A SERIES SHOWCASING LOCAL BUSINESSES’ BEST SITES Getting fit online with Shape Up Missouri
If you think you can’t lose weight in cyberspace, you’re wrong. It’s mandatory on Shape Up Missouri’s Web site, where losing weight is a team sport.
Get a group together, and check out www.smsg.org/SUM. It works like this: The site tracks the team’s activity minutes and weight loss, and the biggest losers win. Prizes are awarded, and everybody who participates earns a T-shirt.
The Shape Up Missouri program aimed to create a Web site that was easy to use and that would help the program record data from its participants. To create it, the program called on designer Steve Powell of Delta Systems.
“It allows users to input the information directly, and it takes some of the data entry out of our office and frees us up,” said Bruce Ungles, assistant director of the Show-Me State Games. “It’s been a big help in saving time.”
The site employs Scriptaculous validation techniques, a Prototype frame and “post-it” notes for further information for users. It also offers eCommerce integration so users can pay for the program online. But perhaps the best part of the site’s design is that it uses the Asynchronous JavaScript and XML (AJAX for short) Web development technique for better interactive applications, according to Powell. In short, those annoying Web forms are less annoying for users.
The new technology makes Web pages more responsive to change by exchanging small amounts of data with the server behind the scenes, Powell said. “When someone enters something on a form, the form can validate itself without you reloading the page,” he said. “Traditionally, when you click on a link, the Web page refreshes the whole page. Now you can actually do things without reloading the page.”
The site’s design complies with accessibility standards so that blind users can access it through screen readers and users with low vision can employ screen magnifiers, Powell said. Powell worked closely with University of Missouri-Columbia information security specialists to make the site secure from hacker attacks and safe for eCommerce transactions.