Library Website Redesign

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Library Website Development is Right on Schedule!

The work is divided into month-long "sprints". Sprints are intense work cycles in the Agile software development methodology. During these cycles, stakeholders and developers agree on priority tasks and functionality for each sprint.

Sprint 1 includes:
* getting the development website up and running
* implementing the website "theme"
* creating home, about, project, ask us, and search pages

Behind the scenes, a technical writer has been drafting and editing content needed for the website preview. DLSS developers have been working on integrating search technologies into the website, including a feed from Stanford Who to create "people" pages, and new and improved support for keeping library hours information up to date.

As each sprint is closed, members of the online experience group will lead a review of the work that has been done, to insure it meets requirements.

Traveling Road Show Update

The Online Experience Group has been busy reaching out to groups all across SULAIR to present exciting information about the website redesign project. In these hour-long visits, we have presented hot-off-the-press glimpses of the look and feel of the new design, sketches of new pages and functions, and the timeline of the work ahead. But most importantly, we have had the opportunity to discuss the redesign progress with interested library staff who have shared important insights, suggestions, and reactions.

In the past month, we have made 8 presentations to staff from over a dozen different units, with still more visits planned soon. If you or your unit would like us to visit you too, please contact us. We are very eager to share updates and hear your feedback!

Library Website Redesign - Traveling Road Show

We have been providing in-person updates to key library staff groups over the last several weeks. We are sharing with everyone the PowerPoint slides we have been using. The slides include a projected timeline for the project, as well as an overview of what staff who create and maintain content on the library website should be doing throughout the project. As always, we include a list of ways for library staff to remain actively engaged with the project.

Page Templates for New Library Website

By now, you've seen the site map and the emerging visual design for the new site; these are like the foundation and the décor of a new house. Between these two layers, there's a lot of design work around creating the rooms, placing the windows, planning the traffic flow, etc. In a website project, that design work is represented in mockups or wireframes that define how the pages will be laid out, what content will be presented, and how the navigation will work.

The 30+ mockups in this PDF cover a representative set of page templates to allow Drupal development and content creation to begin. The designs are based on the user data we collected, and have been validated at several stages by user testing and reviews. We'll continue to validate (and modify) these designs as we build them into a functional site.

As always, your feedback is welcome - via email to online-experience-group@lists.stanford.edu, or the send us feedback form.

Sneak Preview of New Library Website Visual Designs

We are excited to offer a preview of the emerging visual designs for the new library website. We have included a version of the home page and a sub-page (Ask Us) to give you a sense of the colors, font, layout and overall design aesthetic of the new site.

Keep in mind that these designs are in the early stages of development and -- importantly -- the text and labels in these designs are not by any means final.

We expect the designs to change as the Drupal site gets built and is populated with real library content. And of course we expect that continued user testing and feedback will help us create a clean, usable and, yes, attractive library website.

Information Architecture of the New Library Website

A critical step in the development of a large complex website is the definition of the information architecture. The information architecture defines the structure, hierarchy and navigational pathways of a website, and the major categories of content.

Personas

Website designers often use personas to insure the design will meet users' needs. "A persona is a character sketch that represents a particular segment of the target audience," according to Steve Mulder, author of The User is Always Right: A Practical Guide to Creating and Using Personas for the Web.

Website Redesign High-Level Goals

The SULAIR Website Redesign Project has officially kicked off! The project team is excited to be working with web consultants, Chapter Three, on the first big step--developing a detailed workplan for rolling out a new library website by Fall 2011. To help focus the project, we have developed the following high-level goals.

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