9-27-2006 These are very rough first-cut pages that ought to be viewed primarily as layout variants. The actual design of the page banner and link layouts lies in the future. Currently the BIT Company (Bridgewater Information Technology) -- as we are calling the class has formed a three team group to address the Lincoln Project:
OPENING PAGE Team: Bobby Kittleberger, Justicia Latham, and Josh Randall ―The Opening Page team will be developing the Lincoln Project Opening Page. This includes the Banner, the Link Buttons off the main page and main page content.
GALLERY Team: Buzz Baker, Lauren Belella, and Bob Satchell ― The Gallery team is responsible for developing a highly interactive page which will display photographs and explanatory text and be mouse-able in at least some contexts to more complete pages or subordinate Galleries of Photographs. A Gallery is in this context more than a simply Album since it includes the context in which the picture(s) are viewed.
MAP Team: Brandon Neff, Ben Shirkey, and Alton Timbers ― The Map team is tasked with developing a highly interactive map which will show the major Lincoln sites in Virgina and when moused on will expand to pictures and information about the site to include maps and directions.
For this assignment all the class members were asked to provide an example opening page.
Page1 Page2 Page3 Page4 Page5 Page6 Page7 Page8 Page9
A few comments: (from Ray Schneider, CEO of BIT) It is essential to understand that we are at the earliest stage of conceptualization so that various elements are missing or not functional. In light of that caveat the following purely descriptive comments are made by the CEO.
Page1 -- A template kind of page with a top banner, left sidebar for links, and center for content with a place-keeper for the Gallery. No content beyond a set of sample links: Home, About the Society, Map of Sites, Membership, Links.
Page2 -- Similar to page 1 except stand-in graphics. Left sidebar links were Gallery, Map and Home in that order. This leaves off many of the simpler links that are likely to be required. The Banner graphic is not realistic but does include two of the elements, Lincoln and the map of Virginia, that were suggested by previous brochures of the society and by President Stone. Note we will want pages for the Board of Directors for example, Question and Answer, and several other elements that have not thus far appeared in the first-cut prototypes.
Page3 -- TBD
Page4 -- TBD
Page5 -- Template with Left Sidebar Links similar to Page 1 and Page 2 but with a much more comprehensive list of links: Home, Our Mission, Contacts, Events, Board Members, Membership, Donations, Map, Links, and Questions. This seems like a fairly comprehensive list of navigation elements in the sidebar. There are no stand-ins for the banner graphics.
Page6 -- This template provides a notional banner and footer for the opening page. It includes, as did page 1 the Lincoln Signature.
Page7 -- This page contains a notional banner and a set of horizontal links beneath the banner. It appears to be in a three column format with some notional bottom links for Mission Statement and Newsletter Sign-up. The Mission has appeared before in Page 5 for example, but the Newsletter Sign-up only appeared implicitly in the Membership links.
Page8 -- Generic Template with Top Horizontal Banner, Sidebar Left Directory, a central area for Content and a footer titled Legal.
Page9 -- Inspired by Abraham Lincoln On Line this template features a horizontally laid out navigation bar with links for Home, History, Map, Gallery, News, Archives, Links, Membership, and Search. It has some affinity with page 7.
It is my intention to update this page somewhat as prototypes mature. However as soon as the teams focus in on a specific design this page will become of historical interest only.