AllIncontext Limited Web site Design Philosophy (and other things, like Writing Style)

In a Nutshell: Make it simple to design and maintain, and if neccessary integrate automation where required. A basic static Web site is just a series of HTML pages which hyperlink to one another. Then came the age of the Tools with their Graphical User Interfaces (GUIs) and it was great. That is until:

• Someone in the Business wanted a Web site environment which allowed dynamic updating associated with some automated process.
• Someone in the Business wanted to change the look and feel.
• Various people in the Business wanted their own sub-Web site but didn't want to accept the Time and Cost of getting some other person in their Fiefdom to actually get trained and do the sub-Web site work in delivering their vision.

Well, as they say, you pays your money and takes your choice. The AllIncontext vision, keeping it simple, is to have:

• A Web site template which contains a placeholder.
• Data and Information overwrite the placeholder. The source is either a File (or Files), or a Database. This means that any structure, such as a List of things, or a Table, can be off-loaded to other processes to generate the relevant File or Database items. You don't have to modify the generation of a Web page, and the contained Data can update automatically. The Data put into the placeholder probably needs some simple HTML markup, like <br />, <ul> and <li>, but you can delegate that to the automation pipeline. You only complicate things if you need to.
• By delegating Business stuff to those who have responsibility for it, you can start simply. File Data overwriting the placeholder can be just Plain Text. Then, simple HTML markup can be put into the File. Training would take about an hour and a crib sheet. Eventually you might want someone using one of the GUI Tools.
• The Key to making all this work is to match the URL string which refers to the File, or Database Table, to the actual File, or Table name. So, https://www.allincontext.uk/ac.aspx?src=home refers to a File called home.htm (or it might be Home.txt, or the Database Connection string has Home in it).
• A good Information density, which implies the majority of a Web page is given over to Text, containing Information, and relevant Images.
• The Writing Style uses bite-sized Paragraphs, Lists, Images where appropriate, Words or Phrases which need emphasis starting with capital letters, and important words or phrases in bold. These allow your Eye to more quickly Scan a Web page, which is consistent with the AllIncontext motto (top-right of the Web page).

So, if the Look and Feel needs to change, you just re-design the Template, and you might also want to modify the Source of the Data (different Folders, or Databses). Any automation tends to take care of itself.

This approach has allowed the original Classic ASP Web site to be upgraded, with a minimum of effort, to ASP.NET. How? Well, AllIncontext has only ever used the Request and Response objects which exist in both Classic ASP and ASP.NET (although Microsoft has tried very hard to hide that in ASP.NET). How many different flavours of ASP.NET have there been? Web Forms, Model-View-Controller (MVC), Razor, and then there is the splitting of DotNET into .NET Framework (the original) and now .NET Core and Web API. You want to move an MVC Web site to Web API? Well, that's 9, or is it more steps! At this point the mind clouds over.

The problem is that Technology Companies keep producing paradigms ([HTTPS Direct] because that's what they do. Is this the right word or is the new paradigm disruptive?) and all other Businesses want to do is to keep Day-to-Day Operations running. How many paradigms have there been over the last 20 years: Client-Server, Middleware, Network Computing, Centralization versus Intelligent Edge, the Cloud (without any viable Homomorhic encryption scheme). Then we have Java, JavaBeans, Javascript .NET, the plethera of programming languages in *Nix. Ouch, this is when the headache starts. What is Cool today is Legacy in the blink of an eye. Yet Cobol is still used in Finance. Has any of this made Businesses more efficient and productive? Probably, not much, Go figure!!! With all this Technology, one area of growth has been the printing of paper and Xerox is still in business. In 1975, Business Week published an article (HTTPS Direct) predicting the Paperless Office at some point in the Future (also see this Econonist article [HTTPS Direct]). Still waiting...

So, if you really must print a Web page, ensure that page has a good information density, otherwise you're just wasting paper (which means cost, so remember to print it double sided, always. If you can manage with 2-up as well, two pages per paper side, so much the better). The point is: Cloud Computing (the latest paradigm) might only cost pennies, but there is a whole lot of other stuff to consider: Data protection, Government regulation (aka GDPR), Hacking, Printing, especially Ink Jet printers which are cheap to buy but expensive to run, and the perennial what could possibly go wrong for everything else!