I’ve been enjoying 37Signals’ book Getting Real and wanted to share this thoughtful line from Manage Debt:

Hack together some bad code that’s functional but still a bit hairy and you’re building up debt. Throw together a design that’s good enough but not really good and you’ve done it again.

This quote resonated deeply with me. Know that this debt will get passed on to your predecessor if you leave the project and at some point, the debt has to be resolved.

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Building forms has really opened my eyes to the issue of Simplexity. I understand how a form should work and I have an idea of how to present it to a user so it’s easy to fill out. (Simple aspect). I get that it should look Simple to a user. Getting my code to check form fields and make the form run in a logical manner is incredibly hard. (Complex aspect.) The good news is, I know when I feel pain that I’m growing my skills.

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Someone is reselling Backupify accounts on Ebay. Should we allow it to continue? http://bit.ly/afHpGj

That is an interesting conundrum. My answer is No. Before I get to the why, here are a few Pros I considered.

The positive side of allowing reselling

First: many non-techie people use eBay as a discovery device. Much like randomly moving through iTunes to find and buy new music, many of my family members and friends found online services through browsing on eBay.

Second: from experience with my non-techie friends and family who regularly use eBay, I expect many of them would say the same thing: if they found out about the service on eBay, and it interested them, they’d ask their techie friends about it. Meaning, they would get directed to the service’s website long before buying it on eBay.

And one aside: most experienced eBay users would completely dismiss this offer (as far as buying it on eBay anyhow) because the eBay user has a reputation of 0.

Those were the only positive points I could come up with.

Aside from the obvious negatives to allowing reselling,

the passionate NO! comes from my views as a Backupify customer. To see someone so blatantly abusing the generous offer that Backupify gave to its first set of customers, greatly disgusts me. I want to smack this person for their greed. To let it continue means Backupify devalues its own services. Also, knowing the [techie] friends I would refer to this service, if they saw this on eBay, it would lower their opinion of the company greatly. While eBay is a great discovery device for the non-technical crowd, right now I’m going to guess that their main customer base is tech-capable. You have to have some degree of understanding of the web to be using Facebook, Flickr, Youtube, Gmail and others; you have to have enough personal data invested in them to motivate yourself to protect that data by backing it up.

In summary, the emphatic NO comes from my personal concern that it could cause future reputation damage to a company I am just beginning to enjoy.

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Created by antimatter15

Take a look at some of the other work antimatter15 has done. Truly inspiring work!

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• taken Basecamp for a test drive on the PaT project
• tried out Dreamhost’s 1-click install for WordPress
• added the Ahimsa theme
• added a few pieces of content to the site for reference
• installed Google apps: docs, calendar, e-mail
• added Kayte and Marjorie (the PaT webmasters) to WordPress as admins
• assigned Kayte and Marjorie as the Sys Admins for the site
  (full access FTP accounts – Dreamhost’s control panel is awesome)
• tested/currently incorporating events calendar on the site
  (bugs need worked out)

There is still much to do, but I need to pause on development and meet again with Kayte and Marjorie. I haven’t added the content myself because I want to use that as real, hands on training for Kayte and Marjorie. That way they can see how to use the interface. I will know how well it’s going once I get some feedback from Kayte and Marjorie. Here’s hoping they like it so far.

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1. Content is king. Every bit of information on the site is relevant, useful and kept up-to-date. Past events are posted to give new parents an idea of what to expect in the future, even if the future date of the event is unknown.
2. Information architecture by design. Instead of thrown-together content, the information is organized with a purpose. For example, on the landing page the featured events line the right side of the page and events categorized by age line the left side. The school district’s disclaimer is kept at the bottom, in a smaller text size – a normal text treatment used for secondary information and legalese.
3. Readability is excellent. A few splashes of color and a touch of informal fonts convey an open, friendly attitude without becoming distracting.
4. Acknowledges the visitor. That the site even exists means that someone, somewhere has acknowledged how nice it is to have this information available, at a busy parent’s convenience. Another way the visitor is recognized is in the tone of the writing. For topics like Kindergarten Registration, it addresses parents in a direct manner: “If you missed the Kindergarten Registration [...].” then gives a full set of instructions on the page, arming parents with the information they need to get stuff done.

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Landing page for the St. Joseph Parents as Teachers

The First Step

Research. Who owns the parent site? St. Joseph School District. What technology are they using? SJSD is using a combination of ASP and ASP.NET, but the Parents as Teachers site is plain vanilla HTML. That indicates they have independent control. A good thing for me, but possibly a hassle for the Parents as Teachers volunteer who has to deal with managing a site and who had no idea where to start.

Step Two

Find a contact that manages the site. Easy enough, with the Contact Us page.

Hi Debbie,

Scott and I took Erik to our first Parents as Teachers meeting last night. The Water Play for Babies meeting was a lot of fun, and Scott’s taking Erik to the Infant Massage today.

You guys do some great work and I was hoping I could help out. I’m a web developer by profession and I design and build websites for a living. If you need any help with the Parents as Teachers website, I’d love to volunteer. Feel free to contact me by e-mail: [x] or phone: [x].

Cheers,
Thuy Copeland

Wait for reply.

You must be a Godsend.  I am in Virginia now on holiday, but am returning next week. YES, we’d love help on our website.  It is connected to the SJSD site, but we know there is much work to do.
I’ll contact you in the next couple of weeks.
Thanks so much.  I’m glad you enjoyed the class.
Debbie

Now what? My goal is always to make this as easy as possible. Busy people want managers. They don’t want to babysit me.

Hi Debbie,

My goal is to make this as painless for you as possible. I’m ready to work on the site, I just need 2 pieces of information to get this project rolling:

1) FTP username & password
Since they have independent control over their site and do not use ASP, I think it’s safe to assume they have access to an FTP account.
2) Information on events (Date, time, location, etc.)

If you have a Word document or other electronic file, just e-mail me that. I can work with whatever you have.

Bonus:
Contact info for the tech person that provided the FTP info.

Thanks,
Thuy Copeland

I should have made the e-mail a bit shorter, but that’s okay. It only contains 1) relevant, necessary information; and 2) a call to action.

While I Wait

I downloaded their files as a temporary backup and started looking at options. Since the preferred server-side language of choice is ASP, I know it’s highly unlikely they have PHP installed. WordPress is likely out of the question, but I’ll certainly ask. That means possibly sticking with a Dreamweaver/Template-based site. Not a real problem, though. I can still use JavaScript libraries and a nice site design to spice it up.

Aside from technical constraints, I consider their content. What content exists right now? Is it presented in a way that’s easy for a parent to access? How I can generate more for them? What other content would parents be interested in seeing? From my own limited perspective as a parent, I would like to see the events highlighted on the landing page. I would also like to see a map embedded in the “How to Find Us” page, so I can get driving directions or see if I’m already familiar with the area. Already I’m thinking Google Calendar, Google Map and a Flickr photostream (or a local slideshow, depending on their needs).

Design is not what I want to focus on, so I search for a few open-source designs. From the color schemes used on the site and experience from the group meetings, I know the basic messages Parents as Teachers wants to convey: an emphasis on fun, education, and kids. Something bright, bold, open and cheery would do them justice. I take a few screenshots and bookmark the site designs.

I can’t wait to get this rolling!

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