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Writer's pictureDesislava Ilieva
May 18, 2021

Lesson Task - Get the Basics Right

Part one


  • Explain the following terms in your own words: - The Internet - HTML - Browser - Search engine

  • Please research and add another 10 questions to the briefing process.(See the lesson.)

  • From this list of 20 questions (your 10 added to my 10), please create the ultimate list of 10 questions that you would use for clients.

  • Please upload this activity to your WordPress blog.


The Internet - is global network of computers that includes any device that has an Internet connection like computers, mobile phones, tablets, TV's, gaming consoles and many other. The main purpose of the Internet is information sharing between all of these devices.


HTML - is a universal language used to send, present and retrieve information via Internet.

The application created to view these files is called a browser.


Browser - is an application that lets you input a URL and hit enter, the browser searches for the server associated with that URL. It then makes a request to the server for the files for that URL, and serves them to your browser where they are displayed. Popular browsers are: Chrome, Firefox, Opera and other.


Search engine - helps us navigate between all the information available on the Internet by searching the entire HTML document for keywords and showing us only the most relevant results. Example of a search engine is Google and Microsoft Bing.


The ultimate brief


Questions from the lesson


1. What kind of visitors are you expecting on your website?

2. Who are your competitors and how do you differ from them?

3. What actions do you want visitors to take on the site?

4. What is your deadline for completing the site? How big is the budget?

5. What features should be used on your website?

6. Please list the names of three sites that you like and explain what you like about them.

7. Do you have any color preferences? What should the look and feel for the website be?

8. Who will be the contact person for this project?

9. What do you NOT want on your site in terms of text, content, color and graphic elements?

10. Who will be responsible for maintaining the website? Will the person have the time and skills to do so?


My questions


1. Provide a description of the Business/Company and what the site is for.

-This question will help us get a feel for the brand and the history of the company as well helps us get the idea for the website they want.


2. Define the project’s goals.

- Once we have a clear understanding of what the project involves, we want to find out the goals of the website or the problems it is expected to solve. This will ensure that the design is effective, stays within scope, and focuses on what is most important to the client.

Some goals the client might want their website to achieve may include:

  • Increase brand awareness

  • Improve online presence with a responsive and accessible website

  • Increase subscriptions and sales

  • Generate leads and inquiries

  • Become a source of key information via a blog, documentation, or e-learning

3. List the design requirements and specs

- Including all the relevant technical requirements and specifications upfront can save us several rounds of revisions in the future. This can also help us to avoid scope creep, and save the client any additional costs.

Some items to incorporate here include site login credentials, user registration management, and more. A brief created for an ecommerce site may also list product categories and variations, payment methods, discount codes, shipping costs and so on.


4. Is there a previous website, excising logo and brand style.

- Having already existing files as reference will further helps us with the design and idea for the website.


5. Content

- Who will provide content for the website, photos, articles, lists, prices and so on


6. Marketing, online marketing and SEO

- Online or regular marketing for the company/website. Social links and other sources that can help with that.


7. Goals for the future.

-What goals are we aiming to hit and in what time. Do we have clients or someone else that can provide feedback.


8. Include maintenance, hosting, and support plan

- Housekeeping is essential to the performance of a website. Glitches, coding issues, error pages, speed issues, administration access, and bad URL creation are just some of the things that need to be looked out for and addressed.


9. Indicate what success looks like and how it should be measured

- As well as providing the success metrics for the website project itself, we need to think about how we want to measure and report the website’s activity and performance. I’m referring to information on email capture, bounce rate, time-on-page, landing pages, keywords and search terms, sessions, devices used, demographics, source of traffic, user journey and so on. Google analytics has become the standard for this, but you might prefer a different platform or an amalgamation of GA and other platforms.


10. Please include other comments or questions you would like addressed before starting the project, if there are any.

- We are open for any discussions/questions you may have.


Combined list


1. Provide a description of the Business/Company and what the site is for.

2. Define the project’s goals.

3. What kind of visitors are you expecting on your website?

4. Who are your competitors and how do you differ from them?

5. List the design requirements and specs.

6. What features should be used on your website?

7. Is there a previous website, excising logo and brand style.

8. What do you NOT want on your site in terms of text, content, color and graphic elements?

9. What is your deadline for completing the site? How big is the budget?

10. Include maintenance, hosting, and support plan.


Part two


Surf the web and find 10 sites you would consider to be great websites. Simultaneously, make a list of 10 sites you consider bad web sites. Remember to describe why you would define them as such. Upload your lists on your blog.


Sites I like:


I like this site because although it contains a ton of information in the form of videos they have managed to create a clear layout that is easy to navigate and understand. I also like how they have implemented the site menu on the left, making it easy to access at all times.


Although this site contains only a small amount of information, it is presented in a clear and easy to understand layout. They have used a simple top menu bar that helps navigate around the site without feeling overwhelmed.


Netflix is one of the most popular websites for watching movies online. Since the movie selection is the main subject for the website, they have represented the movies with big size and animations that makes them popup when you hover your courser on them. The menu at the top is easy to see, but it's not the main way you would navigate around the site. You can see the different movies, organized in sections by scrolling down the page or by using the search bar.


Pinterest is all about sharing images, animated GIFs and short videos in the form of pinboards. The website layout is built around these images, it uses a scroll down way to show as many of them as possible. The site menu is hidden in a button on the top left, but the search bar, which is the next most important thing for the site is big and easy to see, centered and locked on the top of the site.


This is a website focused on showing us the local news. The menu and website layout makes it easy to see the top news of the day without it being crowded and overwhelming.


A website for clothes with a simple layout, where you can navigate easily trough the menu on top and find the product you need.


The Digital Panda is a modern creative agency headquartered in Vancouver, Canada. Their website is very unique with a scroll down interactive layout. The color scheme is followed in the whole design of the site.


8. Bruno Simon's portfolio website (https://bruno-simon.com/)

This site has probably the most complex layout I've seen but in a very creative and fun way. The website feels like a game where you navigate a car towards the different parts of the menu. The animation and style fit perfectly with each other and the whole site has an amazing 3D feel to it.


Babord is a Norwegian seafood supplier and their website is very well put, with mostly dark and moody theme with a pop of color here and there. The menu is easy to navigate and the main focus is on the seafood products they sell.


This is an informative site, created to rise awareness of car crash incidents. Gtaham is the only human designed to survive a car accident and in the website we are given the opportunity to learn why by interacting with the 3D model of him. The design of the website is clean and represents the information in a interesting way.


Sites I don't like:


Pretty much every outdated and old fashioned webpage or very crowded and hard to navigate websites. Here are a few examples I found during my research.


Many might disagree with this, but I find Facebook extremely crowded with useless options and information that no one ever needs. Their goal to make the website fit every person and business out there has made it very chaotic and hard to navigate.


Although Zara is mainly a clothing store it is really hard to see that from their website. They have tried to achieve high fashion style using human models in their product photos, but that shifts the focus from the actual product to the model only. I find it really hard to browse for clotting on that website and I think the products are not represented in the best way possible.


This site might contain a lot of good information but the layout and design are extremely outdated and the site feels very crowded.


This is easily the worst website I have ever seen out there. All I can say is - this site is a complete mess.


5. Yale school­ of art (https://www.art.yale.edu/)

Another outdated and messy website with a pinch of horrible repeating animations as background.


Although this site is not horrible in general, the layout is a bit outdated and boring. The site also feels a but crowded.


Although the site has good potential, the layout and style used are very messy and outdated.


Old fashioned site with a horrible color palette and style as well as very low quality images.


Although Wikipedia is one of the most popular and visited sites the layout is rather boring and old. Even though the main subject for the site is the information it can be represented in a more creative and unique way with a small update.


10. Norges Jeger- og Fiskerforbund (https://www.njff.no/)

I remembered this one from my research on previous tasks. The site is very outdated and some of the the linked pages have a completely different design that does not match with the main website. For example: https://njffbutikken.no/


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