Photo of panda bear leaning against a treet truck eating bambo at the San Diego Zoo.
Photo by Aimee Wolff

Introduction to Web Development
Instructor: Bill Wolff
Spring 2006

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Project 1 Overview

important due dates

• February 21: Site Inventory and Analysis due; present findings
• March 7: Site Prototype due; present to class
• April 13: Final Site Re-design due; present to class

the assignment

Project 1 is a collaborative project which involves an imaginative redesign of a section of an existing informational web site. Very often, web designers are asked to re-design a web site which already exists. The site may be clumsy, confusing, hard to navigate, aesthetically unappealing, or simply outdated and in need of restructuring. It may lack enough content to interest readers, or provide so much content that is hard for readers to navigate.

For this project, we will work in groups to redesign one section of a University of Texas at Austin Web site: The Jack S. Blanton Museum of Art. In order to make this project succeed, groups will need to work collaboratively, innovatively, and thoughtfully. There are multiple tasks associated with each of the three stages. The stages -- inventory and analysis, prototype, and final re-design -- correspond to the chapters in Web Re-Design 2.0. We will be working on each stage, in order, over the course of 10 weeks. There is a possibility that we may be able to talk with people at the Blanton Museum about their goals for the new museum. . . .

steps to complete the assignment

1. Become very familiar with the web site as it is currently posted and complete site inventory to find out what information is available at the site. Please be strategic in reviewing what is there in order to develop a fairly complete inventory. The inventory can be stored on a web page, a Word document, Visio document, or other electronic form.
2. Conduct comparison research, reviewing and making notes about other sites with a similar purpose or audience. What kind of content is provided? How is it organized? How well is it presented? How usable is it?
3. Analyze the potential audiences for the web site and their needs. This involves fieldwork research. You might conduct an email survey of users, do face to face interviews, and/or observe users who are accessing the site to get a sense of how they use the site and their opinions about its content, organization, and design.
4. Think through the categories of information, organization, and navigation structure for a proposed redesign of the site.
5. Prepare a final design proposal with a prototype (about 10 web pages) and a two-page rationale for the design.
6. Complete the re-design for the pages in your prototype.

the groups

Group numbers link to the group's Web page.

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