Wow. Fine Arts had their annual open house today. There was some beautiful, inspiring, odd, and interesting stuff to see. And nothing is right or wrong. Its there for you to make something of it.

Sadly, I don’t think the correctness of Complex Analysis lies in the eye of the beholder.

Oy. Back to the books.

In my last post about the new U of M website, I gave the new look of the site a rough review. While I still stand behind what I wrote, I now realize that I didn’t focus much at all on what was done well with the new design.

The Good
The new look is definitely very slick and attractive, especially when compared to the websites of most other Canadian universities. It should be a good “landing point” for those following up on national newspaper ads. The News & Features and Profile sections do exactly what the University is going for with their new campaign — highlighting the strengths of our university, its programs and its people.

The Bad
The main problem I still have is that the University’s main page comes off as focused mainly on marketing instead of information providing. Feel free to use your web presence to show people how great your organization is and why they should join you (that’s part of the reason for the investment), but make it easy for the people who use the web as an information gathering tool to find what they’re looking for. They’ll love you for it.

The Uncertain
Perhaps the problem here is that I’m coming at this from an engineering and “information access” perspective, instead of a marketing one. I believe an equilibrium can be achieved between the two, but it can’t just be thrown together.

So, if anyone from the University is reading this (and I’m sure someone is — I’ve been getting a sizable number of 130.179.*.* hits), please feel free to get in touch with me. I can offer some thoughts, ideas, and constructive criticism — more than just one-sided criticism — if you’re interested in talking. This is my university too, and I’d love to see success on all fronts, including its web presence.

Apple has finally seen the light and has agreed that my iBook needs to be replaced.

It will be a “like for like” replacement with whatever Apple currently has in stock. That means a 12-inch iBook G4 with the 60GB hard disk upgrade. However, I’m not stuck with the iBook G4. I can take it’s value as credit for another Apple product, such as this. I would then pay the difference, plus tax of course.

So is a 12-inch Powerbook worth it?

+ 300 MHz on the CPU
+ 33 MHz on the bus
+ 32 MB VRAM and a Core Image-supported video card
+ DVI video out
+ Stylish aluminum case
+ Vastly superior keyboard
+ Sudden Motion Sensor to protect the hard disk in the event of a drop
+~ Two-finger scrolling trackpad (it’s cool, but I like SideTrack)
~ Audio-in port (I’ve never needed one yet)
~ 512 MB factory-installed RAM (the 256 MB DIMM is a throwaway when upgrading)
– Less durable case than the iBook (both in scratch and dent resilience)
– Potentially shorter battery life (only slightly) than the iBook
– Costs money that could be used for other things, like a car or a DSLR
– The iBook is ripe for an update, and it’s already very close to PowerBook territory

All for the sum of ~$630 (or $850 if I were to go for a 100GB hard drive).

Hmm. Let me know what you think…

On the plus side of this deal, I will be getting Tiger regardless of the decision I make. Score!

So, the University released a new version of umanitoba.ca today. (A remedial history lesson is available.)

I can’t really say that I’m a huge fan — it looks very much like a high-design glossy pamphlet, and not enough like a friendly and inviting website for daily use. I guess that’s what they’re going for.

The picture at the top, while nice, isn’t really reflective of what’s going on at the university. It sure looks like a nice place to be, though. The picture of the girl, as vibrant as it may make us Manitobans seem, is even worse, for reasons to be mentioned later.

The bar in the middle (“Student Message”, “Upcoming Events”, etc.) seems out of place, placing items like “Web Registration”, “Summer Session 2005″ and “Cash For Books” in a much higher profile (albeit undeserved) location on the new website.

The “News & Features” and “Profile” sections are a welcome addition to the site and seem like a much more effective use of space than in version 3.0.

But how do you access the Google search engine for umanitoba.ca or get to Jump, the new student portal? To search, you have to a) notice the search box at the top-right, b) roll over it c) know to click on “U of M”, and then click on it, and d) type in your search. You’d never know that the search is powered by Google (i.e. it’s a damn good search) either until you get to the results page. Oh, and Jump? There’s a small link in grey text at the bottom of the page.

Is this how you promote the use of two amazing tools that the University quite obviously pumped a reasonable sum of money into?

Now for the girl. Joey Coleman has covered this very well, so I won’t rehash too much. Suffice it to say she is NOT a student at the U of M, and the Public Affairs department paid somewhere between a minor and majorly outrageous fee for the privilege of having her on the front page. Not only that, but you may remember her from such websites such as Dell and Gateway, amongst others. I’ve said enough… Read all about it.

Looking on the bright side, at least they didn’t change the rest of umanitoba.ca. After all, no one who is thinking about applying to the U of M ever looks there, do they?

For those of you who haven’t noticed yet, the University today released its new homepage: umanitoba.ca. This is the 4th major revision of the University’s doorstep to the world.

What about versions 3, 2 and 1? Below you will find a little umanitoba.ca history to illustrate where we’ve come from (courtesy of archive.org). Most of the thumbnail images link to full-sized versions of the homepage of that era.

(All dates are approximate)

umanitoba.ca 1.0
16 June 1997 (and possibly earlier — this is the first date archived) – 25 May 1998

Welcome to the World Wide Web, and the bad old days. The University has yet to adopt its current logo, and things are pretty basic otherwise.

umanitoba.ca 2.0
25 May 1998 – 2 June 2002

The next major redesign of the U of M’s web presence involves a greater focus on “UMinfo”. It appears that the templates developed during this period paved the way for the first attempt at unification of the University’s many web pages.

umanitoba.ca 3.0
2 June 2002 – 11 April 2005

This was the design that brought us the UManitoba we knew and loved (mostly) until today. Focused around the “At the centre of it all” campaign, it featured a new look and feel that was fairly functional and content-oriented. It also featured a main image, at the centre of the page, highlighting the interesting people and things currently going on at the U of M.

In mid-2003, the right sidebar was updated to contain the bisoncam among other things. This appears to be the last major modification before the 2005 redesign.