Site Development

The Overland Examiner was under heavy reconstruction when Blogger decided we had no choice but to move to their "new and improved" system. I have to admit, the new system has some interesting perks, but I'll have to redesign the site from the ground up to take advantage of it (as the template of this site is not compatible). However, this could be a good thing in disguise.

The current idea for the new site is to design it more like a newspaper with sections to cover different types of news and a front page to pull story summaries together from all the sections. This would allow us to provide more news and information without stories getting lost under each other. The idea is to have a tab navigation bar at the top where users can easily navigate from section to section.

Sections we hope to provide:

• General News - current happenings in Overland
• Politics - City Hall and some broader issues on occasion
• Business - focused on Overland
• Education - focused on Ritenour
• Features - interest stories and Overland history
• Technology - articles about useful tech toys and tools

We would also like to provide some services:

• Community Calendar - listing all Overland Events we can
• Resources - links to places on the net of use to residents
• Announcements - publicly submitted weddings, births, and more

This will all take a lot of work, but it would be a labor of love as I want to create something that is of use to the residents of my adopted home town. Now it's your turn. Use the comments to tell me what you like about the site now, what you hate about it, and what you'd want to see in "version 2.0". If there is something you want to see that isn't listed above, speak up. If you are able to contribute information, articles, etc let me know that as well. If you're not comfortable commenting publicly but have something you'd like ot add, please feel free to email me at: overlandsailor@aol.com.

I want this site to benefit the residents of Overland. This is your chance to tell me what you want to see here. Even, if all you have to say is how much you hate the current site let that rip too. I can learn for any input, and the site will become better because of it.

(Note: we tricked the site into posting this elsewhere by changing the date. This post was actually published on Feb. 3rd, 2007)