Year: 2007
Client: Toronto Community News, Metroland
URL: http://insidetoronto.com
insidetoronto.com supports the frameworks for 9 community newspapers in the GTA. It also serves as a portal to classified, automotive, business, and other verticals.
I redesigned the site from the ground in my capacity as Coordinator or the Interactive Division, when when all of Metroland shifted to the Torstar-bred CMS, TOPS. The system was built on the Microsoft .NET framework and most of the development was in Visual Studio. An additional programmer was hired for the implementation.
I was designed the information architecture and feature-set of the site, wireframed, designed and CSS'ed the site. I also provided training to the Editorial and Photo departments on the new back-end features.
Another important and complicated part of the migration that I completed was the re-architecting and implementation of a new editorial workflow. This involved changing layout software from QuarkXPress and Word to an InDesign CS + InCopy XML-based workflow.
We created a php-based website to dynamically generate InCopy templates with the necessary metadata for web publication, and also an XML pre-processor, to massage our workflow's XML output to conform with the exigencies of the TOPS CMS.
Since my leaving the company in February '08, much of the design has undergone modifications by new staff. The thumbnails below show the site as it once was.
click on the thumbnails below to compact or expand a more detailed view:
