Good Luck Final Exam

I want to say good luck for final exam...
Hopefully, we can do the best for this subject...
Must remember Study smart not study hard...
(^_^)

Sharing Is Caring

Hello everybody…

In this post I want to share my experience during this project. After learn the entire step when develop website from Dr. J, now I can better understand how to make website that related with education. Actually I not education background, so I don’t know how to make website that valuable with the teaching and learning. But now I can understand what the learning theory and how to make that theory related with the project education such as website or course ware.

When develop this project, I make me learn how to work as a team, handle the pressure when happen problem, communicate with my group member and teach the basic principle that should use when develop the theme.

I also wanna to say Thank You so much Dr.J because all the knowledge, skill and experience that i has been enjoy when attend in this class... May Allah bless you...

(^_^)

Final Presentation

The final presentation for our project was conducted at CTL, 3.00 PM. My group is first group for this presentation. Even though, there are some problem happen during our presentation but Alhamdulillah everything is okay....

Congratulation for all the groups because of the excellent project. Good job…hehehehe.. I really enjoy with the presentation

Project : Web Development Process

This is our final project. The figure below show the project has been developed by us.

Home

Objective of the project

Scenario

First Scenario

Second scenario

Third scenario

Objective Tutorial Using Flash

Puzzle tutorial

Download Resource

User Login

Menu User

Page Comment

Admin Login

Admin Menu

About Us

Topic: Commercial Web Hosting

Choosing a Commercial Web Host

1. Reliability and speed of access

   Not only should the web host be reliable and fast, it should guarantee its uptime (the time when it is functional). Look for a minimum uptime of 99%. In fact, even 99% is actually too low - it really should be 99.5% or higher. The host should provide some sort of refund (eg prorated refund or discount) if it falls below that figure. Note though that guarantees are often hard to enforce from your end - the host usually requires all sorts of documentation. However, without that guarantee, the web host will have little incentive to ensure that its servers are running all the time.

2. 
   

3. Data Transfer (Traffic/Bandwidth)

   Data transfer (sometimes loosely referred to as "traffic" or "bandwidth") is the amount of bytes transferred from your site to visitors when they browse your site.

   Don't believe any commercial web host that advertises "unlimited bandwidth". The host has to pay for the bandwidth, and if you consume a lot of it, they will not silently bear your costs. Many high bandwidth websites have found this out the hard way when they suddenly receive an exhorbitant bill for having "exceeded" the "unlimited bandwidth". Always look for details on how much traffic the package allows. I personally always stay clear of any host that advertises "unlimited transfer", even if the exact amount is specified somewhere else (sometimes buried in their policy statements). Usually you will find that they redefine "unlimited" to be limited in some way.

   In addition, while bandwidth provided is something you should always check, do not be unduly swayed by promises of incredibly huge amounts of bandwidth. Chances are that your website will never be able to use that amount because it will hit other limits, namely resource limits. For more details, see the article The Fine Print in Web Hosting: Resource Usage Limits.

   To give you a rough idea of the typical traffic requirements of a website, most new sites that are not software archives or the like use less than 3 GB of bandwidth per month. Your traffic requirements will grow over time, as your site becomes more well-known (and well-linked), so you will need to also check their policy for overages: is there a published charge per GB over the allowed bandwidth? Is the charge made according to actual usage or are you expected to pre-pay for a potential overage? It is better not to go for hosts that expect you to prepay for overages, since it is very hard to forsee when your site will exceed its bandwidth and by how much.

4. 
   

5. Disk space

   For the same reason as bandwidth, watch out also for those "unlimited disk space" schemes. Most sites need less than 10 MB of web space, so even if you are provided with a host that tempts you with 200 MB or 500 MB (or "unlimited space"), be aware that you are unlikely to use that space, so don't let the 500 MB space be too big a factor in your consideration when comparing with other web hosts. The hosting company is also aware of that, which is why they feel free to offer you that as a means of enticing you to host there. As a rough gauge, thefreecountry.com, which had about 150 pages when this article was first written, used less than 5 MB for its pages and associated files.

6. 
   

7. Technical support

   Does its technical support function 24 hours a day, 7 days a week (often abbreviated 24/7), all year around? Note that I will not accept a host which does not have staff working on weekends or public holidays. You will be surprised at how often things go wrong at the most inconvenient of times. Incidentally, just because a host advertises that it has 24/7 support does not necessarily mean that it really has that kind of support. Test them out by emailing at midnight and on Saturday nights, Sunday mornings, etc. Check out how long they take to respond. Besides speed of responses, check to see if they are technically competent. You wouldn't want to sign up for a host that is run by a bunch of salesmen who only know how to sell and not fix problems.

8. 
   

9. FTP, PHP, Perl, SSI, .htaccess, telnet, SSH, MySQL, crontabs

   If you are paying for a site, you really should make sure you have all of these.

   Note that some commercial hosts do not allow you to install PHP or Perl scripts ("What is PHP and Perl?") without their approval. This is not desirable since it means that you have to wait for them before you can implement a feature on your site. ".htaccess" is needed if you are to do things like customize your error pages (pages that display when, say, a user requests for a non-existent page on your site) or to protect your site in various ways (such as to prevent bandwidth theft and hotlinking, etc).

   Telnet or SSH access is useful for certain things, including testing certain scripts (programs), maintaining databases, etc. MySQL is needed if you want to run a blog or a content management system. Cron is a type of program scheduler that lets you run programs at certain times of the day (eg, once a day). Check to see if these facilities are provided.

10. 
    

11. SSL (secure server), Shopping Cart

    If you are planning on doing any sort of business through your website, you might want to look out to see if the host provides these facilities. These facilities normally involve a higher priced package or additional charges. The main thing is to check to see if they are available at all before you commit to the host. You will definitely need SSL if you want to collect credit card payments on your site.

12. 
    

13. Email, Autoresponders, POP3, Mail Forwarding

    If you have your own site, you would probably want to have email addresses at your own domain, like sales@yourdomain.com, etc. Does the host provide this with the package? Does it allow you to have a catch-all email account that causes any email address at your domain to be routed to you? Can you set an email address to automatically reply to the sender with a preset message (called an autoresponder)? Can you retrieve your mail with your email software? Can it be automatically forwarded to your current email address?

14. 
    

15. Control Panel

    This is called various names by different hosts, but essentially, they all allow you to manage different aspects of your web account yourself. Typically, and at the very minimum, it should allow you to do things like add, delete, and manage your email addresses, and change passwords for your account. I would not go for a host where I have to go through their technical support each time I want to change a password or add/delete an email account. Such chores are common maintenance chores that every webmaster performs time and time again, and it would be a great hassle if you had to wait for their technical support to make the changes for you.

16. 
    

17. Multiple Domain Hosting and Subdomains

    For those who are thinking of selling web space or having multiple domains or subdomains hosted in your account, you should look to see if they provide this, and the amount extra that they charge for this (whether it is a one-time or monthly charge, etc).

18. 
    

19. Server

    Is the type of operating system and server important? Whether you think so or not on the theoretical level, there are a few practical reasons for looking out for the type of server.

    In general, if you want to use things like write/use ASP programs, you have no choice but to look for a Windows server.

    Otherwise my preference is to sign up for accounts using the often cheaper, more stable and feature-laden Unix systems running the Apache server. In fact, if dynamically generated pages that can access databases (etc) is what you want, you can always use the more portable (and popular) PHP instead of tying yourself down to ASP. Another reason to prefer Unix-based web hosts (which include web hosts using systems like Linux, FreeBSD, OpenBSD, Solaris, etc) using the Apache web server is that these servers allow you to configure a lot of facilities that you typically need on your site (error pages, protecting your images, blocking email harvesters, blocking IP addresses, etc) without having to ask your web host to implement them. Knowledge about configuring Apache servers is also widely available, and can be found on thesitewizard.com's Configuring Apache and .htaccess pages as well.

    
    

20. 
    

21. Price

    I was actually hesitant to list this, but I guess it's futile not to. However, I would caution that while price is always a factor, you should realise that you often get what you pay for, although it's not necessarily true that the most expensive hosts are the best.

22. 
    

23. Monthly/Quarterly/Annual Payment Plans

    Most web hosts allow you to select an annual payment plan that gives you a cheaper rate than if you were to pay monthly. My current personal preference is to pay monthly with all new web hosts until I'm assured of their reliability and honesty. Paying monthly allows me to switch web hosts quickly when I find that the current host does not meet my requirements: this way, I'm not tied down to a bad web host because I have prepaid for an entire year. I do this even if the new web host guarantees that they will refund the balance if I'm dissatisfied, since at the point I sign up, I have no assurance that they will honour their guarantee. Later (usually after many months or even more than a year), when I'm satisfied with the host, I often change payment plans to the discounted annual plans.

24. 
    

25. Resellers?

    Not all hosting companies own or lease their own web servers. Some of them are actually resellers for some other hosting company. The disadvantage of using a reseller is the possibility that you are dealing with people who don't know much about the system they are selling and who take longer to help you (they have to transmit your technical support request to the actual hosting company for it to be acted upon). However, this also depends on both the reseller and the underlying hosting company. It is thus wise not to rule out all resellers; there are a number of reliable and fast ones who are actually quite good and cheap. In fact, a number of resellers sell the same packages cheaper than their original hosting company. If you find out that a particular company is a reseller, you will need to investigate both the reseller and the real hosting company.

26. 
    

27. International

    If you don't stay in the USA, you have the option of hosting your site with some local provider. The advantage here is the ease of dealing with them (they are after all easily accessible by phone call or a visit), your familiarity with the local laws and easy recourse to those laws should it be necessary. It should be your choice if your target audience is local (eg a local fast food delivery service). On the other hand, hosting it in USA has the advantage of faster access for what is probably the largest number of your overseas visitors (particularly if you have an English-speaking audience). You also have a large number of hosting companies to choose from, and as a result, cheaper prices too.

28. 
    
29. References : http://www.thesitewizard.com/archive/findhost.shtml
30. 
    

Topic: Free Web Hosting

Choosing a Free Web Host

1. Advertising

   Most free web hosts impose advertising on your website. This is done to cover the costs of providing your site the free web space and associated services. Some hosts require you to place a banner on your pages, others display a window that pops up everytime a page on your site loads, while still others impose an advertising frame on your site. There is really no hard and fast rule which is to be preferred: some people hate a pop-up window, other webmasters dislike having to stuff banner codes onto their pages, and many people cannot stand an advertising frame (which may cause problems when you submit your website to search engines). Whichever method is used, check that you're comfortable with the method.

2. 
   

3. Amount of web space

   Does it have enough space for your needs? If you envisage that you will expand your site eventually, you might want to cater for future expansion. Most sites use less than 5MB of web space. Indeed, at one time, one of my other web sites, thefreecountry.com, used less than 5MB of space although it had about 150 pages on the site. Your needs will vary, depending on how many pictures your pages use, whether you need sound files, video clips, etc.

4. 
   

5. FTP access

   (In case you're wondering: What is FTP?)

   Some free hosting providers only allow you to design your page with their online builder. While this is useful for beginners, do you have the option to expand later when you become experienced and their online page builder does not have the facility you need? FTP access, or at the very least, the ability to upload your pages by email or browser, is needed. Personally, I feel FTP access is mandatory, except for the most trivial site.

6. 
   

7. File type and size limitations

   Watch out for these. Some free hosts impose a maximum size on each of the files you upload (including one with a low of 200KB). Other sites restrict the file types you can upload to HTML and GIF/JPG files. If your needs are different, eg, if you want to distribute your own programs on your pages, you will have to look elsewhere.

8. 
   

9. Reliability and speed of access

   This is extremely important. A site that is frequently down will lose a lot of visitors. If someone finds your site on the search engine, and he tries to access it but find that it is down, he'll simply go down the list to find another site. Slow access is also very frustrating for visitors (and for you too, when you upload your site). How do you know if a host is reliable or fast? If you can't get feedback from anyone, one way is to try it out yourself over a period of time, both during peak as well as non-peak hours. After all, it is free, so you can always experiment with it.

10. 
    

11. Perl and PHP

    (In case you're wondering: What is PHP and Perl?)

    This is not particularly crucial nowadays for a free web host, since there are so many free script hosting services available that provide counters, search engines, forms, polls, mailing lists, etc, without requiring you to dabble with Perl or PHP scripts.

    However if you really want to do it yourself, with the minimum of advertising banners from these free providers, you will need either PHP or Perl access. Note that it is not enough to know they provide PHP or Perl access: you need to know the kind of environment your scripts run under: is it so restrictive that they are of no earthly use? For PHP scripts, does your web host allow you to use the mail() function? For Perl scripts, do you have access to sendmail or its workalike?

12. 
    

13. Bandwidth allotment

    Nowadays, many free web hosts impose a limit on the amount of traffic your website can use per day and per month. This means that if the pages (and graphic images) on your site is loaded by visitors beyond a certain number of times per day (or per month), the web host will disable your web site (or perhaps send you a bill). It is difficult to recommend a specific minimum amount of bandwidth, since it depends on how you design your site, your target audience, and the number of visitors you're able to attract to your site. In general, 100MB traffic per month is too little for anything other than your personal home page and 1-3GB traffic per month is usually adequate for a simple site just starting out. Your mileage, however, will vary.

14. References : http://www.thesitewizard.com/archive/findhost.shtml
    

Reflection Week 15

Week 15 ( 22/03/2010)

Today, we learn about the publishing your website.. Before start with the topic, Dr. J discuss about the presentation date.. After discuss, we decide to choose Monday next week for project presentation every group and start at 3.00 PM to get enough time for present..

Then we continue with the topic.... Dr. J ask student what web host that you will choose between free web hosting and commercial web hosting...? In my opinion, i will choose free web hosting because i don't need use money to pay per month...hehehe...

There are several thing that should need to consider when choose free web hosting such as advertisement, amount of space, FTP access, file type, size limitation, readability, speed to access, scripting language whether PHP or ASP and bandwidth.

I also learn about the thing that need should consider when choose commercial web hosting are budget or prize, readability, speed of access, data transfer (Traffic/bandwidth), disc space, technical support, scripting language, secure server (SSL), and annual payment plan.

The different between File Transfer Protocol (FTP) and file manager is when using FTP, we can upload all the structure and file but file manager can upload one until five file per access. Then, Dr. J give some explanation about the using FTP and file manager.

I also know about the example of free web hosting and commercial web hosting. Examples of free web hosting such as tripod, freeserver and geocities. However, example of commercial web hosting are articulate and webhosting.

Reflection Week 14

Week 14 (15/03/2010)

Today, i don't have class....Just try to finish our final project for next week presentation...

(*_*)

Topic : Web Evaluation

Introduction

Evaluation is systematic determination of merit, worth, and significance of something or someone using criteria against a set of standards. Evaluation often is used to characterize and appraise subjects of interest in a wide range of human enterprises, including the arts, criminal justice, foundations and non-profit organizations, government, health care, and other human services.

The definition of evaluation is often problematic and it can be argued that evaluation does not need a definition. Practical problems are not due to a lack of a definition but rather are a result of attempting to define evaluation.

The American Evaluation Association has created a set of Guiding Principles for evaluators. The order of these principles does not imply priority among them; priority will vary by situation and evaluator role. The principles run as follows:

- Systematic Inquiry: Evaluators conduct systematic, data-based inquiries about whatever is being evaluated.

- Competence: Evaluators provide competent performance to stakeholders.

- Integrity/Honesty: Evaluators ensure the honesty and integrity of the entire evaluation process.

- Respect for people: Evaluators respect the security, dignity and self-worth of the respondents, program participants, clients and other stakeholders with whom they interact.

- Responsibilities for General and Public Welfare : Evaluators articulate and take into account the diversity of interests and values that may be related to the general and public welfare.

• 
• 

Topic : Web Testing

Introduction

Web testing is the name given to software testing that focuses on web applications, and is one of the fastest growing areas of software testing.

Complete web testing of a system before going live is the primary step to get assured of an entire web application’s ability to work properly. It can help address such issues like readiness of your web server for the traffic you are expecting and for the increasing number of users (Load testing), the ability to survive a massive spike in user traffic, your server hardware sufficiency and so on. After performing web tests you’ll be able to find bottlenecks in your systems before they happen in a production environment.

Neglecting performance problems can lead not only to poor end-user experience, but even application crashes. Many bugs won't be discovered by testing the system as a single user during the development process, and can only be found when the system is placed under load

Let’s have first web testing checklist.

1) Functionality Testing
2) Usability testing
3) Interface testing
4) Compatibility testing
5) Performance testing
6) Security testing

1) Functionality Testing:

Test for - all the links in web pages, database connection, forms used in the web pages for submitting or getting information from user, Cookie testing.

Check all the links:

• Test the outgoing links from all the pages from specific domain under test.
• Test all internal links.
• Test links jumping on the same pages.
• Test links used to send the email to admin or other users from web pages.
• Test to check if there are any orphan pages.
• Lastly in link checking, check for broken links in all above-mentioned links.

Test forms in all pages:

Forms are the integral part of any web site. Forms are used to get information from users and to keep interaction with them. So what should be checked on these forms?

• First check all the validations on each field.
• Check for the default values of fields.
• Wrong inputs to the fields in the forms.
• Options to create forms if any, form delete, view or modify the forms.

Let’s take example of the search engine project currently I am working on, In this project we have advertiser and affiliate signup steps. Each sign up step is different but dependent on other steps. So sign up flow should get executed correctly. There are different field validations like email Ids, User financial info validations. All these validations should get checked in manual or automated web testing.

Cookies testing:

Cookies are small files stored on user machine. These are basically used to maintain the session mainly login sessions. Test the application by enabling or disabling the cookies in your browser options. Test if the cookies are encrypted before writing to user machine. If you are testing the session cookies (i.e. cookies expire after the sessions ends) check for login sessions and user stats after session end. Check effect on application security by deleting the cookies. (I will soon write separate article on cookie testing)

Validate your HTML/CSS:

If you are optimizing your site for Search engines then HTML/CSS validation is very important. Mainly validate the site for HTML syntax errors. Check if site is crawlable to different search engines.

Database testing:

Data consistency is very important in web application. Check for data integrity and errors while you edit, delete, modify the forms or do any DB related functionality.
Check if all the database queries are executing correctly, data is retrieved correctly and also updated correctly. More on database testing could be load on DB, we will address this in web load or performance testing below.

2) Usability Testing:

Test for navigation:

Navigation means how the user surfs the web pages, different controls like buttons, boxes or how user using the links on the pages to surf different pages.
Usability testing includes:
Web site should be easy to use. Instructions should be provided clearly. Check if the provided instructions are correct means whether they satisfy purpose.
Main menu should be provided on each page. It should be consistent.

Content checking:

Content should be logical and easy to understand. Check for spelling errors. Use of dark colors annoys users and should not be used in site theme. You can follow some standards that are used for web page and content building. These are common accepted standards like as I mentioned above about annoying colors, fonts, frames etc.
Content should be meaningful. All the anchor text links should be working properly. Images should be placed properly with proper sizes.
These are some basic standards that should be followed in web development. Your task is to validate all for UI testing

Other user information for user help:

Like search option, sitemap, help files etc. Sitemap should be present with all the links in web sites with proper tree view of navigation. Check for all links on the sitemap.
“Search in the site” option will help users to find content pages they are looking for easily and quickly. These are all optional items and if present should be validated.

3) Interface Testing:

The main interfaces are:
- Web server and application server interface
- Application server and Database server interface.

Check if all the interactions between these servers are executed properly. Errors are handled properly. If database or web server returns any error message for any query by application server then application server should catch and display these error messages appropriately to users. Check what happens if user interrupts any transaction in-between? Check what happens if connection to web server is reset in between?

4) Compatibility Testing:

Compatibility of your web site is very important testing aspect. See which compatibility test to be executed:

• Browser compatibility
• Operating system compatibility
• Mobile browsing
• Printing options

Browser compatibility:

In my web-testing career I have experienced this as most influencing part on web site testing.
Some applications are very dependent on browsers. Different browsers have different configurations and settings that your web page should be compatible with. Your web site coding should be cross browser platform compatible. If you are using java scripts or AJAX calls for UI functionality, performing security checks or validations then give more stress on browser compatibility testing of your web application.
Test web application on different browsers like Internet explorer, Firefox, Netscape navigator, AOL, Safari, Opera browsers with different versions.

OS compatibility:

Some functionality in your web application is may not be compatible with all operating systems. All new technologies used in web development like graphics designs, interface calls like different API’s may not be available in all Operating Systems.
Test your web application on different operating systems like Windows, Unix, MAC, Linux, Solaris with different OS flavors.

Mobile browsing:

This is new technology age. So in future Mobile browsing will rock. Test your web pages on mobile browsers. Compatibility issues may be there on mobile.

Printing options:

If you are giving page-printing options then make sure fonts, page alignment, page graphics getting printed properly. Pages should be fit to paper size or as per the size mentioned in printing option.

5) Performance testing:

Web application should sustain to heavy load. Web performance testing should include:
- Web Load Testing
- Web Stress Testing

Test application performance on different internet connection speed.

In web load testing test if many users are accessing or requesting the same page. Can system sustain in peak load times? Site should handle many simultaneous user requests, large input data from users, Simultaneous connection to DB, heavy load on specific pages etc.

Stress testing: Generally stress means stretching the system beyond its specification limits. Web stress testing is performed to break the site by giving stress and checked how system reacts to stress and how system recovers from crashes.
Stress is generally given on input fields, login and sign up areas.

In web performance testing web site functionality on different operating systems, different hardware platforms is checked for software, hardware memory leakage errors,

6) Security Testing:

Following are some test cases for web security testing:

• Test by pasting internal url directly into browser address bar without login. Internal pages should not open.
• If you are logged in using username and password and browsing internal pages then try changing url options directly. I.e. If you are checking some publisher site statistics with publisher site ID= 123. Try directly changing the url site ID parameter to different site ID which is not related to logged in user. Access should denied for this user to view others stats.
• Try some invalid inputs in input fields like login username, password, input text boxes. Check the system reaction on all invalid inputs.
• Web directories or files should not be accessible directly unless given download option.
• Test the CAPTCHA for automates scripts logins.
• Test if SSL is used for security measures. If used proper message should get displayed when user switch from non-secure http:// pages to secure https:// pages and vice versa.
• All transactions, error messages, security breach attempts should get logged in log files somewhere on web server.

Reflection Week 13

Week 13 ( 08/03/2010)

Today, i learn about the web testing and web evaluation. Before Dr, J start lecturer, he ask the student about different between web testing and web evaluation. For the information that i get from Google search, web testing is focus on the application of the website and web evaluation is focus on outcomes from the website.

Mistake in Visual Design

Common Mistakes in Visual Design

1.) Not Considering the Impact of the Visual Design

Good learning design is as much about visual communication as it instructional design and learning theory. When I learned video production years ago, we were always told that everything in the frame means something. It’s the same with the computer screen. You’re building the screen and adding content. Everything you add conveys a message, whether it’s your intention or not. Look at a company like Apple. They build good products. But they also tell a compelling story. There is a consistent message between the products they sell and the way they pack it visually. It all adds to the Apple experience. In the same sense, your course is a story. The content design and structure is part of it. But are you committed to a visual design that reinforces the key message and emotions?

It’s not about just making the screen look good. Visual design sets the tone for the course and that shouldn’t happen by accident. Everything on that screen communicates something. It’s your job to make sure that it’s communicating what you want it to.

2.) Lack of Unity

Your course has a central idea or objective and the visual design should be built around that. In addition, where you place the elements on the screen should be consistent and related to one another. You want the learner to recognize the placement and anticipate where the new information will be. It gives everything a sense of order and continuity. The visual design should complement the learning experience and not compete with it.

Many web designers will use a grid structure to map out the page design. That’s a good way to plan how to place content on the screen. For rapid e-learning design, it’s a good idea to use a grid structure to design your PowerPoint template and the layout of your screen. It’s a great way to maintain unity. Here’s a good presentation about grids and how to use them. It’s more about web design, but many of the principles are the same for e-learning.

3.) Graphics Don’t Match

The intern’s demo had some really nice use of photos to support the course. However, there were some places where he used vector images and clip art. While they weren’t superfluous and did fit the context of the course, they just didn’t seem to belong to it. The first rule for using graphics in your e-learning course is to make sure that they’re not just decorative. They should contribute to the content on the screen. This includes the learning experience as well as the look and feel of the course. Again, it’s not all about the learning content. There’s also the aesthetic consideration that is part of visual communication.

The second rule is to use graphics that belong together. These ties into the previous point about unity. It also conveys a sense of professionalism. You want your graphics to look like they belong together and are part of a whole. Even if you’re stuck using clip art, you can find images from a similar style and then modify them to fit together. I show you how to do that in this post on creating your own custom characters out of clip art.

4.) Confusing Use of Contrast

When it comes to visual communication, contrast is one of the most critical elements. Your job is to help guide the learner’s attention. Contrast allows you to do that because it highlights the differences. People are drawn to the contrast naturally. I get to look at quite a few courses and many people do a good job with adding contrast to their screens. The only problem is that a lot of it is unintentional. That means you could be distracting the learners or getting them to focus on the wrong things. There are all sorts of ways to add contrast to your screens. You can change the size or shape of elements. Play around with colors or the placement of objects. What fonts are you using? How are you using their size and color to bring contrast? Andrew Houle of My Ink Blog has a good example of contrast. “Does the eye test on this site? What do you notice first? More than likely it’s the star on the box…they’ve created a focal point using a large image and limited color.” Also notice the way they used the fonts? This could just as easily be the design for an e-learning course slide. Check out this post from My Ink Blog for more good design tips. And here’s another about contrast.

5.) Misuse of Fonts

Fonts serve a few purposes. First, they’re used to display text for reading. That means you have to consider which font style is going to work best on your screen. It has to be the right type of font and the right size. In most cases, a san serif font works best for the computer screen.

Fonts also should fit into the overall theme and design of your course. If you’re doing a traditional or serious course, Comic Sans probably isn’t your best bet. At the same time, if you want to set an informal tone, you’ll probably stay away from something like New Times Roman (unless you’re a financial analyst).