Well, just coming to the end of my first week back in the corporate
saddle, so to speak, and what a week it's been.
You'll recall that I accepted a job as webmaster of the Bank of Canada
after many years of self-employment, and not without a few misgivings.
But it's all been highly enjoyable and challenging so far, and I feel sure I
made the right decision.
Mind you, I've certainly been learning just how much I still have to learn, if
you follow me. I've been discovering that, while I was reasonably skilled
when it came to sitting in a home office and creating one-shot sites that
were thereafter the client's responsibility to install and maintain on his own
server, it's a different proposition to be responsible for the whole works.
Yow. So many things to juggle. But I like it.
(The Bank's internet situation is especially complex because of the pivotal
role the institution plays in the entire financial life of the country. Digital
transactions worth billions move through our various systems every day,
so security is obviously *the* number one priority. The firewalls here
could withstand a thermonuclear blast, I'm sure <g> But this does make
the configuring of publicly-accessible internet services tricky at times.)
I'm also seeing how easy it is, when you're sitting in the midst of high-end
equipment and net connections, to lose sight of the "average user" with
his 33.6 modem and 14" screen running NS 3.0. Vigilance is required.
I now have a 24/7 T1 connection to the net, with my very own Sun Ultima
workstation, high-end PC and PowerMac sitting in my office. All the
software I could ever want too. So it's dangerously easy to start losing
sight of lowest-common-denominator users, or so I'm finding. As a result,
I'm going to get an old PC with a dial-up account installed in my office
next week, as a sort of "real world" breakpoint system to test things on.
A couple of you suggested I do a "before and after" look at the Bank's
site: good idea. Here's the current site (my name's on it, but I had
nothing to do with its present appearance or structure):
http://www.bank-banque-canada.ca/
It needs a lot of work as you'll see. I'll let you know when the "new and
improved" version is in place, probably in two to three months.
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Brent Eades, Almonte, Ontario
E-mail: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
Web: http://www.almonte.com/
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