Previously, browsers would often group the navigation elements with tabs and have the website floating below or have the website grouped in a tab with the navigation elements floating above. This shift marks a change in UI that I think just plain makes sense. Hopefully Firefox and IE aren’t far to follow in this trend.

This project has been one of my favorite projects thus far at Penn State and I think it really highlights the situation based learning that a lot of the IST classes use. Less exams in the major is very relieving, yet it still puts on the pressure in a situation that more realistically resembles my future career. I will have teammates and I will be able to seek external resources. Projects will be a growing and evolving process, rather than some assignment that gets completed and dropped from thought.

Other than highlighting the IST program’s teaching technique, I also feel that the project shows a lot of the technologies I have used over the past couple years and ways I have used them. The project contained standards compliant XHTML and CSS for the coding of the site. Working in Photoshop to contribute to the design. Discussing usability and interface design with teammates. Designing SQL databases and determining the proper relationships between entities. Adding jQuery and Ajax to increase usability and decrease page refreshes.

Despite completing this almost a year ago now, I had rekindled interest in the project as the semester project in my Java class reminds me of it. Perhaps just because it will be another assignment heavy on the development side of things, but that doesn’t make it any less important. I’m excited to start working in teams to create something that will hopefully be of use.

The web space where this has been posted has been taking down, so I am going to try to convert the MSSQL PHP stuff into MySQL PHP stuff and host it so you can actually experience the greatness that was Classroom Portal. I’m sorry I can’t provide a link to the working site, but I can give you a few more screen shots on my Flickr.

1. It will help us understand the process of developing an application in general, a process that we may need to become familiar with in our future profession. While we may not be directly involved in its development in our future, understanding all the things that can go wrong, and right, will help improve any management opportunities we face.
2. It will give us a useful and/or fun application. There are plenty of things that we want our iPhones to do for us, but sometimes the offerings of the App Store are too expensive, general unknowns, poor implementations, or just plain ugly. By developing our own solution we will have the perfect harmony of cost, functionality, and aesthetics.
3. This application will offer us a cash generating opportunity. There’s no other way to look at it, the App Store can be a cash generating machine. Sure for every giant success story there is probably another 100 failures, but we are in a position that enables us to take a this risk will minimal financial loss.

While I can’t say if our endeavor will be successful in a purely fiscal perspective, I hope that we will gain valuable experience that could come in valuable later in our lives. Then again, I also hope that we can make $21,000 a day like the guy that created iShoot. I guess I should also discuss the matter of what name we should be developing under as well. We’ve considered using Bonsai Studios, but I guess we should check with the other parties involved.

For my IST 220 class last semester I created a presentation about a company called First Mile Solutions. This company organizes the implementation of last mile Internet solutions in third world countries around the globe. Their work is extremely important to the continued expansion of the Internet, and while they may not be able to provide Internet like you or I experience, they give people the chance to interact with this important technology.

I love making presentations. However, I think so many people despise presentations and put them through unnecessary abuse. This hurts both them and their audience (and me). While I may not be the best at making presentations, I want to offer my work as a demonstration of what a good presentation should look like.

For the First Mile Solutions presentation I created clean, visual slides that drew from the information to be discussed while it was displayed. I kept the visual style similar throughout the entire presentation by using the same font (Helvetica Neue Light) and keeping the background to either a dark gradient or a high quality, royalty free photograph.

Don’t be fooled by the relatively sparse looking slides though. The presentation should be anything but sparse of information. A good presentation will still provide the audience with an abundance of information, but it shouldn’t overload them with information both visually and audibly.

For the entire presentation, please download the PDF (my favorite format for presentations) of the First Mile Solutions Presentation.