Wednesday, February 17, 2010 - Needles Hall (NH) 3001 - 3:00 pm
Present:
Lara Babalola, Marta Bailey, Mary Lynn Benninger, Janice Cooke, Michelle Douglas-Mills, Sarah Forgrave, Guillermo Fuentes, Eva Grabinski, Chris Gray, Marlon Griffith, Lauren Harrison, Adam Hewgill, Karen Jack, John Kemp, Janet Janes, Tammy Marcinko, Geoff McBoyle, Paul Miskovsky, Isaac Morland, Kris Olafson, Kevin Paxman, Terry Stewart (Chair) and Kelley Teahen
Absent:
David Bean, Jaymis Goertz, Jim Johnston, Pat Lafranier, Don Duff-McCracken, Wendy Philpott, Evan Truong and Jonathan Woodcock
1. Chair's remarks
a) The Chair welcomed Janet Janes from Office of Research; newest member of WAC.
b) Gotham Font - thanks to Kevin for the guidelines on use of Gotham font. Kevin's email will be circulated to the WAC mailing list.
2. Minutes of January 19, 2010 (White Whale Web Services Session) - Approved
3. Web redesign (Sarah Forgrave)
- The Search and Discovery phase will be over on Friday. The redesign committee is waiting for the second deliverable which is the project plan and timelines from White Whale. Jason Pontius from White Whale will be on campus again next Wednesday to meet with the core group and some Deans. Two other groups are working on this project:
- A Redesign task force includes Allan Bell (Chair), core working group (Marta Bailey, Sarah Forgrave, Eva Grabrinski, Adam Hewgill and Jonathan Woodcock), Kelley Teahen, Annie Belanger Michelle Douglas-Mills, Evan Truong; 2 Web Steering members; Undergraduate and Graduate Student reps and four faculty members (currently - J.P. Pretti and Ron McCarville). Their primary function is to provide feedback to White Whale. Jonathan Woodcock is also collaborating with faculty members representing each of the academic faculties. This group has been examining user groups and expected needs of each of the user groups. The Chair requested that minutes of these groups be made available for WAC. The Chair invited comments regarding meetings with White Whale Web. _Discussion_
- "White Whale is a creative and small organization; we will be impressed."
- "Concerned about the big picture - meetings went well - positive but may have only scratched surface on what challenges are/will be."
- "A common information architecture important."
- "It will be important to keep students in the loop."
- "It is important that milestones are delivered prior to payments."
4. Visual identity (Kelley Teahen)
Referring to the memo that was circulated from Feridun Hamdullahpur, Kelley explained that Waterloo members have the option to order the new business cards and individual stationery with the Gotham font and water mark or continue to use the current framework for a one year period. Users are, however, encouraged to use new design on all print media. Positioning guides will be ready for March (both manual and online) and URLs will be ready hopefully by Friday or Monday. Kelley reported that there had been discussion at Web Steering about replacing the Waterloo shield with the Waterloo word mark in the logo
Action: Terry Stewart will send an email on behalf of WAC urging the Web Steering Committee to hold off on replacing the current logo with the new water mark until the web redesign is launched in the Fall of 2010. The Committee's rationale for this request is that resizing can become distorted and that web maintainers may be tempted to incorporate elements of the visual identity without having the entire package and guidelines to work with.
5. Content Management System (CMS) update (Eva Grabinski)
(Eva's Powerpoint presentation is online) The CMS group has decided on a change in direction. Drupal will be implemented as the centrally supported website creation and maintenance tool at Waterloo. The team is university-wide including 17 core project members and 13 consultants from all faculties, Centre for Extended Learning (CEL), Communications and Public Affairs (CPA), Housing, Information Systems and Technology (IST), Library, Office for Persons with Disability (OPD), the Registrar's Office and Secretariat. Various sub-committees have been created to address different aspects of the CMS (technical, design, taxonomy, etc). There are currently ten priorities underway, including accessibility, team training, Sandbox test sites, training resources and content migration strategies.
Team training is scheduled for this month. IST also has accounts for Lynda.com, which has many courses available, including Drupal Essentials, PHP, MySQL and others. Any members interested simply need to send a request to request@ist.uwaterloo.ca for access. The team is aiming to set up Sandbox within the week for those at the training courses.
6. Policy on advertising on University of Waterloo web pages (Karen Jack)
From the memo of the working group, it was determined that advertising goes beyond the web and that general advertising principles need to be defined. Web advertising can then be included in a university-wide policy framework.
Action: Karen will complete the edits to the memo and circulate to WAC members for one final opportunity for feedback. The recommendation will then be sent to Alan George for follow up with Executive Council.
7. Web Technology and Standards Committee (Paul Miskovsky)
The Web Technology and Standards Committee has been struck and members with technical and non-technical experience are being invited to participate. Email Paul or Terry if you are interested.
8. DNS Resolution Policy (Terry Stewart)
Nothing to report.
9. Best Uses for WAC mailing list
The Chair asked the committee about the amount and type of mail being distributed on the WAC mailing? Some members felt that the mailing list should only be for items requiring WAC's immediate attention. Others felt that it should have a broader scope to include many different types of informational items. It was suggested and agreed upon that the WAC mailing list should not be exclusionary but if the item is for information only then senders are requested to prefix the Subject line with "FYI:"
10. Next meeting - Wednesday, March 17 - 3:00 pm in NH 3004
* Meeting adjourned - 4:30 pm *
-- TerryStewart - 27 Feb 2010