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| Calendar Calendar Old news Syllabus Online Projects Webzine Project Doc Re-Purposing Web Site Evaluation E-Portfolio Lab Assignments Lab #1 Lab #2 Lab #3 Lab #4 Lab #5 Lab #6 |
Old News 4/27 - You should have finished lab 6 and written a design document foryour e-portfolio project for today. I'll show you how to create PDFs, which you can apparently do in any public lab on campus. I'll have a link to the review questions for the mid-term posted by tomorrow afternoon. I'm assuming we'll run the final exam like we did the mid-term (20 questions drawn from the list of review questions). For next Tuesday, 5/4:
4/20 - We'll start lab 6 today, which will be due by next week. We'll also spend some time talking about your analyses of the online portfolio genre. Be sure to turn in a copy of your genre analysis before you leave today. For next Tuesday, April 27, you must do the following:
I'll have some review questions ready by next week for the final exam, which you'll take in class on May 4, the last regular class meeting. 4/13 - You'll user test each other's repurposing project tutorials in class today. As with all user testing, the goal is to set up a scenario where the writer/designer collects his or her own feedback about the effectiveness of a given Web site (which is a more grown up twist on the old exercise of peer review). I'll also spend time introducing the e-portfolio project, which will be due on the last day of class, May 4. For next Tuesday, April 20, you must do the following:
3/30 - You should have a design document for your re-purposing project (be sure to turn in a copy before you leave). Usability confession: I changed "announcements" to "news." It only took me a couple months to find a shorter word that fit in my first column (I didn't like how "old announcements" broke across two lines). Latest schedule change: The re-purposing project will be due on April 20. For next Tuesday, April 13, you must do the following:
Enjoy your spring break! 3/23 - We'll first finish up lab #5. Then we'll review today's readings:
I'll show you how to make screenshots for the re-purposing project. We'll use the remaining time to work on the repurposing project. I updated the calendar again with the following changes:
I haven't had a chance to finish grading all Webzines yet. For next Tuesday, 3/30, you must do the following:
3/16 - Today we'll shift gears to the second project, Document Re-Purposing. We'll also review Krug's concepts of usability by working in teams to complete lab #5. Hopefully, I've finally written a lab that can be completed in class. The Webzine project was due today. As of 3:00 p.m., I had heard from all of you, if you want to check out your peers' work. For next Tuesday, 3/23, you must do the following:
3/9 - We'll take the midterm and work on reviewing your Webzine projects, which should be in HTML format by now. One way to review the Webzine projects would be to work in teams or as a class to develop 1-page checklists that boil down criteria reviewed in the readings and then apply the checklists to the drafts. For next Tuesday, 3/16, you must do the following:
3/3 - NOTE: Webzine project is due on March 16, not next week, March 9 3/2 - Two things we can do today:
For next Tuesday, 3/9, you must do the following:
2/24 - We'll review Price and Price's advice for writing effective Web text and go over how you did on their "editor's challenge" exercise (Price & Price p. 456). I revised the calendar again (mostly pushing some reading assignments back). Notice that the midterm is in two weeks! I'll pass out a review sheet with midterm-like questions next week. The midterm will cover all reading assignments up to Krug (i.e., won't cover Krug, will cover Web Style Guide, Hot Text, and mscl. like Mulder). For next Tuesday, 3/2, you must do the following:
2/23 - Found a link to Groopman's article, "The Edmonton Protocol." You can copy and paste this text into a Word file to complete the homework assignment (see below) faster. The article length is 4,205 words. Your goal is to cut the article to about 1,000 words. 2/17 - How'd you do on lab #4? You can see how I did. Today, We'll get started on the first project, the Webzine Project. We'll do some discussion and an exercise to start developing criteria for good Web text, because your Webzine project must foremost be written in a good online style. Of course, the best places to learn about online writing style are: I didn't get a chance to grade your lab #3s, so make sure yours is still linked somewhere on your 413 Web site. For next Tuesday, 2/24, you must do the following:
2/9 - Uh oh, you may have discovered that Jonathan and Lisa Price updated their "Web Writing that Works" Web site—and seemingly scraped their whole "give the book away for free" ideals. They simply made the PDFs harder to find (talk about Web site usability. . .). This is a good time to mention the ephemeralness of the Internet. Web pages are much easier to update than print pages, and information on the Web is often fleeting. Enter the non-profit Internet Archive (http://www.archive.org/). If you have a favorite site that suddenly disappears or changes, chances are it has been archived by IA and you can search for it using the "Way Back Machine." Some good and bad news—it looks like all of the Hot Text PDFs have been archived except for chapters 2 & 4, part of the reading assignment due for today (see what the IA search results look like). But after some digging in the Site Map of Price and Price's new site, I found chapters 2, 3, & 4 under the "Rants" section (it looks like all the chapters are available scattered throughout the new site): In the meantime, we'll start lab #4 today, which deals with Cascading Stylesheets (CSS). You won't need to have read Price & Price ch. 2 - 4 to complete the fourth lab, but familiarity with Mulder's stylesheets tutorial is essential. Chapter 5 in Lynch and Horton's Web Style Guide also gives a brief overview of CSS. A few other notes:
For next Tuesday, 2/17, you must read the following:
2/3 - I'll try to clarify "backend" site maintenance. We'll look over some of your lab #2s and start lab #3. If you're still stuck on lab #2, you'll have some time to work on that, as well. Everybody's name should be added to the 413 page (check your name and URL). I also added some links and my contact information to the 413 Web page. For next Tuesday, 2/10, you need to read the following:
1/30 - If you're having trouble managing the files (the "backend" of your Web site) for lab #2, the easiest way to arrange your files is put all your pages in the public_html folder (forget sub-folders) and then you don't have to worry about the "../" and multiple "index.html" stuff. If all the pages are in the public_html folder (and not in any sub-folders) than all you have to do is type the file name you want to link to (e.g. "page1.html", "page2.html"). 1/27 - We'll focus on completing lab #2 today, about information architecture. When you're finished, you should have a rudimentary multi-page personal Web site. If you don't get done today, you must e-mail me the finished version by noon on February 3. NOTE: If I haven't seen/graded your lab #1 yet, don't write over the lab #1 html file with today's lab #2 file. Re-name the first lab file something like "lab1.html" because you want the first page of lab #2 to be your new homepage (i.e., index.html). For next Tuesday, 2/3, you need to read the following:
1/21 - We didn't get a chance to finish lab #1 in class, so make sure you complete the lab and e-mail me your Web site address by noon on Tuesday, 1/27. I'd appreciate any early submissions. 1/20 - Welcome to English 413, Electronic Documents and Publications. Eng. 413 is part of the English Department's Professional Writing Certificate Program. Today, after introducing the course, we'll get right into things by working on lab assignment #1. You can leave when you complete it. For next Tuesday, 1/27, you need to read the following:
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