Now we get to the fun part: design. Unlike programming, design is one area that everyone on a project can (and usually does) have an opinion. It can be really fun to come up with new design ideas and get imaginative with a project, but it also possible to spend months on revisions and stymie [...]

Before you even write a line of code or color a pixel, the project team should define the information architecture of a site. A lot of people fail to realize that the organization of content greatly affects the design and development of a site. Adding a new section of content months after the design has [...]

Seems simple enough, but I can’t begin to count the number of times that failing to do this caused a project to spiral out of control without direction. Meeting with project managers and content creators about what exactly we’re building, what kind of site we’re creating, is of the utmost importance at the beginning of a project.

This post is the intro to a series on the process I recommend for creating a digital humanities project from scratch, from initial conception to launch and aftermath. The last few months, I’ve been researching design and development processes in an effort to establish and document them for folks at CHNM, and for my own benefit. In a lot of cases, the process could be generalized for any kind of project, but I hope to address specific goals and concerns that humanities projects have at various stages of development. So, here’s what to expect