As work progressed on our backend system, the new site interface began to take shape. Early on in the process, we started building prototypes to experiment with how the new site should look and work.
Using Macromedia's new Dreamweaver authoring tool, we built working models of the dynamic HTML designs we were envisioning without having to write lines and lines of JavaScript over and over again.
After we nailed down the basic architecture and made progress on the new visual language, we brought some people into Wired Digital's usability lab and tested the early prototype. A number of issues surrounding how we were offering lateral navigation and intra-story linking emerged. This enabled us to fix these problems early in the process, rather than scramble to react to user feedback after launching.
Finally, after dozens of design iterations and bug fixes to our template system, we entered an alpha stage. The site was more or less complete and running smoothly on an internal server. Then we brought in more people to test the largely completed site. This gave us a final sanity check before we moved everything over to a beta server. The tests turned up a few final bits of confusion on our dHTML navigation system, which translated into some heated, last-minute debates among our tired team. But, with time built into our schedule for such revisions, we opened the site to a private beta.
Our beta test was only a few days long, but it enabled us to do a last pass on the bug fixing and quality assurance we needed before opening everything up to the public. We found minor link errors and some image problems, but after receiving valuable feedback from our testers, we moved the site to our live servers for everyone to see.
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