Domain
Layout Information | Technical Details
When I was going about choosing a domain name, I wanted something that sounded, for lack of a better word, "homey." A lot of the domain names of sites I was visiting at the time had mysterious and beautiful sounds, but didn't seem all that meaningful to the domains' actual purposes. I wanted a name that reflected what the domain was all about, as well as sounding cool to the ear.
Around the time I chose the name, I had just finished composing a song called "Within My World"--it's a rather sad, lovelorn sort of song, but it expressed my wish to welcome people into my life and into the world I structure page by page, link by link. I wanted people to feel comfortable and safe visiting, like coming into a beautiful old home and sinking down into an old overstuffed chair that feels like it's been a part of the house forever, and feels like it was made to support you.
Thus, after a little bit of deliberation, I chose the name withinmyworld.org as my domain name. I chose to have a .org domain because I didn't really need a .com or .net--it's not a commercial site, and it isn't a network. Also, .org domains are defined as being the extension of choice for nonprofit organizations, and I sure as heck wasn't making any money at the time I got the domain! LOL! I also just liked the sound that withinmyworld.org has; it seems to roll off the tongue (and the keys) a lot easier. It is simply mine...and I love it.
This is Version 10 of withinmyworld.org, and it is a bit of a departure from my usual color choices and image style. I opened a session of Photoshop one evening, driven to create something, and as I worked, I found myself working with more floral elements. Suddenly I had it--a new design for withinmyworld.org! I pulled in some source pictures of flowers, which I had downloaded years ago, changed their colors a bit, and polished up the image until it became what you see above. This, plus the flora in the border, gave the layout its touch of femininity and class that I wanted for this layout.
The structure and coding of the layout is, again, fairly simple; another two-column, 900-pixel-wide layout. The whole layout is aligned with a centered "wrapper" divided layer, in which the header image, navigation, content, and footer all nest. The navigation and content are floated layers, whereas the other two layers are simply 900px wide. PHP includes and an internal CSS stylesheet finished the structure of this layout, as is typical for my recent designs.
Header Pictures: Both available at FreeImages.co.uk.
Font on Header Picture: Vivaldi and Garamond, both of which came with my Windows install.
Anime-Style Avatar: Made using FaceMaker Flash game, playable on this page at DeviantArt.com.
Last.fm Widget: Available on the Last.fm website.
Delicious Widget: Available on Widgetbox.com.
Designed In: Adobe Photoshop Elements 5.0
Coded In: Notepad