Conventions for the creation of websites

Do not use umlauts, blank space, „ß“ or further special characters from other languages (for example ø, œ) in file and directory names. This could cause problems when your website is called up.  

The following characters are accepted: Period, hyphen, underscore.

In order to avoid errors, use small letters when creating directory and filenames. If a file name contains capital letters, these have be use in order to access the website.  

Examples:

www.uni-koeln.de/..../Fee.html

It is not possible to access the website, if put in small letters.

www.uni-koeln.de/..../fee.html

Normal HTML-files must have the extension .html or .htm in order to be accepted by all internet browsers.

If you create websites with TYPO3, the English website holds the same file name as the German equivalent. Hence, you can switch easily between the German and English website. As a result, the English website automatically receives the extension„*.html?L=1“ .
If you use another content management system than TYPO3, please define a uniform and universal procedure for English websites.

Make sure that you choose a universal format for the heading of all websites. Use the format „Überschrift 1“ or „h1“ for the principle heading of a websites. Following headings titles must be subordinated to the structure. Formate subheading with "Bezeichnung 2“ or “h2” and subordinated subheadings with „Bezeichnung 3“ or „h3“.

Please make sure to maintain the order of the headings. H2 is always following to h1, h3 is always following to h2 etc.

Example:

Heading 1

Text

Heading 2

Text

Heading 3

Text

Heading 3

Text

Heading 2

Text

Heading 2

Text

You will find the name of the author and the latest modification date at the bottom of the website. TYPO3 produces these references automatically.

Links in TYPO3 work via the sitemap. The clicking path is created automatically.   
Manuel links: If manual links lead to index pages of a directory, the file name (for example index.htm) will not be named in the path.

For example: uni-koeln.de/rrzk/

Umlauts are permissible in TYPO3. However, websites not operating with TYPO3 can have problems displaying the umlaut correctly. In this case, integrate the correct coding in the meta data (for example: UTF-8 or ISO-8859-15).

Choose a sans-serif and well-established font for your website (for example Arial). The web browser will possibly be not able to display exceptional fonts correctly.

Websites of facilities of the University of Cologne have a uniform design.

You can find further information at technical notes on the design of websites of the University of Cologne.

The functionality of a website should not depend on Java or JavaScript. If Java or JavaScript is required, please leave a notification on your website for users who did deactivate Java or who depend on alternative technologies (such as a screen reader or a braille terminal).

Please test every newly created or modified website with Mozilla Firefox and Microsoft Internet Explorer at least once before release. Various browsers display content differently. This is why, a short comparison is recommended.