Web Design Considerations/Checklist

Content/Design:

• Is content relative and informative to a variety of users?
• Make site more fun (JavaScript games, utilities...)
• Does the site have a theme that is consistent throughout the entire site?
• Include Contact Info
• Is the site free of spelling and grammatical errors? Use Spell Checker and 2nd Eyes for review
• It is OK to publish basic website with placeholders for future links. It is not necessary to include "Under Construction" images or references.
• Does the site conform to Corporate standards for colors, logos and fonts?
• Images: Optimize with Fireworks/Photoshop/ImageReady; use LowRes Source file for images over 30k
• Are Clip Art graphics and images used sparingly? It can be distracting if too many images are used.
• Is original artwork is used? Be careful not to use copyrighted images "borrowed" from the Internet
• Is all HTML code clean and all page elements display properly?
• Don't leave Table Format Fields blank - will display browser defaults (Problems with AOL or Netscape)
• Page Title/File Naming: Check all page names and titles (no untitled); all lowercase names
• Header: <META> Tags: Document Type Definition (DTD), Title, Description, Keywords, Author
• <ALT> Image Text for all images and tables; Image Size
• Cascading Style Sheets (CSS) used and current?
• Always use image size for faster loading
• Photo Albums: Photoshop/DW; customize banners, link back to site

Navigation/Functionality:

• Is it easy to access information on the site and return to the home page or main category pages?
• Are all external links accurate? Test frequently for broken links. Use New Window option for external links.
• Does the site take too long to load? (60 seconds max)
• Does site use special features that can't be browsed by all users?
• Are all images properly tagged with Alt tags to display image names?
• Are pages too long and heavy with information?
• Underlines should only be used for links! Users assume an underlined word means a link to another web location, not used for emphasis.
• Avoid using spaces or illegal characters in URL Addresses
• Test for all browsers (IE, Netscape, AOL...)
• Dreamweaver: cleanup code; Convert FP site; Browser Check - JavaScript Behavior; Convert Word HTML
• FrontPage: Recalulate Hyperlinks and Delete temp files

Page Layout

File Formats

Default page: Always name main homepage "default.htm" or "index.htm"
This allows address to be shortened since it is not necessary to add the default file name inside the main folder.
Example: http://yoursite.com/ (You do not have to type http://yoursite/default.htm)

File Names:

• Use lower case for file/folder names because address URLs are easier to type or remember
• Do not use spaces in file names (links will be difficult to navigate and will substitute "%20" in the place of spaces)
• The web is restrictive on the use of special characters in file names.
• The following characters can't be used in file names:
  
  • Forward slash ( / )
  • more than one dot ( . ). The only period used has to be part of the extension as in index.htm
  • You can't use the hyphen ( - ) as the first character in a file name.
  • Spaces in file names - use the underscore character ( _ ) instead.
  • Ampersands ( & )
  • Number Sign ( # ) - used for page bookmarks

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