Right now, this style sheet is a draft, and not open to anyone outside User Services and OLI/FacTS. The purpose is to create a set of guidelines for creating Confluence content that can be the basis for campus-wide use, tutorials, workshops, and so forth. This will be a set of best practices to encourage standardization of Confluence content around proven styles, arrangements, and use of macros. ITS pages should model these practices as far as possible.
We want campus users to generally follow these standards because:
- Continuity means it is much easier for us to troubleshoot problems for them.
- We can ensure that the macros and arrangements they use will look good on a variety of screens: desktop, notebook, tablet, phone, and so on.
On the other hand, we should be careful not to insist users stick to a narrow list of tools, options, and content arrangements, because:
- We are selling the internet as a diverse, flexible and versatile way of conveying content and promoting engagement. Telling people they must follow a strict style guide offers them much less incentive to bother with it. (Simply touting the efficiencies of paperless communication has a poor record for on-boarding ordinary users to digital technology.)
- We will need to police this, occasionally telling people they "must" change their sites, and "must not" deviate. The more of these kinds of conversations that happen, the more disaffection we can anticipate among users.
I suggest:
- offer tutorial content showing the basics of building attractive content: technical as well as design considerations: follow these standards, and your content is effective. You don't need spend time learning more.
- develop a series of videos showing how to use the basic features to build content. In one-on-one sessions or workshops these are the features we demonstrate.
- indicate that other, "more advanced" features are available, but should only be used with a thorough commitment to testing (time and effort). We can assist with this process.
Developing a best-practice stylesheet will require testing to ensure consistency and reliability of macros, markup, or content arrangement. Below are various features we should consider:
Headings
Headings are easy to explain. The Table of Contents Macro is easy to explain, and uses headings.
Panels
Panels are easy(ish) to explain, and produce callouts that are brightly colored (unlike tables, which are limited to pastels).
Tables
Tables as standard form of organization, especially for tutorials. Recommended.
Testing:
- Android: Chrome browser. Tables usable. Look OK.
Columns
Several ways to use columns. They aren't necessarily difficult to construct, but they complicate views on various devices. I see this as an advanced feature, not recommended for most users.