The foundations need to be right

Posted on Wed Jan 08
Tagged: Design | Leave your comments

I suppose I am writing this post today because I surfed a few sites this morning to see if there were any changes. My surfing is sometimes more involved then the average Internet user simply because I want to know what was used to build the site.

The first page I loaded had obviously been redesigned by someone with design skills. It is much better then the previous site the company had which was great and I was happy with that. Out of curiosity I decided to look at the source to see how it was built.

To my horror the site coding, we can call it the foundations was terrible. First of all it was built in a language that is about 11 years old. Not I don't need to tell you that technology moves at such a fast pace that starting of 11 years ago isn't a smart option.

Now you might be saying "You said the site looks good, so what's the problem". Well it's kind of like buying a house with white ants. It looks fine on the outside, but it is going to cause problems.

Usually this kind of foundation is used by companies that aren't solely web design companies so they don't have the knowledge to research new methods, or it is done by a designer that is cheap, and I mean really cheap. People cheapest isn't always the cheapest option. Think about the amount of money and time it takes to fix something done wrong.

I thought I would delve in a little deeper to see what I can come up with. I decided to run the first step on our Quality Assurance program and things just got worse. Not only was the foundations (coding) 11 years old but it didn't even validate against the standards for that version.

Even if you don't have a search engine optimisation plan in place you don't want to be pushed down the list just for having bad code. So not only is the new site foundations 11 years old but it is harming your online presence.

Now if you can remember at the start of this post I mentioned that I saw two sites. Well the second one is different. It is coded in relatively new foundations yet the layout itself is terrible.

It is the two reasons above that I personally have spent a lot of time developing the Able Net Design process to ensure the highest quality sites are being developed. It may take more time to complete a project but at least I can be assured that the project from my end has been a success.

Remember there is more to a website then what you see.

Welcome to 2008

Posted on Mon Jan 08
Tagged: General | Leave your comments

I thought today I would start of stating how my christmas was. First of all for those that don't know, I went to Switzerland. IT WAS GREAT. As many of you know I am a Snow Boarder, so the amount of snow that we had was great. I took heaps of photos so I'll post some of them soon.

Enough about my holiday for now, what will 2008 and at mean for Able Net Design. Well we have a new Customer Relations director (hows that for a title) who will be basically the go to person. She will be in contact with you soon. As 2008 is all about continued service. I have taken this step so I can commit more of my time to the design and general running for YOUR websites.

We have some great new packages coming out for those that would like to get more out of their website, which I will be talking about in the not so distant future.

With the success of the SnowFlake CMS those that already have it running will see a new user interface being rolled out over the next few weeks. This will be coupled with a few new add-on features for Flakes like blog etc... For those that are using anything less then WebFast version 3.0 you will receive some information on changing over to SnowFlake.

For those that are managing their own websites, I will be reviewing some great applications to help you. Our first review and recommendation will be in the image editing field. I am going for a quality at low cost approach as there are some great products out their that can really enhance what you are doing.

That is the basis for 2008. I look forward to working with you on further developing your online presence.