different ballpark than taking a 1:1 copy of a site before changing a few details and releasing it as "my own work".
You claim to understand the creative process, so surely you can see the difference?
The difference is between being inspired to understand a technique and implement it in your own way, versus plagiarizing it verbatum.
Organic free-range music... yum!
Actually, content is the second-hardest part. Dealing with clients is the worst. If you're your own client (designing a personal site, let's say), this is not a problem at all, unless you're a crazy perfectionist. I "retired" from professional design and only do work for myself and close friends. Apparently I have a low threshold for taking other people's crap, no matter how much they're paying.
Technical problems place a distant third, and it would be even less of an issue if IE didn't exist. :-P
while one cannot "steal" graphics, it would be hard to argue that copying someone's .css file, or a bunch of nested tables, considering that the source is a click away, is copyright infringement. obviously, one could argue, what's it called, brand dilution, if i set up a site called ebey.com and copied the general layout and functionality. but that's different. i someone took layout from one of my sites, hell, i'd be flattered. i'd think it would be quite difficult to trademark html. and,considering that most sites follow the header/3 column layout, how original can one really be.
now, my wife does part-time photography, and belogns to several photo forums. a thread recently had several photo websites that leached everything, even galleries, but, hard linked the photos to the original server. so when the original site owner found out, they replaced the leached photos with gay porn. but that's a bit different.
My problem? I was perfectly gruntled, until some numbnuts came by and dissed me.
Web sites with massive budgets often tend to spend those budgets on areas that have nothing to do with content, which is, after all, what most of us really want from the Web (if we wanted a lot of useless graphics we'd go see a movie.) Expensive, gratuitous flash animations and the rest of that crap can easily detract from the true value of a Web site, or at least can obscure that value to the point where no-one can find it.
Many companies could take a lesson from Google and its minimalist approach to screen design (Yahoo, for example.) A cleanly-designed, truly elegant Web site is a joy to behold and to use. The mistake that many designers make is in equating complexity with elegance. In the old days, we said that ridiculously colorful and complicated displays (whose only goal was to prove that the programmer knew how to do complicated things) were victims of the "Christmas Tree Effect". I must say, the mindset behind the CTE is alive and well, and living on the Web.
The higher the technology, the sharper that two-edged sword.
>>I've been a webmaster and web developer since 1995 and I've freely borrowed designs, graphics and so on from other websites.
Then you are an unethical, worthless, fucking leech!
And please, don't call yourself a 'designer' because if you have to resort to stealing other peoples work then you obviously couldn't design shit!