WEB STYLE GUIDE, 2nd edition

By Patrick Lynch and Sarah Horton

Front matter

• Foreword by Lou Rosenfeld
• Preface to the second edition
• Preface to the first edition

Chapter 1: PROCESS

• Before you begin
  • Planning
  • Developing a site specification
• The site development process
  • Site definition and planning
  • Information architecture
  • Site design
  • Site construction
  • Site marketing
  • Tracking, evaluation, & maintenance
• References

Chapter 2: INTERFACE DESIGN

• Web page design versus conventional document design
• Make your Web pages freestanding
• Basic interface design
  • User-centered design
  • Accessibility
• Navigation
• References

Chapter 3: SITE DESIGN

• Organizing information
  • "Chunking" information
• Site structure
  • Basic information structures
  • Creating site diagrams
• Site design themes
  • Training
  • Teaching
  • Continuing education
  • Reference
  • Entertainment and magazine sites
  • News sites
  • E-commerce
• Site elements
  • Home pages
  • Menus and subsites
  • Resource lists, "other related sites" pages
  • Site guides
  • "What's new?" pages
  • Search features
  • Contact information and user feedback
  • Bibliographies and appendixes
  • FAQ pages
  • Custom server error pages
• Internet versus intranet design
  • Design standards
• References

Chapter 4: PAGE DESIGN

• Visual hierarchy
• Consistency
• Page dimensions
• Page length
• Design grids for Web pages
• Page headers and footers
• Page layout
  • Layout tables
  • Fixed versus flexible
  • Other uses for tables
• Frames
• General design considerations
• Cross-platform issues
• Accessibility
• References

Chapter 5: TYPOGRAPHY

• Characteristics of type on the Web
• Content structure and visual logic
  • Cascading style sheets
• Legibility
  • Alignment
  • Line length
  • White space
  • Typefaces
  • Type size
  • Case
  • Emphasis
• Consistency
• Cross-platform issues
• Accessibility
• Type graphics
• References

Chapter 6: EDITORIAL STYLE

• Organizing your prose
• Online style
• Titles and subtitles
• Links
• References

Chapter 7: GRAPHICS

• Characteristics of Web graphics
  • Color displays
  • "Browser-safe" colors
  • Dithering
  • Screen resolution
  • Gamma
  • Graphics and network bandwidth
• Graphic file formats
  • GIF files
  • JPEG graphics
  • PNG graphics
  • Imaging strategies
  • Summary: File formats
• Images on the screen
  • The screen versus printed color artwork
  • Complex illustrations or photographs
  • Diagrams for the computer screen
• HTML and graphics
• Accessibility
• References

Chapter 8: MULTIMEDIA

• Applications for multimedia
• Web multimedia strategies
  • Audio only
  • Slide shows
  • Video
  • Animation
• Preparing multimedia
  • Processing
  • Delivery
• Design and multimedia
• Accessibility
• References

Back matter

• Illustration credits
• References

About the site

• Help using the site
• Feedback
• Copyright information

PROCESS

INTERFACE DESIGN

SITE DESIGN

PAGE DESIGN

TYPOGRAPHY

EDITORIAL STYLE

GRAPHICS

MULTIMEDIA

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Copyright 2002 Lynch and Horton
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Last updated 12 July 2005

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