John Rainsford // Web Design and Development

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Steps in a Website Design/Redesign

All website projects are different, but here are the main steps which usually occur in a standard website project.

  1. The client has to have a start point for their website- An idea of what information they want on it and how they want it to look- the type of website. Is it an e-Commerce website for selling items? Is it a static website which gets updated twice a year? Is it a website you want to be able to update yourself with a Content Management System?
  2. I need to know the extent of the information going on a website- the actual information is not needed, just an estimate of the amount- this is used for both pricing and design.
  3. Once a price/costing has been agreed, the client receives several 'wireframe' images which show several design directions that their website could go, which would suit their information and marketing/promotion goals.
  4. Once a wireframe layout has been agreed upon, a design is produced using suggested colours, images and typography. Client suggestions are always welcome and changes to elements can be made to suit the overall project.
  5. When the final design is given the go-ahead, XHTMLXHTML (XML HyperText Markup language) is markup language which is used to 'tag' your content so it can be read by your web browser. It is a more strict version of HTML/CSSCascading StyleSheets style your content from an external source, which is seperate to the content. Seperating content from the style information allows for screen readers, Google bots and anyone with stylesheets turned off to access your content. templates and/or Content Management SystemA Content Management System is a web-based administration area for your website, where you, the client, can update your own content, without having to learn complex coding languages. are created and the client's content is inserted and the final site is transferred to a web server and approved by the client before going 'live' to the public.

This is for a standard website design/redesign but every project is different, so variations in these steps are guaranteed.

For more information...

For the sake of brevity, explanations of abbreviations and terms are hidden behind links with a question mark, like thisHere's an example of explanation text. Roll your mouse over these links to show explanations.

Timescales, budgets and availability

The Contact page has more information regarding these issues, as well as guide costs.

Web Standards?

Using web standards (XHTMLXHTML (XML HyperText Markup language) is markup language which is used to 'tag' your content so it can be read by your web browser. It is a more strict version of HTML, CSSCascading StyleSheets style your content from an external source, which is seperate to the content. Seperating content from the style information allows for screen readers, Google bots and anyone with stylesheets turned off to access your content., DOM ScriptingDOM Scripting is the use of a standardised version of JavaScript to add really nice effects to your website without affecting how the content is accessed) allows for your website to be accessed by the largest possible audience.

For development purposes, PHPPHP is a server-side programming language, allowing for some really useful web programming. PHP stands for, confusingly, 'PHP: Hypertext Processor' and Ruby on RailsRuby on Rails is a programming framework for developing really complex web applications. Ruby is the programming language, Rails is the Framework are used.

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