Apparently I am a professional web designer

If I get paid to design a web site, that makes me a professional, right? Maybe not necessarily good at it, but that’s not really part of the definition is it?

One of the side projects I’ve been fiddling with at work is the redesign of my department’s Intranet page. I really, really disliked our old one, as it had frames (bleh!) and looked like a design from 1998. So I endeavored to redesign and recode it myself in between other projects. I’m nowhere near as good as the real pros out there, but I have managed to cobble together some ability in HTML and CSS through online tutorials plus lots and lots of trial and error. For example, this site, jmadigan.net, was coded entirely by me with only a text editor and a fair amount of cursing. And fist shaking. And weeping.

The new Intranet site is pretty much the most ambitious site I’ve created. Since it’s on my company’s private intranet you can’t see it, but here’s a screenshot:



It makes extensive use of cascading style sheets (CSS) and even some JavaScript that I hacked apart from online tutorials and other sites. The three features in the right-hand side randomly changes every time the page is refreshed, which is a good way to provide dynamic content at low labor cost. I’ve been a big fan of that kind of stuff ever since I started at GameSpy.

All in all, I learned quite a few lessons that I’ll apply the next time I redesign jmadigan.net. I’ve already started to kick a few ideas around, as there are some things about this site that I’m already finding limiting. It’s just finding the time to do it that’s the problem.

Speaking of site redesigns, Todd’s www.poweredbysteam.com has gotten a very nice new design that looks pretty impressive from both a technical and aesthetic viewpoint. Check it out.

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One thought on “Apparently I am a professional web designer

  1. Looks slick. Consider sneaking a space invader into the blue “pixel bar” along the top, though. 😉

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