Reboot

bradchoate.com Redesign To Do List

Goal: To publish the cleanest, content-separated-from-design, standards-compliant, accessible and customizable web site possible.

  • Redesign.
  • Eliminate table layout (thank you, glish.com).
  • Drop silly Flash graphic.
  • Eliminate existing 'preferences' stuff.
  • Eliminate calendar on index page.
  • Add 'Last 3 Months' calendar view to archive page.
  • Redesign so that the site can use multiple stylesheets and offer an option for the user to specify their own. Create style sheet selection menu.
  • Create a stylesheet choice that doesn't have my picture on it (mainly for my own use).
  • Change header/footer to use Smarty templates.
  • Make design flexible enough to allow user preference to identify both a stylesheet and template set (this gives ultimate control over multiple layouts).
  • Create collapsable sidebar for Sideblog, Blogroll, Ask Brad, etc. (display preference to be preserved).
  • User-preferences will be: design choice (could be a user-defined URL for stylesheet) and site options (boolean flags); stored in a cookie.
  • Validate for XHTML 1.1 (partially done -- the new home page validates, but I'm still using the XHTML 1.0 Strict DOCTYPE for now).
  • Validate under CSS2.
  • Render acceptably in Internet Explorer, Mozilla, Netscape, Opera, Lynx, Links and Safari (Windows/Mac/Linux); include CSS rules for printing.
  • Implement Mark Pilgrim's accessibility rules:
    • Choose a DOCTYPE.
    • Identify language in "html" tag.
    • Assign meaningful page titles.
    • <link> tags for navigational aids.
    • Present main content first.
    • Skip over for nav links.
    • Use color safely.
    • Use real links.
    • Add titles to links.
    • Define keyboard shortcuts.
    • Don't open new windows.
    • Define acronyms.
    • Give calendar a real caption (N/A).
    • Using real table headers.
    • Summary for tables.
    • Ignoring spacer images (N/A).
    • Using real lists.
    • Providing text equivalents for images - make sure they're 'good'.
    • Providing text equivalents for image maps (N/A).
    • Using real horizontal rules (N/A).
    • Using relative font sizes.
    • Using real headers.
    • Labeling form elements.
    • Make everything searchable.
    • Create an accessibility statement.
  • More accessibility: validate under BOBBY.
  • More accessibility: check CSS designs against VisCheck.
  • More accessibility: render internal and external links differently.
  • Place non-blog, static content in Movable Type so entire site is searchable (and stored in the database).
    • Geek code page.
    • PGP public key.
    • Resume.
    • Work information.
    • Contact information.
  • Implement additional RSS feeds that contain entire post content (keep excerpt version too for those that prefer to read the content at the site).
  • License site using the "Attribute, No Derivatives, Non-Commercial" Creative Commons License.
  • Kickstart my webcam.
  • Finish up the 'About Brad' blog and make it live.
  • Fill out the timeline blog and make it live.
  • Supplement 'Stuff' blog: Software, Music CDs, books (technical and otherwise).
  • Somehow tie site search (MT-Search) and Gallery search together.
  • Start using 'cite' tag for sources. Assign sources to existing blog entries (tedious!). Create citation index.
  • Set up site templates, stylesheets, base images, etc. in CVS.
  • Redesign blogs for Savannah and Seth.
  • Link front-page comment links to individual archive page (rather than use the silly popup window).
  • Create 'Links' blog and populate with fave bookmarks (still filling this in).
  • Add a mechanism (using key/values perhaps) to tell MT when to suppress the body entry from the individual archive page for cases where I only want the extended entry text to appear on the individual archive.
  • Clean up web directory. Remove backup files or files not referenced.
  • Integrate htmlArea into comment forms.
  • Reflow HTML so that it is all properly indented (Mostly done -- main templates are anyway).
  • Clean up entries: replace b, i tags with strong, em tags. Replace strike tags with del tags (this took some time).
  • Start using ins tag for updates following initial post.
  • Document the tricky parts of all this for public consumption.

Why? Because it's simply the best way to learn. I'm a learn-by-doing kinda guy. Items checked off above refer to current state of the redesign effort (which you can't see yet, nyah nyaaaah), not to the state of the public site as it is now. This is a work in progress that began in earnest on New Years day, so we're a little ways off, but hopefully not too much.

Please stand by...

Posted on January 2, 2003 3:40 PM |
Posted in Site News

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TrackBack URL for this entry:
http://bradchoate.com/mt/feedback/tb/500

Listed below are links to weblogs that reference Reboot:

» Choate's Redesign from DevBlog
[brad choate dot com] Reboot- an excellent list of things to do to make an accessable standards compliant userfriendly web [Read More]

Tracked on January 2, 2003 7:11 PM

» Redesign checklist from Site Log
If you're going to do something, you might as well have a list. [Read More]

Tracked on January 4, 2003 8:34 PM

» Redesign checklist from Site Log
If you're going to do something, you might as well have a list. [Read More]

Tracked on January 4, 2003 8:53 PM

» Less Bug, More Virus from the blivit
Moving along nicely, I guess. I finally came up with a decent way to adjust the sidebar to the [Read More]

Tracked on January 4, 2003 9:22 PM

» Less Bug, More Virus from the blivit
Moving along nicely, I guess. I finally came up with a decent way to adjust the sidebar to the [Read More]

Tracked on January 6, 2003 1:36 AM

» Una buena idea para organizar un proyecto de un weblog from mini-d
Brad Choate ">ha hecho un post en el cual muestra mediante una rama de checkbox los puntos que quiere cumplir [Read More]

Tracked on January 6, 2003 11:51 AM

» Brad Choate's redesign checklist from Legends of the Sun Pig

Brad Choate has a great list of things (design, accessibility, etc.) he is planning to do for his blog in 2003. I don't need to do all of these here on my own site, but it's a nice heurist...

[Read More]

Tracked on January 8, 2003 6:26 PM

» Redesign list from Mentalized
Brad Choate is redesigning his website, and he's blogging his progress. He has a long list of ideas/task indicating a [Read More]

Tracked on January 9, 2003 5:44 AM

» Arrrgh. from I Can't Focus
So I'm chuggin along with a redesign and I stumble across Brad Choates list. Great list. I'm doing most [Read More]

Tracked on January 10, 2003 1:16 AM

» Catching Up from John's Jottings
A lot of interesting things have been going on in the web log world that I need to get caught [Read More]

Tracked on January 20, 2003 5:42 AM

» Website Refresh from sooz.com : weblog + boston events + photography + etc.
I was inspired by Brad Choate's "Reboot" list to redesign/update his website. I've been wanting to make some updates to [Read More]

Tracked on January 22, 2003 8:09 PM

» Website Refresh from sooz.com : weblog + boston events + photography + etc.
I was inspired by Brad Choate's "Reboot" list to redesign/update his website. I've been wanting to make some updates to [Read More]

Tracked on January 22, 2003 8:13 PM

» Website Refresh from sooz.com : weblog + boston events + photography + etc.
I was inspired by Brad Choate's "Reboot" list to redesign/update his website. I've been wanting to make some updates to [Read More]

Tracked on January 22, 2003 8:56 PM

» Website Refresh from sooz.com : weblog + boston events + photography + etc.
I was inspired by Brad Choate's "Reboot" list to redesign/update his website. I've been wanting to make some updates to [Read More]

Tracked on January 22, 2003 8:57 PM

» Catching Up from John's Jottings
A lot of interesting things have been going on in the web log world that I need to get caught up with: Burningbird has spent some time documenting her Threadneedle Strategy, which describes how to maximize the use of comments, trackback, backtrack and ... [Read More]

Tracked on March 1, 2003 6:10 AM

» In brief from dive into mark
Python 2.3a1. The quest for the ideal PDA. A productive environment with Chimera and NetNewsWire. A local story on bloggers. Text formatting for Movable Type. Processing RSS with XSLT. Analog and ReportMagic. How to write like a wanker. Really. [Read More]

Tracked on August 8, 2003 4:35 PM

» Brad Choate: Reboot from Roland Tanglao's Weblog
Excellent site re-design checklist that is applicable to all websites! [Read More]

Tracked on September 15, 2003 5:08 AM

» Una buena idea para organizar un proyecto de un weblog from minid.net
Aplica un listado de cosas para hacer, y tendrás un buen punto de partida a la hora de hacer tu web. [Read More]

Tracked on December 25, 2003 1:55 PM

8 Comments

milbertus said:

Good luck, Brad. It's going to take a lot of work, but I hope that you can do it. :)

January 2, 2003 7:27 PM
Joel said:

Looks fantastic! I really dig the CSS-driven columns.

January 2, 2003 11:48 PM
kristine said:

Wow, I can't wait to see the outcome of this list!! :)

January 2, 2003 11:52 PM
lashlar said:

Sounds awesome. I can't wait to see the results of this!

January 3, 2003 6:18 PM
Johan said:

I've been thinking about ways to implement Smarty with MovableType. The most powerful way would probably be to have MT spit out XML that is parsed by PHP so you can shape the Smarty templates in whatever way you want.

LazyWeb, I invoke thee!

January 3, 2003 7:25 PM
robert said:

Great list.

I started a list like this but like the length of yours. More to do!

I want to get started with PHP and MT but am an absolute beginner with PHP -- Smarty will have to wait.

January 4, 2003 8:23 AM
robert said:

Great list.

I started a list like this but like the length of yours. More to do!

I want to get started with PHP and MT but am an absolute beginner with PHP -- Smarty will have to wait.

January 4, 2003 8:23 AM
lowmagnet said:

Brad,

You might want to add a checkbox for 'fix that strange pattern that occurs from time to time behind links. It looks like a desktop pattern, but it's really strange and getting in the way under safari.

January 27, 2003 7:06 PM

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This article was published on January 2, 2003 3:40 PM.

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