How do you formulate a concept? Where do you start searching for ideas and more importantly where do you get your direction from? Direction is reasonably important when defining a concept or searching for a concept. A concept needs a context within which it can be defined. Companies who specialise in the development of training material, for instance, have to understand or find a context for the training material that they create and from the context they develop a concept and from the concept they develop the training material. The concept will work within the boundaries of that context. So basically any concept needs a context…

What can help you find a context for developing a concept? Developing one or more websites is an example of a context, and the method you use to go about constructing a website could be considered the concept within that context. Creating or developing websites means that you adhere to some strict rules and guidelines, e.g. developing standards-based websites is an example of the rules that you must adhere too, and those guidelines shape your concept. Another guideline that needs to be considered when developing a concept is time and money, something that can be forgotten sometimes.

Why is it important to define the way you get to a concept? I guess you have to learn somehow.

Web development as a context relies on a few important things, but most of all it relies on a clear understanding of what it is you are developing and also how that understanding will be presented (Web design). I sometimes struggle to differentiate between web development and web design. Do people differentiate between the two because design-minded people and system-minded people think? Are those design-minded individuals simply Photoshop jockeys who will ignore web standards as long as their design looks right? Do system-minded people have a superiority complex? I wonder.