The Starting Point |
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The natural inclination when beginning to create a website is to dive into Dreamweaver or HomeSite or some other web design software. The true starting point, however, is good old-fashioned paper. Jot down on a piece of paper — any paper will do: a grocery sack, a napkin, the back of your grammar worksheet — the elements you will include in your site. Organize them logically, with some hierarchy in mind. Will your site be organized thematically or chronologically? Step by step? Then, sketch out what you want your site to look like. You don’t have to be an artist or anything close to it. Just get your basic design down on paper: where your banner or nameplate (the title of your website) will appear, where your navigation scheme will go, where the “guts” of your content will go. This work is rather like creating an outline for a research paper. Figure out the big picture, and then you can add or delete items as you progress, as you determine that perhaps something doesn’t fit or needs to be moved to another section of your website. Establish a general framework, and then go from there. | |||
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» the starting point |