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Relief Is On Board || USSVI Reports
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The linked items below may be useful to assist the on-coming webmaster
Info Link: USE OF MASS E-MAIL TO THE POC LIST
ARCHIVED COPY of WEBMASTER WATCH RELIEF SOLICITATION Subject: LOOKING FOR A NEW USSVI NATIONAL WEBMASTER Also see Don Gentry's USSVI
Technology Plan for 2004 Notice
of 24 March 2004 Official blurb about Webmaster Duties
Background: I first took the USSVI Memorials website section from Ron Martini in November 2000. Following that I took over the entire USSVI Webmaster job. In 2002 USSVI made the decision to set up another separate domain of usssvcf.org and to launch the USSVI Charitable Foundation website. Since the start, when Martini asked for a "volunteer" and I raised my hand, this webmaster job, for me, has been both a rewarding task and a demanding one. But it is now time for me to hand it off to someone else. Thus I have served notice to John Peters of my intent to disconnect from the position of USSVI Webmaster - no later than 1 September 2004. During this "tour of duty" I have learned much about doing website layout and hopefully how to do it right. Mainly what I have learned is not so much the geek code stuff. But rather the business of putting together megabytes of material so that it is easily accessible and has a logical coherence in some way that makes sense. So I want to lay out some focus points here for use by the webmaster candidates and also to provide a resource for whomever takes this job. Needless to say, the next webmaster will have the freedom to do this thing in his own way. However, I will jot down a few "lessons learned" because I have always been a strong believer in "not reinventing the wheel" every time a position assignment changes.
HOW DO YOU VOLUNTEER? E-MAIL ME YOUR INTENT cny@sid-ss.net I will confer with the new Tech Committee Chairman (Don Gentry) as to who are the likely prospects before any final decision is made. The candidate's name will then be forwarded to the new National Commander (Tom Conlon) and he will have the final cut on who the next National Webmaster will be.
THE FOLLOWING ARE MY THOUGHTS ABOUT IT ALL 1. When I say I have learned much about "the geek stuff" - what I mean is how to keep the websites organized and handle the load of e-mail traffic without things falling through the cracks. The new webmaster will find that keeping himself organized is the key. He will need to set up folders on his hard drive to handle the action items. 2. I suggest that the geeky stuff be kept VERY SIMPLE. No pop-ups. No marquees. No animated GIFs of diving and surfacing subs or flying Silver Dolphins. Keep the code plain vanilla simple... I suggest staying away from java and javascript unless you REALLY, REALLY know what the hell you're doing. 3. Unless you are a bonafide professional I suggest that the USSVI website is NO PLACE to "strut your techy stuff" and show off every tricky web page skill in the book. KEEP IT SIMPLE!! I would urge no embedded "Anchors Away" or diving alarm sounds (or any other embedded sounds for that matter). They slow down the load time and after the 500th time of listening to them they just piss people off. If you want to make sounds available just link to them. The members will get 'em if they want them. My view is that these two USSVI websites ARE NOT for entertainment purposes. They are for INFORMATION. With a big emphasis on RELIABLE INFORMATION. Folks who want entertainment should turn on their TV or go to Disney Land. The USSVI websites are not an appropriate place for eye candy bedazzlement. (In my opinion that is) 4. It is crucial that the webmaster exercise top notch editorial skills. Be prepared to proof read everything and pay close attention to ensuring good syntax and grammar and know how to use a spell checker. It won't make it perfect - mistakes will creep in - but it requires attention to detail. You can't just take raw data and images and dump them onto a page and hope for the best. Much of what you do is akin to a newspaper editor. The websites are not static and you will constantly be receiving new info and updates to old info. Much of the stuff you receive from members for placement in the websites will require considerable tweaking. Sometimes you will need to go back to the originator and get clarification. Most of the time its easier to clean up items yourself.... and it is time consuming. 5. Have an eye for layout. Burdensome background graphics that obscure the written word should be a NO, NO. Think INFORMATION. If they can't read it then it isn't useful info and you didn't do your job. Try to be consistent with your layout. Don't be pointlessly shifting formats and backgrounds. 6. Do not target your pages for that guy who is on a high-speed fiber-optic hookup with his supercharged connection --- nor to the guy with a monitor the size of an outdoor movie screen. I suggest building pages for use in a 17" screen for the guy who connects to the internet on a copperwire 56K modem dial-up. Normal text should be 11 or 12 point font with large fonts reserved for headings or emphasis where appropriate. 7. Because not everyone views this stuff with the latest software and machines I preview all the pages on five different browsers: Microsoft IEXPLORER(latest version, MOZILLA(latest) and three versions of NETSCAPE: 7.x, 4.x and 3.x. I urge that a webmaster run several flavors of browsers to ensure the display is the same across most of the current popular browsers.. 8. Load time is very important. Do everything possible to keep it short.
IMAGES... 1. You must have a good image editor application on your machine. AND USE IT! 2. Rest assured that now and then you will receive images from members that can exceed 2megs for a single picture of the old USS Ustafish: a picture that is probably mostly sky and water and has such a high resolution you could immediately place it on the front cover of TIME magazine and very likely get an award for it. However, keep in mind that the display qualities of the average monitor is not of print image quality and the cyber presentation has limits --- so reduce the dimensions and the compression and make whatever adjustments are needed to lighten and brighten. 3. Again think INFORMATION and think LOAD TIME. No one wants to sit on a dial-up for 15 minutes waiting for a humongous image to load when with a little tweaking you can enable him to get the image into his box in 15 seconds. 4. Of course, there are times when a large image may be desirable thing to make available --- in those cases use a thumbnail and a simple hyperlink. 5. Use only JPG image format as much
as possible with only an occasional GIF.
GETTING THE INFO OUT You will be the relay station for the BROADCASTS and ZAP-NOTES A familiar repeatable format is essential. Changing formats from e-mailing to e-mailing is unnecessary and confusing. Don't do it.
TO DOC OR NOT TO DOC From time to time you will receive MS/WORD "docs" that contain fairly short articles or notices that are to be placed in the website. Although the amount of text may be short, the file sizes may be disproportionality oversized (its a Microsoft thing). Deciding whether to place that info in HTML or retain it as a "doc" is a judgment call. Some big considerations is that you can't place return links in a MS/WORD .doc and the .doc will require the viewer to have a WORD reader --- plus they make a larger footprint on the server. Why waste the space? So in most cases it is easier for all concerned to just convert the thing into a nice, clean fast-loading HTML page. There are exceptions of course, such as the ON-LINE large official USSVI documents that are usually prepared by the Nat'l Secretary. They are linked HERE.
WHO'S BEHIND THE GREEN DOOR? 1. Bear in mind that many of your visitors will be submariners who don't know squat about USSVI and have just recently discovered the website via a search engine. All the more reason to make it easy, fast and informative. Keep the top page short as possible so they don't go away due to long load times. 2. As much as it is practical to do so, material should be clearly identified as to pub date, title and author. 3. I suggest the webmaster NOT place his e-mail or particulars on every page. I currently have webmaster contact info linked HERE and HERE. That means only that two pages need changing. The reason is that there will come a day when you will want to hand it over to a new webmaster --- so consider the task of changing e-mail addresses on a thousand pages vs. changing two pages..
YOUR HARD DRIVE FILES AND MAKING CHANGES TO PAGES 1. I run two hard drives. Both websites are created on my machine (not directly on the server) and stored on my C-drive. Each time any changes are made I do a FULL BACK-UP of the site to my secondary hard drive. (Its just a drag and drop) where it is saved into a date coded folder. Both sites are in folders on my drive labeled as xussvi and xussvcf Example: xussvi (from C-drive) >>> to xussvi(folder),040520(folder) ... that is 2004, May, the 20th Every month or so I burn the two sites to a CD.
OUR CURRENT ISP Both sites are currently located on the server of ClearChoiceInternet. That ISP is headed up by Mike Sandburg. For quite a while he allowed us to run at NO COST but he now charges USSVI a minimal (vet rate) fee. He continues to make no restrictions as to website SIZE LIMITS or USUAGE LIMITS. (He like vets) You may want to work something out with him or you may want the domains transferred elsewhere. That should involve co-ordination with Don Gentry, the new Chief Technical Officer for USSVI. But be careful before moving --- the grass may not be so green on the other side. You might end up with an el-cheapo deal that could turn out to be a big irritating headache later on.
Be organized on your hard drive - Have a system Proof read Keep it simple
I suggest that if you want the job - that you slowly go through the two websites several times. I'm sure you will find areas for improvement. But don't start improving until you have a full grasp of it all. Look at the source code in the pages. You will see that it is as plain vanilla as possible. Its just simple clean pages with Arial, Helvetica fonts (Sometimes a little Times new Roman). Review these:
SOME SCREEN SHOTS I maintain the files on my C drive as shown here 1a.jpg Transferring files from my machine to
the server: I use WS_FTP I use a HTML page (on my drive) to provide quick access for myself to both the on-line and the hard drive copies. Layout is shown here 3a.jpg I back them up after each major change on my backup drive as shown here 4a.jpg My USSVCF access page is shown here 5a.jpg
HOW WILL I TRANSFER THE USSVI AND USSVCF FILES TO THE NEW WEBMASTER??? I will burn them onto CDs and snailmail them. Then the new webmaster puts them on his hard drive.
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