Liberate Your Website (part 1)
I've come to realize that people aren't "getting it" when I tell them that my websites are "easy to edit" so I've created a movie (6 minutes 10 seconds) to demo it.
It isn't one of those build-your-website applications you always see on the web -- those force you to do all the dirty work and BOY can you break the website, create some hideous Frankenstein-monster website contraption that frightens away clients.
No, that's not at all what this is.
You can't really break the website when you use this application. Maybe you can make some poor content design choices, such as making all your content text bold, or italic, so that you have no means left with which to emphasize a word. Maybe you can type in all caps, make everything on the page a headline, etc. But you aren't playing with the design, only the content, of your website, and changing styles and colors is not an accident.
So, take a look at the demo and see how this is a simple CONTENT management system, and don't frighten your clients away anymore! In the demo movie -- which is only 6 minutes! -- I play with several real live websites, so you can see how easy it is to edit your own content. In 6 minutes I could hardly explain to a web designer what I want them to change on a website; I'd rather do it through the Easy-to-Edit system. That's why all my websites are using this system: in spite of being a web designer, I want to have a quick and easy way to add and edit website content on my sites.
Showing posts with label MetaSite. Show all posts
Showing posts with label MetaSite. Show all posts
Monday, March 5, 2007
Thursday, January 25, 2007
E.T. Client & Portfolio update
Preamble: I have decided I don't like Gallery2 as my portfolio application. I'm going to be working on moving back to PmWiki for my portfolio in the future -- so my latest work is not in my portfolio.
I re-created the Business Exchange Network's website in December, 2006. The old site may still be available. This is a template rather than custom design, however I custom programmed several features for the site, then donated the instructions on how to do it for other sites back at the application project site. This site incorporates a calendar, member business directory, and each member has a profile page that acts as a mini-website for them. Since a few people in the group don't have websites, this gives them a real place on the web to call home until they decide whether they want a website.
I helped out at KwicTax, LLC - programming a form on the site, adding required fields, and generally making the form and subsequent information revealed after filling out the form behave properly.
An ongoing client is up to her usual beautiful designs - Apryl of Silverflux Design has been outsourcing programming and general geekery and software installations to Eclectic Tech. This week we finished working on the Serendipity bead store website in Canada. My handiwork is the calendar and newsletter subscription integration.
Almost completed: Beth Ward of Jaidens Jewels has requested a website redesign and shopping cart. This work is in progress and if you'd like to see it before it's finished, feel free to email me.
Almost completed: Chris Zino of Zino Technical Services in Bayville, NY has requested a website design and wiki application -- he's absolutely thrilled to be using a wiki and is already creating pages on the site, and I haven't even gotten around to training him yet! :) At the time of the writing, we're still hashing out the logo for his business, and once the logo is decided we may well be changing the colors on the site, but the site is up, works, he's in business, and his contact info is there if anyone needs home audio installations, networking installation or repair, computer service, or a dozen other techie services on Long Island (Nassau & Suffolk Counties), he's your guy!
New Client: I'm under contract for the redesign and reworking of Orange Environment's website. I've started working, but there's nothing to show yet. Orange Environment is a non-profit that has been working to save the open spaces of Orange County, NY for 25 years. This is their 25th Anniversary website overhaul, and this year they'll be holding an Earth Day celebration on April 21st. Location(s) TBA. If you see my company name at the bottom of the site, then I've made progress enough to go live on my work. Until then, if you want to see the development site-in-progress, feel free to email me.
New Client: My newest client is Middletown Community Health Center (MCHC) who has requested a modernization and more features for their website. Again, if my company name is not at the bottom of the page, you're looking at their old site. Ask me for a URL for their development site-in-progress. As of the time of writing, I haven't gotten that far yet :) but work should begin shortly.
[tags]clients,activism,design,e-commerce,environment,green,holistic,identity,logo,metasite,new client,new site,non-profit,portfolio,programming[/tags]
I re-created the Business Exchange Network's website in December, 2006. The old site may still be available. This is a template rather than custom design, however I custom programmed several features for the site, then donated the instructions on how to do it for other sites back at the application project site. This site incorporates a calendar, member business directory, and each member has a profile page that acts as a mini-website for them. Since a few people in the group don't have websites, this gives them a real place on the web to call home until they decide whether they want a website.
I helped out at KwicTax, LLC - programming a form on the site, adding required fields, and generally making the form and subsequent information revealed after filling out the form behave properly.
An ongoing client is up to her usual beautiful designs - Apryl of Silverflux Design has been outsourcing programming and general geekery and software installations to Eclectic Tech. This week we finished working on the Serendipity bead store website in Canada. My handiwork is the calendar and newsletter subscription integration.
In-progress Sites
Almost completed: Beth Ward of Jaidens Jewels has requested a website redesign and shopping cart. This work is in progress and if you'd like to see it before it's finished, feel free to email me.
Almost completed: Chris Zino of Zino Technical Services in Bayville, NY has requested a website design and wiki application -- he's absolutely thrilled to be using a wiki and is already creating pages on the site, and I haven't even gotten around to training him yet! :) At the time of the writing, we're still hashing out the logo for his business, and once the logo is decided we may well be changing the colors on the site, but the site is up, works, he's in business, and his contact info is there if anyone needs home audio installations, networking installation or repair, computer service, or a dozen other techie services on Long Island (Nassau & Suffolk Counties), he's your guy!
New Client: I'm under contract for the redesign and reworking of Orange Environment's website. I've started working, but there's nothing to show yet. Orange Environment is a non-profit that has been working to save the open spaces of Orange County, NY for 25 years. This is their 25th Anniversary website overhaul, and this year they'll be holding an Earth Day celebration on April 21st. Location(s) TBA. If you see my company name at the bottom of the site, then I've made progress enough to go live on my work. Until then, if you want to see the development site-in-progress, feel free to email me.
New Client: My newest client is Middletown Community Health Center (MCHC) who has requested a modernization and more features for their website. Again, if my company name is not at the bottom of the page, you're looking at their old site. Ask me for a URL for their development site-in-progress. As of the time of writing, I haven't gotten that far yet :) but work should begin shortly.
[tags]clients,activism,design,e-commerce,environment,green,holistic,identity,logo,metasite,new client,new site,non-profit,portfolio,programming[/tags]
Friday, September 22, 2006
Shopping Cart Showdown
Here's the deal.
I need a shopping cart for a client. I have basic functionality the shopping cart MUST have. Not necessarily because the client demanded them but because I'm forming a hairbrained notion that these are some type of milestone or rite of passage for shopping carts.
1) coupons & discounts -- there's nothing like putting a coupon with your ad or on an invoice. Even better, giving out coupon codes in your newsletters. Make sure they're paying attention! Many carts don't seem to have this. The granddaddy of shopping carts in the open-source world requires being broken TWICE to have coupons ("easy discounts" and "easy coupons" must be added to oscommerce aka OSC to get coupons). Bonus points for coupon support out-of-the-box.
QuickCart & Viart Free have coupons out-of-the-box according to shopping-cart-reviews.com.
2) a template system with under 50 files. OSC fails this test, requiring nearly EVERY file to be changed to consistently alter the HTML appearance features of the website. ZenCart has 95 template files not counting those for the admin panel. Viart Free has 115 template files.
Winner: QuickCart (loaded version) comes in at under 38 -- note "page.tpl" is the "main page" of the site. Other template pages MAY NOT NEED TO BE ALTERED! I haven't figured that out conclusively. But they're not using something standardized like Smarty so you need some PHP savvy to plow through them.
3) separation -- real separation -- of logic and design. ZenCart is OK on this one. OSC fails miserably. Viart Free comes out on top -- using Smarty templating! WOOT! However note the loss on #2, coming in at 95 template files. Shame on them! Smarty is much MUCH smarter than that!
Viart Free, as I mentioned, uses Smarty, and has a standard "header" "footer". In spite of 115 files, using Smarty would probably make it a pleasure. I'm upset that there's no standard "right-sidebar" type formats, but that can easily be added to header/footer files so I'm happy enough.
QuickCart also seems to have real separation of logic vs design, so it's the 2nd runner up for not using a standard templating system like Smarty.
4) real-world examples that show off the system's flexibility for customization & style.
This is a tough cookie because people are generally lazy. I looked 3 times at http://www.mals-e.com/home.php because it had some of the better shopping cart examples I'd seen. Custom buttons, horizontal instead of vertical cart display, entirely different layouts. Turns out this is a free hosted service, you don't install the software, you do have to muck around in your website's HTML, but it's really a service that handles the customer's orders off your site. It allows a lot of flexibility, and he's hoping you make so many sales that you want the advanced site features, which are not make-or-break deals. I don't see coupon/discount code entry, so Mal's service fails #1, but it wins on 2 & 3. How much more separate from the logic can you be?
Viart has an odd quantity feature that involves a drop-down, but that's probably fixable. It requires clicking a JavaScript pop-up to confirm putting something into your shopping basket, which is awkward. These are awkward, but livable issues, but all the sites I looked at had these issues so no one bothered fixing them.
QuickCart -- they don't have that many sites in English, and they have SO MANY in other languages, I needed to narrow the playing field. So of the English sites, I saw minor promising variants in the cart design itself -- something near impossible to do in OSC -- as well as at least one site where the overall design was beautifully done very differently from the others. The cart behaved the way I would want a cart to behave. At least one site had web sites up for sale, with a number of options for ordering, which is something I may be doing myself.
5) No restrictions.
Viart Free fails here. Limited to 50 products. It requires a Zend optimizer installation. But it does install on GoDaddy. However, this is not terribly expensive to upgrade at $119, if you go over 10 categories/50 products.
In any case, the winner system from looking at the websites is Mal's service -- but if I eliminate the one host I bumped into during my search for something better, QuickCart did better than Viart.
The winning system today: QuickCart. Several hundred shops are listed, though some are spammers or the domains are now invalid. One problem is that I've not seen very strongly customized category views, and that's an area I'll need to customize. If you expect to have a very small cart, don't forget to check out Viart Free. Notable mention for money: SquirrelCart -- at about $70 it looks like a good bang for the buck -- but I can't say how it does amongst all the criteria mentioned here, since I couldn't evaluate it.
Note that many carts were eliminated from the contest for a variety of reasons. #1 price. #2 bad reviews out of the starting box (such as VirtueMart/Joomla! which has been repeatedly reported as having the shittiest support forum, being overly complex, etc. If I want that shit, I'll go back to OSC).
Ok, so next I'll be working with QuickCart and I'll let people know how it goes.
[tags]e-commerce, programming, reviews, design, competition, custom programming, education, metasite, usability, web applications[/tags]
I need a shopping cart for a client. I have basic functionality the shopping cart MUST have. Not necessarily because the client demanded them but because I'm forming a hairbrained notion that these are some type of milestone or rite of passage for shopping carts.
1) coupons & discounts -- there's nothing like putting a coupon with your ad or on an invoice. Even better, giving out coupon codes in your newsletters. Make sure they're paying attention! Many carts don't seem to have this. The granddaddy of shopping carts in the open-source world requires being broken TWICE to have coupons ("easy discounts" and "easy coupons" must be added to oscommerce aka OSC to get coupons). Bonus points for coupon support out-of-the-box.
QuickCart & Viart Free have coupons out-of-the-box according to shopping-cart-reviews.com.
2) a template system with under 50 files. OSC fails this test, requiring nearly EVERY file to be changed to consistently alter the HTML appearance features of the website. ZenCart has 95 template files not counting those for the admin panel. Viart Free has 115 template files.
Winner: QuickCart (loaded version) comes in at under 38 -- note "page.tpl" is the "main page" of the site. Other template pages MAY NOT NEED TO BE ALTERED! I haven't figured that out conclusively. But they're not using something standardized like Smarty so you need some PHP savvy to plow through them.
3) separation -- real separation -- of logic and design. ZenCart is OK on this one. OSC fails miserably. Viart Free comes out on top -- using Smarty templating! WOOT! However note the loss on #2, coming in at 95 template files. Shame on them! Smarty is much MUCH smarter than that!
Viart Free, as I mentioned, uses Smarty, and has a standard "header" "footer". In spite of 115 files, using Smarty would probably make it a pleasure. I'm upset that there's no standard "right-sidebar" type formats, but that can easily be added to header/footer files so I'm happy enough.
QuickCart also seems to have real separation of logic vs design, so it's the 2nd runner up for not using a standard templating system like Smarty.
4) real-world examples that show off the system's flexibility for customization & style.
This is a tough cookie because people are generally lazy. I looked 3 times at http://www.mals-e.com/home.php because it had some of the better shopping cart examples I'd seen. Custom buttons, horizontal instead of vertical cart display, entirely different layouts. Turns out this is a free hosted service, you don't install the software, you do have to muck around in your website's HTML, but it's really a service that handles the customer's orders off your site. It allows a lot of flexibility, and he's hoping you make so many sales that you want the advanced site features, which are not make-or-break deals. I don't see coupon/discount code entry, so Mal's service fails #1, but it wins on 2 & 3. How much more separate from the logic can you be?
Viart has an odd quantity feature that involves a drop-down, but that's probably fixable. It requires clicking a JavaScript pop-up to confirm putting something into your shopping basket, which is awkward. These are awkward, but livable issues, but all the sites I looked at had these issues so no one bothered fixing them.
QuickCart -- they don't have that many sites in English, and they have SO MANY in other languages, I needed to narrow the playing field. So of the English sites, I saw minor promising variants in the cart design itself -- something near impossible to do in OSC -- as well as at least one site where the overall design was beautifully done very differently from the others. The cart behaved the way I would want a cart to behave. At least one site had web sites up for sale, with a number of options for ordering, which is something I may be doing myself.
5) No restrictions.
Viart Free fails here. Limited to 50 products. It requires a Zend optimizer installation. But it does install on GoDaddy. However, this is not terribly expensive to upgrade at $119, if you go over 10 categories/50 products.
In any case, the winner system from looking at the websites is Mal's service -- but if I eliminate the one host I bumped into during my search for something better, QuickCart did better than Viart.
The winning system today: QuickCart. Several hundred shops are listed, though some are spammers or the domains are now invalid. One problem is that I've not seen very strongly customized category views, and that's an area I'll need to customize. If you expect to have a very small cart, don't forget to check out Viart Free. Notable mention for money: SquirrelCart -- at about $70 it looks like a good bang for the buck -- but I can't say how it does amongst all the criteria mentioned here, since I couldn't evaluate it.
Note that many carts were eliminated from the contest for a variety of reasons. #1 price. #2 bad reviews out of the starting box (such as VirtueMart/Joomla! which has been repeatedly reported as having the shittiest support forum, being overly complex, etc. If I want that shit, I'll go back to OSC).
Ok, so next I'll be working with QuickCart and I'll let people know how it goes.
[tags]e-commerce, programming, reviews, design, competition, custom programming, education, metasite, usability, web applications[/tags]
Wednesday, July 12, 2006
Storms
There was a sudden loud knocking at the kitchen door. I rushed over to answer. A FedEx man handed me a box I wasn't really expecting, delivering my fixed LaCie backup drive. I thanked him and signed for it, only barely noticing the thick pallor that enshrouded the land and the smell that said the air was thick with moisture.
I tore open the box in haste, gloating over LaCie having entirely replaced my drive -- I hadn't had to return the power cords or gadgets with the drive for repair, and now I had duplicates for everything. With no emotion but relief for a minor ordeal being tidied up, I plunked the new drive down on a cluttered wire shelf next to my crochet work and back-up CDs, and sat in my seat, ready to check email and RSS feeds -- my day of working-as-usual.
There was a large boom, somewhere nearby, and entirely out of the blue. Could that be thunder? I had gotten no storm warnings in my RSS feeds from the National Weather Service, but that gloom outside wafted back to my consciousness -- it certainly COULD be thunder. A louder crackle-boom, far too close with no distant warnings. My hand automatically reached out and yanked the power cord from my laptop, and my other hand reached out for my desktop mouse -- time to Shut Down.
Doorstop, my moody desktop, doesn't shut down properly. In spite of a recent re-install. I've replaced every component in the case except for the video card and motherboard, and it absolutely refuses to shut down properly. I even have the boot-up and shut-down in "verbose" mode, so I can read all the system messages on the screen to see if I can figure out what's wrong. The machine spits "continuing" onto the screen then waits for what seems like forever. I push the moody power switch and wait for the machine to shut off.
Cable goes out. It's enough of a problem to be so dependent on my laptop battery -- now I have no Internet. It's definitely not a good sign. Chris, my partner, starts unplugging equipment wholesale, so I reach down, yank Doorstop out of the way, and grope blindly behind my desk, pulling the two plugs from the wall socket, saving Doorstop and my servers.
With a shrug, I grab my crochet work and move to a more comfortable chair.
What ensued was a violent (and sudden) thunderstorm in our area. We lost power for about a half hour. I can't say if we would have gotten a surge sufficient to take our computers out, but I've witnessed lightning strikes that have done extensive damage throughout home networks, taking out every ethernet card on the network, and any motherboard with built-in ethernet. Note that all my Macs have built-in ethernet. In other words, a power strike could kill my computers. A power strike on my cable line through to my ethernet network will kill my computers absolutely dead with no hope of return. My laptop is joyfully wireless, so it's not under that risk.
It took at least an hour for our Internet to come back up. I got a lot of crochet work done.
Last winter, we had a storm that took out our power for almost 24 hours, starting on a Friday.
In the case of power loss, I have no Internet connection and about 1-3 hours of laptop battery before I can't work at all anymore. Hopefully people can understand this problem. It's not like I live in the boondocks, either; I'm on the edge of Middletown, a pretty sizable city. Regardless of power loss, I need to take my computers offline, and work solely off my laptop, for the duration of any electrical storms. Any backup battery is insufficient to protect my computers from a direct electrical hit on the (overhead) power lines, and my laptop isn't on the backup battery, since it technically doesn't NEED a backup battery.
Not every admin is this paranoid, but then again not every admin has seen the effect of direct hits the way I have.
These storms will affect my ability to work. I pad my deadlines partially because of problems like these, but should power go out, I may have to move my deadlines, with profuse apologies.
I can crochet you a hat to make up for it though! Just ask! :)
I tore open the box in haste, gloating over LaCie having entirely replaced my drive -- I hadn't had to return the power cords or gadgets with the drive for repair, and now I had duplicates for everything. With no emotion but relief for a minor ordeal being tidied up, I plunked the new drive down on a cluttered wire shelf next to my crochet work and back-up CDs, and sat in my seat, ready to check email and RSS feeds -- my day of working-as-usual.
There was a large boom, somewhere nearby, and entirely out of the blue. Could that be thunder? I had gotten no storm warnings in my RSS feeds from the National Weather Service, but that gloom outside wafted back to my consciousness -- it certainly COULD be thunder. A louder crackle-boom, far too close with no distant warnings. My hand automatically reached out and yanked the power cord from my laptop, and my other hand reached out for my desktop mouse -- time to Shut Down.
Doorstop, my moody desktop, doesn't shut down properly. In spite of a recent re-install. I've replaced every component in the case except for the video card and motherboard, and it absolutely refuses to shut down properly. I even have the boot-up and shut-down in "verbose" mode, so I can read all the system messages on the screen to see if I can figure out what's wrong. The machine spits "continuing" onto the screen then waits for what seems like forever. I push the moody power switch and wait for the machine to shut off.
Cable goes out. It's enough of a problem to be so dependent on my laptop battery -- now I have no Internet. It's definitely not a good sign. Chris, my partner, starts unplugging equipment wholesale, so I reach down, yank Doorstop out of the way, and grope blindly behind my desk, pulling the two plugs from the wall socket, saving Doorstop and my servers.
With a shrug, I grab my crochet work and move to a more comfortable chair.
What ensued was a violent (and sudden) thunderstorm in our area. We lost power for about a half hour. I can't say if we would have gotten a surge sufficient to take our computers out, but I've witnessed lightning strikes that have done extensive damage throughout home networks, taking out every ethernet card on the network, and any motherboard with built-in ethernet. Note that all my Macs have built-in ethernet. In other words, a power strike could kill my computers. A power strike on my cable line through to my ethernet network will kill my computers absolutely dead with no hope of return. My laptop is joyfully wireless, so it's not under that risk.
It took at least an hour for our Internet to come back up. I got a lot of crochet work done.
Last winter, we had a storm that took out our power for almost 24 hours, starting on a Friday.
In the case of power loss, I have no Internet connection and about 1-3 hours of laptop battery before I can't work at all anymore. Hopefully people can understand this problem. It's not like I live in the boondocks, either; I'm on the edge of Middletown, a pretty sizable city. Regardless of power loss, I need to take my computers offline, and work solely off my laptop, for the duration of any electrical storms. Any backup battery is insufficient to protect my computers from a direct electrical hit on the (overhead) power lines, and my laptop isn't on the backup battery, since it technically doesn't NEED a backup battery.
Not every admin is this paranoid, but then again not every admin has seen the effect of direct hits the way I have.
These storms will affect my ability to work. I pad my deadlines partially because of problems like these, but should power go out, I may have to move my deadlines, with profuse apologies.
I can crochet you a hat to make up for it though! Just ask! :)
Tuesday, June 20, 2006
New Portfolio launched
Ok, I give. Not everyone wants to have to dig around to see the cool stuff. The Portfolio link takes you directly to a gallery, where you can page through all the artwork. But you aren't totally spared my verbosity. Each detail page may have a blurb.
In the item detail pages, there are links back to the old portfolio pages, where there are case studies for those of you who still care about my babble. So it's the best of both worlds. Everyone can pretend to be illiterate and look only at pictures (like coloring books, ya kno?) and click around playfully, etc. Those who prefer snuggling in bed with a nice book and some warm cocoa can click through to the juicy ramblings and corporate scandals. Can you beat it?
Good luck!
[tags]portfolio, new site, design[/tags]
In the item detail pages, there are links back to the old portfolio pages, where there are case studies for those of you who still care about my babble. So it's the best of both worlds. Everyone can pretend to be illiterate and look only at pictures (like coloring books, ya kno?) and click around playfully, etc. Those who prefer snuggling in bed with a nice book and some warm cocoa can click through to the juicy ramblings and corporate scandals. Can you beat it?
Good luck!
[tags]portfolio, new site, design[/tags]
Sunday, June 11, 2006
CMS Disappointment
I have been trying to work out the features and the back-end program to run Holistic - Hudson Valley.
As I would do for any client, I wrote up a sheet of the major features I required. I checked 3 CMS packages that are free/open source, and that I have confidence that they have a large number of add-ons and a strong community: Drupal, Joomla! and Xoops.
I've used Xoops, and I liked it A LOT.
I've used Drupal, but when looking for plug-ins that would give the package the features I was looking for it fell short.
I researched packages for Joomla, and except for true single-sign-on integration with Moodle, it came up with the most promising feature availability. I saw that a couple of the components would cost money. The amount wasn't enough to hamper me, so I dove in. I started working on it, decided to opt for my first purchase of a module, which was more than the original price I thought I would be spending on the feature ($99). I bought it. It's one of those no-money-back things. Then I saw that Joomla! did not include the fine group permissions that I had come to expect from using Xoops.
My first barricade was that the new $99 module only works with a certain release of Joomla! -- that was OK because I'd downloaded two versions of Joomla. I installed the correct one, got it working, fed it the database info, and everything was happy. Or so I thought. I could now install the somewhat expensive module (the other modules were cheaper).
Joomla! comes with a pre-created set of a few user group types. And no way to customize them, unless you want to buy someone's hack. I have a list of about 8 module features I need installed. The group modification hack gives no easy indication of which other modules it plays nice with -- you need to pour through the forums. Maybe they've created patches for it to work with the modules you want -- maybe not. No guarantees. Oh, yeah, and if you want the best version of their package, there's a subscription fee. Not a one-time license fee -- a monthly or annual subscription fee. This stopped me dead in my tracks.
I was looking for something cheap and easy. So far I'd spent about $100 and had at least another $50 USD and £22.50 (probably about $50USD) to spend ahead of me. If any more unexpected barriers came up and I had to shell out any more money for modules that did not guarantee playing nice with other modules --- this was going to end with me going postal.
I'm starting to think that Joomla! is a rip-off -- about 1/3 of the functionality I was looking for as a base to begin was going to cost me money. I think some of the people charging money for components were on the package's core development team. If the component is terribly useful, and should be ported to the main body of the program -- such as flexibility with user groups -- it would probably never happen because the guy who is making money off the module is going to scream bloody murder. That is not the type of open source generosity I'm looking for. I don't mind asking for donations, and I don't mind giving donations if I make money off my project -- AT ALL. But Joomla! doesn't say "Warning, most of what you want to extend this package with will cost you."
I should have considered my choices longer and harder, but thankfully I've only spent $99 so far. Once I spent the other $100 or so, I may have found out that something else essential was missing, and how much would that have cost me?
I'm off to do more research on the Xoops packages. Xoops has a better core philosophy as far as I can tell. The basic package is deliberately made to be extensible without having to hack the core code. Even if I do end up having to buy an add-on or two, they won't come with huge warnings that they are hacks of the core package and may not play nice with other modules. I've used Xoops and was very happy with it. If there's a module I can't find to fill a feature I need, I can try creating it myself.
Xoops had come in a close 2nd place in my assessments, but I was lured in by the promise of everything "just working" with Joomla!. Joomla! is more polished to the eye, but apparently the "just working" isn't true. I'm going to need to triple check that none of the modules I want costs money, but I'm pretty sure they don't. In any case, I have some experience in hacking Xoops modules...and I know the user groups are already fine-grained and fully customizable.
*Grumps*
[tags]cms, drupal, xoops, joomla, open source, web applications, custom programming, modules, expenses[/tags]
As I would do for any client, I wrote up a sheet of the major features I required. I checked 3 CMS packages that are free/open source, and that I have confidence that they have a large number of add-ons and a strong community: Drupal, Joomla! and Xoops.
I've used Xoops, and I liked it A LOT.
I've used Drupal, but when looking for plug-ins that would give the package the features I was looking for it fell short.
I researched packages for Joomla, and except for true single-sign-on integration with Moodle, it came up with the most promising feature availability. I saw that a couple of the components would cost money. The amount wasn't enough to hamper me, so I dove in. I started working on it, decided to opt for my first purchase of a module, which was more than the original price I thought I would be spending on the feature ($99). I bought it. It's one of those no-money-back things. Then I saw that Joomla! did not include the fine group permissions that I had come to expect from using Xoops.
My first barricade was that the new $99 module only works with a certain release of Joomla! -- that was OK because I'd downloaded two versions of Joomla. I installed the correct one, got it working, fed it the database info, and everything was happy. Or so I thought. I could now install the somewhat expensive module (the other modules were cheaper).
Joomla! comes with a pre-created set of a few user group types. And no way to customize them, unless you want to buy someone's hack. I have a list of about 8 module features I need installed. The group modification hack gives no easy indication of which other modules it plays nice with -- you need to pour through the forums. Maybe they've created patches for it to work with the modules you want -- maybe not. No guarantees. Oh, yeah, and if you want the best version of their package, there's a subscription fee. Not a one-time license fee -- a monthly or annual subscription fee. This stopped me dead in my tracks.
I was looking for something cheap and easy. So far I'd spent about $100 and had at least another $50 USD and £22.50 (probably about $50USD) to spend ahead of me. If any more unexpected barriers came up and I had to shell out any more money for modules that did not guarantee playing nice with other modules --- this was going to end with me going postal.
I'm starting to think that Joomla! is a rip-off -- about 1/3 of the functionality I was looking for as a base to begin was going to cost me money. I think some of the people charging money for components were on the package's core development team. If the component is terribly useful, and should be ported to the main body of the program -- such as flexibility with user groups -- it would probably never happen because the guy who is making money off the module is going to scream bloody murder. That is not the type of open source generosity I'm looking for. I don't mind asking for donations, and I don't mind giving donations if I make money off my project -- AT ALL. But Joomla! doesn't say "Warning, most of what you want to extend this package with will cost you."
I should have considered my choices longer and harder, but thankfully I've only spent $99 so far. Once I spent the other $100 or so, I may have found out that something else essential was missing, and how much would that have cost me?
I'm off to do more research on the Xoops packages. Xoops has a better core philosophy as far as I can tell. The basic package is deliberately made to be extensible without having to hack the core code. Even if I do end up having to buy an add-on or two, they won't come with huge warnings that they are hacks of the core package and may not play nice with other modules. I've used Xoops and was very happy with it. If there's a module I can't find to fill a feature I need, I can try creating it myself.
Xoops had come in a close 2nd place in my assessments, but I was lured in by the promise of everything "just working" with Joomla!. Joomla! is more polished to the eye, but apparently the "just working" isn't true. I'm going to need to triple check that none of the modules I want costs money, but I'm pretty sure they don't. In any case, I have some experience in hacking Xoops modules...and I know the user groups are already fine-grained and fully customizable.
*Grumps*
[tags]cms, drupal, xoops, joomla, open source, web applications, custom programming, modules, expenses[/tags]
Thursday, June 8, 2006
Thank You For Your Time
People probably don't get it, but I write "Thank you for your time" out by hand at the bottom of my emails, above the pre-generated sig lines.
Time is my one finite commodity.
If someone puts a project request up on a site or write to me asking for a bid, they've spent time on that, and in return they're looking forward to quality in the response. I find that many of my competition on such venues are a disaster, a blight on my industry. Their responses are form letters, no consideration is given to whether they fit the job or why, generic quotes are pasted in, if any time has been spent on the response at all. They're quite stingy with their time, and I'll bet it shows when they're on the clock.
When I write to someone, I'm hoping that they read what I have to say. From the moment they open my email, to the moment they close it, their time is being spent on me. Time they will never get back. They're moments closer to the end of life on this fair Earth. My response, even if it ends up being the bid they choose, has just sucked away some portion of their time above and beyond the responses I have no control over.
I send out my blessings for the time they are spending on me every time I write "Thank you for your time" and click send.
At the same time, I have to acknowledge that the return-on-investment of me spending my time on these people hand-writing to them probably far overshadows the quality of responses I receive, if any. I get few if any clients through such competitive venues. That's why, if I know I don't fit a job, I am not going to waste my time writing to the person, unless--
Unless somehow I'm going to serve them in a very quick and definitive fashion.
I often write to people who seem to need a little advice. I have no intention of taking their job, it probably doesn't fit me, but something they said implied a need for direction. Sometimes I'm misguided, and should keep my fingers on the mouse, move on to the next ad. Sometimes I earn a bit of respect for my wisdom.
A long time ago I decided that the chance to help people is well worth spending my time on. If I save someone a moment of time, maybe that's one more time they smile at a child, blow dandelion seeds into the wind, procrastinate one less chore. Perhaps I'm saving some people far more than just a moment. Minutes. Hours, even! Those bundles of moments we measure.
I want to take a moment, if you have read this post, to thank you for your time. I really appreciate that you've listened to my babbling on this. This is a very important and dear topic to me.
With luck, I will eventually have sufficient referrals, print ads, and repeat business to leave off reading Craigslist and other posting venues, and spend more time creating, advertising, dreaming, and contributing to the works of others. In the meantime, here's a toast to the customers I have found at such places, the associates within my field, and to all the moments where people really connect and collaborate, whether for a minute or a month, and then sit back and salute a job well done.
Blessings,
Crisses
[tags]time, gratitude, clients[/tags]
Time is my one finite commodity.
If someone puts a project request up on a site or write to me asking for a bid, they've spent time on that, and in return they're looking forward to quality in the response. I find that many of my competition on such venues are a disaster, a blight on my industry. Their responses are form letters, no consideration is given to whether they fit the job or why, generic quotes are pasted in, if any time has been spent on the response at all. They're quite stingy with their time, and I'll bet it shows when they're on the clock.
When I write to someone, I'm hoping that they read what I have to say. From the moment they open my email, to the moment they close it, their time is being spent on me. Time they will never get back. They're moments closer to the end of life on this fair Earth. My response, even if it ends up being the bid they choose, has just sucked away some portion of their time above and beyond the responses I have no control over.
I send out my blessings for the time they are spending on me every time I write "Thank you for your time" and click send.
At the same time, I have to acknowledge that the return-on-investment of me spending my time on these people hand-writing to them probably far overshadows the quality of responses I receive, if any. I get few if any clients through such competitive venues. That's why, if I know I don't fit a job, I am not going to waste my time writing to the person, unless--
Unless somehow I'm going to serve them in a very quick and definitive fashion.
I often write to people who seem to need a little advice. I have no intention of taking their job, it probably doesn't fit me, but something they said implied a need for direction. Sometimes I'm misguided, and should keep my fingers on the mouse, move on to the next ad. Sometimes I earn a bit of respect for my wisdom.
A long time ago I decided that the chance to help people is well worth spending my time on. If I save someone a moment of time, maybe that's one more time they smile at a child, blow dandelion seeds into the wind, procrastinate one less chore. Perhaps I'm saving some people far more than just a moment. Minutes. Hours, even! Those bundles of moments we measure.
I want to take a moment, if you have read this post, to thank you for your time. I really appreciate that you've listened to my babbling on this. This is a very important and dear topic to me.
With luck, I will eventually have sufficient referrals, print ads, and repeat business to leave off reading Craigslist and other posting venues, and spend more time creating, advertising, dreaming, and contributing to the works of others. In the meantime, here's a toast to the customers I have found at such places, the associates within my field, and to all the moments where people really connect and collaborate, whether for a minute or a month, and then sit back and salute a job well done.
Blessings,
Crisses
[tags]time, gratitude, clients[/tags]
Tuesday, April 4, 2006
New Design Coming
I have been working on a website redesign. It seems that creating a site design that is open and uncluttered does not sell my services. When creating my design, I thought I was expressing my preferences for information delivery over dazzle. And some people have responded to the design very positively, enjoying the fact that it is subdued and unpretentious.
Others, however, are uninterested in clarity and an uncluttered look. That 15 seconds (or less) that I have to capture their attention fails.
I want the audience that inherently understands that my design preference for my site does not dictate how I design sites for other people and other purposes. At the same time, I have to redevelop my own site, because it needs to be repurposed. During the initial design, I was not selling as hard as I am now, so my site was mainly informative. Now, my site must be geared towards self-promotion rather than discussion.
So, I will be rolling out a new design and perhaps some new content soon. The design is already in the works. I have decided on something fancier but with some of the same elements.
A rhetorical rant for those who would never get so far as to read my news: Why on earth would my site be a representation of what your site would look like? You have a different audience, different philosophy, different projections, different goals. Part of what I try to do while I work for you is become enmeshed with the energies of the organization I am designing to represent. I ask for intricate details about you and your goals, the history and the fabric of the entity I am working to represent, and I use those as the clay from which I sculpt the work I bring to you. The more accurately you portray yourself, your organization, and your target market, the more fitting the results should be. My site is not a cookie cutter.
Others, however, are uninterested in clarity and an uncluttered look. That 15 seconds (or less) that I have to capture their attention fails.
I want the audience that inherently understands that my design preference for my site does not dictate how I design sites for other people and other purposes. At the same time, I have to redevelop my own site, because it needs to be repurposed. During the initial design, I was not selling as hard as I am now, so my site was mainly informative. Now, my site must be geared towards self-promotion rather than discussion.
So, I will be rolling out a new design and perhaps some new content soon. The design is already in the works. I have decided on something fancier but with some of the same elements.
A rhetorical rant for those who would never get so far as to read my news: Why on earth would my site be a representation of what your site would look like? You have a different audience, different philosophy, different projections, different goals. Part of what I try to do while I work for you is become enmeshed with the energies of the organization I am designing to represent. I ask for intricate details about you and your goals, the history and the fabric of the entity I am working to represent, and I use those as the clay from which I sculpt the work I bring to you. The more accurately you portray yourself, your organization, and your target market, the more fitting the results should be. My site is not a cookie cutter.
Thursday, March 2, 2006
Logo Day
I'm declaring this Logo Day. If there's already a "Logo Day" (Feb 28th was Pancake Day -- who woulda thought?) then let me know. In the meantime, I'm going to post some interesting stuff about the logo creation process.
First, an article for logo design do-it-yourselfers intended for people who are starting a business and NEED a logo/identity design, money is tight, they're in a rush, and they would rather do it themselves because they think it's a simple process.
The second is a data sheet for people purchasing logo designs (from Eclectic Tech) who need to know why the price tag is so high. Step-by-step explanation of the process and the expectations that the client should have regarding what is going on behind the scenes.
First, an article for logo design do-it-yourselfers intended for people who are starting a business and NEED a logo/identity design, money is tight, they're in a rush, and they would rather do it themselves because they think it's a simple process.
The second is a data sheet for people purchasing logo designs (from Eclectic Tech) who need to know why the price tag is so high. Step-by-step explanation of the process and the expectations that the client should have regarding what is going on behind the scenes.
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