I wanted to thank everybody for the meeting we had today.
A short recap is in order: please comment and correct.
I understand that the direction we are going to take is a hybrid of mock-up1 and mock-up2. Mock-up 2 is going to be the starting point, the main concept. The home page must capture and spell out all or almost all services that we provide.
The following features of mock-up 1 will be adopted for the main mock-up:
1. Horizontal navigation bar.
2. “How Do I…” box will be positioned in the third column of the main mock-up, currently called “Using Your Library”. It may not be available on all pages.
3. The Catalog Search box may still be available on all library pages on the top as it appears in mock-up 1. However, on the home page it was found to be rather distracting (too dominant) when kept above the main content. It may eventually stay in the leftmost column as it is currently in the main mock-up.
A point was made that it is not necessary to build the entire site based on the home page. The home page is special, it may and should have more navigation options, more navigable text than any other page, and it is not necessary to make all pages in the image of the home page. Obviously some stylistic unity must be maintained, but it is a different topic.
We entertained the idea of eliminating the banner (as it is now) in the main mock-up to save real estate. Please comment on this as well.
It was mentioned that the home page design does not have to be dominated by a consideration that some of our patrons are using large fonts and set their monitors at low resolution (800x600). In other words, we do not want to design with the lowest common denominator in mind. This decision will improve our ability to have a more graceful screen resizing, as well as to place everything above the fold.
Mock-up 3 turned out to be elegant but not practical. That design does not capture at a glance all the services the library offers. It was designed with a more hierarchical, less egalitarian approach to services that are “revealed” along the path of mouse-clicks. A meta-home page, with sub-home pages to follow. It was said, we're not ready for it.
Did I forget anything regarding home page discussion?
I would like to suggest that we start putting the requrements in writing. I would like to compile requirements into a rather formal list of what we want to have on the home page and where. It will help us to see tension points between the mission of the home page and some low level requirements.
Miss Vivian hoped that her 'extreme makeover' would put muscle behind the 'no food or drink in the library' rule.
5 comments:
wow, I don't even remember you taking notes! Miss Vivian has a great memory... Excellent reiteration of what was discussed today.
Ditto on the phenomenal recall and your articulation of it.
Can we post to this blog or just comment? I'll try to keep it short tonight since I'm in a comment field.Ha! I think we have a good meeting of minds and that the talents that you and Alice bring to implementing this project will complement what the service staff knows about the user. I realize there are design standards and accessiblity issues that inform the website programming, and that we must keep these in mind. We also aspire towards the elegance and simplicity of the "black and white photo" and "A meta-home page, with sub-home pages to follow" I think that we can have that meta page for each cornerstone of our content, once we get past the homepage; I agree that when a user knows they have picked up the scent of their quarry, they don't mind the click throughs, and page through is better than scroll through. It is clicking through, pecking aimlessly, that fills one with dread, and thus the homepage, dense with glanceable text, would allow the user to pick up the right scent (to carry my metaphor onward) that would lead them into the elegant and rich metapages for their specific world (art,childrens, research, etc) Like a reverse Wizard of Oz moving from color into black and white, which we now see happening in the modern director's cinematic eye. It's leading them to that right path that needs to be the focus of the homepage.
Ps. Bplref is my username for an earlier blog. It's me Gina as Bplref I'll change it later.
Thank you, Nick, for this summary. Points 1,2, and 3 seem accurate. Just a couple things below.
Regarding your question about eliminating the banner (on Mock up 2), my thought is that it would be attractive to see some type of graphic element on the home page, but not necessarily as it currently appears on Mock up 2, or the positioning of it. Is the question whether or not we want graphic elements to be dynamic? If not, or if so, it would be helpful to see examples/suggestions.
Also, with regard to global navigation, I understood that we agreed a nav bar did need to appear on the home page & other pages but that it would need a more easily readable type treatment than on Mock up 1 (more white space? bold? reverse type on contrasting background? other ideas?).
Donna
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