Why I came to the class?

What I was doing before?

• Server side Web Developer @BostonGlobe
• Masters in Computer Science (SW Engineering) from SUNY - Buffalo
• Owner of a successful food blog.

What I want to be doing?

• Web UX Design 

• Redesign of my cooking blog "Story of Cooks"

• Creating Portfolio

What I created?

Github Journal

People's Card

Old site

• Slow - 15 secs loading time
• No pagination
• No visible search option
• Too Much extra
• Big footer
• Flopped Simple recipes
• Where is the newsletter?

New Site

• Fast loading time (2.3 s)
• Clean design
• Sticky left rail 
• Only necessary information
• Less chaos
• Clear Search Option
• Prominent Newsletter Signup
• Small Footer
• Pagination

How I approached the work?

Wordpress or not ?

• Staticgen
• Hubpress
• Metalsmith
• Hexo
• Wintersmith

What other CMS are out there?

Why Wordpress?

• Time-realistic
• Extensive support group
• Available answers (Qoura, Stack Overflow)
• Familiarity
• No Content Migration 

Design 

Design Flaws

• Site id position
• Too many menu items
• Too much busy right rail
• Liked the simple layout
• Quickly found the search
• Easily available Newsletter

Focus Groups

Steve Krug

• Site id should be on left
• Site layout - left to right
• Visible Search
• Less Chaos
• Little learning time
• Omit needless words 

Final Book Review copy link

Flat Markup

Theme creation

Failure

Dev Server Creation

Child Theme

Theme testing

Launch

Tools I used

Future Scopes

Story of Cooks

• Pages behind paywall

• A/B testing

• Interactive Graphics (in progress)

  • Example - NYT Thanksgiving Recipes

New Career

• Building Portfolio (In progress)

• Making mock designs and stories for Bloomberg, a local cafe, Boston Globe, Fidelity. 
• Learning how to create stories.