Thursday, September 17, 2009

Deadly Flaws In AMU Official Website

A new website for AMU was much needed and much awaited by the AMU community. When I went through the New Website, I couldn't believe that it is once again pathetically built. It is an insult for an institution of international caliber. Apart from serious spelling mistakes there are design and technical flaws as well.

  1. The sole link to Our Founder has been mercilessly buried deep on the second last step of the towering sidebar menu.
  2. It lacks the "A NAME" record. To the people who are unaware, "A NAME" record is the new standard that allows the site to be accessed even if it is not prefixed with www. before the site name.
  3. The sidebar has been illogically split and half the menu is badly stuck on the right side of the page, is the space in the sidebar insufficient.
  4. Two flashing blocks on one page that is hardly beyond the screen size. A newbie's most common design mistake.
  5. No "favicon" logo to make a mark in the browser's addresbar.
  6. REGISTRAR seems to be the most important officer in AMU, because the founder has been alloted only one link while the registrar has 3 links on the same page. See, In the sidebar menu Adminstration - REGISTRAR Next in the right side illogical menu Important Links - REGISTRAR, No this is not the end, once again, in Useful Links - REGISTRAR.
Dear Mr. Web Admin AMU, Please visit these sites to have an idea what a university site looks like. Harvard University, Jamia Millia Islamia, Mangalayatan University, Amity university.

Various AMU groups and Alumni have commented on the state of AMU website, Some of them are as follows:
1. World Of Alig Group says "AMU Web site .........A Biodata bank for some officials...a new approach of personal glorifications."

2. Arif Salim Arif Salim B.Tech. 1998 Dubai "Whoever manages and designs the site needs to look and learn from the infinite number of sites on the net especially those of  other universities. If you can't be creative at least try to imitate the current trend - which is a few light years ahead of you."

3.  Mohammad Shariq S.S.S.C.(10+2) -1997 Mumbai "Now we understand why AMU and its affiliated institutions name does not come in any of the ranking. The organization who do ranking must be looking on the official websites and this is what they will get."


4. A letter by Mohd. Khalid Sayeed MBA 2006 New Delhi:
Dear Web- (Mal)Administrator,

Its time to understand that you are administrating a website and not a cob-web in controllers office. My heartiest congratulation for upgrading amu website otherwise I don't know whether it exist or how worse it was before. No matter, you didn't make any difference. Sorry folks! I cant be other than blunt.

I even congratulate Mr Zesshan Ahmad for writing self congratulatory mail for inauguration of this pre historic site. I must say Good morning! and welcome to circa 2009. Sir,for your kind knowledge, It has been ages,when MIT invented www and we are now living in a era of Twitters and Facebook.

Mr. Web Master I don't know why you have put CV of Vice Chancellor. I don't know whether he has email id or you due to some secret after RTI act, don't want to reveal.

Why we have website for AMU controller, AMU Registrar etc separately, which is funded by Student's fees and UGC fund, when all of them convey same information. Is it some Ego problem to have a website or Mr. Web Administrator didn't know that its not necessary to have separate website if you want to move from one page to another. Its called HTML.

Kindly look at the website of BHU and JNU. Also I include,Kindly  look at website of JMI and Osmania.