All About Jazz... Looking Good... Again!

All About Jazz is a 25 year work in progress. We're determined to improve every facet of our platform, from how it functions technically, our security, the unique features we've built to promote jazz, to our appearance.

There's always a constant challenge to keep pace with changing technologies... oftentimes, what was "standard" two years ago is obsolete today, and your friends at AAJ continually invest in remaining current.

As we continue to migrate our source code to a modern framework (opening up a host of opportunities in the process), we're also moving forward to ticket events we'll broadcast. Both are ambitious projects that will take a good portion of the year to complete, but they represent a significant part of the changes we'll need to make to ensure long-term sustainability.

In the meantime, we're modernizing the style classes associated with the website. What you'll notice most are the visual refinements to our content sections, particularly on the home page. Our goal was twofold: improve our appearance and highlight the contributors responsible for creating our content.

Improving AAJ's appearance has always been a fun part of the job and we've spent countless hours striking a balance between form and function. We hope you enjoy the new look and please be patient as our changes cascade throughout the site. If you spot anything out of the ordinary, report it in the comments section below.

Breaking down the home page:

• Navigation Bar: Explore (to find sections at both All About Jazz and Jazz Near You); Donate; Sign Up / Sign in; access your member page; Search (by tag or access our advanced search);
• Header;
• Featured Stories: we slot our top stories in the jumbotron;
• Latest: the last five published articles;
• Radio & Podcasts: presenting our latest programs from a growing list of radio and podcast partners;
• Album Reviews: we typically publish four a day and present the last eight;
• Musicians. We present musicians who have upgraded their professional pages from standard to premium;
• Articles: Select articles that do not appear in the jumbotron;
• Engage: Includes a latest contest giveaway, today's birthdays, and our Publisher's Desk blog;
• News: Sponsored announcements from the industry;
• Free Tracks: Discover new music daily with our Track of the Day feature;
• Musicians Dig AAJ: Three quotes from musicians who have something nice to say about AAJ;
• Fund Drive: Explains our efforts to raise funds to ensure "project AAJ" is ongoing;
• Get More of A Good Thing: Sign up for our free weekly newsletter by simply entering your email address;
• Footer. We gave our footer a bit more pizazz by repeating the header background.

Note: We removed the JazzWeek Radio section and placed a link to the latest chart in the Radio & Podcasts section.

Continue...

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Posted to Publisher's Desk IN THE All About Jazz GROUP
Read more posts by Michael Ricci