The one stop shop to building a website.
From the latest chapter in Digital History one can imagine and develop a historical website with relative ease and harassment. Though I am already familiar with a lot of the topics in the reading for this week having a refresher explanation for some of the abbreviations was much appreciated. That being said, I did not have many questions regarding the process of building a website, so instead I thought I would nestle my questions regarding this subject in with a process story of how I became interested in web design….
My Junior year of high school, I was taught the basic concepts and coding behind html for an English project regarding the novel The Great Gatsby. Meant to be a sort of reference, my class split up various themes and using html coding built individual pieces for a larger three-class website. My particular part related to locations of the novel which you can see here. (For the main page of the project: WSHS Great Gatsby Project. My class was Period 2.)
After I cringe at the design elements in my personal page (too much turquoise) I do have to recognize what that project taught me in the long term. I have to be honest. I hate coding. I hate C++, C, etc. That being said, while I hate, I can appreciate its place in the larger world of computing. For some reason though, I understand html. Now this was a coding language that seemed simple, not mind straining, and really a snap to deal with, and I have had no trouble using it since. That being said, it is no longer necessary to actually know the coding language, but it is a good tool to know for reference sake. (For a quick and easy coding resource go here: HTML Goodies.)
There is one format of web design that the text for this week did not mention—and that is, your very basic, low maintenance Netscape Composer. In essence a word document, this program devised the code for you (it generated the code as you placed things on your document) and all you had to do is use a Microsoft Word based toolbar for design. In my freshman year of college I built an online travel site for a Saturday class that involved traveling to various places in Tidewater VA. Unfortunately I lost my webspace last year (though I have the site on disc) so the site is no longer live. In terms of basic web design, for this project I initially used Netscape Composer, and then three years later in a bout of frustration regarding the design, I stepped back to fix all the errant and extra coding put in by the generator to make the site look more manageable and better. In terms of design the pages were all basic backgrounds, with text and images from the trips highlighting what I had learned in a very public way. (So—yes, I would not recommend using Netscape Composer ever again.)
And then I found Front Page—and later Dreamweaver, both of which are a lot more sophisticated in terms of web development and make the process of creating your web site a lot less unwieldy…..and more presentable to the public at large. This leads me to some thoughts on the connections between history and technology and public history as a whole. There is a clear parallel between the process of building a history web site and the process of building a historical site. (This stems from yesterday’s Public History Practicum class where we talked about Falk and Dierking’s The Museum Experience, and a book Judy Diamond’s Practical Evaluation Guide.)
Both need clear mission statements, and ideas of purpose and content as to why a particular topic is important. Both require a thought to pathways, and flows, and more importantly require planning in the form of front end surveying and observation to determine the best means of presentation. To some extent, in choosing a topic, methodology and tools for building a particular web site we, as historians are learning to produce and operate our own mini-historical sites. While there are some differences, i.e. Historic sites exist in the physical rather than virtual worlds—which affords a lot more considerations the core elements still remain. Who is the audience? What story can we tell? What are the best tools to present this story? How do we maintain the site? And perhaps just as important: How can we constantly improve it?
(The reading for this week mentioned The Sonic Memorial Project--if you weren’t able to check it out, do so. Its an unique array and collection of audio files that gives another deminsion to how we remember September 11.)
February 19th, 2006 at 5:43 pm
Great connection to our public history class! Your comments/questions are extremely valid apply to both historic web pages and physical sites. One other important connection that I would add is funding as financing for both these endeavors can be extremely ciritical. I thought the reading did a good job of discussing low cost options for building and hosting web pages, but the all mighty dollar is often the deciding factor in whether an exhibit may be staged or a site may be built.
February 20th, 2006 at 3:29 pm
The reading did mention Composer briefly. However, given that a lot more folks in our class have Firefox (or access to it), they might prefer to use the Firefox version.
February 21st, 2006 at 11:47 am
I must admit that in the first dreamweaver workshop I just kept saying to myself…it can’t be this easy really it can’t. I was so surprised at how not terrifying the process of creating a website is. In fact its kind of addicting. You are able to make as many or as little changes as you want in order to get your desired results. Although I guess if I was doing this the old fashioned way, like creating or writing the program myself, I am sure I would be singing a different tune.