Web and New Media

The skills that I have developed and practiced throughout this module have been beneficial to me in that I now have them to use in future projects, and I genuinely feel confident with them. 

Firstly my initial idea for personal development will be to continue with trying to resolve the problem surrounding the use of PHP in my project. 

Secondly, for the purpose of this assignment it was not necessary to build all pages to the website; however these are what I will now look to build and develop, so that the menu links such as ‘About me,’ actually have some content to link to and display.  

In terms of developing my CSS skills further, this could include making print-friendly versions of my web pages to go with my portfolio site as a brief example, but overall I think the more practice I have with CSS the better my chances are of becoming quicker at designing on the whole. As for PHP there is a large amount to develop with, and my original project idea of a Facebook application will be another main focus of mine. PHP is where the future of web design is, and as a growing web designer this is the direction I too need to be taking.                  

CSS is seen as a fundamental part of web design; however is an area that I personally admit to have been quite lazy with since learning the field. This is the main reason why I now wanted to develop my knowledge within the area, because at such an important point in my academic studies I knew that it was vital to know how to deploy these key skills confidently into practice, given that my third year project is to build a website and that will take such elements into account. What’s more, they are basic knowledge and skills that are almost certainly required when seeking employment within this sector, Employers will not only be looking for someone who can create unique designs, but will also depend on that person to have such skills that will make the work they produce more accessible, as this is an important issue for web companies. CSS skills also engage the designer more so with usability, for instance the placement of content is thought out more logically with CSS, and hence makes the designer more aware of how content appears and impacts on a user’s general site experience. The main reason people want websites is to attract the attention of users, and a user’s attention is only held with good design - something which CSS clearly promotes. 

Not only have I tried to improve my CSS knowledge and skills, but I have also used some PHP coding in my project. PHP itself is a technology which I have only recently been introduced to, and was the basis for my original project proposal which unfortunately became overrun with problems, and these were deemed too challenging for the short space of time with which this project had to be completed within. The use of PHP in my project is to pass PHP variables with a URL. This means that with my CSS designs, a user would be able to change the style/design of the webpage dynamically, i.e. change/load the new style into the webpage itself by clicking on a link.

In order to learn and develop this technique I first worked with a tutorial, and later also sought advice from the module lecturer. Unfortunately however, I have not yet been able to get this feature to work 100% correctly, and have been trying several methods, that I have been testing on my own personal webspace (http://www.katiebutler.co.uk) over the past week to resolve the apparent problem - so far with little success. Despite this my understanding of the technique has developed from virtually nothing to an adequate level, therefore with more practice and guidance I may eventually be able to get this element to work how it should. In doing so, I will have gained further skills to present to and hopefully impress potential employers or even clients with, especially those who may want to utilise my web services in the future.