Digital Crew: Internet Application Developers

Granite Digital has just launched a new, fully responsive website for IT Tallaght.

Friday 09 November 2012

Granite Digital, one of Ireland's leading website and online software development companies has just launched a new, fully responsive website for IT Tallaght, a first for any Higher Education Institution in Ireland. Using responsive design technology, this investment in a leading user-experience improvement for the ittdublin.ie website recognises the huge shift in website access platforms from traditional PCs & laptops to tablets, smartphones and other mobile devices.

What is responsive design?

It's a method of designing and developing a website with a fluid layout so that images and other elements of the site adapt or 'respond' to the screen on which the website is being viewed.

What are the advantages?

One of the main advantages of this method is that a site built using responsive design offers an incredibly high quality user experience. Traditional websites, which are not optimised for mobile devices, often display content that is difficult to navigate or too small to read. We have all had the experience of squinting on our smartphone to try and read that tiny phone number or email address and scrolling endlessly up, down, left and right

With the huge increase in people browsing on mobile devices, the implementation of these new features will allow visitors to have a far better user experience with quicker and more intuitive access to content on the go.

The website is now clever enough to ''respond' to the device and show website sections which are more relevant to the user. 

John Hannigan commented; "Together with our web partners Granite Digital we have implemented a fully responsive version of our website optimised for mobile devices such as the iPad, iPhone and most other smartphone and tablet devices. We are delighted with the results and are very excited that we now serve our audience better. Our web analytics is already showing significant improvements in usage patterns from our increasing mobile and tablet audience."

Robert Carpenter of Granite Digital commented; "From our first conversations with ITT Dublin it was agreed that we needed to implement significant change to serve a huge change in how users access and navigate the ITT Dublin website. It was essential that we prioritised their mobile audience and give users access to content on the go and quickly. There is so much talk and confusion for website owners about needing a mobile version of your website. We get calls every week from business owners saying they need an app to take care of the huge increase in iPhones and iPads. This is not true and bugs me a little at how easily people can get caught up in the hype around ‘mobile apps’ They invest in the wrong solution for their digital presence. You don't need to develop a web version, a mobile version and a tablet version separately. This would be a huge admin headache as well as involve high running costs. You need your website to respond to your audience. With one website responding to the device there is no extra admin time for your Webmaster. All website updates are done once centrally within the CMS (Content Management System). This is essential for ITT Dublin and any serious website owner. This phase is now delivered and we look forward to implementing even more improvements in 2013 - watch this space! "

ITT Dublin Web analytics are already showing significant improvements in usage patterns from their increasing mobile audience and the results are very exciting.

To the best of our knowledge, they are the first HEI to release a fully responsive design to their website and are already looking forward to exciting new improvements planned for 2013.