The Fog
Date started: May 2007 | Date released: September 12 2007
Under its longer name, The Fog Online Newspaper its function is a bit more evident. Several factors contributed to The Fog's creation. Several years ago I had tried to contribute an article to the school paper, only to find that submission was limited to members of the journalism class. The idea for The Fog really came during sleep. One night I woke up and it was there, both the name and the idea. Still in a daze, I jumped out of bed, grabbed a pen and piece of paper, and scrawled my thoughts down in the darkness lest I should forget when I woke up. The next day I tried to formulate a design, and come up with a typeface for the name. Over the next few weeks and months, I coded the website to make sure what I had envisioned was made a reality.
Another factor that fuled the creation of this online newspaper was that I wanted to learn how to develop a website for the ExpressionEngine Content Management System. So now the site supports an array of student writers, each with their own accounts. They can log into the backend and publish their articles online. This was also the first website I created where I made a development blog to document the process (available here).
While support for The Fog was slow at first, I managed to release the first edition of The Fog in print about two months after the site was opened to the public. This vastly increased the popularity of the paper, and writer applications began streaming in. Hopefully the project will continue to grow, and with more writers the article mill will continue to churn.
Visit the website: www.teddywing.com/thefog
Screenshots
The Fog's homepage. Articles appear in the center column, announcements are on the right, and there is an extensible navigation bar with search area on the left.
The front page of issue nø1 of The Fog In Print. After a very arts-oriented few weeks, the majority of articles are related to the arts.
Software
A list of the software used to create this website.
- Panic Software's Coda - to code the XHTML and CSS.
- Bare Bones Software's BBEdit - to code the XHTML and CSS.
- Macromedia Fireworks - to mock up the site and create individual layout elements.
- Adobe Photoshop - to add effects to the layout elements of the site, and to create the site's header.
- Bebosoft's Forms To Go - web PHP form creation.
- ExpressionEngine - to support the backend of the site.