[paieye]

Our group has its own, very simple, beginnerish web-site at The TEDWORTH Pony Club. The group wants to have a scrolling ticker-tape type of streamer or similar on the home-page that will provide the latest news-items -- news about the group, I mean, not about the world at large.

I manage the site, and until recently achieved the desired result via a 'Marquee' streamer on the home-page.

That had the disadvantage that I was responsible for inserting whatever text the group asked me to insert, and I want to avoid that.

Question: Is it possible to achieve what the group wants by placing an RSS-streamer or similar on the home page, the feed for which can be controlled by nominated members of the group without reference to me ?

If it is, could some kind soul explain in the simplest terms how to go about this ?

One possibility that occurs to me is that I could link an RSS-streamer to (for example) an InvisionFree message-board; I would also administer the message-board, and could limit access to the message-board to individual members of the group; they would then post group news there without reference to me, and the streamer would display the posting.

Might something like that be possible ?

Thank you -- and my apology if I am in the wrong category here !

[besson3c]

You could put the text into a database and grant people access to edit this text via phpMyAdmin or a homemade CMS, or you could put the text in a flat file and allow people to edit this text via a homemade CMS or by granting physical access to the file. Is this the sort of thing you were looking for?

[paieye]

The difficulty with what you suggest is that it presupposes a level of competence in the group members that just does not exist, and never will. That is why I suggested a message-board.

Would my suggestion not work ?

[besson3c]

The streamer would pull from the posts in a message board? It would honestly be easier to just pull from your own database... Interacting with a web app from outside of that web app requires knowledge of that app's database schema, and it assumes the risk of things breaking when the app is updated.

Honestly, if you want my opinion, this is going to be far more work than it is value. I don't really find scrolling marquees a particularly good way to convey information on any site, and I would say that if you want to make your site more valuable there are places I would focus on first before this.

[paieye]

All right, you have convinced me. Are you able to tell me in simple terms where to look for what I shall need, and how to structure the arrangement ?

Thank you for taking the trouble to help me, by the way !

[besson3c]

Also, for doing any database reading or parsing of a flat file/spreadsheet, you will need a middleware language such as PHP, Perl, Ruby, etc. installed, and a database engine such as MySQL for the database. You'll probably also want phpMyAdmin which will gives you a web-based GUI for accessing and managing your database(s).

[besson3c]

Originally Posted by paieye 

All right, you have convinced me. Are you able to tell me in simple terms where to look for what I shall need, and how to structure the arrangement ?

Thank you for taking the trouble to help me, by the way !

Well, see my last post... Do you have the prereqs?

I would suggest PHP and MySQL, since this is a highly common combination.

[paieye]

Let me look at this, and come back to you.

[besson3c]

The only other way is to hardcode the headlines into your page and update this manually whenever you want to update the marquee. This requires knowledge of connecting to the server, downloading the file, updating the news ticker array within your Javascript class/function/file, and re-uploading the file, or else using a Unix based text editor such as Nano.

[paieye]

It is absolutely fundamental to all this that (1) I do not do any up-dating, it is all done by group members and (2) the activity of up-dating will not daunt even the most technically-incompetent individual.

[besson3c]

Is there money available? If it were me I would move the site to WordPress control so that the whole site could be managed by technically-incompetent individuals including the entire news system, and pull the crawl from a custom WordPress query_posts call. Using WordPress you can generate nice permalinks "permanent URLs" for accessing the stories story in a dedicated search friendly URL, and you can also WordPress to drive a searchable news archival page too. WP is the easiest-to-use CMS I'm aware of existing.

Are you cool with the Javascript code necessary to handle the scrolling?

[paieye]

I shall have a look at WordPress, and report back to you. I have not yet tried the JavaScript code, but am reasonably calm about that.

[besson3c]

Originally Posted by paieye 

I shall have a look at WordPress, and report back to you. I have not yet tried the JavaScript code, but am reasonably calm about that.

What I think is more elegant than a scrolling marquee are headlines that fade in an out like I have at the bottom of this page. Apple does this on their homepage too. You can do this pretty easily using Script.aculo.us.

[paieye]

I have set up a WordPress blog, posted a message and named various authors. Could you very kindly just explain what I now do to make the latest blog -- yes, I know there is only 1 for the time being -- appear on the group website ?

[besson3c]

You install the blog software on the group website.

You can download WordPress here: WordPress › Blog Tool and Publishing Platform