4 Documentation
Website development: storyboarding a website before coding takes place, action-plan
for producing a site
Plan a web site - The Action Plan
Why do you need an Action Plan?
In fact, you can probably think of all the steps in your head right now. But how do you ensure that you really have covered everything? Would anyone else know where you'd got to with the work if you were unexpectedly off sick for a few days? And are you quite clear about when you need to start if everything is to be done and dusted by the deadline?
An Action Plan is a simple list of all of the tasks that you need to carry out to achieve an objective. It differs from a To Do List in that it focuses on the achievement of a single goal. To-Do Lists are prioritized lists of all the tasks that you need to carry out. They list everything that you have to do, with the most important tasks at the top of the list, and the least important tasks at the bottom. Whilst To-Do Lists are very simple, they are also extremely powerful, both as a method of organizing yourself and as a way of reducing stress. Often problems may seem overwhelming or you may have a seemingly huge number of demands on your time. This may leave you feeling out of control, and overburdened with work.
An Action Plan is about achieving a single goal - in this case a web site. To draw up an Action Plan, simply list the tasks that you need to carry out to achieve your goal, in the order that you need to complete them. This is very simple, but is still very useful! Keep the Action Plan by you as you carry out the work and update it as you go along with any additional activities that come up.
What are you going to do and when - how long will it take?
You will need to set dates for when you would like to see the work completed. You have done the designs - someone else will be implementing it. You will need to see how they are getting on with your website and how they have changed your ideas. Any changes made will need approval via a change management system. These changes will need to be documented with the full reasons for the change, and will need to be signed off by the designer, your tutor, your year tutor and a board of independent other users (your class). This will normally happen in a meeting when all the changes are discussed by the group. Changes cannot be made at other times. Any other changes will not be approved.
Use Microsoft project or Excel to help you. Measure all times in Hours. Simple Project Exercise Excel/MS Project
How to use MS Project - a simple exercise
What is an incremental action plan? The difference between an action plan and an incremental action plan is that an incremental action plan has numbers down the side stating the order in which the tasks should be undertaken. Example
Does the Action Plan explain in detail
Exercise
Lets looks at a fictitious site to prepare you for making the Assignment site. You are going to make a website for the West Herts Computing Department.
Create an incremental Action Plan for the creation of this Web Site.
Homework Create a Story board for NSOS web Site - Page Designs - Questions for client - SiteMap Assignment Front Cover Sheet