Ministry of Transport (2006)
Website: transport.govt.nz (site has since been redesigned) - view screenshot
Size: over 1,000 pages
Government status: Government Ministry
My professional status: employee at Base Two
Website client: Ministry of Transport
Dates: April - June 2006
Categories: Project manager, Front-end developer, Govt web standards tester, CSS-based layout, e-govt/WCAG compliance, SilverStripe, Government websites, Large sites
Brief: to complete the build of the new Ministry of Transport website, which was a CSS site using the SilverStripe Content Management System.
My responsibilities included:
- Bug fixing and working to improve the CSS and HTML already built - this included bugs in the CSS, the HTML, the CMS and the JavaScript
- Last-minute client alts to the content and site structure
- Browser testing in a range of browsers on Mac and PC
- Liaison with SilverStripe - the CMS development company.
Although I had built a number of sites in HTML and XHTML which would then be programmed to work within a Content Management System (including National Library Timeframes and NZHistory), this was the first CMS-based site I worked on where the site was already integrated into the CMS.
The project was almost complete when I came on board, so my job consisted of bug fixing, last-minute client alts, browser testing and getting my head around this enormous site where the contents of each page were pulled from a number of sources within the CMS. This made bug-fixing a challenge, to say the least.
It's interesting to look back on this project years later, with SilverStripe now WebWeaver's CMS of choice, and remember how much I did not enjoy working with it for the first time on this project. To be fair, it was a very early iteration of the CMS (possibly the earliest) and I was joining the project right at the very end, which is always a tricky time to join, but it's also great to see how far SilverStripe has come since then!