Do you have a process for developing a website? Buildings, cars and websites all require steps to build a website. Without a systematic process, you wouldn’t be able to consistently build houses, cars or websites. At WordCamp Seattle 2014, Morten Rand-Hendriksen, gave a talk on Web Design is a Process. He focused on first 3 of a 5 part process: Prepare, Plan and Build.
Here are my notes from the presentation:
Prepare
- Set up version control; use Git, Mercurial or Subversion
- Establish code and style guides: see @mdo’s Code Guide and Google’s Web Fundamentals
Content Strategy
- Ask questions about the content: Why does it matter? Why should it be on the website? Who is the target audience?
- Complete a website content audit. Create a list to know where all of the content is.
- Create a sitemap of your website
- Create a template map to match the WordPress hierarchy. Identify the templates that you are going to need to use.
- Develop a wireframe for mobile only without any design elements. Use paper to create your wireframes.
- Ask real people if your design works
Build the Site
- Build the site with a blank starter theme and add the content
- Add accessibility in before adding design elements
- Add design elements in the browser. Use modular or atom design.
Summary
Website development is constantly changing. Morten provides different ideas on how to design a website. He suggested matching the WordPress templates with templates that you are going to use. This will save you time when you build your theme. Morten’s suggestions can help you to speed up the design and development time, so you can finish project faster and get paid sooner.
What changes are you going to make to your design process?