IPFW Home
IT ResourcesTitle Photo

IPFW Web Site Design Guidelines


 |  The Web at IPFW  |   Identify Your Pages With IPFW  |   It All Begins With a Plan  |   Standard IPFW Footer  |   Web Page Resources at IPFW  |   Section 508 Compliance Standards

These guidelines are provided as a resource for developers of official Web pages for IPFW academic and administrative units.

The Web at IPFW

The World Wide Web at Indiana University-Purdue University Fort Wayne is the electronic extension of this regional university. The Web is a valuable tool in behalf of the instructional, research and informational goals of the University.

These guidelines have been developed by a university-wide committee charged with updating and improving the official home page of IPFW and the home pages of its component units. These guidelines apply to those units whose activities are under the jurisdiction of the Trustees of Indiana University and Purdue University. These guidelines do not apply to personal home pages, student home pages, or faculty/course pages.

The goal is to present the University to the electronic eyes of the world in as unified a manner as possible without squelching the creativity and enthusiasm sparked by this new medium of communication. Well-designed Web pages will help define a positive and accessible visual identity to those who visit IPFW through the Web.

Institutional identity guidelines and procedures aid in establishing a consistent, comprehensive format through which the institution presents itself to the various constituencies that will access the IPFW official Web site. The guidelines are presented to eliminate confusion, to unify and strengthen the image of the institution and its component parts, and to project cohesiveness.

IPFW Web pages provide valuable interactive information to current and prospective students, faculty, staff, alumni and the general public. This dual role of the IPFW Web--internal and external--needs to be part of the design of the official pages in order to serve the University well.

Identify Your Pages with IPFW

Follow these guidelines to help identify your pages as part of the IPFW Web Site.

  • Place the IPFW logo near the top of your site's home page. The Resource Library contains copies of the logo, as well as approved logos for IPFW, appropriate graphics, and photos of the campus. Note that images from the Library are intended for use only on official IPFW pages.
  • Link your home page to the IPFW home page (http://www.ipfw.edu). Use the IPFW home page navigational button provided in the Resource Library. Also link the page to appropriate campus or school pages using buttons or text centered links.
  • IPFW retains the copyright for the official home page and the home page for all component parts. Therefore, the copyright statement linked to the IPFW home page covers all official University Web pages. If units still want to link to the IPFW copyright statement, do it in the footer.
  • The footer should contain important contact information. The footer should provide information on who to contact by mail and telephone identified by name and title.

It All Begins With A Plan

  • Assign responsibility. Web development cannot be done as a "spare time" project. Decide in advance who will do what -- provide content (text and graphics), designing pages, post pages, receive/handle comments, maintain the site, etc. As a rule of thumb, the design stage may require 80-200 hours. Depending on the complexity of the site, maintenance will generally require 10-40 hours per week. The times can be reduced by the use of appropriate technology (hardware and software).

  • Design your information
    • Know where you are going before you start. Identify all your audiences and all the purposes you want the site to accomplish
    • Identify the information that must be included in your site to address the needs of your audience and to accomplish your purposes.
    • Map out your information before you start creating pages.

  • Design your pages
    • Make graphics work for you. It is easy to go overboard with graphics. Large graphic files dramatically slow response times. Good design aids the reader without getting in the way: keep it simple.
    • Use a consistent design on all the pages in your Web site.
    • Keep your pages relatively small. Text should not require excessive scrolling unless you provide in-text links as in this document. As a rule of thumb, the total of all images should not exceed 50K, with a single image rarely going over 30K.
    • Keep in mind non-graphical browsers. Although these browsers are fading, you should still provide alternatives for readers using text-only browsers. Be careful in using graphical image maps within your site.
    • Provide navigational tools. Include graphic navigational buttons or bars leading forward, back, and to the original index on deeper-level pages. This is necessary for readers who have used the browser's forward/back buttons or gone to another site and returned to your page. A link to your home page is always helpful for those who might get lost within your site.
    • Design for interactivity. This capability is the hallmark of the Web. Guest books, mail requests, and e-mail forms can build interest.
    • Keep it current. Web documents are living documents. If your information is out of date, it will be difficult to lure readers back a second time.

Standard IPFW Footer

The standard IPFW footer should be included on all official IPFW Web pages. The footer is an easy way to date (and update,) address, sign and link your Web pages. Research demonstrates that users depend on these elements.

Unless a footer clearly conflicts with a Web page design, it should be set off from the body of the page with a paragraph separator above the footer text. The footer may be centered or flush left. Substitute your specific information for generic elements indicated by this type in the example below. Note: you may use a smaller size font for the footer.

Return to: the previous page in the hierarchy
Last updated: day month four-digit year
URL: http:your_server.ipfw.edu/directory/filename
Contact: Name, title, phone #
Comments: mailto: Unit Webmaster e-mail address

  • Return to: allows the reader to link directly back to the next higher page in the hierarchy.
  • Last updated: Here are a few hints about using and formatting dates.
    • Change the date in the footer whenever you update/edit your page.
    • If your page includes dated material, put the date at the top of the page, either preceding, as part of, or immediately following the title.
    • The date format should be unambiguous for cultures worldwide. Therefore we recommend using the format [day number] [month name][four digit year] with no commas between elements.
  • URL: As a courtesy to users, especially to those who wish to print your page and then find it again, include the URL for the page in plain text as part of the footer.
  • Contact: This information will permit readers to contact the appropriate academic or administrative unit outside the Web. This can be very helpful in making the Web a tool and not an end unto itself. A "mailto:" link may also be included.
  • Comments: This "mailto:" link allows readers to contact the Departmental Webmaster to allow feedback about the page itself, as well as an e-mail link to the Department if none is included in the footer.

We hope these guidelines serve you well in creating Web pages that present IPFW to the world in an informative, efficient and exciting way. Let us know what you think.