AnJoe Lite:Web Designers’ log

When Macromedia Flash (Now Adobe Flash) was first introduced, I thought I was going to wet my pants. Adding animation and sound to the website?  Now that’s great! Flash allowed us to add more content on a limited space, in an organized and visually enticing manner.  For me, it was revolutionary.  With this great power, so did the vultures who craved it.  Advertisers harnessed this awesome power to dark side and began annoying the hell out of online community. Don’t worry. I’m not blaming everything on advertisers. I’ve worked on their side of the business before and I can understand why they do it.

So, here is a question many businesses may ask or designers may ask. Should we go with Flash site or static (HTML) site or even both?

Consider these questions before you move down the path.

What kind of business do I own?

Are you in restaurant business? Should you have Flash website? My personal opinion is yes and to go further, have both.  Restaurant business is highly competitive industry. These days, when people want to try new food they will do their research online. Most people I’ve talked to, if the website doesn’t look good to them, 90% of the time, they will not visit the place.

Is your business geared towards entertainment such as paintball, bowling or night clubs? My opinion is yes and mix it with static content.  Animation coupled with proper background music enhances user experience. If you want people to entertain themselves by coming to your establishments, would you want them to have the same experience when they are researching? One thing to be careful is not to go overboard with animation.  Many people are looking for slightly animated, fun website with easy access to information they need.

Is your business more B2B such as commercial finance, software or hardware or insurance? In my opinion, I would go with static format.  These businesses require right balance of aesthetics and contents.  Animation can be incorporated in a subtle manner but not to full extent.

Who are my target audience?

If you are targeting hard core programmers as audience, avoid or use very little flash.  They don’t have patience for long loading flash websites.  This is why, I say if you are covering wide range of audience, give users option to select between Flash or HTML site. 

When your target audiences are kids to teens, flash would benefit you.  They attention span is even shorter than us and you want to grab their attention.  Flash is a great attention grabber.

What is my budget?

Designers will charge more for flash website then normal HTML sites.  Flash takes planning, both artistic and logical skills and most importantly time.  Mixing the two types of content might even be cheaper in some cases.  And don’t forget about SEO (Search Engine Optimization).  Compared to HTML, flash is harder to optimize for SEO.

So have I offered you some insight on this matter? No? Yes? Drop me an email. json@anjoedesign.com

Having a website isn’t luxury anymore. I personally think that as a business owner, having a website is a must! I’ve listed some reasons for investing in a website.

1. Virtual face of your business: How many people do you think will do their research on future purchase manually these days? When I say manually, I mean reading a newspaper or a book or even perhaps traveling to competing stores to find out prices.  Probably not much.  Most people WILL do initial research online.  Market your business online thorugh your website as if you would market yourself when you meet new prospective clients. You wouldn’t meet your prospective clients in baggy jeans and unkempt hair would you?
2. Cheap marketing tool: When you have a “Well made” website, your audiance becomes world wide.  Even if people accidentally stops by your site, that’s an advertisement.  Now I say “Well Made” website and you might think it will cost arm and a leg to make something like it.  This isn’t necessarily true.  Depending on the size of your business, you could get a great deal on template based website or even customized website. How can you find one? Ofcourse you would probably go online to do your research would you? (refer to my first reason)  Also, ask around your friends and family, there are many aspiring web designers out there with great skills.
3. Distribution medium: Take advantage of digital format.  Have people visit your website to download your product brochure, coupons or menu. 
4. Available free services: There are numerous quality business service website available for you to use and guess what? They are free.  Take Google local business for example. Create an account and have your business appear in google map.  Yahoo and MSN offers similar service.  If you are a resturant owner, there are city guide services available where you can advertise your place. 

Owning a business and having a website for that business go hand in hand.  If you do not have a website yet for your business, please reconsider your options.  Here are some numbers you may want to think of.

Owning URL and registering for hosting: 2yrs/100GB space/1000GB transfer ~ Approx. $140
Customized website design: $1000 to $1500 or more.
Template website design: Depends on the site. Hosting companies such as godaddy.com offers cheap and affordable ways of easily publishing your website.

Again, it may seem like large amount of investment but the value it will return is priceless. 

Annie and I recently took a trip out to our new neighborhood Harris Teater grocery store in search of wine under $15.  We may agree on most things in life but when it comes to wine, have distinct taste and preferences. During our search, we came across Cellar No 8, 2005 Merlot. It is from Asti Winery in Sonoma Country, named after Asti region in northern Italy.  This winery is unique in a sense that they only produce Red Wines such as Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot and Zinfandel. 

My First Impression:
The initial scent was strong. Like most Merlot I’ve tasted so far, it had bold acidic scent in the beginning. Deep and rich color.  The taste was entirely different experience for me.  It was very mild and smooth.  Mixing it with oxygen released more flavor and allowed smoother drinking experience.

I’d definately recommend this wine for any one. 

I’ve been asked to lead a three day training class talking about the basics of FileNet P8 Platform. This training will be geared towards software testers who are brand new to the software.  So in this guide, I’ve decided to start from the very beginning and cover areas which are relevant to software testers.

FileNet is a Java based, enterprise workflow management system that helps manage contents and business processes.  The P8 platform comes in two flavors, Process Engine and Content Engine.  Process Engine handles the workflow elements such as work flow map, queue definitions, work item field definitions (many more) while the content engine handles the document management of the system.  As a tester of FileNet P8 based software, you will find all the tools required to support your testing. 

• Lets start by exploring “Workflow Map”.  Workflow map is a visual representation of business process.  Usually, it’s a job of BA (Business Analysts) to gather requirements on business processes and translate it into workflow map.  As a FileNet based software tester, it is important to understand the basic components of workflow map. 
• Work Item: This is an object representation of a task a user is performing.  It carries with it, the copy of work flow map at the time of its’ creation and work item index fields defined in the work flow map. It moves from one step to next depending on user actions.
• Queues: This is an object representation of different departments or areas in the business. It is where work items go to wait for user interaction.
• Routes: Paths which work items can take from one step to another.  There are condition based so that multiple routes can be defined.  To make it more obvious, it is represented by an arrow. (* har har har *)
• Submaps: As the name indicates, this is maps within map.  It has access to all fields, queues defined in the main work flow maps.  A good example of usage of submap would be, creating business process map of HR department within a company wide process map. It is also very useful because once created, it can be added anywhere in the main work flow map. (Code reuse!!!)
• Steps: This is a very generic term given for each points of destination in the work flow map.  Steps can be more specific like System step, queue step, general step, collection step . 
• A work item always starts from “Launch step” or “Start step”.

I’d say that when it comes to testing, there two most important tools available to testers. The all knowing, all powerful Process Administrator (PA) and the wise Process Tracker (PT).

Why I love PA and PT:

• PA gives you the ability to find the work item quick.  It almost looks like User Friendly SQL editor. Well actually, it is a user friendly SQL editor. You define the area of your search, (By roster? or by Queue?). Then you provide additionial criteria such as “Name of your work item fields” = “value”.
• If you have the right access, PA gives you the ability to change values and even complete the work item!
• PT can be accessed directly from PA results.  PT gives you a historical look at the work items’ trail and it’s current location.  This is sometimes developers’ best friend but also good friends with testers. In PT, check marks indicate where the work item stopped, arrow down symbol indicates which submap in went into and sand timer symbol indicates where it is currently awaiting progress.

So, I know this wasn’t all that helpful if you are looking for an answer on how to install fileNet or fix performance issues.  However, there arent’ that much useful links out there on FileNet p8 products.  If you know of any, please let me know. If you have any questions, leave a comment. =)

Next year is going to be busy year. Dave & Gina’s wedding comes first and Chris & JoJo’s wedding is next. First off, congrats to both!

Chris & JoJo would like to send out Save the Date card to all the guests using email. Very much like designing an email campaign. So let’s get started!

Their wedding stands out compared to any other weddings I’ve been to. It will be held in Cancun, Mexico! It will be an outdoor wedding facing the beautiful ocean. How romantic is that!
So, for our first layout, We’ve decided to go with tropical theme with lighter pastel colors.

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The palm trees and big Sun in the background brings out the tropical flavor.

Layout 2 is some what out of theme. Traditionally, wedding is a formal event. So with this layout, we decided to go formal as well. 

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Layout 3 is expanding on our first layout. The theme is more playful. We’ve taken “Save the Date” message literally and created a pin board layout with invitation, photo and a calendar pinned on it.

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I’ve just started tasting wine about a year ago. It was great change from college mindset of drinking light beers, hard liquors and occasional soju mindlessly. Wine offered culture, artistry and flavor.

 Bogle vineyard wine is one of the first wines we bought and tasted.   I was drawn to mild and smooth taste of Bogle Merlot and it has been my favorite ever since.  I found it complimenting with smoked Gouda cheese.
2005 & 2006 wasn’t as good as 2004.  I found 2005 merlot to be a bit bitter for some reason.  Give it a try and let me know what you think about it. I’d love to hear more readers’ favorite.

No this post will not be about my opinion on marriage. =)

One of my best friend and my girlfriend’s younger sister is getting married.  Yes, two weeks ago, at the center of New York’s beautiful central park, he got down on his knee and proposed.

Annie and I have been asked by the newly engaged to build their wedding website.  At first I was a bit hesitant to take on the job. Building friends’ or familys’ website always comes with higher pressure and expectation.  However, this project will be something new for Anjoe Design. 

We gladly excepted the request and began brain storming designs. So far, we’ve come up with two layouts:

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This design was to show their fun personality and their modern relationship.  This didn’t work out too well for them because they wanted something more elegant. I do like the layout. I may use it on other projects. We did invest our time in coming up with the design.

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This layout is still in works. We are thinking that the layout will be in flash and behave as invitation.

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This is my thrid layout. I found a really cool brush trick on Photoshop to create flowered border. Once you select the color, photoshop will use different shade of your selected color to create the pattern.  The main navigation will be the colored folders on the right. It will slide to left or right showing/hiding the contents.

Out of the three layouts, they liked the second one the best. They wanted the functionality of sliding menu incorporated into the second design as book pages.  Basically, it will be animated to imitate page turning.  The theme of the site will be wedding guest book with the design elements shown on layout two. 

I found a great tutorial on page turning effect on O’Reilly Web DevCenter.  Hope this tutorial will be useful to everyone. Thank you O’Reilly!! I know I certainly will take advantage of it.

Ok! now that I have basic design elements figured, it’s time to open Flash and begin developing different elements of the site.

Day 2: Design layout research1. Deciding on the theme: 

Like any other projects I’ve been involved in, I have so many different ideas mixed up together.  My past web projects I’ve undertaken started out like it and ended up like it as well.  In the end, it looked horrible. My most recent project, U.S. Bowling LLC, had an overall theme.  The theme was, well… bowling alley. It kept me on track in terms of keeping over all look and feel of the site consistent.

What underlying theme should I go with for AnJoe Design? As of right now, I have no idea.  I’m going to start my research. One website I love to use during my design stage is CoolHomePages.com.  No I’m not browsing the site to steal other people’s design, I am looking for inspiration. Studying each websites’ theme, color layouts, designs.  There is fine line between inspiration and plagiarism.  We all need to check ourselves not to cross that line.

The name AnJoe is only understood by a few. In Korean, this word can roughly be translated into “Sit down”. In other language? Who knows. Here is a quick background on the title. Anjoe is a name I came up with which combines by girl friends’ name, “Annie” and my name “Joe”.

On our one year anniversary, I was contemplating on what to get her. This is a special relationship and I wanted to get her something romantic. After thinking long and hard, I figured jewelry would be the best way to go. Annie is very particular about her jewelry and not knowing this at the time, I purchased a silver necklace with five circles in increasing size. I was very proud of my selection.

Next day, I walked over to her house, knocked on the door and found myself looking at the beautiful girl standing before me. She welcomes me with her bright welcoming smile, and gives me a blue ray disk of UltraViolet. My first thought, OH MY GOD, I can buy Play Station 3. My second thought, this girl is awesome!
She welcomes me in and says to me, “I have another surprise for you”. And she walked out with Play Station 3 console, which she paid full price for.

I was Stunned.

Who WOULDN’T BE?!?!

I just figured, it was my duty to name this gift that represents us. The name has evolved from a name of a gift into something greater. AnjoeDesign

I was watching TV one day and came across a commercial that caught my attention. It was the HP laptop commercial with Gwen Stafani.  What caught my attention wasn’t the commercial but the phrase.

“Creativity, it’s just that simple and it’s just that hard”

Isn’t this the most liberating phrase you’ve ever heard?  It gave me sense of hope. It gave birth to my confidence and motivation to open up my closed and shredded artistic side. AnJoe Design is the result of my new goal.   

I look forward to presenting my work to the world.  Some may see it as garbage and ignore it, spit on it, or even ask to remove this website completely. It is my hope that I can reach people who will embrace my showcase as “being creative”.  One day…