maweb.co.uk is a family-run freelance website design, web programming and database development business based in Kington, rural Herefordshire. The business, which is a partnership between husband and wife team Malcolm and Yin-Fun Allaway, was set up in 2005 to give us the freedom to use our skills on a variety of projects with a number of different organisations.
Malcolm Allaway, MSc, has been developing computerised systems since he started working on pioneering databases in the mid-1980s. He took his database experience into the world-wide-web in the 1990s, starting with programming HTML websites and progressing via perl to master the intricacies of PHP / mySQL driven sites. Whilst he is able to create the layout for a website, he feels his skills lay in the programming and development sides and leaves most of the website design work to Yin-Fun. To consolidate and update his knowledge, he studied for a Post Graduate Diploma in Computing taking it through to a Master of Science Degree in computing with a focus on Effective Internet Presence for Business.
His expertise is based on formal, university delivered, Post Graduate training in the following:
Malcolm has held senior management positions with a number of organisations including technical management in a radio station, general management of a medium sized business and website manager for a large international charity. He brings this experience into helping businesses and charities develop a website that reflects the needs of the organisation. Having worked on database development with the Royal National College for the Blind, Malcolm pays extra attention to trying to make all websites as accessible as possible to all members of society. He also strives to make web pages as usable as possible and by looking at pages from the user perspective and thoroughly testing pages before they go "live".
Malcolm has spent much of his life in a multi-lingual environment and has developed a number of multi-language computer systems. This experience was a great asset when he spent three years overseeing the development and launch of an English / Spanish / French website for an international charity with offices in more than 130 nations.
Yin-Fun Allaway is married to Malcolm and is a partner in the business. She learnt graphic design the "hard way" back in the days of rubber cement and razor blades! Yin-Fun is our resident website designer and is actively involved in preparing graphics for most of the sites Malcolm programmes and does much of the layout design work for these sites (plus the occasional flyer and book cover). She has a good understanding of what works on fast-loading, accessible and usable web pages and manages to produce effective page designs within this framework and puts her eye to good use in checking the integrity of the layout of each site.
As an active web user, Yin-Fun tests every site before the project is signed off. This helps to ensure that our websites work as they should and are virtually error free. She takes the lead in identifying potential clients and is always looking to expand the portfolio.
Yin-Fun is an AAT qualified accounts technician and oversees the administrative side of the business, ensuring, amongst other things that you, the customer, are not charged too much for the work we do!