Final Project Requirements

• Scope. Each certificate or matriculated student or those students seeking a record of attendance must create a website containing a Home page plus 6 additional pages for a total of 7 pages. Students can choose the subject of their sites.
• Basic HTML Coding. All coding must use HTML’s hierarchical rules. Text must be marked up with the appropriate block element (such as the P and Heading elements), following HTML's semantic rules. The BR element should not be used to simulate text blocks.
• List Structures. Somewhere on the website there should be at least one example of a list (Ordered, Unordered, or Definition).
• Tables. Are not required, but when used should be restricted to presenting tabular data. Tables should not be used for page layout.
• CSS Styling. To avoid redundancies and conflicts in a website's CSS, the styling that is employed sitewide should be set in a universal external CSS style sheet. Styling particular to a specific section of a website should also be included in an external style sheet for that site section. Students should avoid using embedded (page) style rules that repeat across multiple pages; embedded style rules should only be employed when a style is unique to a particular page. Inline style rules should be used minimally and only as a last resort.
• Typography. Cascading Style Sheets (CSS) should be used to define your site’s typography such as typeface, font color, and font size.
• Page Defaults. Each page's margin, background color, default text color, font, font size, and link colors must be defined.
• Colors must be specified with numeric values.
• Page Layout. Students must use HTML 5 semantic elements as well as CSS to lay out their web pages. Laying out web pages via tables is not allowed. Although the DIV element is still included in the HTML 5 specification, the World Wide Web Consortium recommends the following: "Authors are strongly encouraged to view the DIV element as an element of last resort, for when no other element is suitable". Students’ HTML code will be judged as to whether they have used the most appropriate HTML elements to mark up their content and lay out their pages.
• Web Graphics. Images must all display correctly, each graphic should be saved in format best suited for that graphic.
• Site Internal Navigation. Your site must be fully navigable via hyperlinking. The only option available to the end‑user to navigate away from an internal web page must not be a browser's back button or history.
• External Links. Your site must hyperlink with two outside sites that are similar in theme.
• Site Management. Your site must be uploaded to a web server using proper file and folder naming conventions and have a well-defined directory structure. HTML pages, graphics, and style sheets should be grouped (organized) into folders (directories) appropriate for each. HTML pages should be grouped according to content or website section.
• Web Server. Students will have a web account on the Parsons web server. Students may choose to place their website at a commercial web hosting provider but are responsible for getting the correct FTP information from their providers. Students who opt for a commercial web hosting provider are also responsible for obtaining a Domain Name and pointing their Domain to their web hosting provider's DNS servers.
• Accessing Sites. Students' websites must be accessible via their URL's. This means that anyone should be able to access a student’s Home page by entering the URL for the student's web account or their domain name (if using a commercial web hosting provider) into a browser's location field and then hitting the Return key or a Go button.
• User Interface. There must be a consistent graphical user interface motif throughout the website.
• Validation. All HTML and CSS programming must be validated. Students should use the HTML and CSS W3C Validators, which are accessible from the Tools page of this website, to validate their code. Please note that although the Validators will identify syntactical errors in programming, they will not reveal every problem with a website's HTML and CSS. For instance:
  1. With CSS, the Validator will not solve issues with redundancy and conflicts in a site's style rules.
  2. With HTML, the Validator will not weigh in on whether or not the code follows HTML's semantic rules.

  So each student should realize that even though their documents pass validation, this only means they have produced syntactically correct documents; their documents might still have other programming errors. Ultimately it is the student’s responsibility to produce well-formed HTML and CSS files.

• Plagiarizing Code. Students must write all their own HTML and CSS programming themselves. Students risk failing the course if they use code from class exercises, from the class website or from an online source.
• Allowed Programs. Students are not allowed to use visual HTML editors, such as Dreamweaver, to write their HTML code. Students can use a text editor or an HTML editor such as TextPad or NotePad++ for Windows or Text Wrangler and BBEdit for the Mac.
• Early Review and Feedback. Although time will be set aside in the next to last class for students to work on their final projects -- at which point they may seek advice and help from the instructor -- they are also encouraged to bring in their work and any questions about their final projects prior to the last two classes. Students who take the time to arrive early or stay after class can show the instructor the progress on their final projects, ask questions and solicit input.
• Examine Period. The examine period refers to the week between the end of the 14th class and the beginning of the 15th (final) class. During this time students are expected to work on their final projects unassisted. Requesting help or asking questions of the instructor during this period will indicate they could not finish their websites on their own, and any help or answers they receive will result in points being deducted from their final project grade. However, students may ask questions about final project requirements without the risk of a grade point deduction.

• Presenting Your Site. Your site must be fully functional and uploaded to a web server at the beginning of the last day of class. Points are deducted if students are still working on their sites after the last class session has begun. Students must be at the last class session to present their projects.
• Turning in Your Final Project. Prior to the start of the last class: students' final project site folders should be compressed into a zip archive an uploaded to canvas, and students' website must be also uploaded to a web server.
• Multimedia. Although it will not be covered in class students can add multimedia (video and/or audio) to their pages. Do note that points will be deducted if these items do not work or function as they should and/or are not properly integrated into the web site’s overall design and interface.
• Grading. Students' projects will be judged by the quality of their code, plus all of the above requirements must be met to receive a passing grade.
• REMINDER: students are required to attend 12 out of the 15 class sessions. If a student misses a class, it is his/her responsibility to acquire (via the recommended reading, class website, and willing classmates) the information that was covered on the missed day. Students are encouraged to email the instructor for a list of topics covered in each class from which they were absent.