Design

Server-side software used

• Writer’s Block is a Content Management System I coded myself. Allows you to create non-blog pages (Anypages), categorise posts and Anypages and has a robust spamguard to protect comments.
• Novice Form is a PHP-based mailer script, so you can set up a feedback form without needing to delve into the mucky muck that is CGI.

Design Mentality

I’m a supporter of Minimalism in web design, as you can see. I believe that form follows function, and the main function of any website is to communicate information. The site’s color scheme is black, white, greys, and browns, so that you don’t get distracted by any radical colors. The site has few images so that loading times can be kept to a minimum.

Fonts used

• Georgia — A serif font for increased screen legibility in body text. I happened upon it when I was typing something on RoughDraft and I got attached to it. Its best points are 1) it has all the special punctuation marks I could want, and 2) its numbers aren’t lined (they don’t line up in blocks, so they blend into the text).
• Verdana — For titles, navigation and header/footer sections. Probably the most readable sans-serif screen font, and common to both PCs and Macs. This is the primary font-face in lots of my printed work because it is still readable at 6 point.
• 1454 Gutenberg Bibel — Used in the masthead.
• WM Designs 1 — dingbat font used for most of the ornaments on the page.
• Fleurons — dingbat font used for the comment separator ornament.

Past designs

You can click on a design to see a bigger version of it. After Front and Centre I significantly changed the blog’s coding to make it more accessible to everyone, but unfortunately this made it impossible to allow users to actually use past designs.

“Side-by-Side” June 2002–March 2004

“Front and Centre” March 2004–September 2004

“Tabula Rasa” September 2004–October 2005

“Newspaper” October 2005–March 2006

“Manuscript” March 2006–Current

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