Website Development

[rmccoy]

I was recently laid off due to a lack of work. So I've decided to give building my personal website a shot. I am looking to make something that I can easily upgrade. My question is... What type of website programming should I look at using?

 

I was looking at developing my website using aspx but my hosting server is linux based so i can't use it. I wouldn't mind using flash. But that doesn't seem to be easily upgradable. I basically want to be able to have a clean website that is template based and easy to use. I've never built a webpage before so this should be an adventure.

 

Any ideas or suggestions? I know I could look other places but I value the opinion of the members here.

[Spooner04]

I would recommend http://icetemplates.com

I've only opened up flash a few times but I was able to take one of the templates from icetemplates and customize it. I would link my site but it is still under construction. there are alot of templates with a content management system for 100$ or less. With the content management system you can upload the photos to the proper folder on your server and then modify a text file with the new photo names and a description. The website then reads the text file and updates.

 

I'm sure there are alot of free templates out there too. I think i have seen them in creative arts and some other magazines.

[dgolden]

I would suggest looking into Wordpress. It's a great CMS that's not hard to customize, and it's extremely search engine friendly straight out of the box. It's free, and lots of web hosts have a 1-click install feature for it.

 

There are also tons of custom themes for it floating around on the web, but if you learn CSS and a tiny bit of PHP you can make your own.

[rmccoy]

Thanks for the replies. I am trying to build a furniture design portfolio site. I figure I should try and do what I actually would most enjoy for a career.

 

Below are some furniture designers that I like their sites and what I like about them.

 

Brodie Neill

http://www.brodieneill.com/

I like the simplicity of his site. ease of use and navigation. easily expandable.

 

Timothy Schreiber

http://www.timothy-schreiber.com

I like navigation and simplicity in design. I hate the pop-up site and the music. some of the flash may be too much.

 

Giovanni Pagnotta (contains slight nudity)

http://www.giovannipagnotta.com

I like the overall approach to his style for site. Great way to present his work. Hate the pop-up sites.

 

Anyways, once again any help would be appreciated. I would really like to build the site from scratch on my own. Which way would be best to go about creating a site like these?

[gerard]

Hi

I have also almost finished my website. I've used 'Namo Webeditor' small software and very easy to use. Download the help pdf also, its got a step by step tutorial. You can also test your page within the same window. It also lets you create buttons, which i replaced later with photoshop buttons.

[dgolden]

Unfortunately the correct answer is: Learn to be a web designer. Study Flash, Actionscript, XHTML, and CSS, all to an intermediate level at a minimum. Otherwise creating sites like these from scratch isn't a realistic option. I've been doing web design for 13 years, and I know it takes a certain amount of time to learn these skills.

 

There are lots of Flash templates out there that you could plug your own images into and so on, but more often than not these templates are thrown together in a hurry en masse; and people unfamiliar with Flash won't be able to make head nor tails of them.

 

Of course, if you are interested in learning to be a web designer, I would recommend buying a CS4 package (or downloading the free trial versions), getting an account on Lynda.com, and spending a few dozen hours going through the beginning video tutorials for Flash and CSS. Then you could begin to cobble together at least some jury-rigged static (but flashy) sites.

[gerard]

Hi

my website should be up on monday. http://www.pixturerise.com. I had to do it(since business is slack) used Namo webeditor, cost $80, could not afford a professional at the moment.

[rmccoy]

Thanks for your advice David. I have the CS3 Master Collection and that I use mainly for the graphics and video portions. I decided to wait to upgrade until I get a better computer first. I purchased a couple of the Lynda.com Dreamweaver DVD's that I've been going through. I guess my next step should be flash and css.

 

should I look at learning php also? Ideally, I would like to be able to do some basic web design on the side in the future. I just don't want to try to learn too much too fast and get burnt out on this whole thing.

[Hazdaz]

Website development has turned into an alphabet-soup of acronyms - it really is frustrating for us non-website guys that are trying to learn what all these different terms mean, when it seems like few people have good answers that make any sense.

I have always been a computer-nerd and in the past I used to laugh at people that couldn't get computer acronyms straight, but geez, internet terminology is getting 10x worse with no relief in sight, in my opinion.

 

Anyways, sorry about the rant, it's just rather frustrating cuz I know the basics of HTML and trying to get motivated enough to learn Flash.

[rmccoy]

That's pretty much how I feel about this whole thing.

[dgolden]

should I look at learning php also?

Learn PHP and MySQL if you are interested in making dynamic sites, or customizing popular content management systems, but I don't think you are. You just want a static site that will showcase your designs, so there's no need to learn to be a programmer, since you can do it all in Flash and just use a basic HTML embed tag, or do it with a sliced Photoshop layout and HTML/CSS.

 

Remember that web development (i.e. coding) is no joke. It's its own discreet and extremely deep technical field with all types of languages, APIs, databases, protocols, interactions, etc. In general, visually creative types seem to have an extremely hard time becoming good programmers, and vice versa. (If you have ever seen a programmer's front end GUI, you will know what I'm talking about .) But web design can be done on an entry level with some basic knowledge of HTML/CSS and/or Flash, and the visual design skills most people here probably already possess.

 

As far as acronyms go, Wikipedia should give a good basic overview as to the definition and use. I would highly recommend Flash as an alternative for people who are non-coders, since you can make nice full sites mostly by just doing a ton of stuff on the timeline, and a certain amount of your 3d animation experience will carry over, since it's very WYSIWYG (). Although it seems that the majority of people who do sites fully in Flash tend to go way overboard and annoy many of their users away with terrible usability practices...

[3D_IC]

I used the video tutorials from http://www.cartoonsmart.com to create my site. The tutorials helped me to learn flash from scratch to the level i needed. I paid for the tutorials through paypal with money made from selling models on turbosquid.

 

I've also found that cartoon smart have posted free video tutorials on vimeo.

 

Flash is a great too, but one either likes it or loathes it.

Bare in mind anyone with an Iphone can't view flash content when browsing the net.

 

Handy to offer a html and flash alternative if you're really bothered about reaching everyone.

[brianzajac]

Remember that web development (i.e. coding) is no joke. It's its own discreet and extremely deep technical field with all types of languages, APIs, databases, protocols, interactions, etc. In general, visually creative types seem to have an extremely hard time becoming good programmers, and vice versa. (If you have ever seen a programmer's front end GUI, you will know what I'm talking about .) But web design can be done on an entry level with some basic knowledge of HTML/CSS and/or Flash, and the visual design skills most people here probably already possess.

 

I agree with the statements above...especially the mess you get with any WYSIWYG interface that's been heavily programmed.

 

However, let's not forget "why" you need this site - to draw more people to your site and convince them that you do exceptional work (the "wow" factor). While the above gets into the technical aspects of the "wow" factor, how do you suppose you're going to get them there?

 

- Email Marketing - If you have a list, you can keep them hooked through email campaigns.

- Search Engine Marketing (Organic) - translate your site into Google/MSN/Yahoo friendly site and get traffic to your site.

- Pay Per Click/Sponsored Lists Marketing - if you don't have many clients coming to you from Organic Marketing, consider using a paid system until you get that traffic.

- Press Releases - if you have important things to say and it's newsworthy, you can get a fantastic return on your investment (ROI).

- Social Media (Facebook, Digg) - Works great, but can suck the time right out of your life if you're not careful.

- Quick Updates (i.e. Twitter-based systems) - Can also suck your life away. However, it's great for giving your business a personal connection with your clients/potential clients.

- Off Line Referrals - If you're not doing this, you're dead in the water.

- Link-backs from other sites (in a reputable way) - Build reputation and increase rankings for your site by having others link back to you. But, you have to give them something in return.

 

And the list goes on...

[Hazdaz]

DGOLDEN - that was a very good write-up concerning web development.

It seems that many people already in the web development business can't understand why it is so difficult for some of us to "get it", but being an outsider to all that - but still being a computer nerd - I see web development being a mish-mash of technologies that have been used to expand the very limited origins of the internet. Basically band-aid solutions to jerry-rig video, and tack-on animation, and squeeze in interactivity onto a core technology that never was supposed to have any of that type of stuff. Because of that, it's rather confusing for some of us.

 

3D_IC - thanks for the link. I had bought a Flash book ages ago, but it's just one of those things that since the program involves movement and sound and such, a book isn't the easiest way for someone like me to learn the program. That is especially disturbing to admit since I used to know Director (ages ago) which seems to be one of the forefathers of Flash and that was WAY before video tutorials were easily available... hell, it might be even before the internets.

[3D_IC]

I also used Director and still do. Its great for interactive CD's