Sunday, September 21, 2008
Updates to Enid Blyton Society
Lately I've been working hard to revamp the Enid Blyton Society's website. This started many moons ago, when I did a "first stab" draft based largely on the existing design but with a few changes to make it a little warmer and more colorful. Tony Summerfield, Anita Bensoussane and I discussed it for a bit and then I had to get on with some work. Months slipped by, and then we started into it again, and this time came up with a drastically different idea with five slightly different alternatives. Finally we whittled it down to one.
With the basic design finally settled, it was on to the details. Which illustrations should go on the menu buttons? What should we include in the masthead? Which typeface would look good for the logo? So many little details! But as a web designer by trade, I'm used to working with others by email and, like most jobs, this one went very smoothly — but slowly. There was another long delay while I dealt with some more work; Tony pays for the web hosting, and I get my Journals for free, and I make a little money from referrals on book sales, but otherwise all the work I do on the Society site (as well as my own) is free. I can't even begin to quantify how much time I've spent over the years on both sites! Anyway, because it's a hobby rather than a paid job, I have to make sure to earn a living as well — hence the delays!
Finally I got back to it and started hammering out the other pages. There was some fairly major reorganizing to do, but in the end I realized it was time to make the new site live. It's a funny thing though. I currently host something like 40 websites not including my own, and I went through the same design and build process on each one. But I rarely get "anxious" about going live. I think this one was different because of the forums; displaying my work in front of familiar faces with voices, instead of an unknown faceless audience, is quite nerve-wracking!
I'm happy to say the reaction so far is favorable, so I can relax. Actually I was more concerned with bugs than anything; you can't please everyone with regards to design, but technical bugs simply mean webmaster incompetence! There was one minor bug that I fixed — a browser incompatibility issue which meant the links at the top of the page were half hidden — and there's another minor layout issue that I want to look at.
But there was also what I feared was a major, major bug, when Julie2owlsdene sent me a screenshot that showed a complete mess! It turned out that while she could see the new page content, her browser was not checking to see if there was a new stylesheet. The stylesheet tells certain components how to line up on the page, and viewing a new page with an old stylesheet is like trying to build a flat-packed cabinet with the wrong set of instructions. Nothing fits.
Yikes! Anyway, when Julie refreshed the screen, all the problems went away. Typically browsers check for any associated files when it visits a new web page. But once it has the necessary files for that page, it won't check again if the same files are required for other pages. Why bother? It has the stylesheet, for example, and there's no point downloading it again and again for each and every page. It's the same with images; once downloaded, they're stored in the temporary internet file folder (or cache) so that the next time you need those images, they load super-fast. Unfortunately, if a web page is updated and requires a new stylesheet, the browser might not realize it and continue to work with the old one. That's where "refresh" comes in. Pressing the "refresh" button forces the browser to go and look for newer versions of any files it has stored in its cache. Aha! Yes, see, the stylesheet is different now...
(Actually, the Fatty in me suggests that the problem was slightly more complicated than that. Why was the screen showing the bright new shade of red if the old stylesheet was still being used? Hmm. I think Julie's browser, for some reason, only loaded half the stylesheet. Or something.)
Now that the updates are complete, there's a whole slew of things to add. But all that's for the future. Right now I have more work to do. As for my own poor EnidBlyton.net...! I'm just lucky I have two very reliable moderators dealing with messages and posts. I don't know what I'd do without them. And, speaking of Julie (above), she has very kindly sent me another FanFic story to add, so watch out for that very soon!
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As for the dedicated moderators on your site Keith, Nigel is so right, you are indeed most fortunate!!!
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