Web Site of the British Pharmacological Society - Case Study Example

BPS Web site: At a Glance British Pharmacological Society (BPS), a professional association for pharmacologists in the UK, a leading pharmacological society in the world, and a registered charity possesses a Web site under the url http://www.bps.ac.uk/ (British Pharmacological Society). BPS has the prime objective, as mentioned in their Web site, that to promote and advance pharmacology, including clinical pharmacology. Visitors of the above said Web site can also have an idea about the other activities of BPS like assisting, promoting, and encouraging research and thereby providing a forum for the presentation of pharmacology; publishing the results of research; promoting and encouraging the education and training of pharmacologists; publishing material in various forms; promoting and arranging conferences and meetings etc.. In a comprehensive view of official site of BPS, it is come to know that the website has three frames where two of them remain unchanged in every web pages. On the title frame which is horizontally located which includes the Title with graphics depicting pharmacology related picture, a search engine right of that frame and important links designed to fulfil the requirement of the visitor/user as well as meet the objective of website. Looking at the second frame which is placed in the extreme left side of the website seems to be members’ part. In this frame the views are informed about how to get membership id and password and selection of members and its categorization. The third frame we call it body frame is a simple Web site with all the relevant pages incorporated and excluding unwanted flashy designed animations and unnecessary pop ups. It has a number of dynamic pages through which normal laymen to professionals can directly interact with BPS. Web pages have been designed in ASP environment and its worth mentioning that the web pages are platform independent, i.e. pages can be accessed both in Windows as well as Linux Platform. Though the Home page is a little bit lengthy it contains links which helps the user to have the access of required web pages. It also contains all activities/events being held recently related to the Pharmacological Society and provides the information regarding the forthcoming events on the subject. Grading as a simple Web site it fulfils all the requirements needed for a simple one. But as far as changing it into a perfect website there are certain criteria one should take into consideration. The complete and detail report in this subject is narrated in the following pages. As far basic principles of simple web designing is concerned the BPS Website meet the following factors effectively. Purpose: Before designing a Web site the basic factor should be kept in mind is the purpose. The subject web site has some what achieved the objective and purpose for what it has been designed for. But it is also necessary while designing similar kind of web sites that a study on competitor’s web sites and implementing their unique elements can attract more visitors for you. Simplicity: Websites with a lot of flashy designs, or showing pieces to portray one’s creativity are not considered as good websites. It should contain effective, true and valuable information while designing a simple web site. The BPS website meet the criteria and having all the qualities of an informative website. Navigation: Navigation occupies an important place while designing a web site. Relevant links must be placed appropriately so that the links lead the visitor going to the desired pages. Use of fictitious link results in driving the visitor away from the Web site. The above said web site used proper links that hyperlinks related topics by which user get information quickly. Loading time: Users/visitors generally leave the websites that take a lot of time to load. So overloading images, audio and other media clips are seldom suggested in web designing. Considering this factor BPS website tried to avoid loading time so as to get quick view for visitor, but the graphics on the title frame at every page take a little bit time to load. In addition to the above mentioned factors the website is consistent to a great extent and consistency is the main characteristic or it can be treated as the backbone of site. Though BPS web site meets the requirements of visitors/users it lacks in terms of its impressive look and failed to provide a platform for interaction among users. BPS Web site: Where it lacks: While designing a website the important factor one should remember is its impressive look. Regarding looks the first impression of visitor/ surfer will be the last impression. In this web site, the graphics as well as the colour combination used is not up the mark. Had it been more attractive or impressive upon the viewer or visitor of this Web site if exact colour combination or sober colours applied instead of dusky colours. Impressive colour combination for eyes of visitor is the prime factor to increase the viewership of the web site. Second arena of the Web site where improvement required is in its lengthy home page. A viewer may have very short time to visit a website and extract information within that time and due to this factor he may skip this web site due to its lengthy home page which contains lengthy descriptions of events/meetings and news. Instead of giving the descriptions in Home page itself it could be displayed on separate web page using proper links. Proper utilisation of area of webpage is another important factor to be complied with. In this site particularly referring to the Home page the second frame i.e. located in the left of page has a lot of space wasted being blank without any information for the visitor or any links. Of course it may be considered as the members’ area. But it should be kept in mind while designing a web page that no space of a web site is wasted being unutilized. It is worth mentioning here that designing a website using frames is not a bad idea. But it should meet all the requirements while using frames. The disadvantages of frame based sites are mentioned below:- Most of the search engines fail to index and thereby recognize framed websites. Because main page i.e. home page itself would be a framed one having very little content and hyperlinks. Thus search engine tools may leave this site and report nothing. In case the search engine managed to catch the site, viewers of search engines may go directly to the content pages rather than the home page. As per the opinion of the viewers frames are sometimes annoying. Visitor may feel difficulty for printing of framed web pages. The common problems with frame sites are refresh and reload problems. If the designer doesn’t take special care with coding the visitor may be return to the original frameset while refreshing a particular webpage. Finally, the most important factor which the website failed to incorporate is the interactivity among the users. Because the visitors of this website may be of different categories. Some of them may be novices in pharmacology seeking subject related information, some may have professional qualifications who can provide specialised, valuable and current information on the subject to the website as well as to other users. So the website should possess/provide a modern tool or utility for the interaction among the users through which they can communicate with each other. If the user may be provided with the above mentioned utility he can not only download information from the website but he can also upload whatever data he wants to share with others. The remaining part of this report discusses about the Web 2.0 tool which is nowadays widely popular in terms of user interactivity and information exchange and its application in the subject website so that it may lead to encourage participation and interaction between users. Web 2.0: An overview: “Web 2.0 is a term which describes the trend in the use of World Wide Web technology and web design that aims to enhance creativity, information sharing, and, most notably, collaboration among users.” According to Tim OReilly, a technical expert, “Web 2.0 is the business revolution in the computer industry caused by the move to the Internet as platform, and an attempt to understand the rules for success on that new platform.” (Web2.0). These are concepts which cause the evolution and development of hosted services and web-oriented communities, like the social-networking sites, blogs, wikis, and folksonomies. Soon after the first OReilly Media Web 2.0 conference in 2004 the term Web 2.0 became popular in the web world. It is an independent term and is not an update to any specifications related to Web, but it is considered a new version of www (World Wide Web). During the first Web 2.0 conference, OReilly and John Battelle, experts in relevant field projected the characteristics of Web 2.0. They summarised that with the use of Web 2.0 tool, the web being a platform can be changed into an architecture where users’ participation and contribution of website content creates a network environment. This tool tend to nourish innovation in the group of systems and web sites developed and composed by joining together features from independent and distributed web developers. This can be referred as a kind of "open source" or possible "Agile" method of software development, stick with an end to the traditional software development cycle, symbolised by so-called "perpetual beta".) Skype, eBay, Orkut, Wikipedia are the examples of “Web 2.0" based Internet gained their popularity due to the effective inter-human relations and connectivity derived from the network process using Web 2.0. As the general people frequently use these kind of applications its impact is still growing in the civilized society. These are called Leve-3 applications of Web 2.0 tool. Some applications termed as Level-2 of Web 2.0 may work offline and gain advantages from by going online. Flickr is such type of application that has its shared photo-database and gets benefits from its community-generated tag database. Applications involves Level-1 may operate offline but gets features online. Google Docs & Spreadsheets and iTunes (due to its music-store section) are examples. Level-0 applications operate both offline and online. Yahoo! Local, Google Maps, and MapQuest are some examples. Applications like instant-messaging clients, email, and telephone generally known as Non-web applications kept outside the above hierarchy. Web 2.0 is actually an idea which enabled the interaction among the users and user with the provider. Frankly speaking, genuine interactivity, it helps the people to download as well as upload anything they want. Thus Web 2.0 consists a social element where users offer and distribute informative contents with an option to share or re-use. This factor increases economic value of the web on business perspective, due to the user’s participation online. That’s why it got so much popularity among the people. But there is a conflict among people about the role of Web 2.0. Some people term it as a meaningless buzzword in the current marketing strategy, and others do accept it as the conventional wisdom for the modern web technology. The following figure will brief you about Web 2.0. “Figure shows a "meme map" of Web 2.0 that was developed at a brainstorming session during FOO Camp, a conference at OReilly Media during October 2004. Its very much a work in progress, but shows the many ideas that radiate out from the Web 2.0 core.” (O’Reilly). Effective Web 2.0 tools that help BPS Web site: The Web 2.0 concept as discussed in general relates to e-commerce. But here we will discuss its impact on the improvement of BPS website with regards to its informative and user interactive context. The technological savvy of this world are exploring the possible aspects of transform learning and discussion using Web 2.0 technologies. As BPS provides Diploma in Advanced Pharmacology and involve a lot of meetings and events the tools like blogs and wikis may be useful for this site. By incorporating blogs users can post their work and invite or receive feedback. As far as the tool wiki is concerned users can post their work and invite other co-authors. wiki do keep track of the changes or work, thus the authorship can be recorded, if needed. Other user interactive tools like Skype, Orkut can be included in this site so that visitors may communicate with each other and share their ideas as well. Media sharing is also preferred to be included as part of this site from which visitors/ users could share the relevant clips/parts of the meeting or events or any other multi media resources across the world. An advanced type of Web 2.0 tool called Microblogging provides central web space as a general and unique room or place for members for sharing their thoughts or suggestions. “Microblogging is a relatively new type of social networking and quick information exchange, and a recent addition to web 2.0. Different from traditional (macro)blogging, microblogging is a way to share brief snippets of information (less than >140 characters) with people in your own network of friends (think Facebook) no matter how weighty, pointless or mundane. (Microblogging – the most popular web 2.0 tool in 2008). Hence it differs from other type of social interactive media tools. Connotea is a kind of web 2.0 tool that can be used in this site which will exclusively meant for clinicians, researchers, scholars and scientists. For the purpose sharing and organizing references a newly inducted reference management tool like this is great. Suggestion for the developments to BPS site: After studying and analysing the purpose of the BPS web site its impact over the visitors the following developments are suggested on priority wise. As far as the Home page of website is concerned, proper use of space or space management may be ensured. Instead of having three frame site, it would be beneficial to have two frame or no frame site. A lot of space has been kept wasted on the left frame below the members’ authentication part. Had necessary space management been adopted, the lengthy home page can be designed attractive with proper links to the descriptions and it looks good for viewers. The second improving factor to the site is related to the application of Web 2.0 tool. By incorporating the tool the website becomes a social element which has inter user interaction that helps to share information quickly among the visitors / users. Finally the looks of the Website can be improved by using sober and appropriate colour combination, by placing low memory graphics which take little time to load during the display of website. Considering all the above improvements the website can be perfectly designed for attracting its viewers/visitors thereby it would achieve its purpose as why it has been designed for. So here the report is concluded after suggesting the improvement measures for the perfection of website. Works Cited British Pharmacological Society. BPS. 2008. 13 Aug. 2008. . Web2.0. Wikipedia: The free Encyclopedia. 14 Aug. 2008. 13 Aug. 2008. . O’Reilly, Tim. What Is Web2.0: Design Patterns and Business Models for the Next Generation of Software. O’REILLY. 30 Sep. 2005. 13 Aug. 2008. . Microblogging – the most popular web 2.0 tool in 2008. Open Medicine Blog. 20 July. 2008. 13 Aug. 2008. . Read More