Paper publications, Web publication, Roles and Project Management
In a previous post I touched on how web development has a lot in common with software development. In ‘development’ I am talking application development, site design, layout, etc. The roles in software development are well documented but why would you apply them to web development? Especially when we are talking content. After all a web page is an ongoing project, it has nothing to do with project management since there is no beginning or end.
Publication Process
Content publication on the web, or web site development for that matter, is no different than paper publication except that with the web you do not have the commitment of paper. For example the Daily Bulletin (DB). The DB has a daily publication schedule that requires the editor to go through a ‘project management’ exercise daily to ensure the publication appears on time, accurate, within budget, and complete.
The process the DB goes through is essentially similar from the paper publication it grew from, the Gazette. The Gazette had a weekly (later bi-weekly) publication schedule that was a ‘project management’ experience repeated along the publication process. There is in fact a clear project process except we add a one other ‘advanced’ step – rebirth.
The roles in a weekly paper publication (Gazette):
- Editor,
- Writer(s),
- Pagination,
- Graphic Artist,
- and printer.
Then you have to think about distribution.
The roles in a daily web publication (Daily Bulletin):
- Editor,
- Writer,
- Page design/layout,
- Graphic Artist,
- Server admin,
But you don’t have to distribute it, just upload new material and update a link on the homepage.
Name a publication, paper or web, and you will see these five core roles being taken on by anywhere from one to x-number of people. If you don’t you likely see obvious problems with the publication – more likely with web sites.
Creeping Scope
Scope changes can throw a project into turmoil. What is know as ‘scope creep’ plagues many web pages for the simple reason that a web site was initially designed based on the content and requirements placed on the site at the time a ‘web site (re-) design’ had taken place. But since then the content has been added to, new content created, and maybe even the audience has changed. The web site’s architecture is now stressed, images are dated, information may be misplaced or lost or not properly classified, and technology changes could be leaving the site with inconsistencies.
An unknown is when to update your site in order to fix these problems. The Internet is too young, technology changes too rapidly, and the audiences’ needs are in constant flux. There are also legal responsibilities such as accessibility or privacy to take into consideration in many cases.
Why don’t we see this problem in paper publications?
With paper it is really easy to see the start and finish of a publication cycle – when the paper is printed it’s over only to start again (rebirth). I am not just talking newspapers either. On campus we have many publications like the course calendar, We’re Waterloo, Waterloo Alumni Magazine, Keystone Campaign newsletters, view books and other recruitment materials, and many more. All of these have obvious project/publication teams and a process that is followed. Some are better than others at this process but they all have a start-finish-rebirth cycle.
Publication and design cycles
I should mention that there are two clearly different cycles in paper publication as there should very well be for the web: publication and design. With a publication cycle you are looking strictly at content and its layout within a given template. In design you are looking at changing the template from logos to colours to paper to fonts. That is design. On the web it is pretty much the same thing from code to logos to colours to fonts.
Publication and design cycles vary but often in news papers you see subtle changes over time that if you look at a paper five years ago you really notice. On the web it can happen in a blink of eye that can result in massive user interface changes which is not ideal but is really the norm currently.
Road to improvement in 3 steps
The first step is let go of the thought a web site can be perpetually updated but the content layout never needs reconsideration. When a site is never updated I like to say it suffers from ‘drop down syndrome’ where new content is simply stuck in categories that had been labeled years before and don’t really fit, often drop down menus.
The second step is identifying a publication process. If you update content in sync with a paper publication then you have a process but you have yet to acknowledge it. Formalize the process, identify what content will appear on your site, who is responsible for it, when you expect it to be updated again, and why is the content there in the first place? Just because you can update your content right away, do you really need to?
Web project roles that are recognized by the industry include (From Web Redesign – Workflow that Works by Kelly Goto & Emily Cotler);
- Project Manager – Organizes the project from start to finish.
- QA Lead – Takes care of Quality Assurance, identifying and squishing bugs as they appear. Responsibilities include building a test plan and checking browser compliance, HTML, and content placement.
- Information Designer – This person develops the site map and structures the way content navigation is laid out on a page – all of this in a non-design-oriented manner. The information designer defines site navigation, functionality, and user interaction.
- Usability Lead – The usability lead gathers firsthand information about how users actually use a site and analyzes what works and what doesn’t.
- Production Lead/Production Designer – The production lead heads a team of HTML production designers to facilitate HTML production and testing, while keeping an eye on scope and schedule at all times.
- Copywriter/Content Manager – Expert in web-specific writing that includes style and tone.
- Art Director/Visual Designer – Basically does the stunning graphics that are found on the site.
- Programmer/Backend Engineer – This person worries about the server side code and architecture.
In web projects, any team member depending on the size or scope of the project often takes on more than one role. Very few universities have people assigned to these roles at the time of this report. The ones that do often are found inside medical schools or other specific departments.
The third step is to ask for help. There are a few web experts on campus and even more project management people around that can offer advice. I would also recommend talking to people involved in publication of paper-based projects. Communications and Public Affairs have decades of experience to share with those interested. Remember publication is not a new just the medium has changed.
I would like to encourage some discussion on this topic so please send me an email or comment below.
It has been a short week
There will be no grand link list this week, I have been too busy to pay attention to my RSS reader. But I have been working on Part 2 of Web as Platform and plan to post it later today. I do have one important link that speaks to the fundamental principle in all design – be it web or application or graphical you must remember KISS. Oh and here is a great article: Growing Up With Web Standards.
Party weekend
This weekend is the big Moz party weekend for Firefox. 4.5 million downloads of version 1.0 since November 9th and counting is worth celebrating. In the Kitchener-Waterloo area you can join the party at the Huether tonight. If you are one of the 4.5 million, you will enjoy these links even more 
- BBC News web site has won an award from the Online News Association. This after three Webby awards!
- Web Design references from the University of Minnesota. Great resource.
- ABC redesign – another major site goes with Web Standards.
- Flash Image Replacement greatly improved. This is an advanced technique for prettying up your web site that is just cool.
- An assessment of the above method by the CSS Zen Garden creator.
- Search engine optimization and increased usability.
- For the mathies – every web designer/developer should have a Venn Diagram.
- Shift in usability culture.
- Accessibility: The Human Factor from a UW Alum.
- Browser, Browsers Everywhere
Now where did I put my party hat?
Why would you be running IE 5.5?
I have asked google, why run IE 5.5 and I get a list of sites dating back to 2001 and earlier. But I don’t get an actual reason as to why anyone would run it today.
Being a non-Windows person (have win98 and XP on Virtual PC for testing only) and somewhat computer literate, I often marvel at the lack of updates people apply to their machines be it OS X or Windows 98. After running Windows Update on my VPC win98 install it defaults to install IE 6… so I can only assume that those who are using IE 5.5 are doing so on machines that are not secure just from the lack of updating.
Upon checking with W3 Schools stats page I am relieved to see IE 5 down to 5% but somewhat alarmed that win95, the only windows system that can’t run IE 6 (I think), is at 0.1%. So that means there could be 4.9% of web users definately not updating windows? or maybe some of that are IE 5.1 OS X users?
As an OS X exclusive member (no perks) of the computing public I must have the wrong idea. Why would you keep IE 5.5 around?
Firefox 1.0, changing times, an Engineering site
Firefox 1.0 is now out! As of this posting, 2 109 079 downloads of Firefox 1.0 have been recorded by SpreadFirefox since November 9, 2004. Interesting launch related ‘buzz’ around the net:
- Beautiful Browser
- Why I like Windows – ha-lari-ous
- Are you a college student?
- Microsoft says Firefox not a threat to IE
On a related topic, why is Internet Explorer unsafe? I would say it’s time to banish IE to that second browser status.
Ok, so what else is buzzing around the net? Very importantly for Ontario folks, the Accessibility for Ontarians with Disabilities Act is on the move. Looks like enforcement is being legislated this time. If you haven’t embraced accessibility by now.. wake up.
As we move more towards RSS feeds around here, a timely mention on how that changes things. Basically RSS feeds give people instant deep access to your site so your home page is less important.
..and a decent tip from Gerry on obvious mistakes web folks make.
Now. I would like to highlight more of the interesting web developments on campus. Especially given ‘collobrative’ software being a real buzz. I had this link sent to me from a student is SYDE, class of 2008. Their site is a great example of different technologies converging on one site. It looks cool too
