Goals

My goals for this semester are to make sure that the web design and development for my customers are up to par. I have learned most of my HMTL background by being thrown into a job that required it. I am fairly proficient in the code that I know, but I am lacking the design skills to make it look pleasing to the customers. Sometimes I come up with good designs, but they do not come to me consistently.

My goals for the next 10 years are to be able to supplement my day time income with my side business of web design and photography. I am not sure which I enjoy more or which one my skills are better suited. Hopefully, in the next 10 years I can develop my skills in both and then I don't have to choose one or the other. I will probably stay in school until every school in Northeast Indiana gets sick of me!

My long term goals are to be able to leave my full time job and make my small business into something that can profit and sustain my household. However, if that doesn't work out I am sure that my skills will help my obtain a better job in the future.

My trouble spots in my plan are that I am not the most outgoing person, so hopefully the internet has something to help that! Also, I am apprehensive to building a shopping cart and checkout for customers. There is something about being responsible for loosing someone's credit card number that just doesn't sit well with me. So I would like to learn how to do that with the correct code and also be able to make it look good.

Exercise 4 - Domain Name

The domain name that I chose was my name. http://jaredhaagen.com. The reason I chose this domain name, well, because I have had it for about 2 years now. I actually own about a dozen domain names, but they are pointed at businesses, so I didn't feel it appropriate to put my school work on a company's website.

I didn't have any problems finding my domain name, however I did have trouble finding a domain name for Hillside Pools. We tired anything from hillsidepools.com to indianahillsidepools.com. They ended up settling on hillsidepoolsonline.com. It is a long domain name, but it was ultimately the owner's decision.

The features that I was looking for in a web host was that they would allow multiple domain names on one account, there was enough disk space and bandwidth to handle several small businesses on one account, and that they had 24 hour support.

I chose godaddy.com because they offered everything that I wanted at a decent price. They also had decent customer service (I made sure I had a reason to contact them before signing up with them). So far I haven't been disappointed.

VISC 110

This is the beginning of Fall 2009 VISC 110.