Current Project
rogergordon.net, version 3
| Project Type | Client | Technologies Used | Status |
|---|---|---|---|
| Personal Website | NA | XHTML, CSS, PHP Photoshop CS3, Wordpress | No longer online. Replaced with this site. |
Project Introduction
As I have learned more and more about web design and development, I’ve used my personal Web site as a vehicle for creativity and experimentation. Version 3 was a major step up from my previous versions, both stylistically and technically. The site had 4 sections: Home, About me, Blog, Chinese, and Work. I used Wordpress to manage the content, with the Blog, Chinese and Work sections each being a separate category template. Version 3 of rogergordon.net taught me a lot about the architecture and internal workings of Wordpress, and about the creation of templates for blogs.
My Role
Design and development of the entire site.
Development Method
As each section of the site had a completely different design, I created the designs in Photoshop and turned them into static XHTML and CSS pages one by one. Only after the creation of these static pages did I convert them again into Wordpress templates. Once I had tested these templates on a local web-sever, I uploaded them onto my public web space at rogergordon.net. The ‘About Me’ page was a static page, employing CSS to style the text in a unique way. Because the Blog, Chinese and Work pages were all of a blog format, I was able to re-use a lot of the code. The home page consisted of a black frame around a Flash-based slideshow of some of my photography. I created this by overlaying an image with a transparent center section over the entire slideshow. The visual effect was good, but the overlay of the image left the slideshow unusable (and totally inaccessible for non-visual users). I constantly refined the designs until I decided to create this current version of the site (version 4).
Special Features
- Cross-browser (IE 6 & 7, Firefox, Safari ) compatible CSS and XHTML
- Browser-specific style sheets for a consistent look across browsers
- Advanced use of typography on the ‘About Me’ page.
- Unique blog designs for all 3 major sections of the site.
- The birth of my Chinese Weblog!
