Week 1

Tuesday, January 13

Group Activities

• Introduction to the course and each other.
• Review carefully the Course Description, paying particular attention to all requirements. It is important that you become very familiar with the course policies so you can understand what is expected of you in this class.
• Before Thursday, be sure to post your Introduction as a comment to my post on our front page.

In-Class and On Your Own

Exploring the class website:

• Complete Getting Started 1: Registering on the Site, Getting Started 2: Logging in for the First Time, and Getting Started 3: Editing Your Account for the First Time
• Read Learning to Navigate the Site. Then explore the class website. Make sure that you login; some class website features are not available to guests. It'll be easier as we move forward if you take the time now to explore. Get familiar with where things are located, which links take you further into the class website and which take you outside to other resources.
• Review How to Post to Your Individual Weblog and then "How to Post Comments and Replies"
• I've created a post on the course home page inviting you to introduce yourself. Post a comment to that post in which you
  • describe where you are from
  • give your course of study and year
  • talk about your career goals
  • tell what you would like to get out of this course
  • share at least one thing personal about yourself (a hobby, your favorite sport, a favorite activity, etc.)

Thursday, January 15

Group Activities

Q & A about the Course Drupal Site, Course Description, Course Projects, etc.

Taking Inventory and Managing Your Workspace. One very important aspect of computer-aided publishing involves testing to make sure that your workspace performs as it should, identifying what tools are available for different tasks, and customizing your workspace to improve productivity. Working in teams of three, do some user-testing of the functionality of important publishing software on the Mac desktop. Your goals are the following:

1. Test the software to make sure that it has basic functionality;
2. Create a document, save it to your home drive;
3. Save the same document to a USB drive;
4. Check to see what file types are associated with the software;
5. Determine how much customization is possible, including whether it's possible to customize the workspace, add plug-ins, install or export fonts, etc. and, if not possible, any available workarounds; 5) record errors, take screenshots, and do a quick write-up of any problems you discover so that they can be reported to ITaP for resolution;
6. Have one person post the results of your usability testing in a blog post tagged "workspace" to the class website.

The software to examine: Firefox, PhotoShop, InDesign, Acrobat, Illustrator, Dreamweaver, Fireworks

Resources

• Free Mac Fonts
• 309 Assets at Drop.io
• 22 Firefox Add-Ons for Designers
• Photoshop Actions for Designers

For next week . . .

Dr. B. may be called out of town for a conference and so arrangements have been made to view a film in class on Tuesday (1/20), and attendance will be taken. On Thursday, 1/22, if Dr. B is out-of-town, you won't have to attend class but there will be a short reading assignment.

Week 2

Tuesday, January 20

Film: David Levy on "The Digital Future"

Thursday, January 22

There will be class today! (Dr. B.'s trip has been canceled.)

Reading: Before and After Page Design, pp. ix-xii, "Introduction"; scan the table of contents and the rest of the book to begin to see what types of projects you might be interested in attempting.

Collecting Assets and Inspiration: Locate two samples of design/publishing work that you admire and bring them to class today for sharing and class discussion. At least one of the samples should be print-based. Both should be examples of what you consider good design or creative ways of presenting information in a published document. They could be sources of inspiration, in other words, a published document that makes you think "I wish I would have done that!"

For concepts that will help you talk about design, read the attachment, which is an excerpt from The Thomson Handbook. The class password is required to open it.

Week 3

Tuesday, January 27

Assets and Inspiration

• Be prepared to share at least one of the assets you collected last week with the rest of the class and to discuss your reasons for your choice(s)
• Introduction to Drop.io for project management and asset collection.
• Review the "Resources for Computer-Aided Publishing" page.

Thursday, January 29

• Before class, be sure that you have created your drop.io site and then added the username/URL to our Drop.io Assets Links wiki page. Your drop should be set so that other people can add and view content, but you don't need to grant permission for people to delete files. Be sure to create an "admin" password for yourself, but use the common "guest" password for the class. You'll need to place at least one file to create your drop site.
• Read "Should we fear a world without books?" at Dennis Baron's "Web of Language" blog before class and be prepared to post a short reading response in class.
  
• Discussion of Design Logs and how to collect and use assets in your projects. In-class, you'll have a few minutes to start your first Design Log entry.

Week 4

Tuesday, February 3

Project 1: DIY: Design-It-Yourself Wireframe and Project Management Brief

• For this project, you'll design a wireframe (design structure) for what's called a Project Management Brief that you can then use in subsequent projects (see the sample, "project-management-design-TH.pdf" at our 309 drop site or attached below). You'll create your wireframe in Adobe InDesign and essentially make a re-usable template. I'll show you samples in class, and you'll learn to easily create project briefs that go with a variety of documents, such as websites, brochures, newsletters, etc. You'll also generate a set of questions for each type of project that will help you generate a "brief" for planning purposes. In the real world of publishing and design, writers and project managers use these documents when working with clients on complex design and publishing jobs. (Individual: 10% of course grade.)

Thursday, February 5

Reading/Resources

• Read about Information Architecture at Usability.gov

Project 1 Development

• By today, you should have thoroughly studied the sample Project Management Brief (Step 1 of Project 1). You will have class time to work in InDesign, so be sure to have any necessary files available. Store assets in your drop.io assets folder for safekeeping!

Design Logs

• By Friday, you should post your first weekly design log entry to your blog. Use this tag: design log (all lower-case, two words). If you don't use the correct tag, your design log might get missed!

Project Logs

• By Friday, you should post your first project log entry to your blog. Read these Project Log Guidelines to see what's possible. Use this tag: project log (all lower-case, two words).

Week 5

Tuesday, February 10

Reading

• Read in D.I.Y.: Foreword, Why D.I.Y., D.I.Y. Theory, and Basic Design (pages 15-31) and be prepared to discuss or write about these sections in class.

Project 1

• Continue work in class on Project 1. You should be well into the project by now.

Thursday, February 12

Project 1

• Continue work in class on Project 1. You should be nearly finished with the project by now.

Design Logs

• By Friday, you should have posted a new entry in your weekly design log to your blog.Use this tag: design log (all lower-case, two words). If you don't use the correct tag, your design log might get missed!

Project Logs

• By Friday, you should have posted a new entry in your weekly project log to your blog. Read these Project Log Guidelines to see what's possible. Use this tag: project log (all lower-case, two words).

Week 6

Tuesday, February 17

Project 1 is due today. You should post a PDF copy to your blog and turn in a printed copy in class. You should include a short cover letter ("Submission Notes") that explain any special circumstances and/or request feedback on a particular aspect of your work.

Project 2: DIY: Design-It-Yourself Document assigned. Begin work on this project in class (see Step 1)

Thursday, February 19

Due: Step 1 (Project Management Questionnaire) should be completed today and posted to your blog (see the Project 2 description for complete directions).
Discussion of Typography. Download the attachment (PDF format; class password) for review.
Work on your Project Management Brief for Project 2 in class.

Design Logs

• By Friday, you should have posted a new entry in your weekly design log to your blog.Use this tag: design log (all lower-case, two words). If you don't use the correct tag, your design log might get missed!

Project Logs

• By Friday, you should have posted a new entry in your weekly project log to your blog. Read these Project Log Guidelines to see what's possible. Use this tag: project log (all lower-case, two words).

Week 7

Tuesday, February 24

Work on your Project Management Brief (Step 2 of Project 2) in class. Your Brief is due at the start of class on Thursday for in-class peer review.

Thursday, February 26

Due: Step 2 of Project 2 (Project Managment Brief) is due at the start of class for in-class peer review.

Steps for Peer Review

Work in teams of three to provide peer feedback on your Project Management Briefs (PMBs). Each reviewer should write two reviews, spending about 30 minutes on each. Write your peer review as a response to the person's blog entry/submission notes.

Authors: read the handout on "Eliciting Good Response" and then, following the guidelines, post your PMB to your blog with notes that will elicit good response. You should attach your document to the blog post in PDF format.

Reviewers: Read the author's notes and then write a response to them. In addition, you should comment on these aspects of the PMB:

1. What is the strongest part of the Brief and why?
2. Suggest one additional "persona" (a primary or secondary reader) who would likely interact with the document. What would s/he expect? What would his or her purpose be?
3. Does the wireframe for the document clearly show all of its components? Is there anything missing?
4. Please comment on the layout of the document in the wireframe.
5. Does the color palette suit the document? Do the colors work well together? What would you suggest? What mood or ethos do the colors suggest?
6. Have typographic styles been defined? Are they well suited to the rhetorical situation? What mood, ethos, or level of formality does the typography convey?

Design Logs

• By Friday, you should have posted a new entry in your weekly design log to your blog.Use this tag: design log (all lower-case, two words). If you don't use the correct tag, your design log might get missed!

Project Logs

• By Friday, you should have posted a new entry in your weekly project log to your blog. Read these Project Log Guidelines to see what's possible. Use this tag: project log (all lower-case, two words).

Week 8

Tuesday, March 3

Continue work on Project 2. Today, the goal is to conduct peer review of just the design document for Project 2, which is due in its entirety on Thursday.

Authors: Post your design document as a separate post with short submission notes following the guidelines for eliciting good response. (15 minutes)

Reviewers: In addition to addressing the author's submission notes, comment on these components of the document. There may be other issues to address as well.

Elements of the Layout: Contrast, Repetition, Alignment, and Proximity

• Contrast: Is there sufficient (but not too much) contrast in the use of color? Is there sufficient visual interest to balance text and image? Is all text clearly legible?
• Repetition: Is there a consistency to the layout of similar elements (such as headers, body text, images)?
• Alignment: Are elements of the page (typography, images) properly aligned with respect to each other, borders, edges, images? Is the information on the page well balanced?
• Proximity: Is information on the page grouped logically? Are there are any page elements too close or too far apart from each other or from page edges?

Typography

• Is the choice of fonts and typefaces consistent?
• Does the typography express the right mood or tone?
• Is there too much variation in typefaces or fonts?
• Is the size, leading, and/or kerning of all text appropriate?
• Is all text clearly legible?
• Does the font color contrast sufficiently with the background?

Color

• Is the color palette well balanced? Are there any colors used that you wonder about?
• Is there sufficient contrast in colors?
• Do the colors convey the right mood or tone?
• Do any colors draw too much attention to themselves?

Negative Space (aka "white space")

• Does the document include sufficient negative space to help focus attention on the information that matters?
• Does the document appear too crowded? Too empty?

Thursday, March 5

Due: Project 2. Collect all files (Steps 1, 2, and 4) and post them to your blog. Use this tag: Project 2. You should also print one copy of the final document to turn in, if your is a printable project. The due date is Thursday, March 5, by the start of class. You should include a short cover letter ("Submission Notes") that explains any special circumstances and/or requests feedback on a particular aspect of your work.

Project 3 assigned.

In class today, you will be given time to update your design and project logs and to respond to the design logs of your classmates.

Design Logs

• By Friday, you should have posted a new entry in your weekly design log to your blog.Use this tag: design log (all lower-case, two words). If you don't use the correct tag, your design log might get missed!

Project Logs

• By Friday, you should have posted a new entry in your weekly project log to your blog. Read these Project Log Guidelines to see what's possible. Use this tag: project log (all lower-case, two words).

Week 9

Tuesday, March 10

Project 3: Project Management Questionnaire Due

Introduction of Project 5: Catalog, Newsletter, Website Design, or Other Complex Document

For Project 5, you'll plan, design, research, and produce a multi-page document, such as a catalog, newsletter, or website. As for Projects 2-4, the steps will include completing a Wireframe and Project Management Brief, adding weekly notes to your Project Log, collecting assets at your Drop.io site, and submitting printed and electronic copies of your project when it is completed. (Individual or Collaborative: 30% of course grade.)

Thursday, March 12

The class does not meet today.

Design Logs

• By Friday, you should have posted a new entry in your weekly design log to your blog.Use this tag: design log (all lower-case, two words). If you don't use the correct tag, your design log might get missed!

Project Logs

• By Friday, you should have posted a new entry in your weekly project log to your blog. Read these Project Log Guidelines to see what's possible. Use this tag: project log (all lower-case, two words).

Week 10

Week 10

Tuesday, March 17 and Thursday, March 19

Spring Break

Week 11

Tuesday, March 24

Welcome back from spring break!
Work on Project Management Brief for Project 3

Thursday, March 26

Design Logs

• By Friday, you should have posted a new entry in your weekly design log to your blog.Use this tag: design log (all lower-case, two words). If you don't use the correct tag, your design log might get missed!

Project Logs

• By Friday, you should have posted a new entry in your weekly project log to your blog. Read these Project Log Guidelines to see what's possible. Use this tag: project log (all lower-case, two words).

Week 12

Tuesday, March 31

Project Management Brief for Project 3 due for in-class peer review.

Steps for Peer Review

Work in teams of three to provide peer feedback on your Project Management Briefs (PMBs). Each reviewer should write two reviews, spending about 30 minutes on each. Write your peer review as a response to the person's blog entry/submission notes.

Authors: read the handout on "Eliciting Good Response" and then, following the guidelines, post your PMB to your blog with notes that will elicit good response. You should attach your document to the blog post in PDF format.

Reviewers: Read the author's notes and then write a response to them. In addition, you should comment on these aspects of the PMB:

1. What is the strongest part of the Brief and why?
2. Suggest one additional "persona" (a primary or secondary reader) who would likely interact with the document. What would s/he expect? What would his or her purpose be?
3. Does the wireframe for the document clearly show all of its components? Is there anything missing?
4. Please comment on the layout of the document in the wireframe.
5. Does the color palette suit the document? Do the colors work well together? Are they complementary or contrasting colors? Is there sufficient color contrast between text and background? What mood or ethos do the colors suggest?
6. Have typographic styles been defined? Are they well suited to the rhetorical situation? What mood, ethos, or level of formality does the typography convey? Is it easily readable? Is typographic variation (in styles, font choices) modest or too much?
   

Thursday, April 2

Project 5: Project Management Questionnaire Due. Post the responses to your blog and use "Project 5" as your tag.

Design Logs

• By Friday, you should have posted a new entry in your weekly design log to your blog.Use this tag: design log (all lower-case, two words). If you don't use the correct tag, your design log might get missed!

Project Logs

• By Friday, you should have posted a new entry in your weekly project log to your blog. Read these Project Log Guidelines to see what's possible. Use this tag: project log (all lower-case, two words).

Week 13

Tuesday, April 7

Peer review of design documents for Project 3.

Authors: Post your design document as a separate post with short submission notes following the guidelines for eliciting good response. (15 minutes)

Reviewers: In addition to addressing the author's submission notes, comment on these components of the document. There may be other issues to address as well.

Elements of the Layout: Contrast, Repetition, Alignment, and Proximity

• Contrast: Is there sufficient (but not too much) contrast in the use of color? Is there sufficient visual interest to balance text and image? Is all text clearly legible?
• Repetition: Is there a consistency to the layout of similar elements (such as headers, body text, images)?
• Alignment: Are elements of the page (typography, images) properly aligned with respect to each other, borders, edges, images? Is the information on the page well balanced?
• Proximity: Is information on the page grouped logically? Are there are any page elements too close or too far apart from each other or from page edges?

Typography

• Is the choice of fonts and typefaces consistent?
• Does the typography express the right mood or tone?
• Is there too much variation in typefaces or fonts?
• Is the size, leading, and/or kerning of all text appropriate?
• Is all text clearly legible?
• Does the font color contrast sufficiently with the background?

Color

• Is the color palette well balanced? Are there any colors used that you wonder about?
• Is there sufficient contrast in colors?
• Do the colors convey the right mood or tone?
• Do any colors draw too much attention to themselves?

Negative Space (aka "white space")

• Does the document include sufficient negative space to help focus attention on the information that matters?
• Does the document appear too crowded? Too empty?

Thursday, April 9

Project 3 due. Collect all files (Steps 1, 2, and 4) and post them to your blog. Use this tag: Project 3. You should also print one copy of the final document to turn in, if yours is a printable project.You should include a short cover letter ("Submission Notes") that explain any special circumstances and/or request feedback on a particular aspect of your work.

Introduction of Project 4: DIY: Design-It-Yourself Document

Design Logs

• By Friday, you should have posted a new entry in your weekly design log to your blog.Use this tag: design log (all lower-case, two words). If you don't use the correct tag, your design log might get missed!

Project Logs

• By Friday, you should have posted a new entry in your weekly project log to your blog. Read these Project Log Guidelines to see what's possible. Use this tag: project log (all lower-case, two words).

Week 14

Tuesday, April 14

Project Management Questionnaire for Project 4 due.

Thursday, April 16

Project Management Brief for Project 5 due for in-class peer review.

Steps for Peer Review

Work in teams of three to provide peer feedback on your Project Management Briefs (PMBs). Each reviewer should write two reviews, spending about 30 minutes on each. Write your peer review as a response to the person's blog entry/submission notes.

Authors: read the handout on "Eliciting Good Response" and then, following the guidelines, post your PMB to your blog with notes that will elicit good response. You should attach your document to the blog post in PDF format.

Reviewers: Read the author's notes and then write a response to them. In addition, you should comment on these aspects of the PMB:

1. What is the strongest part of the Brief and why?
2. Suggest one additional "persona" (a primary or secondary reader) who would likely interact with the document. What would s/he expect? What would his or her purpose be?
3. Does the wireframe for the document clearly show all of its components? Is there anything missing?
4. Please comment on the layout of the document in the wireframe.
5. Does the color palette suit the document? Do the colors work well together? Are they complementary or contrasting colors? Is there sufficient color contrast between text and background? What mood or ethos do the colors suggest?
6. Have typographic styles been defined? Are they well suited to the rhetorical situation? What mood, ethos, or level of formality does the typography convey? Is it easily readable? Is typographic variation (in styles, font choices) modest or too much?
   

Design Logs

• By Friday, you should have posted a new entry in your weekly design log to your blog.Use this tag: design log (all lower-case, two words). If you don't use the correct tag, your design log might get missed!

Project Logs

• By Friday, you should have posted a new entry in your weekly project log to your blog. Read these Project Log Guidelines to see what's possible. Use this tag: project log (all lower-case, two words).

Please Note: On next Tuesday (April 21), the class won't meet so that we can attend the keynote presentation by Sarah Robbins at the Teaching, Learning, and Technology Conference here at Purdue in Stewart Center. Sarah "Intellagirl" Robbins is an expert on Web 2.0 technologies and virtual worlds (e.g., "Second Life"), technologies very important to professional writers. Attendance is free, but you should register first here: http://www.itap.purdue.edu/tlt/conference/register/form.cfm. The presentation is in Stewart Center (Fowler Hall, most likely, but it hasn't been announced yet) from 9:30 to 11 a.m.

Week 15

Tuesday, April 21

Please Note: Today, Tuesday (April 21), the class won't meet so that we can attend the keynote presentation by Sarah Robbins at the Teaching, Learning, and Technology Conference here at Purdue in Stewart Center. Sarah "Intellagirl" Robbins is an expert on Web 2.0 technologies and virtual worlds (e.g., "Second Life"), technologies very important to professional writers. Attendance is free, but you should register first here: http://www.itap.purdue.edu/tlt/conference/register/form.cfm. The presentation is in Stewart Center (Fowler Hall, most likely, but it hasn't been announced yet) from 9:30 to 11 a.m.

Thursday, April 23

Project 4: Project Management Brief due for in-class peer review.
Project 5: Design documents due for in-class peer review.
Complete peer review for Project 4 first, then discuss Project 4 design documents orally.

Steps for Peer Review: Project 4 (PMB)

Work in teams of three to provide peer feedback on your Project Management Briefs (PMBs) for Project 4. Each reviewer should write two reviews, spending about 20 minutes on each. Write your peer review as a response to the person's blog entry/submission notes.

Authors: read the handout on "Eliciting Good Response" and then, following the guidelines, post your PMB to your blog with notes that will elicit good response. You should attach your document to the blog post in PDF format.

Reviewers: Read the author's notes and then write a response to them. In addition, you should comment on these aspects of the PMB:

1. What is the strongest part of the Brief and why?
2. Suggest one additional "persona" (a primary or secondary reader) who would likely interact with the document. What would s/he expect? What would his or her purpose be?
3. Does the wireframe for the document clearly show all of its components? Is there anything missing?
4. Please comment on the layout of the document in the wireframe.
5. Does the color palette suit the document? Do the colors work well together? Are they complementary or contrasting colors? Is there sufficient color contrast between text and background? What mood or ethos do the colors suggest?
6. Have typographic styles been defined? Are they well suited to the rhetorical situation? What mood, ethos, or level of formality does the typography convey? Is it easily readable? Is typographic variation (in styles, font choices) modest or too much?
   

Design Logs

• No design logs due this week.

Project Logs

• By Friday, you should have posted a new entry in your weekly project log to your blog. Read these Project Log Guidelines to see what's possible. Use this tag: project log (all lower-case, two words).

Week 16

Tuesday, April 28

Project 4  will not be due until Thursday at the start of class, in print and as one PDF attachment to your blog.

Thursday, April 30

Last day of class. Project 4 is due in print and as a PDF (all in one) attachment to your blog.

Project Logs

• By Friday, you should have posted a new entry in your weekly project log to your blog. Read these Project Log Guidelines to see what's possible. Use this tag: project log (all lower-case, two words).

Please Note: Project 5 documents should be posted to your blog no later than Thursday, May 7, at midnight EST. Please be sure to include all documents in PDF format, including the questionnair, brief, and design document(s). If your design documents are in another form (e.g., a "Blurb" book), you can turn it in in printed form to Cathy Archer in Heavilon 302. She is there from 8-3 daily. Please don't turn materials in to the English Department main office. Email Dr. B. with questions (blakesle@purdu.edu)

Project 1: DIY: Design-It-Yourself Wireframe and Project Management Brief

Overview

For this project, you'll design a wireframe (design structure) for what's called a Project Management Brief that you can then use in subsequent projects. (see the sample, "project-management-design-TH.pdf" at our 309 drop site.) You'll create your wireframe in Adobe InDesign and essentially make a re-usable template. I'll show you samples in class, and you'll learn to easily create project briefs that go with a variety of documents, such as websites, brochures, newsletters, etc. You'll also generate a set of questions for each type of project that will help you generate a "brief" for planning purposes. In the real world of publishing and design, writers and project managers use these documents when working with clients on complex design and publishing jobs.

The two goals of this project are to 1) learn to use some of the tools in Adobe InDesign and 2) create a template of a Project Management Brief to use in later projects.

Definitions

• a wireframe is a visual illustration of one page in a document or website showing all the items to be included on a page without defining the look and feel of the page. A wireframe is meant to illustrate the placement (layout) of features, content, links, and other page elements. A wireframe is like a "mock-up" but the layout and the parts may be more precisely defined than a sketch. The wireframe will also prioritize features by positioning. The purpose of a wireframe is to help the designer(s) plan the best way to meet the needs of readers (users, site visitors, readers, etc.) and to make it easier to discuss layout in the early stages of a project. For more information, see the section on "wireframes" at "Define the Information Architecture" at Usablity.gov. Wireframes are commonly used to draw the outlines of 3-D objects in computer modeling.
• project management refers to the planning, organizing, scheduling, and managing of resources, assets, and people that helps meet a projects goals. Project management will typically involve careful consideration of a project's scope, goals, schedule, budget, assets and resources, methodology, constraints, deliverables, and more.

Step 1

Read and review the sample wireframe and project management brief for The Thomson Handbook so that you can see what a complete wireframe/brief should look like (see the calendar for Week 4 or our class drop.io assets for the PDF file). Bear in mind that your goal in this project is only to create a template for a document just like this, one that you will adapt later to your other projects in the class. In this instance, your template will only have place holders for content. You could complete Step 1 by Thursday, February 5.

Step 2

Use InDesign to create a template for a project management brief that you can use for subsequent projects Your brief should contain the following pages and components:

Project Brief: title of the project, version history, problem addressed, solution, needs to meet, and purpose/function of document.

Personas: Create a three-row, four-column table. Each row will be for a different persona. Column headers should be in the form of these questions:

1. Who are we designing for?
2. What are their goals?
3. What are their tasks?
4. Use cases and scenarios

In each row, include a space for the persona name and photo, as in the example.

Design Concept: The design concept distills key aspects of the rhetorical situation to draw conclusions about

• ethos (how the author/writer/client wants to be perceived)
• how users will actually use the document/site
• general goals of the design (what it should convey, how it should look, what should be highlighted)

On your Design Concept page, leave room for idea clusters tied to purpose and use, as in the example.

Wireframe: Create one page that blocks out important regions of the page and identifies what goes where, as in the "Home page wireframe" example. You should pick a layout for a particular type of document, one that you might want to produce in a subsequent project, using Before and After Page Design or DIY: Design It Yourself for the layout parameters.

Colors / Typography: Include one page that identifies the color palette, typography, and features of any printed media (type of paper, color, coating, etc.). Your template will include regions for this content. Use a sample color palette that you can create from a resource like Color Mixers or Firefox's Web Developer plug-in.

3. Deliverables: Export your Project Management Brief as a PDF document and post it to your blog. Use this tag: Project 1. You should also print one copy to turn in. The due date is Tuesday, February 17, by the start of class. You should include a short cover letter ("Submission Notes") that explain any special circumstances and/or request feedback on a particular aspect of your work.

Grading and Criteria

This project counts as 10 percent of your course grade. Your deliverables should have all of the components mentioned in Step 2, and your template should be neatly organized and elegantly presented. All major assignments will be graded on the standard plus-minus letter-grade scale: A=100-94, A-=93-90, B+==89-87, B=86-84, B-=83-80, C+=79-77, C=76-74, C-=73-70, D+=69-67, D=66-64, D-=63-60, F=59 or below.

Questions

Don't be afraid to ask them in class or by email . . .

Project 5: Catalog, Newsletter, Website Design, or Other Complex Document

Overview

For Project 5 (as for Projects 2, 3, and 4) you'll plan, design, research, and produce a multi-page document, such as a catalog, newsletter, print-on-demand book (for Blurb or Lulu, for example), or website. As for Projects 2-4, the steps will include completing a Wireframe and Project Management Brief, adding weekly notes to your Project Log, collecting assets at your Drop.io site, and submitting printed and electronic copies of your project when it is completed. Your choices are only limited by the samples in the course texts or in class, which cover a vast range of possibilities. You should complete a Project Management Brief (including a wireframe of the key page(s) of your document), add weekly notes to your Project Log, collect assets at your Drop.io site, and submit printed and electronic copies of your project when it is completed. Examples of acceptable projects include but are not limited to the following: catalog, newsletter, ezine, brochure, ebook, printed book, photo/art book, magazine, multi-page website, digital portfolio (with designed interface), template for Wordpress or Drupal, and more. (Individual or collaborative*: 30% of course grade.)

* Collaborative Option: Students have the option of making this project collaborative. One client-based project already in the works involves working with Discovery Park to produce a detailed Project Management Brief for marketing materials.In this case, the final document will be the Brief itself, but in this case the wireframes will be multi-staged and complete. Throughout the process, students will communicate with the clients and research Discovery Park. We need three or four students for this group, so volunteer if you're interested. Other collaborative projects are possible and should involve working with real clients on a complex design project. If students complete a collaborative project, they will be asked to fill-out a Collaborative Project Evaluation Form individually, at the time the project is completed. Dr. B. will provide additional assistance in planning the collaborative projects.

Step 1

Complete the Project Management Questionnaire for this project. Be as thorough as possible.You should post your completed document (minus address/information) to your Project Log no later than Thursday, April 2.

Step 2

Project Management Brief. Use the template you created in Project 1 to start a new Project Management Brief focused on this specific project. Your finished Brief should include (at minimum) these components:

1. Project Brief page.
2. Personas. Include at least three personas, each of which should represent a different type of user or reader. Be sure to include information that answers these questions: 1) Who are we designing for? 2) What are their goals? 3) What are their tasks? 4) Use cases and scenarios
3. Design Concept page. Summarize on this page these elements of the rhetorical situation: ethos (how the author/writer/client wants to be perceived); how users will actually use the document/site; general goals of the design (what it should convey, how it should look, what should be highlighted). It would be helpful to create a cluster that shows how users (or readers) relate to the document.
4. Wireframe(s). These should include one or more blank wireframes that show key features of the layout. Use D.I.Y. or Page Design (or even InDesign templates) for help with parameters.
5. Color Palette/Typography/Paper page. Include here a precise listing of the colors. typography, and media to be used for the finished. Name colors by color code. Use font names, styles, and sizes. For printed media, identify the color, finish, and weight of the paper to be used. For digital documents, include any relevant details (URL, interface, plug-in, etc.)

Read and review the sample wireframe and project management brief for The Thomson Handbook so that you can see what a complete wireframe/brief should look like (see the calendar for Week 4 or our class drop.io assets for the PDF file). You should complete Step 2 Thursday, April 16, and be ready for in-class peer review.

Step 3

Asset Collection. Upload all assets to your drop.io site. Be sure to collect or create more assets than you are likely to need. See the Resources page for some asset sites. If you create drafts, upload the working version to your drop.io site so that it can be reviewed by others as needed. This is an ongoing component of this project.

Step 4

Design the document(s) for this project using InDesign or other publishing software, then produce high quality PDF versions (if a printable document) or publish it to the Web (if a digital document). If you are producing a printed document, you should (at least) print a prototype of the document, showing crop marks. Ideally, you would produce the finished document (if it's not too expensive to do so). Your design documents should be ready for in-class peer review on Thursday, April 23.

Deliverables

Collect all files (Steps 1, 2, and 4) and post them to your blog. Use this tag: Project 5. You should also print one copy of the final document to turn in, if yours is a printable project. The due date is Thursday, April 30, on the last day of class.. You should include a short cover letter ("Submission Notes") that explain any special circumstances and/or request feedback on a particular aspect of your work.

Grading and Criteria

This project counts as 10 percent of your course grade. Your deliverables should have all of the components mentioned in each step and be carefully edited and of high quality. All major assignments will be graded on the standard plus-minus letter-grade scale: A=100-94, A-=93-90, B+==89-87, B=86-84, B-=83-80, C+=79-77, C=76-74, C-=73-70, D+=69-67, D=66-64, D-=63-60, F=59 or below.

Questions

Don't be afraid to ask them in class or by email . . .

Project 2: DIY: Design-It-Yourself Document

Overview

For Project 2 (and 3 and 4, later) you'll draw inspiration from D.I.Y.: Design-It-Yourself to come up with a relatively small project that involves one type of document (or other type of "published" material) and that you carry through to the end by actually producing and publishing it. Your choices are only limited by the samples in the book, which cover a vast range of possibilities. For each of these small projects, you should complete a Project Management Brief (including a wireframe of the key page(s) of your document), add weekly notes to your Project Log, collect assets at your Drop.io site, and submit printed and electronic copies of your project when it is completed. Examples of acceptable projects include but are not limited to the following: resume, stationery, flier, poster, brochure, mailer, postcard ad, advertisement, t-shirt, invitation, logo, wall graphic, CD or DVD packaging, embroidery, business card, gift, invitation, tote bag, banner, photo album, scrapbook, presentation slide template, bumper sticker, button, and more. (Individual: 10% of course grade for each project.)

Step 1

Complete the Project Management Questionnaire for this project. Be as thorough as possible.You should post your completed document (minus address/information) to your Project Log no later than Thursday, February 19.

Step 2

Project Management Brief. Use the template you created in Project 1 to start a new Project Management Brief focused on this specific project. Your finished Brief should include (at minimum) these components:

1. Project Brief page.
2. Personas. Include at least three personas, each of which should represent a different type of user or reader. Be sure to include information that answers these questions: 1) Who are we designing for? 2) What are their goals? 3) What are their tasks? 4) Use cases and scenarios
3. Design Concept page. Summarize on this page these elements of the rhetorical situation: ethos (how the author/writer/client wants to be perceived); how users will actually use the document/site; general goals of the design (what it should convey, how it should look, what should be highlighted). It would be helpful to create a cluster that shows how users (or readers) relate to the document.
4. Wireframe(s). These should include one or more blank wireframes that show key features of the layout. Use D.I.Y. or Page Design (or even InDesign templates) for help with parameters.
5. Color Palette/Typography/Paper page. Include here a precise listing of the colors. typography, and media to be used for the finished. Name colors by color code. Use font names, styles, and sizes. For printed media, identify the color, finish, and weight of the paper to be used. For digital documents, include any relevant details (URL, interface, plug-in, etc.)

Read and review the sample wireframe and project management brief for The Thomson Handbook so that you can see what a complete wireframe/brief should look like (see the calendar for Week 4 or our class drop.io assets for the PDF file). You could complete Step 2 by Thursday, February 26, and be ready for in-class peer review.

Step 3

Asset Collection. Upload all assets to your drop.io site. Be sure to collect or create more assets than you are likely to need. See the Resources page for some asset sites. If you create drafts, upload the working version to your drop.io site so that it can be reviewed by others as needed. This is an ongoing component of this project.

Step 4

Design the document(s) for this project using InDesign or other publishing software, then produce high quality PDF versions (if a printable document) or publish it to the Web (if a digital document). If you are producing a printed document, you should (at least) print a prototype of the document, showing crop marks. Ideally, you would produce the finished document (if it's not too expensive to do so).

Deliverables

Collect all files (Steps 1, 2, and 4) and post them to your blog. Use this tag: Project 2. You should also print one copy of the final document to turn in, if yours is a printable project. The due date is Tuesday, Thursday, March 5, by the start of class. You should include a short cover letter ("Submission Notes") that explain any special circumstances and/or request feedback on a particular aspect of your work.

Grading and Criteria

This project counts as 10 percent of your course grade. Your deliverables should have all of the components mentioned in each step and be carefully edited and of high quality. All major assignments will be graded on the standard plus-minus letter-grade scale: A=100-94, A-=93-90, B+==89-87, B=86-84, B-=83-80, C+=79-77, C=76-74, C-=73-70, D+=69-67, D=66-64, D-=63-60, F=59 or below.

Questions

Don't be afraid to ask them in class or by email . . .

Project 3: DIY: Design-It-Yourself Document

Overview

For Project 3 (as for Projects 2 and 4) you'll draw inspiration from D.I.Y.: Design-It-Yourself to come up with a relatively small project that involves one type of document (or other type of "published" material) and that you carry through to the end by actually producing and publishing it. Your choices are only limited by the samples in the book, which cover a vast range of possibilities. For each of these small projects, you should complete a Project Management Brief (including a wireframe of the key page(s) of your document), add weekly notes to your Project Log, collect assets at your Drop.io site, and submit printed and electronic copies of your project when it is completed. Examples of acceptable projects include but are not limited to the following: resume, stationery, flier, poster, brochure, mailer, postcard ad, advertisement, t-shirt, invitation, logo, wall graphic, CD or DVD packaging, embroidery, business card, gift, invitation, tote bag, banner, photo album, scrapbook, presentation slide template, bumper sticker, button, and more. (Individual: 10% of course grade for each project.)

Step 1

Complete the Project Management Questionnaire for this project. Be as thorough as possible.You should post your completed document (minus address/information) to your Project Log no later than Tuesday, March 10.

Step 2

Project Management Brief. Use the template you created in Project 1 to start a new Project Management Brief focused on this specific project. Your finished Brief should include (at minimum) these components:

1. Project Brief page.
2. Personas. Include at least three personas, each of which should represent a different type of user or reader. Be sure to include information that answers these questions: 1) Who are we designing for? 2) What are their goals? 3) What are their tasks? 4) Use cases and scenarios
3. Design Concept page. Summarize on this page these elements of the rhetorical situation: ethos (how the author/writer/client wants to be perceived); how users will actually use the document/site; general goals of the design (what it should convey, how it should look, what should be highlighted). It would be helpful to create a cluster that shows how users (or readers) relate to the document.
4. Wireframe(s). These should include one or more blank wireframes that show key features of the layout. Use D.I.Y. or Page Design (or even InDesign templates) for help with parameters.
5. Color Palette/Typography/Paper page. Include here a precise listing of the colors. typography, and media to be used for the finished. Name colors by color code. Use font names, styles, and sizes. For printed media, identify the color, finish, and weight of the paper to be used. For digital documents, include any relevant details (URL, interface, plug-in, etc.)

Read and review the sample wireframe and project management brief for The Thomson Handbook so that you can see what a complete wireframe/brief should look like (see the calendar for Week 4 or our class drop.io assets for the PDF file). You should complete Step 2 by Tuesday, March 31, and be ready for in-class peer review.

Step 3

Asset Collection. Upload all assets to your drop.io site. Be sure to collect or create more assets than you are likely to need. See the Resources page for some asset sites. If you create drafts, upload the working version to your drop.io site so that it can be reviewed by others as needed. This is an ongoing component of this project.

Step 4

Design the document(s) for this project using InDesign or other publishing software, then produce high quality PDF versions (if a printable document) or publish it to the Web (if a digital document). If you are producing a printed document, you should (at least) print a prototype of the document, showing crop marks. Ideally, you would produce the finished document (if it's not too expensive to do so).

Deliverables

Collect all files (Steps 1, 2, and 4) and post them to your blog. Use this tag: Project 3. You should also print one copy of the final document to turn in, if yours is a printable project. The due date is Tuesday, April 7, by the start of class. You should include a short cover letter ("Submission Notes") that explain any special circumstances and/or request feedback on a particular aspect of your work.

Grading and Criteria

This project counts as 10 percent of your course grade. Your deliverables should have all of the components mentioned in each step and be carefully edited and of high quality. All major assignments will be graded on the standard plus-minus letter-grade scale: A=100-94, A-=93-90, B+==89-87, B=86-84, B-=83-80, C+=79-77, C=76-74, C-=73-70, D+=69-67, D=66-64, D-=63-60, F=59 or below.

Questions

Don't be afraid to ask them in class or by email . . .

Project 4: DIY: Design-It-Yourself Document

Overview

For Project 4 (as for Projects 2 and 3) you'll draw inspiration from D.I.Y.: Design-It-Yourself to come up with a relatively small project that involves one type of document (or other type of "published" material) and that you carry through to the end by actually producing and publishing it. Your choices are only limited by the samples in the book, which cover a vast range of possibilities. For each of these small projects, you should complete a Project Management Brief (including a wireframe of the key page(s) of your document), add weekly notes to your Project Log, collect assets at your Drop.io site, and submit printed and electronic copies of your project when it is completed. Examples of acceptable projects include but are not limited to the following: resume, stationery, flier, poster, brochure, mailer, postcard ad, advertisement, t-shirt, invitation, logo, wall graphic, CD or DVD packaging, embroidery, business card, gift, invitation, tote bag, banner, photo album, scrapbook, presentation slide template, bumper sticker, button, and more. (Individual: 10% of course grade for each project.)

Step 1

Complete the Project Management Questionnaire for this project. Be as thorough as possible.You should post your completed document (minus address/information) to your Project Log no later than Tuesday, April 14.

Step 2

Project Management Brief. Use the template you created in Project 1 to start a new Project Management Brief focused on this specific project. Your finished Brief should include (at minimum) these components:

1. Project Brief page.
2. Personas. Include at least three personas, each of which should represent a different type of user or reader. Be sure to include information that answers these questions: 1) Who are we designing for? 2) What are their goals? 3) What are their tasks? 4) Use cases and scenarios
3. Design Concept page. Summarize on this page these elements of the rhetorical situation: ethos (how the author/writer/client wants to be perceived); how users will actually use the document/site; general goals of the design (what it should convey, how it should look, what should be highlighted). It would be helpful to create a cluster that shows how users (or readers) relate to the document.
4. Wireframe(s). These should include one or more blank wireframes that show key features of the layout. Use D.I.Y. or Page Design (or even InDesign templates) for help with parameters.
5. Color Palette/Typography/Paper page. Include here a precise listing of the colors. typography, and media to be used for the finished. Name colors by color code. Use font names, styles, and sizes. For printed media, identify the color, finish, and weight of the paper to be used. For digital documents, include any relevant details (URL, interface, plug-in, etc.)

Read and review the sample wireframe and project management brief for The Thomson Handbook so that you can see what a complete wireframe/brief should look like (see the calendar for Week 4 or our class drop.io assets for the PDF file). You could complete Step 2 by Tuesday, April 21, and be ready for in-class peer review.

Step 3

Asset Collection. Upload all assets to your drop.io site. Be sure to collect or create more assets than you are likely to need. See the Resources page for some asset sites. If you create drafts, upload the working version to your drop.io site so that it can be reviewed by others as needed. This is an ongoing component of this project.

Step 4

Design the document(s) for this project using InDesign or other publishing software, then produce high quality PDF versions (if a printable document) or publish it to the Web (if a digital document). If you are producing a printed document, you should (at least) print a prototype of the document, showing crop marks. Ideally, you would produce the finished document (if it's not too expensive to do so). Your design document should be ready for in-class peer review on Thursday, April 23.

Deliverables

Collect all files (Steps 1, 2, and 4) and post them to your blog. Use this tag: Project 3. You should also print one copy of the final document to turn in, if yours is a printable project. The due date is Tuesday, April 28, by the start of class. You should include a short cover letter ("Submission Notes") that explain any special circumstances and/or request feedback on a particular aspect of your work.

Grading and Criteria

This project counts as 10 percent of your course grade. Your deliverables should have all of the components mentioned in each step and be carefully edited and of high quality. All major assignments will be graded on the standard plus-minus letter-grade scale: A=100-94, A-=93-90, B+==89-87, B=86-84, B-=83-80, C+=79-77, C=76-74, C-=73-70, D+=69-67, D=66-64, D-=63-60, F=59 or below.

Questions

Don't be afraid to ask them in class or by email . . .

Getting Started 1: Registering on the Site

To get started with your course, you'll need to complete a few steps, which include

• Registering for the course website (here).
• Logging in for the first time.
• Editing your account for the first time.

Registering for the course website

1. Go to the course website.
2. Click on "create new account" under "User Login" in the navigation menu on the left.

   

3. Create a username that will identify you in the system and that you will use for logging in. Because this site is public on the Internet, your username should not include your last name. You are welcome to use any username (e.g., your IM screenname) that would not be offensive to others or otherwise inappropriate for a course website. Capitalize your username as you intend to use it; usernames are case sensitive.

   

4. Enter your email address. You may use your Purdue email address. If you have an alternate one, use the one that you check most regularly.
5. Provide your real name and home page URL (web address, if you have one). Note that your real name will not be visible publicly but only to students registered at the site.
6. Complete the Blog info and and Major and interests boxes, using the suggestions on the form.
7. Check whether or not you grant permission for your instructor to send you grades via your registered email address.
8. Click on "Create new account." Registration information will be sent to the email address you listed, so check your email soon after you register. You will need the password that it sends you. Your instructor will approve your registration (if new account requests are moderated), and then you will be able to log in to use site features.
   

Getting Started 2: Logging in for the First Time

To get started with your course, you'll also need to complete this second step:

Logging in for the first time

1. You should have received an email from the system that includes your new password. With that email handy, return to the course website.
2. Enter your username and password in the "User login" box. Your initial password can be retyped or cut-and-pasted into the password box. If you cut-and-paste it, make sure you don't include any extra spaces before or after the password characters. The password and user name are case sensitive.

   

3. Click on Log in. When you've successfully logged in, you will see a block of links in the left sidebar with your username above it as a title. This is a navigation menu that provides you with links to many services and content on the site. If you are unable to log in successfully, try re-entering your password. Remember that usernames and passwords are case-sensitve, so make sure you don't have Caps Lock turned on by accident and that (if pasting in your password) that you don't include extra spaces. You may also click on "Request new password" if you ever forget yours.

Getting Started 3: Editing Your Account for the First Time

To get started with your course, you'll also need to complete this third step, which will take a bit more time than the previous two.

Editing your account for the first time

Once you've logged in successfully, you need to edit your account and provide some additional information about yourself.

1. Click on my account link in the navigation menu on the left.

    

   

2. On the next screen, click on the edit tab.

   

3. On the account settings screen, scroll to the Account information area.
   
4. Change your password by entering a new one into the password boxes. Choose a password that you can remember but that is secure. Remember that passwords are case sensitive.
5. Scroll to the Picture area.
   
6. Upload a picture of yourself or avatar (an image that represents you well) that you would use in a public context. You may have to find one and edit in an image editor, so you just try to have this step completed by the end of Week 2. If you need help editing an image, send a copy to your instructor for help. See Creating Avatars and Images for Your Profile for more information.
7. Next, scroll to the Theme configuration.
   
   
   
8. The default selection will be checked. You can select any theme you like and all pages will show up with that theme. The default theme has been specially designed and will probably offer the most consistent display of all site content. The instructor uses that theme as the default and so designs pages with it in mind.
9. Scroll to Contact settings.
   
10. Check the Personal contact form box.
11. When you have made your changes, click on the Submit button at the bottom of the page.

The following steps ask you to complete information for your profile. This will enable the instructor and fellow students to learn a little more about you and help the instructor tailor this class to your background and goals, as well as arrange collaborative projects.

1. Click on the edit tab again, then on the Personal Information link at the top of the next page.
   
2. Enter the required information in the boxes. If you don't have a home page, leave that box blank.
3. Click on Submit to save.

That's it! You have completed all the steps of the Getting Started process. If you ever need to change any of the information, you can always edit these pages again.

If you have any trouble along the way, please be sure to let your instructor know.

Creating Avatars and Images for Your Profile

Some of you may be in search of an avatar or image to use in the profile that you created for yourself when you registered. If so, here are some suggestions:

An avatar is just an image that "stands-in" for your picture and can be an object, artwork, a photo, or something else that might convey some aspect of your identity, personality, or interests. So, for example, someone interested in biking might use an image of a bike as an avatar rather than a personal picture. The image works best if it's in jpg, gif, or png format, and the dimensions should be (about) 85x85 so that it displays correctly (and doesn't get squished when displayed, for example).

To find an existing avatar to use for free, you could look at a site like these. If you have a Yahoo! ID (free to get, if not), you can get some nice ones:

http://avatars.yahoo.com/

or try

http://www.avatarity.com/

You could also take an existing image of yourself and then create a picture by cropping out the part you don't want. If you haven't used an image editing program before, that can be a bit tricky. But if you have, just use the crop tool to draw a box around the part of the image you want to use, crop it, and then resize it so that it's about 85x85 pixels.

If you have a larger photo and would like help to make it into an avatar, send it to your instructor as an email attachment. Your instructor can help you from there.

Learning to Navigate the Site

For the first day of class, you'll want to explore some of the features of the site. This document gives an overview of a few features you might want to take a look at that will help you to navigate the site.

Navigation

In the header visible at the top of every page, you'll find one row of links:

• The first five take you to important sections of the course guide.
• The others take you to useful resource sites at Purdue.

Once you've logged in to the site, directly beneath the header on the left, you'll find the main navigation block, accessible from every page:

The navigation block is your gateway to many areas of the site useful for creating and viewing content and managing your work. For example,

• My workspace
  Lists all the blog posts, files, and other content that you have posted to the site.
• My inbox
  All Private Messages sent to you by your instructor or other students from within the course site are listed here.
• Create content
  From here you can post to your individual weblog or the front page (see How to Post to Your Individual Weblog).
• Blogs
  Lists all the blogs on the site and includes a direct link to your blog in its submenu.
• Members
  Need to find out a classmate's email address? Use the members list. You can also click on any username to access the personal account page. Only registered users have access to the private portion of account pages.
• Recent posts
  This display allows you to access all of the recent content posted by everyone. Note how it provides red asterisks to denote pages you have yet to read and notices of new unread comments.
• My account
  Links to your profile information, site settings, and more. Adjust your account profile here.
• log out
  Use this to log out of the website, which is recommended after each session.

Book Navigation

All course materials on the site are integrated into the course guide:

The course guide is a hypertext with many levels of pages.

• You can use the book navigation links that show previous and next pages below the main text or use the breadcrumb navigation at the top.
• Use the printer-friendly version link beneath any page to get a text-only version of that page and all of its subpages collated into one. For example, if you go to the top page of the guide and click on printer-friendly version, you will see the entire course guide, including the calendar, on one screen (a very long one).

How to Post Comments and Replies

Posting comments, as you will soon see, is easier than creating and sending an email.

1. You must be logged in to the site in order to post comments.
2. While you can click on the add new comment link on any post from the course home page, instead, first click on the title to access the full post and all comments. Always make sure you view the full post first. There may already be a comment conversation thread begun about what you are interested in discussing. Rather than starting a new thread, join in the existing one.
3. Choose add new comment to reply directly to the main blog post and start a new thread or reply to respond to an individual comment.

   If you don't see an add new comment link, you are most likely not logged in.

4. Enter a title for your post in the Subject field. Your title should describe the content of your post. If you do not enter a title, the system will automatically use the first few words of your comment post.
5. Enter the text of your comment in the Comment field. You may use plain text or some HTML. Some people may have the "enable rich text" link visible. If you use that feature, Drupal will give you a set of buttons much like a word processor's to help you input your message. Be careful to review your input, however, since this feature will do some strange things with your text on occasion.
6. Click on "input format" to learn about your formatting options. Drupal will use a filter to convert line breaks and URLs when you select "Filtered HTML." If you want to format your posts nicely, include images, or insert more sophisticated HTML, then choose "Full HTML." Generally speaking, leave the Input format on Filtered HTML unless you have used HTML tags other than those allowed.
7. Select Preview comment at the bottom of the page.
8. Always review what you have written in preview mode. You will not be able to edit your comment once you have posted it.
9. If you are ready to submit your comment, select Post comment at the bottom of the page. Don't forget this step! The most common way people lose posts is by forgetting to submit after previewing their comments or blog entries. If you have made changes to a post, preview it again.
10. Verify that your comment has been posted. It should be visible on the page. If something went wrong, try using your back button to get to the input screen. Review and resubmit if it's still there.

Note: You can use the Comment viewing options to change the way that comments are displayed on the page. Experiment with this feature and see which configuration works best for you.

How to Post to Your Individual Weblog

Posting to your individual weblog is a little more complex than posting a comment, but after a couple of times, you'll find it as easy as email.

1. You must be logged in to post to your weblog.
2. From any page on the site, choose the create content link in the main navigation block on the left hand side. That will bring you to the create content page. [You can also click on the blogs link and then the "my blog" sublink.

   

3. The first time you visit the create content page, read the descriptions under personal blog entry and story.
4. To post to your individual weblog, choose blog entry. This will bring you to the Submit blog entry page.

   

5. [Tip: Users of The Thomson Handbook should review the Project Checklist on "Networking in Online Forums" (p. 627) to refresh your memory on posting successful weblog messages. (All of Chapter 28 would be a good review at this stage.)]
6. Enter a good Title for your post.
7. Choose a Category tag for your post. You can use a standard one (like "Reading Response" or create one suggested in the prompt or that suits your content. You may use multiple tags.
8. Enter the text of your post in the Body field. You may use plain text or some combination of HTML in creating this post.
9. Leave the Input format on Filtered HTML unless you have used HTML tags other than those allowed.
   
10. Under URL path settings, you can give your post a short and unique URL alias. For example, you might want to use "team3projectlog" to identify your team's project log. If you use that URL, the full path would be something like http://digitalparlor.org/up07/420Y/team3projectlog.
11. Optional: If you need to attach a file,
    • Click on the File attachments link.
    • Use the Browse button to locate the file on your hard drive.
    • One you have located the file, click the Attach button.
    • A bar will show the progress of the upload . You should then see your attachment listed.
12. Choose Preview.
13. Review your post. If you make any changes, preview it again.
14. When ready, select Save to post.

Notes:

• The system will not offer you a Save button if you do not give your post a title.
• If enabled by your instructor, choose story on the create content page to post to the course home page. The rest of the procedure is the same as for creating a personal blog entry.

Creating Hyperlinks

For this class, you'll have to learn at least one HTML tag, the one for making hyperlinks.

It's easy to learn. Check it out:

1. Make sure that your rich-text editor is enabled. Click on enable rich-text below the Body box.
2. Highlight the text you want to turn into a link.
3. In the buttons below the Body box, click on the chain link button.
4. This box should appear.
   
5. In the Link URL box, cut and paste your full URL there. Then click on Insert.

Your link will now show up in your text.

Here is how you make links in traditional HTML coding. it's still easy, but it doesn't show up with our rich-text settings and input format.

<a href=""></a>

is the tag itself without any information in it. Within the quotes, you'll put the url, or web address, for the site which you want to link to. In between the ><, you'll put the text you want displayed on the screen.

For example, the url for slashdot is http://slashdot.org/. And if you want to make the word Slashdot a link in a sentence to the website in a blog post, type in,

<a href="http://slashdot.org/">Slashdot</a> is a well known community blog site.

To get

Slashdot is a well known community blog site.

HTML is picky and it's easy to make a careless mistake. Don't include any extra spaces in the HTML tag. Make sure that you include "http://" as a part of your web address. In fact, one of the easiest ways to make sure that you get the URL correct is to copy and paste it from the address bar of a browser window currently displaying the page.

See? Not too difficult. But there's one more thing . . . .

Avoid merely posting the URL as a link:

http://slashdot.org

Notice how this doesn't convey much information. Better to have put the page title (often found either on the page or in the window bar at the top) or link to part of your text (think of the examples in this site). At the same time, really long URL's won't word wrap at the end of a line. They may cause problems with the way that text is displayed on web pages.

Creating PDF Files

Portable Document Format (PDF) is a file format created by Adobe Acrobat and useful for sharing printer ready versions of documents. Unlike when files are shared between different productivity applications (i.e., word processing, spreadsheet) or different versions of the same productivity software, the same layout and typographic styles are maintained regardless of the computer environment. What the author sees when creating a PDF is exactly what the receiver of the file sees and can print out on their computer. Consequently, PDFs are particularly useful for sending resumes, cover letters, and other business documents where layout and presentation is critica. Writers want all of the effort they put into formatting professional-looking documents to be maintained.

PDFs are typically viewed using Adobe Reader (which is free to download). However, Adobe Reader will not produce PDFs. As you will soon be submitting drafts of cover letters, resumes, and other documents in PDF format, make sure that you can successfully generate a PDF using one of the following means:

• Adobe Acrobat Professional, Standard, or Elements are three versions of Adobe's productivity program for producing PDF files. These programs are not free and do not generally come installed when purchasing a computer. However, some public computer labs (i.e., most of Purdue University's main campus labs) may have Acrobat Professional installed. When Acrobat Professional is available, from your word processor or browser (or any screen that can be printed), select File -> Print. On a PC, you will be able to select, under Printer Name, "Adobe PDF" instead of sending your file to a printer. (See the figure below.) On a Mac, you will see a button "Save as PDF" on the print dialog box. In both cases, you will be asked where you want the created PDF to be stored.

  

• Adobe offers a free PDF trial service online. However, you may need to produce PDF's more than allowed by the free trial.
• CutePDF is a free application which you can download and install on your home computer.
• Google Docs: You can use these free applications (word processor, spreadsheet, and more) for collaboration and, conveniently, to export a document file to PDF format. (Upload your Word document, for example, then export it as PDF later.)
• OpenOffice is a free, full-featured, open source office productivity suite comparable to Microsoft Office that has PDF generation built in. From within OpenOffice, choose File->Export as pdf

Eliciting Good Response

Imagine the following scenario:

You have a great idea for a project for your department at work. Because it will require significant resources and funding, the senior manager in your department has asked you to prepare a ten-page proposal.

After working on the proposal for a while, the senior manager sends you an email requesting to see your draft in progress. The proposal is far from complete, but you fire off a reply saying "Here is my working draft," and attach it. The next day, you receive another email from the senior manager full of feedback which you are obligated to take. However, the feedback asks you to revise your proposal in new directions, quite contrary to what you had planned, effectively taking over the direction of the proposal. You now have to discard many good ideas you had for development. Those sections where you knew you needed the most help--they were not addressed at all.

This happens all the time in getting response to our writing. We get proofreading corrections when we need ideas; we get heavy revision suggestions when the draft needs to be proofread to meet a deadline.

To elicit useful and focused responses from readers (during peer review, for example), we must solicit good response. In the above scenario, if the writer had explained to the senior manager where she needed help in the draft and what her plans were for further development, it's quite possible that the feedback would have been more focused and helpful. So when asking for feedback on a document, explain to the responder

• your concerns about the current state of the draft (i.e., where, specifically, you need help)
• where you are in the process of drafting (i.e., ready to polish to meet a deadline, planning to do more revision)
• your target audience
• any plans you might have for further development of the text

Once you've defined your needs, your reviewer is more likely to shape their feedback effectively for you. As a reviewer, it's much easier to address the writer's concerns than to try to guess what might or might not be useful to the writer.

Five Steps of Storyboarding

1. Find or create a storyboard template that you can use to draft your outline, like the storyboard template available from the Professional Writing website (PDF format).
   
2. Each frame of your storyboard should represent a unique page, a step in a sequence, or some other individual component of your work (such as a PowerPoint or Keynote slide, a keyframe in Flash, or a Web page).
3. In each frame, identify your content. Use shorthand to describe the content (including images and audio) that you want to include and approximately where it should be placed, as in the example below.
4. Add notes to each frame in your storyboard on design, source files, material, and anything else that will help you remember what each frame should contain and how it should be presented.
5. When you have completed a rough draft of your storyboard, read back through it to see whether it has an order that makes sense and includes the multimedia you want to use. Move frames around as necessary.

Principles for Comments and Replies

Posting projects, drafts, reading responses, comments, and replies will be a primary means of class interaction and discussion. The course description explains the purpose of this coursework

When commenting and replying to blog and other posts on the course website, follow all directions and guidelines listed in the course description or calendar. It will also be helpful to

• Review How to Post Comments and Replies .
• Read through all comments and replies in the thread
• Strive to be thoughtful and analytical in your comments.
• Try to find something new to say instead of repeating what has already been said in the original post or in other comments already posted.
• When relevant, feel free to share the personal experiences that shape your views on the topic.

You should also

• Provide links to additional resources on the Web that would better inform the discussion. You should always link to any other texts on the Web you mention, even those on the course website.
• Contend with and/or support the original blog post. If you are criticizing what the blogger has said, remember to do so respectfully, which encourages further dialogue. "This sucks" would not be an appropriate response. Neither would "That's great!" if you don't explain what you mean.
• Direct attention to related and relevant issues. You may find that none of the posts on the class website about a particular set of readings confront what you feel is an important issue on the assigned texts. As long as it is related to the general topic of the readings or the topic of this class, feel free to post a comment which turns the conversation in a new direction (use the subject line to clearly specify this new direction).
• Occasionally comment on blog posts not on our front page, which keeps dialogue with your peers lively and interesting.
• Use emoticons and acronyms to convey additional information (such as tone and intonation).

For those of you wishing to do more than the minimum requirements of the course, you might visit the class website additional times per week and post new comments and/or replies to any of the blog posts.

Principles for Posting to Your Weblog

You'll do a lot of the writing for this class in your individual weblog space on the course website. You can access your weblog via your my account page.

One way to think of a weblog or blog is as a journal. However, unlike a journal that you might keep at home (as well as most if not all of the writing you have done in school before), your blog space is public. Your fellow class members will be invited to read your blog. Classmates will respond to your posts with comments and replies. Group members will review notes you take when doing research. And, of course, since it's on the Internet, other Web readers may encounter your writing and take a look at what you have to say.

There are many uses for weblogs, but you'll only use them for a few things here. During this class, you may be asked to use your course weblog to

• share drafts of your work-in-progress for peer review
• keep a project log
• post research notes 

In addition to the individual weblog space that everyone has, the home page of the course website is a community blog space where new content may be posted. While most of your blog writing will be posted to your individual weblog, the home page may be used as a place to promote discussion among all class members. For example,

• When there is a reading response assignment, your instructors may promote someone's post to the front page for community discussion.
• Groups may be asked to lead discussion by posting their reading responses or blog posts to the course home page instead of to their individual weblogs.
• Groups may be asked to share proposals and progress reports with the entire class.

Good Blogging Practices

• Titles for blog posts should reflect the context of what you have written, not merely restate the name of the title of the assignment or reading. Interesting and informative titles draw more interesting responses from others.
• Blogs should demonstrate the principles of writing for the Web as they are covered in this course.
• Bloggers link. Use hyperlinks when referring to another post on the public Internet and follow good attribution practices. Hyperlinks mean converting text to a link, not merely cutting and pasting in an URL. To do so, you'll have to know a little HTML for creating hyperlinks.
• People visiting the course website from the Internet won't know what you mean if you just mention "the reading assignment for today." At minimum, you should mention the name of the text and the title of the chapter or section you are referencing.
• Good bloggers always keep in mind that they are writing for a public audience.

To Learn More

• To receive credit for your work, be sure to follow the course requirements for reading responses, replies, comments, and other coursework.
• Optional: Read Meg Hourihan's What We're Doing When We Blog for a brief description of weblogs. For further reading on weblogs, take a look at The Weblog Webliography on Kairosnews.

Principles of Reading Responses

Your instructor may require you to respond to course readings with blog posts. Each reading response should be specifically focused on the reading and the prompt provided on the calendar, clearly indicate that you have read and thought seriously about the reading, and be sufficiently developed. Your instructor may set a word-limit minimum for these responses. Post your reading response as a blog entry and tag it "Reading Response" or use the tag provided in the prompt itself.

You and possibly your group members may be assigned to post your reading response to the course home page by submitting a story. The posts on the course home page will then be the focus of full class discussion. Selected reading responses will also be promoted to the front page for more lively community discussion.

In composing your reading response you should:

• Be sure to focus your response on the subject of the prompt.
• Link your response to recent class discussions online, your current project work, something you might have read elsewhere, and/or previous professional, academic, or personal experience writing and communicating in other contexts.
• Discuss how the reading contributes to your understanding of the current project, expands your understanding of recent discussions, or suggests ideas for your work in the class.
• Be sure to properly cite the original reading and any other sources you might mention. Good citation practice is critical in all writing and especially so on the Web.
• You can apply the rhetorical considerations discussed in Principles for Posting to Your Weblog to your reading responses.
• When it is your group's turn to post reading responses to the course home page, consider that the goal of these blog posts is to share new information and stimulate discussion. If your group is reponsible for posting about an assignment, check to see if anyone has already posted a response on the reading. If so, read through it. Shape your blog post to take the conversation in different directions.

Project Log Guidelines

During course projects, you will be required to keep a weekly project log and post it to your weblog on the course site.

Purpose

Project logs provide a record of your progress on projects, help with project management and planning, and provide a resource to return to later as you start new projects. After college, you may find keeping a project log useful in your professional career:

• In the busy life of a professional, it can often be difficult to remember all aspects of a project when compiling monthly or quarterly progress reports.
• Consultants use project logs to provide supporting evidence of work done on a project in preparing invoices or in case a client questions billable hours.
• Once a project is completed, a project log can be useful as a record for planning similar, future projects that will be completed by others.

Requirements

A good project log will usually include a progress report each week. For English 309, your log entry should be no later than Sunday on the week it is due. For example, at the end of Week 3, you'll post your first project log entry by the following Sunday. That means that at the start of Week 4, everyone will have posted their first entry. Your short report should be created as a blog entry and cover all of the following:

• Use informative titles (e.g., Project Log for Week 5: Project 2 Takes Shape)
• Tag your post with "Project Log"
• Report on the status of the project: Is it in early drafting? Is it production ready? Are you conducting research? Etc.
• Identify what tasks you have accomplished thus far.
• List any remaining tasks.
• Identify any possible problems or trouble areas and explain how you plan to address them.
• Report on any scheduled plans for completing specific tasks in the project. What are your deadlines?
• Plan out ideas for completing the project, including ways to elicit peer review of your drafts.
• Reflect on any lessons you have learned during the current project.

Note: These are individual project logs, but when you keep a log for a collaborative project log in the future, you'll also want to include the following: 1) project calendar and time and date of group meetings and communication; 2) descriptions of what was accomplished in meetings; 3) type of communication used (email, IM, Google docs, etc.); 4) goals achieved; 5) your contributions to the group project; and possibly more.

Remember: Your project logs are public and may be read by classmates, who will be encouraged to comment, add suggestions, answer questions, and more.

You can of course post more than once a week to your project log.

Project Management Questionnaire

I. COMPANY / ORGANIZATION INFORMATION

1. Contact info.

Name:

Title:

Company name:

Address:

City/State/Zip:

Phone:

2. Describe the company or organization in one short paragraph.

II. PROJECT INFORMATION

1. Project overview

1.1 What are your goals for this project? For example,  what do you want people to do or get from the document (website, etc.)? If this is a redesign, why do you want to redesign?

1.2 What are the document’s/site’s short-term, medium-term and long-term goals?

1.3 What would constitute a successful project? What are the expectations?

1.4 What are your time constraints? Do you have an intended launch date?

1.5 Do you have a budget range for this project?

1.6 Who is responsible for approvals?

2. User description

2.1 Who is your audience?  Who are the users, customers, suppliers, readers, etc. who will use the document/site?

2.2 If the audience could come away with just one thought about the organization/company/product/service what would that be?

2.3 Two thoughts?

3. Competitors

3.1 Who are your competitors, if any? What are the strengths/weaknesses of other organizations or competitor sites on the Web? (Provide URLs of their sites) If you don't have competitors, what companies or organizations have businesses or goals similar to yours in some fashion?

3.2 Why might your customers/readers rather go somewhere else for their information/product? What do competitors or similar organizations have that you don’t?

4. Design

4.1 What sites/documents do you like that are in the same category and why do you like them? Please be as specific and detailed as you can. You might talk about a document’s look and feel, how one interacts with it, etc.

5. Site or document structure

5.1 Please provide an outline of the main sections for your site/document as you envision it now. Think of this as a site map or table of contents. You may be as verbose as you like.

6. Other notes and comments

Resources for Computer-Aided Publishing

On this page, you'll find a wide variety of resources and tools for designing and presenting your work, including new technologies, asset repositories, user documentation, conference opportunities, examples, and more. It will grow substantially over the course of the semester.

Assets

Images, illustrations, animations . . .

iStockphoto.com: http://www.istockphoto.com
A vast collection of low-cost, high quality, royalty-free photography, illustrations, and animations.

Flickr Color Selectr: http://color.slightlyblue.com/
Searches Creative Commons-licensed photos on Flikr by color profile

Music . . .

Incompetech: http://incompetech.com
Royalty-free music by Kevin MacLeod for use with digital projects, film, and animations.

Color Management

Color, Contrast, and Dimension in News Design: http://poynterextra.org/cp/colorproject/color.html
A Flash movie that teaches the fundamentals of designign with color

ColorMixers: http://colormixers.com/mixers/cmr/

Color Blender (Eric Meyer): http://meyerweb.com/eric/tools/color-blend/

ColorMatch: http://www.neteffect.dk/colormatch/

To learn more about color,

Color Matters: http://www.colormatters.com/

CSS Resources and Tutorials

HTML and CSS Tutorials at HTML Dog: http://www.htmldog.com/

CSS: Tutorial: http://www.w3schools.com/css/default.asp

CSS Resources / Models: http://cssvault.com/resources/

CSS Tutorials at MaxDesign: http://css.maxdesign.com.au/

Digital Presentation Tools and Reference Guides

Animoto: http://animoto.com/
Helps you make Ken Burns-style music videos using your own image collection (and music, if you want to), for posting to personal websites, Facebook, etc. You can get a free account to make short animotos. These may be useful for promotion and marketing, digital scrapbooking, and more. Try one out as a "preview" (or overture) before a live presentation to get the audience in the mood. Check out our class-generated examples.

Scribd: http://www.scribd.com/
Perhaps best described as "YouTube for documents," a free tool for publishing a wide-variety of documents in iPaper format for distribution at the Scribd site or for embedding in social networking sites and local websites. For an example, see the 680S course flyer.

slide:ology: http://www2.lib.purdue.edu:2425/9780596522346
A book on professional slide design by Nancy Duarte, who helped engineer brilliant slide presentations by, among others, Al Gore in An Inconvenient Truth. This is a Safari Online book and is only available to Purdue students and requires log-in before you can access it. It's well worth the visit.

Photoshop Tutorials

You Suck at Photoshop: http://www.mydamnchannel.com/Big_Fat_Brain/You_Suck_at_Photoshop/YouSuckatPhotoshop1_398.aspx
Donnie Hoyle's hilarious and instructive Photoshop tutorials are a new approach to user documentation that may well catch on (these are very popular and effective).

Project Management Tools

drop.io: http://drop.io
A free resource for sharing files and managing complex projects. This is one of those "must-haves" for digital designers and others working collaboratively to develop projects.

Typography Tools

Typechart: http://www.typechart.com/
Lets you flip through, preview and compare web typography while retrieving the CSS.

Typetester: http://www.typetester.org/
Lets you compare type on the screen, on the fly, with CSS exporting. Very handy!

Resource
GUIDELINES FOR TYPOGRAPHY IN NBCS, an excellent overview of typographical design by Charles Hedrick. PDF document.
http://www.nbcs.rutgers.edu/~hedrick/typography/typography.janson-caspari.11515.pdf

Web Development Tools

Firefox Add-Ons
These free add-ons for Firefox give users a wide array of tools for analyzing Web pages, CSS, images, colors, and more.

Web Developer: https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/60

Firebug: https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/1843