TheOverAnalyzed

A few days ago I linked to my professional site, http://anthonycraigdds.com.

Although the entire site only weighs 461 KB, and although it is only as single “page” with a more-or-less centered layout, it took me a while to get up and running because I had to learn some things. That, of course, led to some experimentation with DNS, etc. You’ll see.

GitHub Pages ¶

As I eluded in its introductory post, Camel wasn’t going to suit me for my dental website. I asked Casey Liss if he had any recommendations, and he pointed me to GitHub Pages—a service I knew nothing about before the conversation with Casey.

When I finally dove into GitHub Pages, it all went pretty smoothly.

The instructions provided by GitHub couldn’t be any plainer:

1. Create an account on GitHub (if you don’t already have one)

   (I’m @toniwonkanobi on GitHub.)

2. Create a new repository for the webpage you want to create

   (The repository for my professional website is located here: https://github.com/ToniWonKanobi/anthonycraigdds)

3. In this new repository, create a new branch (distinct from the master branch) called gh-pages

   (GitHub also recommends setting the gh-pages branch as the default branch)

4. Create file called index.html (which would serve as the homepage for the site) and commit the change

After that, the project page is available at http://username.github.io/repository, or, for me: http://toniwonkanobi.github.io/anthonycraigdds/

So, for exactly $0/month, I had a blank slate for which to build my website 👌🏿

DNSimple ¶

Now, I don’t know about you, but the username.github.io subdomain-y stuff wasn’t really what I was going for with my dental website.

Imagine this scenario:

Hello, potential patient I just recently met in a non-dental setting.

Oh, you’d like some contact information?

Sure, just head on over to toniwonkanobi dot github dot eye ohh.

Oh, you don’t know how to spell that?

Oh, okay. Sorry about that.

It’s just TEE, OH, EHN, EYE, DOUBLE-EW—

Oh, you think that’s a super long and hard-to-remember URL?

Oh, okay. Sorry about that.

…

Oh—sure I know the addresses to several nearby dentists whose URL is easier to speak and remember.

All kidding aside, I would never dream of putting that URL under my name.

I purchased anthonycraigdds.com a while ago, and I always intended on using that domain for my dental website. So that’s what I did.

Hover has been my domain registrar for a while now, and I’ve been plenty happy with them.^[1] The interface isn’t terribly difficult to navigate, and their customer service is quite great. Whenever I’ve had a problem, I launch the chat window, and moments later, someone smarter than me is just a few keystrokes away.

However, one thing I’ve been wanting since I left Squarespace is a website without the www.

So, when my users navigate to

http://www.anthonycraigdds.com

I wish it would direct to

http://anthonycraigdds.com

The problem is that the type of DNS record that enables this nifty modern web preference—ALIAS or ANAME—is not a record that Hover has implemented.

I looked into this seriously a few weeks ago, but gave up when I realized that Hover couldn’t do what I wanted.

Then, a few days ago, I read a blog post by Manton Reece, in which he mentioned DNSimple:

Feels like years in the making, but I’ve finally moved all my domain names to a single provider: DNSimple.

So, I checked them out. And guess what? DNSimple supports ALIAS and ANAME records!

Goodbye www.

SSL ¶

I went as far as purchasing an SSL certificate from DNSimple, only to realize that GitHub Pages does not support the https protocol for custom domains.^[2]

So, as long as my dental site is hosted on GitHub Pages, it’ll be http for me.

Design ¶

If you haven’t yet visited http://anthonycraigdds.com, go ahead and do so now.

Notice anything?

It’s hard to miss.

I’m sure you know what I’m talking about: my professional site is completely monotone. You know, a lot of grays, some darker grays, etc.

<fullstop>

In actuality, my dental website somehow became what is likely to be the most colorful website I will ever build.

My original concept was basically the current layout, but with a bunch of blue shades.

But then I realized I should step out of my comfort zone and do something different.

Dentistry ¶

I wanted my website to be more than just a contact page—I wanted my website to embody my ethos as a dental professional.

Just as much as the next dentist, I thoroughly enjoy clean preparations and generally a job well done. That said, I could never touch a tooth again and die a happy man.

I don’t really care about working on people’s teeth.

Part of that is because it’s really not rocket science. There are millions of dollars pumped into the dental research industry every year, all with the same goal: invent something new that makes patients and dentists happier. But here’s the thing: despite the research endeavors, dentistry is basically the same as it has been for the past 50 years. Sure, there are breakthroughs like implants and CAD/CAM, but really, it’s the essentially the same story:

1. Patient has messed up teeth because of laziness and/or lack of education, environmental, genetic problems, etc.
2. Patient may or may not have pain/concern related to dental problems
3. Dentist examines tooth issues, informs patient of options, and both decide on a treatment plan based on patient’s level of concern
4. Dentist removes grunge-y tooth structure and replaces it with plastic or metal or zirconia or ceramic glass or titanium or acrylic
5. Patient leaves office
6. Some amount of time later, patient returns, and
7. Go back to Step 1.
8. And so, and so forth.

It’s all the same.

Because so much of dentistry is old hat, it can be boring and/or tiresome if one only focuses on teeth.

That’s why my fulfillment as a dentist comes from patient interactions, instead.

The teeth are easy. Learning about the patients preference in cars, or about their job, or their family, or their favorite movie—that’s way better than fixing their teeth.

ROYGBIV ¶

I’m not just Dr. Anthony Craig. I’m a dentist who cares about the person behind the teeth.

And I’m a nerd.

Ask any of my patients (or co-workers). They’d know it to be true (if they searched their feelings).

Therefore, ROYGBIV.

Or, if it’s been a while:

Red
Orange
Yellow
Green
Blue
Indigo
Violet

These are the colors generally regarded as comprising the visible light portion of the electromagnetic spectrum.

What better way to project pure nerdome than that!?

I applied each color of ROYGBIV to a different horizontal section of my layout. After doing that, I toned-down the colors by converting to RGBA and setting the alpha channel to around 50%.

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So, have some fun exploring my simple new site. On desktop browsers, hover around some of the hyperlinks and see what pops up.

Oh, and if you need some dental help, come see me.