Federico+Bizzaro+Unit+5

Unit 5: How can I contribute to a problem facing my country?

Deadlines for the unit:
 * __ Stage of the Design Cycle __ || __ Deadlines __ ||
 * Investigation || Thursday 2nd of May ||
 * Design Stage || Monday 13th of May ||
 * Plan Stage || Wednesday 22th of May ||
 * Create Stage || Tuesday 28th of May ||
 * Evaluation Stage || Friday 31st of May ||

Investigation The Problem: I will have to look into a problem that is currently occurring in my country. I will be looking at the economic crisis that has hit Italy and has been going on for a couple of years now. This crisis has made a lot of people lose their money and jobs so something has to be done to help them.

Italy was hit hard by an economic crisis in 2007 and it has lasted until now. Throughout this period of time Italy’s economy has shrunk by 6.76% and at the moment Italy is part of the struggling economies of Europe with Greece, Spain and Ireland. Though out of all of them Italy is in the safest state since a lot of the national wealth is owned by national subjects, which means that a lot of the country’s money is owned by the people. If the government loses money the country won’t suffer as much since not as much of the money is owned by the state but by large companies or business men. Making things worst Italy has spent a lot of time now without a government due to the resignation of Napolitano (Italian President). They held the elections a couple of weeks ago and Pier Luigi Bersani won but was not able to get more than 50% of the votes which meant that he could not have become president of the state. They were supposed to do a second vote with only the top two candidates who had the most votes (Bersani and Berlusconi) which would mean that one of them would get more than 50%. This did not occur because by the time they would have done this elections Italy would have gone into an even bigger economic crisis. In the end the leader of the European Central Bank Mario Draghi (an Italian as well) had to plead Napolitano not resign and remain in his current role as President. With him remaining in his role he would be able to find a prime minister and make the government. Though with him staying in his role both Bersani and Berlusconi had to resign their roles and not take part in the upcoming elections.

Napolitano now formed a committee of senior politicians from the center-left and the right to make some keys points that both sides could then agree on. This committee will have to try and prevent the re-introduction of the austerity measures that Monti took and find a new prime minister. Austerity measures are when the government cut down on their spending money and increase the countries taxes. This is not the best measure to take if you want the peoples votes because they are forced to pay more taxes which means that their overall income will decrease. That is why it is now very unlikely that Monti will be voted again. The committee has been able to elect a new prime minister now, Enrico Letta. He has to tackle this crisis and try to get the country over it as soon as possible. At the moment he is favored by the people since he will not introduce the extra taxes that were needed before. At the moment due to the economic crisis a lot of people in Italy are losing their money very easily due to the increase of cost in products. To prevent this people need to start saving up money by creating saving bonds. Instead of waiting to get extra money and then putting that in a saving bond they should always take a certain amount out of the salary that they can add to their savings every month. If people start doing this then after some time of saving they will be able to have a lot of extra money that they then can invest into a business or use as they wish. Another second thing that is important to do would be to create an economic goal, for example I won't spend more than this amount of money this month or i will save up x amount of money.

Design Brief: I will be creating a website about the economic and government crisis that is occurring in Italy at the moment. To solve the problem I have researched into the topic using a couple of different sites and now have a wide range of ideas for the topic. To contribute on stopping the problem I will include ways to save money that the people can use.

Design Specifications:
 * Visible page title
 * At least a paragraph of relevant text and quality not quantity of text
 * Links to all the pages
 * Simple background in all the pages and simple layout
 * Make it simple to use
 * Make sure that the colors don't clash so the text is visible
 * Researched into the problem
 * Looked at what causes the problem
 * Merged tables where needed
 * Some relevant pictures but not too many
 * Decent sized text for the web page
 * Meet all of the design specification’s

Test: __ References __ Wikipedia, “Italia GDP 2000-2011”, available from:, accessed on 23rd of April 2013 Wikipedia, “Economy of Italy”, available from: [], accessed on 23rd of April 2013. [|Mail Online, “Plans for the collapse of the euro”, available from:][], accessed on 3oth April 2013 Forbes, “Italian president Giorgio Napolitano is trying to avert a crisis of systemic proportions”, available from: [], accessed on 30th April 2013. The New York Times, “Italy forms new coalition government to end moths of political stalemate”, available from: [], accessed on 30th April 2013. Aljazeera, “Italy braces for confidence vote”, available from: [], accessed on 30th April 2013. [|Mail Online, “Plans for the collapse of the euro”, available from: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2058868/Italy-economic-crisis-Fears-UK-dragged-second-recession.html], accessed on 3oth April 2013 __ Design Stage __ This was the first design that I made and it was my first idea. Overall all I thought that it was a good design but it was not the one that I chose as my final design. This is so because I thought that it wouldn't look best out of the four and because since the links were in the middle then it might have not been easy to use. If I analyse it against the design specification it did quit well, the page title is visible, it does include links to all the other pages, the background is not represented on this though. It might not be as simple to use because the links might get mixed up with the text, so that the colors don't clash you could use light colors and dark colors always. There would be merged tables to create this design, the amount of pictures is fine, the text size is not noted. __**This is the 2nd design and is the one that I chose**__ and based my website on. I chose this design because it was the one that I thought looked best and that it was the one that would be easier to use for anyone using the website. I also found that a lot websites use designs similar to this which means that it is a design that is liked. The title is visible at the top of the page, there is a paragraph of relevant text in the middle of the page, there are links to all of the other pages, the background will be simple but it is not noted here, it would be simple to use, the colors won't clash because colors light colors and light colors or dark colors will not be put together. To make the layout of the page tables and merged tables will be used, there will be two pictures which is a good amount compared to the amount of text, the text will all be of the same size except for the title that will be larger. This is the third design but is not the one that I chose to use as the final. This is so because I found that some parts would cover up others, for example since the text and the title are together and there isn't anything else then the title could be less visible. All there would be empty space where the pictures are. The title would not be visible enough, there is a paragraph of text, there will be a simple background but it is not noted here, it would be simple to use, the layout would include merged tables and there would be the right amount of pictures. The text should all be of the same size and a different color from the background.
 * I can give out a survey asking what people think about my website
 * I can look over my website and test everything such as links, animation etc that might be on the website.
 * I can ask someone to test my website to make sure it is easy to use for example a parent or friend
 * I can also compare what I made to other simple websites

This was my forth design and it wasn't the one that I chose as my final. This is so because I wasn't sure if I would be able to create the columns by merging the links and I found that the pictures should came later not before the text or else you would not be able to understand what they were about. The title would be visible since the pictures are under, there is a paragraph of text and the links to the other pages are on the right. It should be quite simple to use but since the pictures are before then you might not understand what they are about since you haven't read the text yet, the background will be simple like on all the other pages but it isn't shown here, the colors will not clash since they will be completely different. To make the layout merged tables will be used, there is the right amount of pictures compared to the amount of text, the text will be of readable size and easily visible. __ Plan Stage __ Steps for creation of website:
 * 1) Start off by creating the whole layout for all of the pages, which would be for example the text boxes, the title box etc. This useful because since you already have a template then all you have to do is fill it in.
 * 2) The second step will be to write all the text (including the title) that you will include on each page by saving it on word and then copying it onto your website. By doing this you will be able to better understand how much space will then be available to you since you have already put in the text which is one of the biggest parts of the page
 * 3) Now you will start putting in the pictures for each page but first you will have to have already found them on Google and referenced them. When you have added the pictures you have already basically done most of your website, now you will have to make sure that there is enough remaining space for you to include the rest of the things that will need to be added in.
 * 4) For the fourth step you will be adding in all of the links to all the pages. Since you have already made all the pages with all the text in them then it will be easy to just hyperlink them to each other. With this done there will only be some finishing touches to do.
 * 5) On the last steps you will just need to include any finishing touches that are needed, such as the background and maybe changing the text color.

Resources: To create my product I will be using only one type of program and some other necessary resources. I will use Microsoft Expression 4 to create the whole webpage. I chose this program because it was something that I had already worked on in the past which meant that when I would be creating the page I would have less trouble on doing so. Also if I have some problems on using it then I can look back at the first Unit that we did and how we solved them there. The necessary resources that I will be using are: Microsoft Word where I will first write out my text. By doing this you are then able to spell check it better and make sure that any spelling or grammatical mistakes are fixed. I will also be using websites to help me find pictures or how to create certain things on Microsoft Expression 4. There are also other obvious things such as using the monitor and computer etc.

Timeline for the creation stage: To do the creation stage I will have a single lesson and a double lesson plus some time at home if needed. On the first single lesson that I have I will need to create all of the pages and make sure that they all have the same template outline. By doing this I have set out my website and will then just need to start and will in. For the first part of the single lesson I will start adding all the text into my website and then also the pictures. For the second half of the double lesson I will start to then add the background and make the links plus the finishing touches. Anything that will be left to do can then be done at home or at break time.

I think that overall my plan will work quite well but I will have to keep my final deadlines to make it work best. There were only a few modifications that I did to it, these were mainly about the deadlines of the work. For example on the design stage I will extend the deadline since I had some internet problems and wasn't able to upload it at home and when I brought it on a flash disk it got formatted at school. This means that I went off the plan and will have to find time to do this. There were also some changes on how long I would have for each stage and now only have a couple of days at home to work on the evaluation stage.

__ Create Stage __







I used the second design as my overall outline for the websites, though I had to change some things. For Example on the first page I added another picture to the website because I thought that it was relevant and that it should be added to the page, though by doing this it meant that it would be slightly different from my design since there was one more picture. On the second page I also added another picture under the text so that it would look better and it would use the empty space that there was. Instead on the third page I only put one picture because that's all I thought I would need to add in, also the webpage would look better like this. This was also a change from my design. On the last page I followed the design by how I had planned it but when I opened it as a webpage it went a bit off and there was a lot of empty space. I followed most of my plan to create the final page, I started off by creating the merged tables on all the pages which would be the layout. Then I wrote out my text on word and then copied it onto the webpage to make sure that there weren't spelling or grammar mistakes. I then looked for pictures on Google and added them to the webpages. Since I had already created all of the pages I started to make the links to all of the others. Then for the final thing I added the background and made sure that the text did not clash.

Evaluation Stage

On my final website I was able to follow a lot of the design specifications and only missed on a few. The title was visible but I think that I could have made it a bit larger next time. There was a paragraph of relevant text on all of the pages, I added links to all the other pages and then added a simple background. I think that overall it would be easy to use but I should have had someone try and use it, the colors did not clash and they were all easily visible. To make the layout I created merged tables and added my info to it, I think that I added the right amount of relevant pictures which was between 1 and 3. On my create stage I didn't research into the problems where I should have and I didn't look at the causes. The text was of a readable size when opened which would be above size 12 at least.

If I could do this project again then this is what I would change: I would have tried to work on the create stage more and maybe create another page instead of only four pages. I would also try to change the the layout so that when it is uploaded the whole webpage doesn't change and actually stays the same as it was on Expression 4. I would have also tried to research more into how to help with this problem and look at how the government is dealing with it. Plus in my design's I should have included all of the design specifications instead of missing a few, they should have also been of the whole webpage instead of just being a template of it. If I did all of this next time it would really help improve my product.

Links to other pages: Homepage Unit 1 Page Unit 2 Page Unit 3 Page