For my COT 5930 mini-project 1 assignment, I developed a site that depicts a fictional t-shirt manufacturer providing direct sales to on-line customers. The target market is internet shoppers with young children. The inspiration came from an evening with my family at an ice cream store when I suggested that I print “my shirt is not a napkin” on my then six-year old son’s shirt, with the letters appearing upside down so that he could easily read them. While not yet fully functional (there is no shopping cart), the proposed teachtees.com web site currently features specific product designs on the home page with a full product line shown on the shop page. A third info page answers questions typically asked by online shoppers.
The site was coded in XHTML 1.0 strict compliant code using compliant CSS as well. A small javascript script written by a third party and used with permission was implemented on the home page. The script provides a fading slideshow presentation of three images.
Design Process
I coded the site using Coda, a Mac OS based web development tool which I find to be very useful. The HTML coding was straightforward and took from four to six hours. The creation of the graphic elements, however, was very time consuming, requiring approximately fifteen hours to complete. This was the first time that I used elements that provided mouseover effects, and this was also the first time I implemented a javascript. While the mouseover effect was easy, I struggled considerably with the scripting and I need to study the use of javascript further.
I followed an on-line tutorial at sixrevisions.com built around a 960 pixel grid system. While the tutorial helped, I should have planned the layout in advance better than I initially did, as I redrew my design mock-ups in Photoshop three times until I settled on the current appearance. I prefer modern, minimal web sites based on light grays and white, and I am pleased with the final result.
Future Development
I would like to develop the site further for future assignments by implementing a shopping cart and improved javascript effects (such as zoom features on the shirts). I also feel that the large, feature image on the main page should be more dynamic (changing instead of the smaller banner below), and I would like to add some photography. I also need to further develop and refine the “info” page. Finally, I am considering the using of a horizontal scrolling javascript in order to make transitions from page to page feel more “fluid”.
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