Last Content Update: October 22, 2009
PointProfiles.com was created by Scott Bannon to fulfill the goal for a professional online presence allowing for a customized environment showing off career related information that could not
be presented on your standard resume. Initially I created a totally scaled down version to be hosted on an entirely different website, but after working on my own profile space I thought about all the other professionals and how they could
benefit from my work... so PointProfiles.com was born.
The design goal differences between PointProfiles and other career/professional related Internet sites are:
Ongoing Focus/Goals
The primary purpose & goal of this website is to be an online career profile for professionals, everything designed in the future will be to this end. Enforcement policies, rules, and technical coding will make sure that it stays a professional environment free from abuse, misuse, unintended use, and any other uses that would take away from the primary focus for which it was intended. Additional as my background is Information Technology security, I will include various aspects that will safeguard as much as humanly possible the individuals who choose to maintain profiles on the site... this will include privacy when appropriate (i.e. email addresses if desiring a private forwarding account), individual profile login history so users can detect unauthorized access, profile change notifications so users know when unexpected changes occur, and various others. All this logic/concepts I have incorporated previously in other Information Technology applications developed so they have been time tested for effectiveness.
Website Design Explained
The visual design was something inspired by various sources including my previous web projects... but the overall site is a completely unique design using bold colors I like and had not previously used in other projects. I am not by trade a graphics design artist and will never claim to be one... but I do know what looks good and can manage the various graphics applications I have used over the years to make descent images. The PointProfiles.com logo was something I just came up with while playing with several designs I had thought about... and I was satisfied with the result. As everything can be improved especially by talented graphics design artists by trade, maybe in the future the logo will be improved further. Additionally I wanted to make the web interface simple but functional, with each profile kind of acting like it's own mini website so that individuals with profiles have a more personalized feeling for their content.
The technical design of course falls in line with the visual layout, but has other aspects that only web designers and administrators would usually be aware of. The CSS layout was custom built to allow for dynamic content sizing both vertically and horizontally when the browser or screen resolution changes. This non-static width design gives maximum usable content space on the screen but restricts the dynamic width sizing to keep the intended visual design. Images of course are used to achieve the visuals but optimized as much as possible to keep performance which will be important when profile pages contain large amounts of content increasing data to be transmitted to the visitors' browser. Internal coding used for page functionality includes multiple logic based operations, such as for example the in-page HTML dynamic CSS designed to serve only CSS used by the page and merged with the page HTML (i.e. in-page) so that the visitors browser does not have to fetch an additional CSS file from the server... thus improving performance for the visitor. This and other coding functionality are all designed with the purposes of: 1. Performance, 2. Maintainability, 3. Scalability, 4. Transparency to the visitors, 5. Security of course.
The design goal differences between PointProfiles and other career/professional related Internet sites are:
- User customized profile allowing for flexibility in the content they want to present (i.e. Work Ethic, Development, Portfolio, Recommendations, etc...).
- High content posting limits such as write-ups containing all the details they wish visitors to know. I myself was frustrated with other sites limiting me to only brief summaries which did not do justice to what I wanted to explain.
- Portfolio images for profile users that want to show the work they have done. Most people think portfolios are for graphic design artists, but I feel that any individuals (i.e. web, applications, print, marketing, etc...) whose work ends up as anything visual benefits from presenting such material in a portfolio.
- Profiles created are indexed by Internet search engines for better visibility whereas I have found other professional websites seem to lack this for whatever reasons.
Ongoing Focus/Goals
The primary purpose & goal of this website is to be an online career profile for professionals, everything designed in the future will be to this end. Enforcement policies, rules, and technical coding will make sure that it stays a professional environment free from abuse, misuse, unintended use, and any other uses that would take away from the primary focus for which it was intended. Additional as my background is Information Technology security, I will include various aspects that will safeguard as much as humanly possible the individuals who choose to maintain profiles on the site... this will include privacy when appropriate (i.e. email addresses if desiring a private forwarding account), individual profile login history so users can detect unauthorized access, profile change notifications so users know when unexpected changes occur, and various others. All this logic/concepts I have incorporated previously in other Information Technology applications developed so they have been time tested for effectiveness.
Website Design Explained
The visual design was something inspired by various sources including my previous web projects... but the overall site is a completely unique design using bold colors I like and had not previously used in other projects. I am not by trade a graphics design artist and will never claim to be one... but I do know what looks good and can manage the various graphics applications I have used over the years to make descent images. The PointProfiles.com logo was something I just came up with while playing with several designs I had thought about... and I was satisfied with the result. As everything can be improved especially by talented graphics design artists by trade, maybe in the future the logo will be improved further. Additionally I wanted to make the web interface simple but functional, with each profile kind of acting like it's own mini website so that individuals with profiles have a more personalized feeling for their content.
The technical design of course falls in line with the visual layout, but has other aspects that only web designers and administrators would usually be aware of. The CSS layout was custom built to allow for dynamic content sizing both vertically and horizontally when the browser or screen resolution changes. This non-static width design gives maximum usable content space on the screen but restricts the dynamic width sizing to keep the intended visual design. Images of course are used to achieve the visuals but optimized as much as possible to keep performance which will be important when profile pages contain large amounts of content increasing data to be transmitted to the visitors' browser. Internal coding used for page functionality includes multiple logic based operations, such as for example the in-page HTML dynamic CSS designed to serve only CSS used by the page and merged with the page HTML (i.e. in-page) so that the visitors browser does not have to fetch an additional CSS file from the server... thus improving performance for the visitor. This and other coding functionality are all designed with the purposes of: 1. Performance, 2. Maintainability, 3. Scalability, 4. Transparency to the visitors, 5. Security of course.
Wanting to contact PointProfiles for some reason... hopefully it is positive, but in any case we respect others opinions and ask that you keep the following in mind when you
decide to contact us:
Email: info@pointprofiles.com
- Detailed information is always helpful so that we can get the most benefit from the time you spent to email us.
- Negative information is always welcome so we can remedy a problem or make improvements... but please keep it as "constructive criticism" at a minimum.
- As I am very busy with changing technology & my career goals, I will not be able to respond to all emails but will do my best. If the subject/reason for your email is not clear if you expect or would like a response, please indicate so within the email.
Email: info@pointprofiles.com