On Monday July 09, we will vote for the 2012 PRM layout mockup that we want to have on this year’s site.
The Art Department
The winning team will become the Art Department. The Art Department will produce the following by Monday July 16th:
- Story, Index, and “Category Listing” HTML files. Fully commented. Code organized.
- Designs for “Contributors” and “About PRM” pages.
- A page for videos. Using sample video content is fine, but please consult with the Video team about sizes.
- A single CSS file that controls the index, story, video, category, contributors, and about PRM files. Fully commented. Code organized.
- A favicon for the “desktop” site.
To make things easier for the Responsive Design Team, the Art Department will specify widths in percentages, with a max-width of 960 px enforced on the “wrapper”.
Stories will be wrapped in ARTICLE tags. The headers in each ARTICLE will start at H1 and proceed downward to H4.
The Responsive Design Department
The Responsive Design team will take over on Monday July 16th and produce a responsive and tested design by Monday July 23. While working, the Responsive Design team will not modify the original CSS or HTML files. Rather, they will make their css in an external file, loaded after the Art Department’s css file.
Targeted devices include the ones we have in the department—iPhone, iPad, Kobo Vox.
The Responsive Design team will also make the favicon that will be used when users save the site onto their home screens.
After July 23rd, the Code team (described below) will incorporate these media queries into the main stylesheet.
Any requests for changes to HTML or CSS submitted by the Art Department will be made to me.
The Video Team
The Video team can start editing today if they want. They will consult with the Layout team in order to agree upon dimensions, etc.
The video team will upload the edited videos to YouTube and set up a Pacific Rim Magazine 2012 channel.
I would like this to be done by July 23. I’m not a video editor, so if this is an unrealistic expectation, please tell me.
The video team will embed the Youtube video on LangaraPRM.com on July 31.
The Editorial Department
The Editorial team will ensure that all textual content from this year’s magazine has been entered into LangaraPRM.com by July 16th.
The Editorial team will make sure that all heading levels are used in a logical manner, starting with H1 and proceeding downward by number. The editorial team will check that content that should be a proper header hasn’t just been bolded.
All content will be assigned to a category and its actual author.
All content will be tagged with 5 – 10 relevant tags. It is important that this be done carefully.
All stories will have an except entered by the Editorial team. These excerpts must be between 50 and 53 words long.
The Editorial team will make their initial sign-off July 16th, certifying that there is not a single typo to be found in any PRM2012 content.
The Editorial team will also compile the content for the Contributors and About PRM pages.
The Code Department
The Code Team will start on July 16th and produce by July 30th the WordPress template files to realize the designs made by the Art Department. This department is suited for people who are meticulous and logical.
At minimum, we will need home.php, single-php, category.php, sidebar.php, and style.css files.
Much of the grunt work will have been done by the other departments. You are going to finesse their visions into working WordPress files.
The Code team will also research a Contact Form plugin and assist in installing and configuring it.
The Images Department
The Images Department will, in consultation with the Art Department on July 16th, compile all the images to be used in all the articles. These files must be saved as high-quality JPEGs (100% quality) with a width of 3000px. We won’t be using them at those dimensions, but in a few years, we could very well be doing so. If an original image isn’t that big, don’t scale them them up: just save its maximum pixel dimension.
If the Art Department decides that that the site needs one or more sliders, the Images department will research WordPress plugins to produce these.
We will do this with plugins rather than writing the Javascript ourselves. This will make it easier to quickly incorporate this functionality into the site.
The Images team will have images compiled by July 23rd. On that day, the team will report what dimensions are needed. This information will be used by the Code team to modify the functions.php file that determines at what sizes WordPress saves uploaded graphics. ( I will show the Code team how to do this. )
After the Code team has produced the WordPress template (by July 30th), we will install it on Langara PRM.
After that is done, the Images team will upload the images to their respective stories. They will finish that task by Aug 01.
Quality Control Department
On July 16th, the Quality Control team will test the Art Department’s sample layout in a range of browsers, including Internet Explorer 7 and above.
Working with the Art Department, the Quality Control team will produce any necessary “fixes”. Fixes to specific versions of Internet Explorer will be introduced to the main stylesheet via “conditional” styles. These are already in our blank template file, but I will explain how to use them if needed.
On July 23, the Quality Control team will test the Responsive Design team’s efforts on iPhone, iPad, and Kobo Vox. Any necessary fixes to the Responsive designs will be made by the Responsive Design team, in consultation with the Quality Control department. This must be signed off by July 25th
On August 02 & 03, the Quality Control team will pore over every inch of site and sign off on it by the end of the day Friday August 03.
On Tuesday July 10, at the start of class, I will ask you to write down your three preferred department choices. I will make the Departments up that evening, hopefully during that day’s lab.