Beursonline
Role: Maintenance, functional design, HTML/CSS template. (note: See text below regarding the latter.)
Acquired by IEX in 2008, Beursonline was then completely rebuilt by Michael Kattenbeld (design) and Trilab (Hosting / Implementation.). The design was deliberately kept low-key and basic. In part this was to keep a link with the previous design and in part because research showed that for this audience a ‘ugly’ site works best. The complete rebuild was mostly on my recommendation as the site was an outright disaster before. Basically I stated flat out that I would not, and could not, accept any responsibility for maintaining the site as it stood. That is how bad it was. (Because I enjoy a challenge and don’t say such things lightly.)
A full rebuild had not been budgeted both in terms of finance and time. Between those restraints and a temporary shortage of skilled staff with external parties, the HTML template I provided, nor Michael’s excellent design, were completely implemented as intended. I therefore do not take credit for the site as it stands today, but I tip my hat at all parties involved for even producing this under the circumstances.
Accomplishments: When I still maintained the site, it validated fully and ran in ’standards compliance mode’. The company from which we acquired the site had one FTE dedicated to just this one website. After the redesign, it went into the ‘pool’ of ten+ websites maintained by two FTE and in fact, required very little maintenance, mainly due to the robust and compliant codebase I set up.
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