Students will be able to access the sixth version of the UA Web site, with more options and a new look, when it goes live this weekend.
The Web site, which was developed by the UA Web team with guidance from the UA Web Advisory Council, will have a better search engine and more fluid design, said Tracey Hummel, a Web developer.
The first UA homepage was released in 1994 and the current page was released in 2002.
The Web site is redesigned every two to three years, in order to meet new technology standards and eventually attract more students with a modern design.
Since the redesign started in August, about 50 people, consisting of a Web council, a Web redesign team and volunteers, have been working on the site’s completion.
The page took about a year to complete with only two and a half staff members working on it full time, Hummel said.
Except for the two new people who were hired by the Center for Computing and Information Technology, no extra money is involved in the process.
Lana Law, engineering management junior, said the new Web site looks more blocky.
“I like the old design better with the picture in the middle and everything around it,” she said.
Law said she uses the Web site often to look at calendars and to access student link.
The Web site was designed to be more accessible to people with disabilities, Hummel said. That’s why there is text instead of buttons. The text can be enlarged or reduced according to users’ needs and most pages automatically resize to fit the width of the browser page.
The news section, the weather and the www.google.com search have been popular on the old page and have not been changed.
The Web site will also have separate homepages for students, new students and faculty and staff. The student homepage has links to UA Web Mail, the library and student link.
Some of the new features include a customized master calendar of current events, quick links that can be customized to people’s favorite UA Web sites, an expanded index of community services and UA stories.
“These are real stories with real people,” Hummel said, “They’ll spotlight the achievements of UA students, faculty, alumni and staff.”
The Web team asked for input from several sources, including visitors, parents and students before designing the Web site, she said. The team held focus group sessions, feasibility sessions and looked at search engine logs to find out what most website visitors were looking for.
The UA also evaluated Web sites from its peer institutions – 15 universities across the country to see what other schools’ Web sites had to offer.
A link to the new version of the Web site can be found on the current UA Web site. Although Hummel said she didn’t know how many people have taken a peek at the new site, she said they have gotten over 230 suggestions from the suggestion box on the link.
Kirsten Lovette, agriculture and biosystems engineering senior, said she’ll get used to the new Web site after awhile.
“It’ll take time to get used to the new design – I’m used to the old one – but this one looks cool,” she said.