The following will be a report on the assignment we were set in the module Computer Applications. The brief was to create a website using a popular content management system to blog a couple reviews on two online tools/apps in relation to their educational uses.
Step-by-step Progress of Set up
This first meant creating the wordpress site. This was done through NCL’s blog network, and from there I chose a theme, and edited accordingly to my preference of colours an also setting up the pages required from the brief, as well as making the “home” of my blog a static page. I stumbled at this stage when I wanted to create a drop-down menu for my “Reviews” page to reveal direct links to the individual links so the reviews could be clearly separated. I had to look up how to do this using a You-Tube how-to video but finally figured out that I had to make the parent page of each of the reviews my “Review” page.
Once this was done and set up I then posted a small “Welcome” to my blog so my home page had a small introduction and didn’t look quite so bare. I then proceeded to complete my “About” page and a small introduction on my “Reviews” page to clarify what in general I would be reviewing about.
After, I moved on to deciding my two online tools and playing around with the systems on my computer to learn as much as possible about them and what they do. I followed up by creating the reviews with this knowledge.
And writing this report concludes my final step in completing the assignment!
Difficulties and the Easier Tasks
As mentioned before, I found setting up a dropdown menu within my menu a bit of a hurdle that required research. I, entirely by coincidence and luck, chose a theme that had within it’s preset had a Menu already created. However had I chosen a different theme I think I may have found that a hurdle to include a menu and set it up to my preferences through the widget options, although my questions would have been answered within the same You-Tube video, and other suggested videos, that I watched to understand re: dropdown links.
Aside from that I found setting up the basic format of the page fairly straightforward. I played around with the widgets but didn’t feel any of the extras were appropriate, aside for the calendar to add some visual aids, for the content of this assignment but can see how they would add to a long-term blog. As a consequence I think my blog is quite bland in appearance but finding an image for the header that fits in with the brief was a bit of a struggle and would have potentially broken copyright laws.
I found writing the reviews fairly simple, but I think that is mainly because I have the software myself and use it in the way I was discussing it; as educational tools. Regarding the “About” page I wasn’t sure how in-depth to go without revealing too much about myself and breaking privacy and so I decided to focus on my education and educational aims for the future.