Customize Your Anthology

This documentation is for anthology leads. For programmers and designers who are interested in the technical aspects of anthology customization, see Chapter 22. Programming.

Rationale

All LEMDO anthology websites inherit our functionality and style. Although your anthology website would be fully functional without any style customization, most anthology leads choose to make some modifications so that their anthology has a unique look and feel. Depending on the extent to which you want to customize your anthology site, you may need to hire a programmer and/or a web designer to support you.
This documentation will outline what you may modify for your anthology site, the principles that should guide your customizations, and information about when and how to hire a programmer or web designer.

What You Can Customize

All anthologies will customize:
Their logo.
Their favicon (the tiny image that appears beside the Web page name in browser tabs).
The number and names of items in the top navigation bar of their website (e.g., QME has About | Performance Editions | Production Records | Contexts in its top navigation bar, while MoMS has Preface | Introduction | Editions | Resources | Credits).
The drop-down menus under each top navigation item.
The credits and links in their website’s footer.
Additionally, some anthologies choose to customize:
The appearance of their banner/header.
The appearance of their top navigation bar.
Their colour palette.
The appearance of their footer.
The appearance of their side panels (i.e., the hamburger menu, the metadata pane, and the annotation/collation pane).
The font(s) that they use.
The splash image on their home page.
If you want to customize something not on this list such as adding extra interactions or functionalities, you must first consult with the LEMDO Project Director.

Principles for Customizing Your Anthology

All anthology customizations must follow LEMDO’s standards for Endings-compliance, accessibility, and overall functionality. In order to do that, your anthology must:
Customize using only HTML, Cascading Style Sheets (CSS), and JavaScript (JS).
Ensure that the top navigation bar and contents of the page are navigable by keyboard.
Ensure that colours have good contrast.
Not remove any functionality that comes with standard LEMDO anthology websites.

When and How to Hire a Developer

Most anthologies need to work with a developer to customize their functionality and appearance. The only cases where you do not need to work with a developer are if:
You are customizing only your logo, favicon, and navigation bar and you know basic HTML and CSS.
You meet all of the technical and competency requirements for LEMDO anthology developers and you have the time to devote to customizing your anthology’s appearance.
If you are not in either of those scenarios, then you should set aside funds to either hire a developer or work with a LEMDO developer.
We have developed a list of technical and competency requirements that you can use to create a job advertisement. All anthology developers must:
Know HTML and CSS/SCSS.
Have a computer that is able to run the required software. Practically speaking, this means they must use either a Linux or Mac operating system (Windows is not able to run required scripts).
Be willing and able to install and work with the software outlined in Software to be Installed Locally.
Like anyone working in the LEMDO repository, they will also need to install a Subversion client and check out the shared LEMDO repository.
If you want to customize your anthology’s functionalities as well as its style, your developer will also need to know JavaScript (JS).
If you want the LEMDO Director to look at the resumes of your top candidates, please ask. Your developer will have to work closely with the LEMDO Team, so we have a shared interest in hiring the right person.
Once you have hired someone, introduce them to the LEMDO team via email and let us know that this person has your permission to make changes to files in your anthology. We will help them apply for a UVic NetLink ID, point them to technical documentation written specifically for developers, and grant them permission to make changes to the required directories. Note that LEMDO will not grant that permission without your explicit instructions to do so.
You may also want to hire a graphic designer to make your logo, favicon, and banner, as well as pick your colour palette.

Decisions To Make Before Hiring A Developer

Before you hire your developer, you should have answers to the following questions ready:
What top-level menus do you want in your top navigation bar? Every anthology should have an About menu. Most will want to have an item for Plays. Look at other anthologies and other scholarly websites for examples.
What items do you want to appear under each top-level menu? For example, an About menu will probably have items like Team, Credits, Editorial Guidelines, and Contact Us. Each of these items will correspond to a page in your anthology. Think carefully about how you want to organize the information and resources in your anthology.
What would you like your logo to look like?
What would you like to see at the top of your page as a banner? Text? A picture? Both? A plain or textured colour?
What is the colour scheme of your anthology? If you do not have an idea yet, you might gather up some typical images from the period and from your project.

Prosopography

Janelle Jenstad

Janelle Jenstad is a Professor of English at the University of Victoria, Director of The Map of Early Modern London, and Director of Linked Early Modern Drama Online. With Jennifer Roberts-Smith and Mark Kaethler, she co-edited Shakespeare’s Language in Digital Media: Old Words, New Tools (Routledge). She has edited John Stow’s A Survey of London (1598 text) for MoEML and is currently editing The Merchant of Venice (with Stephen Wittek) and Heywood’s 2 If You Know Not Me You Know Nobody for DRE. Her articles have appeared in Digital Humanities Quarterly, Elizabethan Theatre, Early Modern Literary Studies, Shakespeare Bulletin, Renaissance and Reformation, and The Journal of Medieval and Early Modern Studies. She contributed chapters to Approaches to Teaching Othello (MLA); Teaching Early Modern Literature from the Archives (MLA); Institutional Culture in Early Modern England (Brill); Shakespeare, Language, and the Stage (Arden); Performing Maternity in Early Modern England (Ashgate); New Directions in the Geohumanities (Routledge); Early Modern Studies and the Digital Turn (Iter); Placing Names: Enriching and Integrating Gazetteers (Indiana); Making Things and Drawing Boundaries (Minnesota); Rethinking Shakespeare Source Study: Audiences, Authors, and Digital Technologies (Routledge); and Civic Performance: Pageantry and Entertainments in Early Modern London (Routledge). For more details, see janellejenstad.com.

Joey Takeda

Joey Takeda is LEMDO’s Consulting Programmer and Designer, a role he assumed in 2020 after three years as the Lead Developer on LEMDO.

Mahayla Galliford

Project manager, 2025-present; research assistant, 2021-present. Mahayla Galliford (she/her) graduated with a BA (Hons with distinction) from the University of Victoria in 2024. Mahayla’s undergraduate research explored early modern stage directions and civic water pageantry. Mahayla continues her studies through UVic’s English MA program and her SSHRC-funded thesis project focuses on editing and encoding girls’ manuscripts, specifically Lady Rachel Fane’s dramatic entertainments, in collaboration with LEMDO.

Martin Holmes

Martin Holmes has worked as a developer in the UVic’s Humanities Computing and Media Centre for over two decades, and has been involved with dozens of Digital Humanities projects. He has served on the TEI Technical Council and as Managing Editor of the Journal of the TEI. He took over from Joey Takeda as lead developer on LEMDO in 2020. He is a collaborator on the SSHRC Partnership Grant led by Janelle Jenstad.

Navarra Houldin

Training and Documentation Lead 2025–present. LEMDO project manager 2022–2025. Textual remediator 2021–present. Navarra Houldin (they/them) completed their BA with a major in history and minor in Spanish at the University of Victoria in 2022. Their primary research was on gender and sexuality in early modern Europe and Latin America. They are continuing their education through an MA program in Gender and Social Justice Studies at the University of Alberta where they will specialize in Digital Humanities.

Sofia Spiteri

Sofia Spiteri is currently completing her Bachelor of Arts in History at the University of Victoria. During the summer of 2023, she had the opportunity to work with LEMDO as a recipient of the Valerie Kuehne Undergraduate Research Award (VKURA). Her work with LEMDO primarily includes semi-diplomatic transcriptions for The Winter’s Tale and Mucedorus.

Tracey El Hajj

Junior Programmer 2019–2020. Research Associate 2020–2021. Tracey received her PhD from the Department of English at the University of Victoria in the field of Science and Technology Studies. Her research focuses on the algorhythmics of networked communications. She was a 2019–2020 President’s Fellow in Research-Enriched Teaching at UVic, where she taught an advanced course on Artificial Intelligence and Everyday Life. Tracey was also a member of the Map of Early Modern London team, between 2018 and 2021. Between 2020 and 2021, she was a fellow in residence at the Praxis Studio for Comparative Media Studies, where she investigated the relationships between artificial intelligence, creativity, health, and justice. As of July 2021, Tracey has moved into the alt-ac world for a term position, while also teaching in the English Department at the University of Victoria.

Orgography

LEMDO Team (LEMD1)

The LEMDO Team is based at the University of Victoria and normally comprises the project director, the lead developer, project manager, junior developers(s), remediators, encoders, and remediating editors.

Metadata