Web browsers have …

Websites are tools, and the tools that endure are the tools that serve a purpose.  Shovels are good at making holes, cars are good at moving people from one place to another.  If you want people to use your website, it must serve a purpose.  However, it is not sufficient for the site to serve a purpose for you, it must serve a purpose for whomever you want to use it.

What Purpose Should Your Website Serve?
And Whom Does it Serve?

There are any number of purposes a website might serve, but let’s take a look at some of the more common …

Redesigning a website is like building a new one:

Start with a purpose.

If you know you need a change, but can’t put the reason into words, try answering these questions:

“What do I want my new website to do that the old one couldn’t?”

“What do I want my new website to do better than my old website?”

Maybe you want your new site to reflect a new identity, perhaps you want to start selling products online, or you want to start an online community, or improve online customer communication, or reduce the turn around time between when you decide …

In all areas of design the trends of the past can inspire the variations of the future.  We all know this, and have invariably made studies of what’s come before in our own areas of interest.

However, without a large library and a lot of time, it can be difficult to consolidate the images of the past.  Thankfully, several online archives and indices may have already done the work for you:

For example, the Duke University Library maintains three digital collections of early Canadian and US print advertisements that collectively house more than 16,000 scanned images from the 1850’s to the 1950’s.  …

White space is a term of art referring to any portion of a physical or digital page that is left unmarked.  This includes margins, gutters, paragraph breaks, column divisions, and the space around and between graphics and illustrations.

These areas are not necessarily white, but they are traditionally left empty.  Because white space is characterized by the lack of content, it is sometimes known as negative space.

Why Should a Website Have White …

There are so many web sites that it is overwhelming to try and decide the best business to hire. Web sites have become really generic because businesses are trying to design them on their own using cheap and uninteresting templates and stock photography.

I am a professional portrait photographer and have the opportunity to work for web site designers that know the difference between a generic site and a personalized site that will set your business apart from the hundreds of other sites selling the same service or product.

The first way to set yourself apart from all the sites that are difficult to navigate …

Ontology is a fancy word for thinking about the universe, sorting it into categories, and determining how those categories relate to each other.

It is especially important to people who are trying to develop “smart” search engines that can formulate answers instead of just presenting relevant web pages.  This is because different types of information should be handled and interpreted different ways (which is why Wolfram | Alpha will frequently ask you for clarification).

For an example, just try a Wolfram Search for “internet” (just remember to hit the back button in your web browser to return to us).

Wolfram …

Sound can be a touchy subject online.

Remember many people will have multiple web browsers open at once, or while playing music of their own, and that catchy jingle that is perfect for your site can cause your visitors no end of consternation while then are engaged in other activities.

Earache My Eye

It is very rare that you can guarantee that your audience will give your site their undivided attention. Any sound that starts up on its own will most likely be considered audio SPAM.

It is better “netiquette” to let visitors chose to turn your chosen soundtrack on. …

Steven Wolfram’s new “knowledge engine” has launched to mixed results.  While the tool is just as powerful as advertised in some areas (like the comparing stocks, answering physics questions, or performing complex numerical calculations), there are other areas where it falls short of the mark.

While Wolfram|Alpha can compare the 2008 season of the Oakland A’s against that of the San Francisco Giants, it still can’t figure out when the baseball season begins.  Perhaps, in time, Wolfram Research will be able to work out the bugs.  But for the time being it is still a very specialized tool.

Thankfully, Wolfram|Alpha does excel …

Unless you are one of the lucky few with a relatively distinctive name, you have encountered a situation where you have signed up for an e-mail address, only to be told that your own name has already been taken, but would you be interested in one of half a dozen variations on that name?  Or perhaps your name with a few extra numbers thrown on at the end so that it’ll be distinguishable from all the other people who’ve set up e-mail accounts using the same name.

The same thing is true of Social Media sites.  They require visitors and members …