Some basic website design help - pretty please!

[Renee Barber]

Originally Posted by peppie

Ahhh, Renee I've got you curios now I can see.

But I would like to keep the revealing of the actual site for a bit longer, I think It possibly helps here to keep the subject to the Theory of Design principle for a bit. My reason being that it would be too tempting to just launch into solving a particular design problem and not address the need as such. The need I see here is to come up with a solution to a very simple web site that needs to be very easily changed/updated on a regular basis.

The site design is not a problem and everyone is happy with that, for now at least - just the ease of being able to update. I will reveal more in time,,,, at least when I have more to reveal. And I have the same problem Renee, it is getting late and I cannot go to blanket bay until I do some more work!!!

Caught me there ... Curiosity is one of my landmark personality traits. However, I was never a big fan of philosophy. I remember being asked the whole, 'If a tree falls in a forest and no-one is there to hear it, does it really make a sound?' For some reason, the answer 'Yes' seemed to give my professor the irrits.

While we're talking about courses though, one of my favourite classes in school was Trigonometry (yeah, math nerd). You were given a starting point and an ending point and all you had to do was find the 'middle bit'. That's why I think I'm in favour of seeing the system you have in place as, for me, knowing the 'problem' shapes the solution.

Anyway, smile, I shall have to hone another part of my personality which isn't such a natural part of my psychological DNA: patience.

[Carbonite Australia]

I have no web design not technical skills at all and was introduced to WordPress a few months ago for a personal project I was working on. For anyone just wanting to get a basic site up and running about their business and who has a budget of a few hundred dollars (domain and hosting costs included) then I would recommend Wordpress.

Its all free and whilst it probably doesn't have many of the features of the CMS's mentioned in previous posts it works great.

This is an example of a personal project I used Wordpress for. Remember I have no technical skills. www.prepaidplans.com.au

This is an example of our company website. This was developed by someone who has technical and design skills. I edit the copy for this site. www.carbonite.com.au

Arthur Koulianos
www.carbonite.com.au

[LukeH]

As a non Web designer I have had significant issues engaging with Joomla. If you know where to look then I am sure there is a decent Joomla support community, but I never found it. For advanced designers, the Joomla page structure probably makes sense, but I just can't work it all out.

As others have suggested, Wordpress would definitely be my recommendation. If you're willing to put in a few hours to learn the basics (there are heaps of video tutorials out there) then you can get up and running quickly. There are free themes available or premium themes if you want to spend $50-$100 to give your site a certain look, without having to hack too much code. As a non web designer I have been able to build decent looking sites using Wordpress - and actually quite enjoy it too. It's not usually a "hair-tearing" process.

Good luck!

[dragon26]

We have a flat rate service for small business and laborers wanting to get on the internet without spending a fortune. We include all the fiddly bits like web site registration, hosting, page setup, email address setup etc etc

See us at www.tradesmenwebsites.com.au

We are 100% Australian.

Thanks
John.

[docxtools]

Originally Posted by AKoulianos

I have no web design not technical skills at all and was introduced to WordPress a few months ago for a personal project I was working on. For anyone just wanting to get a basic site up and running about their business and who has a budget of a few hundred dollars (domain and hosting costs included) then I would recommend Wordpress.

Its all free and whilst it probably doesn't have many of the features of the CMS's mentioned in previous posts it works great.

This is an example of a personal project I used Wordpress for. Remember I have no technical skills. www.prepaidplans.com.au

This is an example of our company website. This was developed by someone who has technical and design skills. I edit the copy for this site. www.carbonite.com.au

Arthur Koulianos
www.carbonite.com.au

1. Off TOPIC and to be very blunt,
2. Remember, it shows you have no technical skills and its all FREE - wow - the site couldn't possibly be making any money if it can't do transactions.
   
3. I suggest they find someone else to edit their site. I tried to purchase on this site last month and it was impossible to complete the transaction. I perfer to put money in Australia where I live if the service is reputable. I tried 3 times to do the transaction. I went back to the US site which I've always used. I bought a 3 year plan in US dollars. Let's hope they last that long in the US. I've been with them for 2 years already.
   
4. Not much of a website if it doesn't work properly since it relies purely on the transaction process.
   
   Someone should pay more attention on a daily basis to a site that can't do transactions which is it's livelihood.

[ryanchadwick]

Hello,

For your particular site I would recommend Moodle (http://moodle.org).

It's primarily a learning environment however it converts nicely into other uses. What I am envisaging is that the site would become more of an interactive hub for your club and offer things such as forums, wiki's and blogs for your members (yes I know other cms's offer these features too but Moodle offers them in a nicely managed way for breaking it all up, say into areas for teams and so on) (It is also rather easy for non techies to manage)

I realise this is changing the orignial scope a little but think it could offer a lot of value to the club.