As you can already see, the PSTV Alumni website has a new look. Gone are the multitude of different styles that users can choose from, replaced by a single simplified design. Those styles included Yokum Hall (red), Lake Champlain (blue), Adirondack Mountains (green), Avid Keyboard (yellow), and a Minimalist Web 2.0 design (white). While choosing your own website theme was a cool trick, it wasn't really very useful. Plus it also caused a few minor glitches with cookie conflicts. So I focused on making just one good design that works well.

The most obvious new design feature is the new header image of Amity Plaza at SUNY Plattsburgh. I altered the image with some PhotoShop effects and overlays, but I want to thank SUNY Plattsburgh student, Erik Graham, for providing the original panoramic shot, and for sharing his work through a Creative Commons license.

The other notable new design feature is a horizontal navigation menu with expandable submenus. This layout opens up more page width for actual content. Plus it's able to hide lesser-used menu items to reduce clutter.

Also worth noting, I finally got around to updating the PSTV History page to reflect that PSTV has had Faculty Co-Advisors since 2003 (a fact that I was unaware of until this year). There are still many other additional website changes on my to-do list, but most of those are not high-priorities.

P.S. Some of you may have noticed that I copied myself. The horizontal navigation menu is the same script that I also use on my own personal website.

Update 6/13/07: I'm now noticing some problems that show up only in Internet Explorer browsers. There shouldn't be a gray space between the header graphic and the navigation menu. There's also an issue with the forum not being centered in IE too. I'll try to fix those bugs when I get a chance.

Labels: website