The future was yesterday

Columbia is no stranger to website redesigns, but here comes an overhaul that will actually matter. As CUIT so eloquently phrases it on the CourseWorks home page, this fall “CourseWorks Begins Transition to New CourseWorks.”

The current CourseWorks is based on the Prometheus course management system and has been around since 2001—to put that in perspective, if CourseWorks were a child, it would be entering 5th grade. It’s seriously been a long time coming, and CUIT has been planning this since 2008, but Columbia is finally starting to begin its transition to a new course management system, based on the open source Sakai Project.

In a press release, CUIT hails this system for its “state-of-the-art online learning and information sharing tools,” includes discussion boards, grade books, and file drop boxes. If this sounds familiar, it’s because Sakai will have largely the same offerings as CourseWorks, only presumably now it won’t go completely offline whenever PrezBo plugs in too many things in his office or something. Moreover, some new features of Sakai include some sort of live chat/IM system, polling, wikis, and what CUIT’s press release ominously refers to as “social media.”

CUIT will begin transitioning classes to this new system in waves, starting in Fall 2011 and concluding in Spring 2013. First up are classes from the Med Center, School of Social Work, Anthropology and Statistics departments, and select “early adopters” from SEAS, the J-School, and Architecture department. With this transition, Columbia will finally be joining a long list of institutions that have already adopted Sakai, which has been around since 2004. Don’t get too excited though: to quote one student from a school already using Sakai, “It’s not pretty, but it gets the work done.” To quote another, “It sucks.”

Generic Sakai website via Sakai Project

The real world has no finals. (Unless you count taxes.) Here’s what’s happened around you while you were cooped up in the library:

Columbia just never seems to be satisfied with their Web presence. The SEAS site recently got refreshed— by our count the fourth redesign of this year. (For those keeping score, first came Cubmail, followed by the main page, and then Barnard.) Talk about vanity/ vigilance! The SEAS site was actually revamped just 18 months ago.

In this particular pecking order, SEAS may come last, but certainly not least: the new SEAS website seems to be an improvement over the old one. The placement of links to the SEAS Bulletin and Columbia Directory are more prominent, and when compared with the old one, the new Engineering logo is more consistent with the visual style of the other Columbia schools’ logos. Still, it adopts the curious drop-down menu system similar to the Barnard website, and there are some broken links. Womp.

Following recent redesigns of the Columbia website and Cubmail’s homepage, Barnard got its own online makeover today. The revamped Barnard site features flashier effects, but you’ll probably be too distracted by the collage and Fidelity-esque blue stripe in the background to notice all the techie magic.

In the past two years, we’ve seen major web design overhauls for Student Affairs, SEAS, Columbia, Cubmail and now, Barnard. Still there’s one eyesore left: Courseworks. As one DevFest lecturer said, “Just imagine a world…with a prettier Courseworks.” We can dream!

The look of the future is here! Following this week’s earlier redesign of CubMail’s login page, Columbia’s home page got its own makeover today. Eye candy and gloss abound, and nifty transitions are hidden everywhere. Some parts of Columbia’s online presence still remain unchanged though, notably the undergraduate admissions and financial services pages.

And because we’re still on the last legs of break, here’s some nostalgic Conan for ya:

CubMail got a makeover today, but not the part you’re thinking about. Its home page has a new design that is “more in line with the style of the new University home page,” which should officially roll out later this week. The new login screen features some smooth transitions and glows, and when you type in your UNI, your name and basic directory info show up, just in case you were in the middle of an existential crisis. But once you log in, you’re greeted with the same familiar CubMail interface you’ve come to know and… well, know. We encourage everyone who actually knew about this redesign before this post to join us where the grass is greener. After all, the real news here is that people still use CubMail.

Here’s a side-by-side comparison of the new and old designs, for nostalgia’s sake.

The Barnard website is getting a makeover, but it seems like it’s going to take a while. On Thursday, Barnard students received an email from Scott DiPerna, Director of Electronic Communications (?!), announcing the plan for an overhaul of Barnard.edu and introducing a Barnard Website blog that will keep whoever’s actually interested up-to-date about the site’s progress.

The blog describes the redesign as an element of Barnard’s “new visual identity,” and notes that the current “lack of consistency” on the site “has not gone unnoticed.” The picture to your right shows some of the “changing faces” of the Barnard site. One Bwogger noted that the Barnard administration seems only too eager to collect feedback on the new site rather than, ya know, the mandatory meal plan. Full email after the jump.

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Dear readers,

We’ve spent the last month or so road-testing the new design, while combing through your feedback, and today we’re unveiling the new New Bwog.

We’ve done our best to listen to your comments, bringing back the centered scroll and serif type that many of you favored. We’ve also revamped the logo (that’s Low Library in the background).The Hawk, City, Arts, Events, and Lost and Found sections remain the same, and we look forward to using them more and more. We’re always looking for feedback, of course, so sound off in the comments and/or send your suggestions to bwog@columbia.edu.

Thanks for reading,

James Downie

Bwog Editor

Dear readers,

After more than two years with the same front page, we have decided that Bwog is in need of another makeover. The new version will be launching today, and we’ve kept pretty much all of the features that we had before, merely reorganizing them for an even more streamlined look.

We have added two new features, and will be adding more in the next few weeks. First, the “City,” “Arts,” and “Hawk” tabs will be used for easier organization, and will also (like the hawk blog) get their own exclusive content. Second, we’ve added a Lost and Found box to put lost and found announcements in. We’ll be tweaking the site over the coming weeks, so please let us know what you think in the comments.

Thanks for reading,

James Downie

Bwog Editor

Fresh from the newly cleaned-up Spectator website:

How about just… not assigning exams in Lerner?

Morningside Heights to Rangel: Draft? Seriously?

Now where will we buy our discount movie passes?

This just in: Professors’ ideas on sexuality often out-of-date! (please read this)