SEO – Search Engine Optimization

Search engine optimization is a way used to make web pages more useful to customers by making them more transparent and understandable to search engines. There are rules that have to be followed in order to get more views on Web site and make it rank highly in search engine results:

 

Writing Strong Content

search engines want to provide links to relevant pages so they constantly read and review the content of Web pages to make sure that it really is about what you say.

Valid HTML

Having valid HTML is often forgotten or ignored by many developers. And when it comes to SEO it is very important to have our code valid. There are few websites which might help validate html code, for example:
http://www.validome.org
http://www.validator.w3.org

Finding Good Keyword Phrases

Instead of trying to come up with every keyword phrase possible. Every Web developer should focus on one or two phrases that really describe what the page is about and then make sure that the content, headlines and links within the page have these phrases repeated.

Loading Times

From now on Google has included loading times in the algorithm for desktop and mobile web sites.

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Apart from these listed above, Google offers variation of tools that can improve websites so they can rank higher in search engine results.

There are three specific tools that I will be looking more into, and these are:
Page speed tools
“Fast and optimized pages lead to higher visitor engagement, retention, and conversions. The PageSpeed family of tools is designed to help you optimize the performance of your website. PageSpeed Insights products will help you identify performance best practices that can be applied to your site, and PageSpeed optimization tools can help you automate the process.”
Webmaster tools
“it is a free service offered by Google that helps you monitor and maintain your site’s presence in Google Search results. You don’t have to sign up for Webmaster Tools for your site to be included in Google’s search results, but doing so can help you understand how Google views your site and optimize its performance in search results.”
Google correlate
In most simplistic words – “Google Correlate finds search patterns which correspond with real-world trends. ”

 

 

 

Discovery Phase

Discovery Phase – Personas

What is Persona?
It is a fictional person representing a major user group for a site. Personas are representation of site’s target users which are giving clear picture of how users are going to use the web site and what they expect from it.How do I get information on each Persona?

How do I get information for each persona?
Usually personas are based upon analysis of users. There are few ways of doing it:

• contextual interviews
• individual interviews
• usability testing
• small focus group

I have interviewed few of my friends including my parents and asked them questions regarding what they would expect from the website, what are their goals and needs. their level of web usage. and add to it some standard info about them such as: Age / Gender / Location.

Below are three persona’s that I have created based upon interviews:

 

Now based upon these personas I can plan more less on what website should have and what I need to meet Goals and Needs of each one of these.

 

 

Discovery Phase – Descriptive Words

 

 

Discovery Phase – Style Approach

Style board is all about the look of the website.

Discovery Phase – Moodboard

Moodboard is created to show how does it make feel our users, when they visit website.

 

interpretation of four elements

When it comes to expressing four elements in bit different way than just air, wind, fire and earth.
I have decided to get into Greek Mythology as there are gods and goddesses which are representing each one of these elements.

Earth

When it comes to earth I have picked Greek Goddess Gaia (or Gaea) which was a primeval divinity of earth and one of the primal elements who first emerged at the dawn of creation, along with air, sea and sky. In the myth Gaia appear as the main opponent of he heavenly gods. She has protested against her husband Ouranos (prime god of sky) because he has imprisoned her sons in her womb.

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Water

I have picked Poseidon to represent water element. He is Greek god of the sea, rivers, flood and drought. In the war of the Titanes where he fought beside Zeus and Hades, he has imprisoned the old gods in Tartaros. Usually depicted as a mature man with dark beard and holding a trident.

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Air

It took me a bit of time to decide which god I should choose to represent Air element because there are two Gods I could use. Zeus and Uranus.
Uranus was the primeval god of the sky and Godfather to Zeus. Uranus and Gaia fathered twelve sons and six daughters.  After his downfall, Uranus prophesied the fall of the Titans and punishment they would suffer for their crimes. which was a prophecy, later fulfilled by Zeus.
Zeus was god of the sky and weather, law order and fate and also god of all gods. Son of Cronos and Rhea and brother of Poseidon and Hades. His usual attributes were a lightning bolt, royal sceptre and eagle. Zeus has battled Typhoeus. Monstrous giant with hundred heads who has attempted to capture heaven.

I have decided to go with Zeus for very simple reason. Zeus is much more known to people than Uranus. And I have decided to randomly ask who is Greek god of sky, and everyone has said ‘Zeus’.

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Fire

I have already knew that as a fire element I will choose Olympian god of fire, Hephaestus. Also god of blacksmiths, metals and volcanoes. His Roman equivalent (each Greek god has its own equivalent Roman God) Son of Zeus and Hera. Served as the blacksmith of the gods, he made all the weapons of the gods in Olympus.

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These above are all Gods which I have chosen to represent my four elements.
In Greek Mythology there are also tons of Heroes and Titans and actually some of these
I could use a extra information on each element. For example Greek Titan Prometheus. I can associate him with fire as he stole Fire from Zeus  from heaven and delivered it to mortal kind. As punishment , Prometheus was arrested and bound to a stake on Mount Kaukasos where eagle was set to eat his liver which was continuously regenerating.

Four elements – Representation & origins

The Four elements: Earth, Air, Fire, Water. These are representation of different aspects of nature and the forces of energy that are controlling the world we live in. We can incorporate these elements in our daily life, our home and work environment, our attire, or anything else that you can relate four elements to.

During the Greek Hellenic civilization (323-146 B.C.) the symbols used to represent elements of Greek physics were based on the triangles:

• Water: Triangle pointing down
• Fire: Triangle pointing up
• Air: Triangle pointing up with horizontal line through centre of triangle
• Earth: Triangle pointing down with horizontal line through centre of triangle

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Fire  – masculine element. In feng shui masculine energy is called yang.

It represents  noon in the cycle of the day / summer season  or  young adulthood in cycle of life.

Fire within Feng shui:
Symbols – Candles / Dragon
Feng Shui colours – Red / Pink
Colours of fire in other Cultures – Red / Pink / Orange / Purple

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Water – feminine element. In feng shui it represents Wealth, Prosperity or Abundance. 

In pagan cultures, water rules the compass direction of west and the autumn season. When it comes to feng shui, water element is assigned  to the north.

Water within Feng Shui:
Symbols – Aquariums / Water fountains / Outside water features
Feng shui colours – Black / Blue / Metal colours: Gold, silver or white
Colours of water in other cultures – Aqua / Turquoise / Gray

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Earth – feminine element and is passive. In feng shui it represents a strong solid foundation.

Earth symbolizes the planet earth, mother / grandmother / direction north / season winter and wintertime of life (old age) . it represent stability, permanence, security and solidness and midnight in the cycle of the day.

Earth within Feng shui:
Symbols – Crystals / Earthenware / Ceramic pottery / Gemstones / Rocks
Feng shui colours – Yellow / Brown
Colours of earth in other cultures – Brown / Tan / Green / Yellow / Russet

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Air – masculine element in many cultures. Not an element within Feng shui.

The chi energy rides on the air to travel around the world. Air cannot be contained or recreated to use. That is why it is not considered to be an element, but a vital component of chi energy. When it comes to different cultures, air is recognized as the breath of all life forms and nothing can exist without it.
Air is an invisible force and can only be seen in its passing through other elements such as – Leaves of trees / Dust storms / Flickering flames on fire / Over the ocean.

Air within Feng Shui:
Symbols – there is no symbol that might represent Air as it is not considered as an element  within Feng shui.
Feng Shui Colours –  Again.. because air is not considered as an element within Feng shui, there is no colour that represent it.
Colours of air in other cultures – Blue / White / Gray

 

 

Research continuation

I have done another research. This time I was looking for on-line exhibitions (if such a thing even exist). From beginning of research I haven’t been expecting to see online exhibitions where I can walk like in game (from 1st person) and discover different parts of  museums, instead just pictures and text.

I have spent most of my time on two websites, one of them is Smithsonian American art museum

I would say that, this website is using old design trends. 3 Column layout in the middle. there is lots of text and links everywhere. Instead of buttons used as a hyperlinks there is quit a bit of blue texts which are used as a links.

There is HUGE amount of content on this website, so everyone can find something for him. But I was mostly interested in these On-line exhibitions, which can be accessed from drop down menu (Exhibitions), and how these were done.

My expectations regarding on-line exhibitions have not been met and instead realistic thinking about text and pictures came true.

So when you go to on-line exhibition sections, this is what you get. List of available on-line exhibitions with a little bit of information (pic-1).

(pic-1) (pic-2)

Most of the time you get pictures with text on one side and all inserted into gallery (pic-2).

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The Fitzwilliam Museum. This is another website that I had look at. 

Old design, two menus at the top and left side. Different sizes of fonts and colours used in fonts. Lots of useful information on museum,  what’s currently on, previous exhibitions, on-line shop and much much more. But again i came here to look for on-line exhibitions.

Again I had little bit of problems with finding these on-line exhibitions but finally under On-line resources I have found it. Like in previous website you get list of exhibitions. But this list looks better in my opinion. first of all you have little pictures for each exhibition with a bit of text on side.  Instead of having to click on link to see more, You have well visible ‘Find out more..’ which is much better, for people with lack of experience on how to navigate through website.  And on top of that everything is nicely separated with grey line.

When it comes to checking these exhibitions, there is no specified layout/design on how each one of these is showed:

• You can get text with 1-2 pictures which after clicking on you get full size picture in new window.
• Again lots of text with 6-12 picture thumbnails which each one of these opens new html page with certain picture and text, and you have ability to click on ‘next’ and see next picture.
• Some of them contains only a bit of text with only one picture.
• There was one more when you get only pure text with three links to html galleries.

This slideshow requires JavaScript.

 

I was bit shocked that this website haven’t used any dynamic gallery as it would look much better and navigation would be also improved.

Now i have more less idea on how my exhibition might look like but still these are all fresh ideas and these are yet subject to change.

 

Researching.. (+Surprise)

Like before every project, first thing that has to be done is research. Because I am creating website for 21st century museum and exhibition on four elements (air, earth, fire, water).

I have decided to start my research with searching from exhibition websites. Most of the websites that showed up had usually information on their current and previous exhibitions. Their design usually consisted of 3 column layout  due to lots of text and most of them are still using old designs. Often these websites are using two menus, one on top and one on the left side.

First website that I had look at (2 days ago)  was:  Tower Bridge Exhibition website  and this is how it has looked.

.3 column layout. With all information that you need either on exhibitions or bridge history or even its lift times. When it comes to design we can easily say that it is a bit ‘old school’.

Today I have decided to re-visit this website again and I simply couldn’t believe. It took me few minutes to realize  that I am not on wrong page,  its just their design that has changed drastically.

You can smell that creator of this website knows design trends. Big picture used as a background, minimal amount of text and big buttons.

On previous design exhibitions section could be accessed through menu on top. When it comes to new design it took me a bit of time to realize that in order to access exhibitions I need to scroll down a bit and there was link to exhibitions.

Audience Identification

By doing a bit of research on Internet I have found out that Target audience shouldn’t be based only on age.
There are certain categories of our audience which we should also consider:

Gender
Age group
Ethnicity
Education
Religion

When it comes to my application It is going to be used for historical
exhibitions wherewe have choice of tour(difficulty?) either for kid or adult and additional games/quizzes.

I am not planning on adding tours for elder people as I consider them as adults. Even though their experience with technology will be lower
i am going to create app for adults easy to use with big touch of simplicty.

Comparing tours for kids and adults, there is obviously going to be less text and less complex games/quizzes etc. for kids, with a bit different approach from app to user.
for example: when using app as kid, you will hear more sounds towards you as to real kid, when as using as adult, you might hear you kids talking to you, and people talking to you more seriously.

My target Audience..
So, who really is my target audience?
I could say that from kids which are able to hold tablet in their hands and use it fluently to elder people not being afraid of how to learn using application.

While writing text above i got briliant idea of adding a little tutorial which could be turned on at any time and quickly explaining use of app.