Change is good. And where technology is concerned, change is often necessary. That’s why our design team, programmers and editorial staff have worked behind the scenes for the last six months to re-imagine ChemicalProcessing.com.
[pullquote]
We were tasked with creating a new navigation system as well as a new layout for the homepage to put all the important content right at your fingertips. The result is dramatically different from the way the site had been. However, once you’ve become familiar with the redesign, which hopefully won’t take too long, we expect you’ll find it even better for fulfilling your chemical processing needs. If that’s not the case, you can always email me your questions or concerns and I will address them right away.
For now, here’s a quick primer on how to navigate the new site.
Starting from the top you’ll see a black navigation bar. This houses six links. The first is Home (you can go to our home page from any page on the site by clicking here or on the Chemical Processing logo). The next link is Technical Resources, which will take you to a page that features eHandbooks, white papers, special reports, reliability-centered maintenance PDFs and a portal to upcoming webinars. Our News section focuses on industry news, vendor news and monthly Economic Snapshots. Columns & Blogs gives you access to all the monthly columns that appear in the magazine as well as web-exclusive columns and our Chemical Reaction blog. eNewsletters & Magazine houses links to current online and print publications, including CP China, issue archives, and our editorial staff and editorial board members, and our editorial guidelines. And finally, Products and Vendor Information will give you access to products, an events calendar, vendor videos, vendor literature, case studies and industry links.
The second navigation bar is just below the Chemical Processing logo. Hover over any of the six categories there — Automation, Processing Equipment, Asset Management, Environmental Protection, Safety/Security and Utilities/Energy — to get a more-detailed breakout of each section. Hovering over any element of this granular menu shows the most recent story, a short blurb and an image if one is available. To the right you will see all other recent content pertaining to that topic.
Throughout the home page you’ll see several modules of content. Each is labeled, so it should be pretty evident what you are looking at. Do note that the Editor’s Corner is no longer on the top right. It lives down on the left side of the page. It’s now called Editor’s Take because it’s not in the corner anymore.
Just above Editor’s Take is our monthly cover story. This now gets the prominence it deserves.
The last new feature I’d like to point out — for now — is our super footer. It lives on the bottom of every page and is what I consider the “Dummies Guide” to our website. Trust me when I say that I will be using this quite often in the beginning of this changeover.
So there you have it — a quick overview of the redesigned site. I encourage you to poke around and let me know if you have any questions or concerns.