website for an airline

In May 2007 I was asked to make a website for Kam Air in Afghanistan. At the time, this was the biggest contract I had handled and a great introduction to programming. Ultimately, though, massive delays meant that the site only ever got about 75% completed and it was only online until early 2008.

I now consider the site to be sub-standard and definitely not a "portfolio piece", but I sill keep a version of it on this server in case anyone wants to take a look

A key lesson I learned from this contract is that in order for web design projects to succeed it is essential that as much information as possible is obtained at the outset. Sure, there may be initial delays of up to a week or so while the main content is written and edited, but any longer than this and delays have a tendency to lengthen and multiply, and there eventually comes a point at which the enthusiasm of everyone concerned starts to wane and quality begins to suffer.

Because of this, I now not only clarify the sort of content that will be needed (ie, text, photos, prices, etc), but also make sure that everything is made available in accordance with a pre-agreed time scale. On the whole, this approach works well. My recent projects have progressed from start to finish much more smoothly than used to be the case and the results, I'm pleased to say, have been good.