Host problems + lack of time

It took a week and a half to get the FTP info for the centre's current host and last night we discovered that the host (dmd) is likely to not support php (a code language essential for Silverstripe to function). So we went into problem-solving mode and at 1am started looking for a suitable new host for the centre's website. We were quite concerned because we didn't want to have to make the NSWC fork out a couple of hundred dollars for a new host, and we began feeling quite guilty that maybe we'd blown it for our challenge.

Then, taddaa! After looking at many costly hosts we found www.hostican.com. At the moment they have a deal where they will pay off your old contract, so that the centre wouldn't have to pay 2 hosts at the same time. Also, they have waived the set-up fee and their monthly rate (about $6-$7 depending on the contract) is very reasonable.
One hiccup however, the site says that after payment it takes around 24 hours for the contract to come into effect. So at the moment we are encouraging the centre to act as soon as possible, in the hopes that hostican is the centre's host by Friday so that we can migrate the site before the 6pm deadline. Whatever happens we will be working right to the very end, as this will delay us quite a bit while we wait.

This also means that we aren't able to disseminate our badge. This is quite heartbreaking as we were looking forward to seeing whether it would succeed and people would like the idea.

One positive aspect: all 3 of us are driving over to the centre tomorrow to teach Cathy how to use Silverstripe. We are very excited about this as the moment the centre staff are able to update their own website will be very triumphant! We've asked her to prepare a topic for the 'important issues' page or a news bulletin for the home page so that once we are all confident she can use it, Cathy can attempt to update the site herself while we are there to give any assistance needed. We are hoping all goes smoothly and she requires no help, so we can sit back and relax knowing the staff will have no problems after we're gone.

Can't believe the end is only 2 days away. Whoa. I keep telling myself the other teams are just as busy as we are, which kinda helps calm me down, but if the hosting problem isn't sorted out then we really cannot fulfill our brief... and that's all out of our hands.

A rebranding exercise

Miles has been hard at work designing a fresh new image for the NSWC. Below are examples of possible new designs for a pamphlet and a business card. Once I get my hands on the current ones I will scan them in to compare the old with the new.

We are getting to the stage in the Challenge where stress is kicking in. 2 team members have a uni forum on Wednesday night and an essay due on Friday (which neither has started) and the 3rd has a girlfriend coming back from London on Friday whom he hasn't seen in a month. So we all have a few distractions trying to cloud our vision, but we are determined to see the Challenge through and if that means failing an essay, well so be it! The North Shore Women's Centre have put all their hopes in our hands and we must not let them down. We have such high ambition for the website and we hope to really achieve the best we can. Unfortunately time is running against us and we keep realising all the things we could do "if only we had more time".

At the very least we know that even if we don't achieve everything we have set out to do, we will have made a big difference in the way the centre uses their own website, simply because it can be updated daily as opposed to fortnightly.

We are all so excited to get to the end, and to see all the other teams' work come together. It will be very interesting to compare all the projects and the difference everyone has made in their NPO's daily use of digital media.

-Aurélie

Mid-Challenge Review - The week ahead

We did an awesome video for you guys... then when I went to edit it I realised I couldn't get any sound out of it. Because the deadline for the review is today we won't have time to redo it so I'll just do a written overview of what I can remember everyone saying.

Aurelie:

• One thing we have definitely taken off our to-do list is the changing of domain name. Basically, we've realised that it's not needed and would bring unnecessary costs to the centre. Being a non-profit organisation means that funds need to be spent on more important things, and because the current website ranks very high on google, it means that people can find the centre's site easily despite the strange domain name.

• Our initial brief did not mention Silverstripe as our CMS. We've found this to be relatively easy-to-use and quite customisable. It also has a built-in newsletter function.

• Finally, we have decided that if we complete the planned website before the deadline, we will add an online donations button. This is only if approval can be gotten on time, as anything to do with money will probably go through an even more lengthy process than the designs had to go through.

Miles:

• After getting approval for the use of the logo I designed, I have now created concepts for pamphlets and business cards. I am aiming to create a fresh image for the centre to attract new members as well as invite current members to get more involved.

• The website design is already on its way to getting approval and I've made the badge. The next step is finally getting the FTP information for the centre's website host. Without this we can't migrate the site to the centre's domain name, which is quite an important step! Unfortunately the centre is having problems getting hold of the person that used to take care of the old website.

• I have been discussing forum options with a professional web developer who will suggest some options. I am hoping for a definite solution to be found by tomorrow so that I can start helping to implement it – we are leaning towards phpBB.

Katherine:

• I'll be going through current content and condensing it down. I shall fix current spelling/grammar mistakes, and basically make the whole site more readable. At the moment the home page has paragraphs which are way too long and distract from the main message. I shall also separate the latest news from the centre introduction.

• The most important part of the whole project however is making sure the North Shore Women's Centre staff are able to update the website themselves. There is no use in us changing the CMS to something more accessible if it makes no difference. My main task will be to liaise with the staff to teach them the ins and outs of the system. I have also begun to put together a step-by-step guide to using Silverstripe and have planned a meeting with them for next Thursday, in which we have dedicated a whole hour to going through such processes as sending a newsletter, adding a new page, adding to an existing page, using links and anchors, etc.

• We hope to make a huge difference to the way the centre currently uses digital tools and allow them to update their own website with anything at anytime.

-Aurelie

Mid-Challenge Review - the first week.

Wow, what an interesting week. I don't think any of us could have predicted how complicated projects can get! To be honest, we are quite behind on our brief but are planning to catch up over the weekend, with an intensive team meeting Saturday night to review our brief and make any changes that need to be made (+ possibly add a video of our new directions, if there are any).

The week so far... many highs and lows but we are hoping that it will stay high from now on! After the meeting on Monday, the trustees took forever to go through the approvals process for our logo, this was complicated by the fact that another person had also presented logo concepts to the centre. A couple of days later and still no definite answer, then finally on Thursday we receive news that the other person's logo was chosen! Needless to say we were all quite shocked and a little bit upset. As the process had been taking so long we had started on website design, but now we would have to start all over to fit in with a new logo.

To cut a long story short, there had been MAJOR miscommunication within the staff at the centre, and the wrong message got relayed to us: The trustees loved our logo, they simply wanted a fuller-figured woman in there somewhere. So we lost quite a few days waiting for approval, and we went through one day of complete confusion, but from today onwards we will focus on the task and hopefully get it all done on time.

So to recap: Logo approved, website designs almost ready to be sent off for approval (hopefully that won't take too long), all content from current site has been migrated to new CMS. Tonight we are starting on the badge and doing more research on the forum, so that tomorrow we can deliver to you a fresh look at our brief.

This is the final graphic for our logo. Unfortunately Blogger keeps inverting the colours (it is normally cream and burgundy) but I'm sure you get the message :)

It's Miles' design and he is quite proud of it. It basically encompasses all that the North Shore Women's Centre is about: things like diversity, empowerment, support, teamwork, etc. while at the same time bringing a fresh, modern look to the centre's image.

There will be things and stuff...

Aurelie didn't mention the most exciting bit...
Yesterday while we were across the bridge Aurelie and I got a bit sidetracked while looking for a petrol station and stopped at the Glenfield Salvation Army. What a treat that shop was. We spent $30 and between us we got shoes, bags, a leotard, a skirt, a top, a japanese book, a Hanson tape and the most important our digital fix mascot! I will put a pic on here later but so you don't die from the suspense its a Barney soft toy...amazing
The team meeting last night was great and very productive. How information flows in a website is a crucial aspect...its not all about looking good. But it helps haha
We should get the go ahead on the logo and colour scheme later today or tomorrow and then we are set.
And Aurelie was overreacting we had heaps of petrol!!
Katherine

Logo approval and the first of many technical difficulties

Yesterday afternoon (Monday 28th), Kat & I trekked out to Glenfield to meet up with Kaira to present our final logo options to her for approval. Miles had done a wonderful job and I found the logo to be simple yet very effective at putting across the message of diversity and interdependence.
This time we knew our way there (vaguely, still had a couple of looks at the mapbook), however, the petrol light was on the whole way and would beep at us every now and then. I was a little concerned we were going to break down in the middle of the northern motorway.

We were introduced to Cathy, the NSWC web-person. We discussed the logo at length and decided we would mock some up using more red and playing around with type layout.

Later on in the evening, after topping up on beers and picking up some Thai takeaways, we had a very long team meeting, at times productive & sometimes frustrating. We were very keen on producing a really cool website for the centre but decided that usability was a more important factor. We needed our website to be done in a way that ordinary staff the the NSWC could update it themselves. In the end we decided to try out a NZ application called Silverstripe. We are having trouble downloading it though (silly open source geeks making things complicated...) but if it doesn't work we might resort to just using Wordpress.

Tonight we will mock up a few website design options and pass them onto the centre for approval, and hopefully decide on the way we will implement that design. It is also unfortunate that we still do not know whether their current hosting system supports php. I hope all this will be sorted out by our next entry!

Task 3 coolness

Team Name

Digital Fix

The organisation

North Shore Women's Centre

Mission/Vision (of organisation)

There is still a need for women to have a place to challenge the assumptions and promote debate, in order to better the lives of women. Our vision is to provide services which enable women to empower themselves to lead fulfilling lives.

Identified Goal (of yMedia project)

To help the women's centre reach and engage with a broader audience - especially young people by having a larger digital presence and a more interactive, stylish and helpful website. Adding more interactivity will hopefully attract people to become more involved in the cause, especially discussing contemporary issues of gender inequality.

Current barriers/difficulties in achieving this goal

A lack of understanding about digital media within the organisation. A large part of the project will involve teaching the NSWC staff how to use the technology implemented on their own website. All of them are very passionate about their cause and have to much to say, they simply need the skills to be able to turn those opinions/knowledge into instant posts on the website.
Another barrier is the fact that the organisation has a very involved board of trustees with very strict guidelines. If they do not like a particular aspect of the project then it will not go ahead. This could easily lead to wasted time, and therefore clear communication between Digital Fix and the NSWC is absolutely crucial to a succesful project.

Typical client/Target audience

Women. One of the main ideas the NSWC has tried to get through to us the the importance of diversity. They are very adament that no-one can be left out. Whatever digital solutions we implement will need to attract a diverse range of women. This could be construed as another difficulty in achieving the goal, but we look at it more as a challenge. We realise the importance of reaching out to as many women as possible and the reasons why.

Possible/discussed digital solutions/options

Social networking sites, website forum, interactive form for signing up to classes and the e-newsletter, a brand new look for the website included in a rebranding of the entire organisation.

Evaluation of solutions

The NSWC had already decided that a rebranding of the entire organisation had to be performed and are very excited about it, this is one aspect of the project they had already been thinking about before meeting us. From our point of view the interactive side is equally important, making the site more useful to get people to visit the site again and again. Finally, we will look at ways to advertise the NSWC and it's website through the idea of an icon which people can put on their websites as a sort of 'badge' to say they support the centre, and also via social networking sites + "the word of mouth" effect they produce.

Proposed solution

Our final proposed solution involves first the rebranding of the website and the organisation itself. We will endeavour to create a logo and font/colour combination which attracts as many women as possible and creates a sense of diversity around the NSWC. We shall present the centre with many concepts from which the trustees can choose from as soon as possible so that we can get the project underway. After a choice has been made, one of our team members will focus on design while the other two find solutions to the aspect of interactivity. Once we have worked out what we need, we will again communicate with the centre about the structure of the site, and how the new interactive elements will fit in with existing content. One member will also focus on possible ways of advertising the NSWC digitally.

Focus of solution

The overall focus of the whole project is to create a website which will incite women to be informed about contemporary gender issues, and also show them ways in which they can empower themselves through courses etc. By creating a website where women can share opinions, sign up for courses, and hear latest news from the North Shore Women's Centre, we will make it easier for them to help themselves. Of course, a website is useless if no-one knows it exists, so it is important for us to get to where women already converse and that is on social networking sites. Many women also have blogs, and we will encourage them to place an icon there to inform other women that this website exists.

Design approach

Elements - A diverse range of women. We have come to an agreement that the new 'brand' design for the centre needs to refer to different cultures/ages/occupations of women. We have discussed ways of achieving this and have decided that either silhouettes or profiles would be effective. After extensive research we have agreed on a tangent for logo concepts to go on, which involves flower imagery and women silhouettes as petals. Other design elements which has been discussed is the colour scheme, at which point centre members explicitly stated they did not want too much pink in the design, as this is one of the main problems with the current design.

Look/Feel - An important factor of the project is that the site needs to feel welcoming to a diverse variety of people. Therefore the design will be very clean and simple, and will be implemented in a way so that it does not alienate the current users of the site, but it also invites younger people and others to become part of it.

Scope of work (work that will take place)

Design: New logo; colour scheme; fonts; website; business card; pamphlet; , Usability: New domain name + redirection from old domain name; forum; application forms online; opportunity for staff to update website e.g. latest news section, Advertising: Social networking; website badge/icon,

Outside of scope (work that won't take place)

Video, Internal operations, content,

Technology to be used

Photoshop, Illustrator, Forum software, Facebook, Bebo, Myspace, Blog, RSS?

Proposed structure

There will be things and stuff

Timeline Dates

Logo concepts will be presented at a meeting on Monday 28th of July and one particular logo will be chosen. From there Miles will continue designing a concept for the website, the business card and the pamphlet.These will be presented via meeting or email by Friday 1st of August so that a final copy of each is finished by Sunday 3rd. At the meeting on Monday, we will also discuss the research done into the possibilities for forums, online forms for courses, and the blog icon idea and get an ok on all of those. Aurelie and Katherine will then attempt to implement the forum by Sunday 3rd and the online form by Wednesday 6th August, seeking help along the way from digital media tutors if absolutely needed. The icon imagery will be created by Miles by Sunday 3rd at the very latest, as a version of the NSWC logo. The icon will need to be distributed as quickly as possible as it is a viral idea and will hopefully spread exponentially. It will start with 3 or 4 blogs from people we know, and we predict it will be taken up by people reading those blogs, and so on and so forth. Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday will be used to finish off anything that has run over time, and fix up any glitches within the code etc. These days will also be there to showcase the project so far to the NSWC staff and have their input on any possible changes. Once all is done we will dedicate a day to teaching how to use the new site elements and possibly even write a summary manual in case they forget. However, all along the way we will endeavour to use the simplest technology available for all our digital solutions, so that the NSWC staff can learn to use it instantaneously.