www.iastate.edu

[clonefromNE]

I got to thinking today about Iowa State's website (non-athletics). After looking around at some other university's sites, why don't we have a more attractive and welcoming site? I would think we would have a much better site especially because we are a school of science and technology.

One would think that with the beautiful campus that we have, our website should have large landscape shots all over it. You know...show off our strengths. I guess iastate.edu could be better if it had more of the feel like the prospective student page. Anyone agree?

The same could also be said for our athletics page, but in that sense it need a little toning down...

 

[mwitt]

One of my professors last semester talked about how we have one of the worst university websites he's seen.

 

[sodakjoe]

Because we're a University of Science and Technology...we don't know how to make websites. :wink:

 

[scottie33]

Its a very horrible site to go to. I try to avoid it as much as possible. I don't even type in iastate.edu to go to webmail or webct. I type in teh link directly becuase I had going through or seeing the homepage of iowa state

 

[balken]

The same could also be said for our athletics page, but in that sense it need a little toning down...

The athletics site needs some help. It looks like a Jackson Pollack painting.

 

[ISUboi12]

It is probably not the prettiest, but I find ISU's website to be very functionable and easy to navigate compared to uiowa.edu. Also, if you want to see a website that is both ugly, and hard to use look at Nebraskas... Every letter on the homepage is a different font size.

 

[Dormeezy]

It is probably not the prettiest, but I find ISU's website to be very functionable and easy to navigate compared to uiowa.edu. Also, if you want to see a website that is both ugly, and hard to use look at Nebraskas... Every letter on the homepage is a different font size.

exactly. what more do you want? the webpage is a directory of information for the university, it is functional and very easy to find what you're looking for.

if you ask anyone who has a brian, a clean functional website is MUCH better than some fancy flash production.

 

[clonefromNE]

I agree that it is very functional and a good directory of information, however, it also serves as a face of the university...and I think that ISU could be represented in a much better way to the public and prospective students. I am just a little surprised it's not presented better.

 

[ISUboi12]

I get what you are saying, but in all seriousness it probably is more professional the way it is now.

I think about two years ago they changed it to its current state. At the time I remember thinking that this website was almost too glitzy

Technology doesn't always mean a pretty display. Look at MIT. Looks like university of phoenix. Go to Main Page - www.digipen.edu and try to convince me that its a better website than ISU.

 

[Dormeezy]

Go to Main Page - www.digipen.edu and try to convince me that its a better website than ISU.

Oh god, there's nothing like using the old <MARQUEE> tag. :no:

 

[brianhos]

exactly. what more do you want? the webpage is a directory of information for the university, it is functional and very easy to find what you're looking for.

if you ask anyone who has a brian, a clean functional website is MUCH better than some fancy flash production.

Anyone who has a what? I think I am one of those.

 

[Sousaclone]

It's not flashy but it works very, well has no annoying flash or java and everything is CLEAN and simple. If I wanted maps and couldn't find a link you click on M and then scroll to maps. I went to iowa a couple of weeks ago and it took some digging to find a map of their campus on their site.

I'd rather have the iastate.edu be the face of Iowa State than cyclones.com

 

[Phaedrus]

Anyone who has a what? I think I am one of those.

hahahahahaha! Beat me to it, except I was going to have him ask your lovely wife, who evidently really has a "brian".

 

[Aldude505]

Being a student and using the website everyday I am going to say that many other websites are easier to use. You can not use the search function on ISU's website, just don't do it the only thing that will happen is that you will get mad. The only reason I go there is because I have to get to my mail and WebCT. But seeing that someone just bookmarked the websites I will probably do that now just so I don't have to look at it. Hopefully I will get the opportunity to fix the website somewhere along my computer engineering line.

 

[Landshark]

The athletics site needs some help. It looks like a Jackson Pollack painting.

The athletic site has come a long way actually, it use to be embarrassing to go to. I find it very manageable.

 

[TykeClone]

Being a student and using the website everyday I am going to say that many other websites are easier to use. You can not use the search function on ISU's website, just don't do it the only thing that will happen is that you will get mad. The only reason I go there is because I have to get to my mail and WebCT. But seeing that someone just bookmarked the websites I will probably do that now just so I don't have to look at it. Hopefully I will get the opportunity to fix the website somewhere along my computer engineering line.

Use google the site:iastate.edu tag ahead of your search will limit the search to that site.

 

[crash_zone]

it is very functional - after using KSU's and a few other universities, ISU's is really easy to use

 

[Rogue52]

Being a student and using the website everyday I am going to say that many other websites are easier to use. You can not use the search function on ISU's website, just don't do it the only thing that will happen is that you will get mad. The only reason I go there is because I have to get to my mail and WebCT. But seeing that someone just bookmarked the websites I will probably do that now just so I don't have to look at it. Hopefully I will get the opportunity to fix the website somewhere along my computer engineering line.

As a EE in Electrical and Computer Engineering, I can gurantee you that you will NEVER get a chance to fix the website and shouldn't. Your field has absolutely nothing to do with webpage design.

Half the reason there might be aesthetic problems with the website is because almost everyone who works in WebDev are computer science or engineering students. Let the College of Design deal with it. As someone stated above, if there are problems with our website it's because we ARE a college of science and technology.

I, however, am of the opinion that the site is very easy to use which is more important to me than how it looks. I do think it looks very professional. Not flashy, but professional. And the ABC index is the real strength of the site not the search tool.

 

[wonkadog]

You can not use the search function on ISU's website, just don't do it the only thing that will happen is that you will get mad...Hopefully I will get the opportunity to fix the website somewhere along my computer engineering line.

I hope you get the opportunity as well because then maybe you'll figure out that it is one of the easiest university websites to navigate in the entire nation and you're not going to be able to upgrade anything. Just take a random sampling of universities and hit up their sites. Most of them are more "flashy" and "cool" but it takes 20 minutes to find a phone number or some other info that should be easily attainable. Maybe you should try and use the "index" instead of the "search" function on the ISU site. I use that all the time with great success.

 

[jdoggivjc]

Seriously - who wants an overly "flashy" site? It takes forever to load up and most of the time the design is ridiculous. Most web designers will tell you that it's best not to have a website cluttered with garbage. Especially index pages, you want them to get right to the point and navigate you to the page you want to go. iastate.edu does an excellent job at this.