Category Archives: Web Design

Quickie

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Been busy and will be busy… so here’s a brief list of thoughts and events that happened this week and then I’ll be away from this blog for a while until things start to settle a bit…

  • Had interview on Monday: went well! Although a few really tough questions were hard to answer I left with a positive feeling!
  • Client asked for quote: once agreed I’ll have to design new spring collection catalogue.
  • This sad pathetic person once again checked my business website last Friday and looked for the presentation that I’ve password protected.
  • Had to get loads of groceries for my mum’s birthday and clean her house.
  • Still been bothered by a severe cold and fever and having to go out three days in a row to buy all necessary stuff for a birthday is not helping much when you should be in bed.
  • Received a phone call on Friday that I’m through to the 2nd round, there’s only two available places so in two weeks I’ll know, but getting through feels great already!
  • Received a ‘friend request’ on this business networking website from a former teacher (Graphic Design study), exchanged emails with him, he invited me to come and talk. He’s a good contact and a really great teacher so I should head over one day!
  • Received two great references from MvdM to place on the aforementioned website and my own business website.
  • Updated my portfolio on my business website with projects I’ve worked on, should update blog as well, perhaps later today after some ‘me’ time.
  • Younger bro came over and stayed all weekend. Of course I wanted to entertain my sweet 1.5 year old nephew and my 3.5 year old niece!
  • Crocheted a stuffed toy for my nephew in five hours: a cute lamb…
  • My niece named him ‘Kerrie’ (Dutch for curry *LOL*) she’s got great sense of humour!
  • Took her out for a walk today to feed the duckies, she loved it.
  • Sis-in-law wondered how I felt about having/watching a mini version of myself running around the house: I just love it! She’s too cute…
  • My Vaio laptop needed formatting/new OS: I use it to check cross-platform website design, needed it coz I’m working on one. Bro helped me out. Bloody windoze…
  • Going to start working on my business plan in a few: will start product design because after a busy week I need some wind down time for me.
  • Managed to put myself first without feeling guilty or selfish, I could suppress the urge to only make time for others. Instead I set priorities and left those things to wait.
  • Cut the Valentine’s day roses, even dried they remain gorgeous.
  • Time to get started on my product designs…

Hope you’re having a wonderful weekend!

Update February 28 13:51:33: wow, at times it’s good to have tiny kids around with globs of snot. My previous annoying cold has now turned into a full-on flu and fever. One week and I’ll feel better again…

© Zesty Gal – ‘Kerrie’ a crafted gift for my cute nephew

© Zesty Gal – Still gorgeous…

Google: a Girl’s Best Friend

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I didn’t want to write about this at first because it was already a sad situation to begin with but then yesterday I found out about something: and then the picture became extremely clear all of a sudden and made the whole situation truly pathetic. So I’ve changed my mind because I’m stumped for the type of behaviour coming from someone my age probably older. You would expect someone that age to have left the playground by now and leave the immature 10 year old attitude behind as well, but I guess I was wrong…

A friend of a friend had mentioned a certain website from an organisation he/she worked for and how hard it was to convince this organisation to have it redesigned and/or rebuild. I had a look at it a few weeks later and to be blunt, it totally sucks. It has the worst navigation I’ve ever seen, it’s confusing, it’s chaotic, it’s a mess and the design is something I don’t even wish to discuss. I wanted to help out this person so he/she had something to show and convince the organisation that things could be improved.

I won’t go into design rules/details but navigation is the most important aspect of a website and very much underestimated, I’ve worked for web design agencies since the start of the internet in 1995 and I’ve seen it all evolve over time but that one rule is still very very valid. Anyway… I had set up a system and structure where the organisation was able to update the website themselves, including a new design based on a clear and easy to use navigation. This presentation website/sketch already contained about 90 pages.

I contacted the friend of the friend who was very enthusiastic and immediately noticed the difference in structure/navigation. It was then passed on within the organisation. A certain person had a look as well but she also had the nerve to snoop around my directories trying to get to the core which she couldn’t reach because I’m not that stupid, it’s all protected. Through my stats I could see she’d spent a total of 44 minutes visiting 16 ‘sketch pages’ and 16 hits on my business website, portfolio, testimonials and fees page.

Then I received the email… the first few lines were normal but the second paragraph had a tone in it that slowly changed from bad to worse and ended in a request demand to remove a small image from my business website. I keep a ‘recent projects’ column that shows what I’m currently working on, either finished website or presentation. Only a finished website has a link and my client’s name all else says ‘in progress’ and has no other info. The image showed 5 mm of the bottom of the logo which was enough to offend her.

I had no intention of removing anything at all especially not when I’m approached like that, I’d done nothing wrong, I wasn’t lying, it mentioned ‘presentation’ (what’s so hard to understand about that word?) and had no links nor names attached to it. But I was willing to adjust the image and I sent her a polite email back explaining how she got it all wrong. Never heard from her again… Of course I’d password protected my design after this incident and my gut feeling was confirmed later that day when she tried to snoop around again.

Yesterday I googled her name out of curiosity and to my surprise found out that she’d started her own unsuccessful graphic/web design business in 2001. Her business website looks as bad as the one I mentioned above. She had only three graphic design examples displayed at the size of a stamp and three website designs. Two of those linked to a dead end page: a for sale domain and the third linked to her sister’s business. It all looked like frontpage and PC crap and not proper design. And of course that’s when the/my penny dropped…

I’m still stumped that someone could overreact the way she did, so huffy… but now I realise it must have been jealousy and envy and it wouldn’t surprise me if that current chaos of a so-called website has been designed by her. It would totally explain this overreaction and pathetic behaviour. I haven’t heard back but that doesn’t surprise me at all, I’m a threat and she has a severe case of being driven by territorial imperatives. Her loss…

Can you imagine having to work with this person? I’m glad I gave it a miss the moment I received her email.

I am better than that.