Technology Services

Author: jlencion

  • Schedule Quick Links are Back

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    jlencion

    After receiving some helpful comments from our feedback form on the top of every page (yes, we are listening :), we put the quick links back on the list of schedules. These links help you find the information you are looking for by providing a quick jump to each letter in the alphabet. We know…

  • Former Web Team Member Paints Mural in Old Main

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    jlencion

    Lili Payne, a former member of the Web Team, was on campus last week donating her time to painting a fine art mural of the Parthenon for the Classics department. The mural has a strong presence, covering an entire wall in the Classics office on the first floor of Old Main. Lili was a solid…

  • Homepage Featured in O’Reilly Book

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    jlencion

    While browsing for good books, I came across two that looked particularly interesting: Object-Oriented PHP and the recently updated Information Architecture for the World Wide Web, Third Edition (AKA “the Polar Bear Book”). Little did we know that while Jerry was mindlessly thumbing through Peter Morville and Louis Rosenfeld’s Information Architecture he would find the…

  • Welcoming Our Newest Member… Ryan Rud

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    jlencion

    Today, it’s official. Ryan “Rudi” Rud (previously) is the new Web Application Programmer for Web Services! While Ryan has been with us for a few years as a student worker, we are completely thrilled to keep him around here as a full-time administrator for the College. Ryan has been and will continue to be a…

  • New Faculty Schedules, Phase One

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    jlencion

    The new faculty schedules went live yesterday, in place of the old and aging version that had been in use over the last couple of years. While this new version is entirely different under the hood, most of the original experience has been preserved while bringing some new features designed for ease-of-use. What’s the same?…

  • Gribly Gets New Feathers

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    jlencion

    Last week, we put live a slightly upgraded version of the Gribly with some extra color coding (among other features) that should help visitors parse information more quickly and efficiently. Finding a particular faculty member with the last name “Smith” among a sea of students, administrators, and support staff with the same surname should become…

  • A College Calendar face-lift

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    jlencion

    The College Calendar is an important hub of information. It is the centralized source of all events at Gustavus. The calendar received a small but substantial face-lift yesterday to help improve its usability. Here is a rundown of the most important changes. Shorter, smarter URLs Similar to the effort to shorten many of our URLs…

  • More Usable Contact Form

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    jlencion

    In celebration of World Usability Day we re-designed Technology Services’ contact form. How is this better? The new design divides the form into two logical sections to help visitors input their information as quickly as possible. It also sports a larger text box for visitors to type their concerns. Additionally, the form now will remember…

  • Wanna say something? You have 4 seconds.

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    jlencion

    New research shows that four seconds is the acceptable threshold for loading times on retail websites. This comes in light of similar recent research which suggests that visitors judge the quality of a website in a mere 50 milliseconds. So, if you want to say something on the web, you have no more than four…