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Online site creation - question?
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moonmonkey
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Aug 12, 2011, 08:49 PM
 
I would like to set up a small business.

I had a look at squares space, but its not advanced enough.

People should be able to register:
The site would need to keep their personal details and key variables about them: age, weight, height , bum size, etc.
When they login to their account, I would need to be able to display these key variables back to them?

Would this be possible with any of the online tools? I just don't want to make it offline, or pay someone else.
     
iMOTOR
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Aug 12, 2011, 10:16 PM
 
So you want your customers to be able to visit your website, register an account with a username and password, then enter private information into a database? And you want to design this website using an online tool?

Not likely.

At the very minimum, in order to let visitors register a user/pass account on your website, you will need a dedicated IP web host and an SSL certificate.

Then you need to engineer code that can collect form data with your SSL cert. I’m not aware of any online tool that does that. There might be a CRM product that makes this easier; what kind database are you using now?
     
moonmonkey  (op)
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Aug 13, 2011, 02:33 AM
 
whats a database?
     
Waragainstsleep
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Aug 13, 2011, 02:54 PM
 
Are you serious?
I have plenty of more important things to do, if only I could bring myself to do them....
     
phantomdragonz
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Aug 13, 2011, 04:39 PM
 
If you dont know what a database is then you absolutely need to hire and pay someone to setup this site. A database is crucial to your idea and nit something that can be whipped up easily
     
moonmonkey  (op)
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Aug 13, 2011, 07:38 PM
 
Joking, I had a look around and gatorhost has site building tool and that allows server side scripting.
Site building tools are still ver immature, don't seem to have improved much in the past 10 years.
     
besson3c
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Aug 13, 2011, 08:27 PM
 
Hire somebody, like me
     
iMOTOR
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Aug 13, 2011, 09:53 PM
 
Originally Posted by moonmonkey View Post
Site building tools are still ver immature, don't seem to have improved much in the past 10 years.
There’s a lot of good site building tools, but they aren’t web based. FWIW, web based tools aren’t meant for serious use.
     
arjo
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Aug 13, 2011, 10:28 PM
 
Let me see if I have this right: You want what is essentially a fairly advanced web-based CMS with a WYSIWYG editor and pre-designed front end templates... and you want it for free.

Good luck with that. If and when you decided that you're actually serious about this business there are many talented designers and developers out there that could execute your vision, and execute it well. In my opinion anything worth doing is worth spending money on and doing it right the first time around.
     
besson3c
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Aug 13, 2011, 11:12 PM
 
Originally Posted by iMOTOR View Post
There’s a lot of good site building tools, but they aren’t web based. FWIW, web based tools aren’t meant for serious use.
Nor are desktop based website building tools, IMO.
     
iMOTOR
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Aug 13, 2011, 11:22 PM
 
I knew you would say that.
     
besson3c
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Aug 14, 2011, 03:46 AM
 
Originally Posted by iMOTOR View Post
I knew you would say that.

Which one would you argue is decent?

I was actually going to argue the reverse in saying that WordPress is decent at site building, in terms of its GUI.
     
moonmonkey  (op)
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Aug 14, 2011, 04:40 AM
 
Originally Posted by arjo View Post
Let me see if I have this right: You want what is essentially a fairly advanced web-based CMS with a WYSIWYG editor and pre-designed front end templates... and you want it for free.
No you didn't have it right.
     
ghporter
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Aug 14, 2011, 08:05 AM
 
There is no "right out of the box" solution for anyone to build a reasonably useful site. A user that understands a bit of code can create a site that works, but at the cost of either extreme simplicity or massive coding, so good development tools are important to making a site do more than just present text, pictures and links. But there are two necessities for a commercial site: strong underpinnings to make sure the site works under heavy loads, and strong security to make the site resist both casual and determined attackers. You simply cannot manually code all of that in any reasonable amount of time, and the basic tools for site development don't address either of these issues realistically.

What seems to work well is to have online tools that help a user mock-up or prototype what they want, and then moving to having an experienced web developer evolve that into a real, polished web site. I've used Geocities' tools to put together a page-and got bored and lost interest because those tools were so basic and limited. I've used tools from my current host (1 and 1) and gotten better results with less angst. I can write basic HTML, I can arrange things artfully, etc., and having tools that give me the flexibility to do that without missing some background settings or leaving some bracket open and having a whole bunch of stuff crash makes that process much easier. But I don't have the time or frankly the patience to do it all, so I've gotten help for the web pages I really needed to be smooth and polished. I've had students practice their skills building pages, and interns populate their portfolios building sites for me. My own coding is, frankly, pretty lame, and I recognize that, so I go to someone that both enjoys that work and has the background and experience to make things look and run well.

To the point: building what sounds like an online web site creation system for online-paying customers sounds as much like an example of what you want the tools to do as an example of what you want to offer. I'd suggest finding a web developer with online commerce support experience and seeing if they can satisfy your needs.

Glenn -----OTR/L, MOT, Tx
     
arjo
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Aug 14, 2011, 12:29 PM
 
Originally Posted by moonmonkey View Post
No you didn't have it right.
I'm interested, where did I get it wrong?

ghporter presented my thoughts in more detail and much more eloquently.
     
iMOTOR
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Aug 14, 2011, 04:36 PM
 
Originally Posted by besson3c View Post
Which one would you argue is decent?

I was actually going to argue the reverse in saying that WordPress is decent at site building, in terms of its GUI.
Dreamweaver. I know I’m in the minority, but I like the split view, tabs, find and replace, and site management all in one. I could use something like Subethaedit, but I prefer Dreamweaver.
     
iMOTOR
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Aug 14, 2011, 04:39 PM
 
Originally Posted by arjo View Post
I'm interested, where did I get it wrong?
The OP is not looking for a CMS.
     
Doofy
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Aug 14, 2011, 04:40 PM
 
The last version of GoLive is pretty spiffy too.
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besson3c
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Aug 14, 2011, 04:53 PM
 
Originally Posted by iMOTOR View Post
Dreamweaver. I know I’m in the minority, but I like the split view, tabs, find and replace, and site management all in one. I could use something like Subethaedit, but I prefer Dreamweaver.

You can't easily (if at all) create account management and a database driven user interface in Dreamweaver using only its WYSIWYG editor, which I'm assuming is what you are referring to? If not and you are just referring to using it as a text editor, sure, but I'm assuming that the original poster is not looking to get into writing his own code?

Dreamweaver was built around websites circa 1990s and early 2000s consisting of static pages, where a physical file structure mattered (where you could utilize DM's site management stuff), where WYSIWYG editors used to create entire sites were acceptable, and where management of sites like this did not involve CMSes and databases and stuff...
     
Doofy
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Aug 14, 2011, 04:58 PM
 
Now here's the thing about database-driven user interfaces: The likelihood of failure is greater than with static-based sites. Which means either shelling out lots of moola every time something goes wrong or having a pet geek on staff. Neither is really very viable for small business.
Been inclined to wander... off the beaten track.
That's where there's thunder... and the wind shouts back.
     
besson3c
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Aug 14, 2011, 05:07 PM
 
Originally Posted by Doofy View Post
Now here's the thing about database-driven user interfaces: The likelihood of failure is greater than with static-based sites. Which means either shelling out lots of moola every time something goes wrong or having a pet geek on staff. Neither is really very viable for small business.
Nonsense.

Unless you are talking a very small number of records that will not grow in size over time, some moola is going to be needed when the user outgrows this rinky dink way of doing things and needs to transfer all of these static pages to a database format, moola will be needed to touch each of these pages when a field needs to be added or taken away (unless you can afford the time required to do this without consequence), moola will be required once there are enough records that a search tool would be helpful (ditto for sort, categorization, etc.), moola will be required will be required for authentication, delegating these duties to somebody else, etc.

Don't paint yourself into a corner, do it right the first time original poster. Even if you don't need any of these features today, it will cost a lot less now to establish this foundation for yourself than it would if you put this off for later and had to migrate all of your records to a database/structured format.
( Last edited by besson3c; Aug 14, 2011 at 05:16 PM. )
     
iMOTOR
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Aug 14, 2011, 05:11 PM
 
Originally Posted by besson3c View Post
You can't easily (if at all) create account management and a database driven user interface in Dreamweaver using only its WYSIWYG editor, which I'm assuming is what you are referring to?
I’m not aware of any WYSIWYG software that lets you do that, I was just making a general comment about online vs. desktop based site building tools.


Originally Posted by besson3c View Post
Dreamweaver was built around websites circa 1990s and early 2000s consisting of static pages, where a physical file structure mattered (where you could utilize DM's site management stuff), where WYSIWYG editors used to create entire sites were acceptable, and where management of sites like this did not involve CMSes and databases and stuff...
Have you used DW in the last ten years? I don’t use DW as a WYSIWYG app. I use it in the split view (where the top half is source code and the bottom half is the browser view). That way I can pop open a page, click on the element I want to edit in the browser view and DW goes straight to the div tag in the source view. It’s just a more rapid way of doing things in my experience.

FWIW, DW would be a pretty crappy tool for WYSIWYG only editing.
     
besson3c
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Aug 14, 2011, 05:15 PM
 
Originally Posted by iMOTOR View Post
I’m not aware of any WYSIWYG software that lets you do that, I was just making a general comment about online vs. desktop based site building tools.




Have you used DW in the last ten years? I don’t use DW as a WYSIWYG app. I use it in the split view (where the top half is source code and the bottom half is the browser view). That way I can pop open a page, click on the element I want to edit in the browser view and DW goes straight to the div tag in the source view. It’s just a more rapid way of doing things in my experience.

FWIW, DW would be a pretty crappy tool for WYSIWYG only editing.

I'm sure it's a fine text editor (although I probably wouldn't pay that much for one when there are so many other great options: TextMate, Subethaedit, BBEdit, vim, emacs, Coda, etc.), but a text editor is not a DIY site building tool like the original poster wanted.

Then again, while WordPress can be a DIY site building tool, it doesn't fit the bill for the original poster either.
     
iMOTOR
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Aug 14, 2011, 05:27 PM
 
I wouldn’t pay so much for DW either if Subethaedit had the split view that I like so much.

Originally Posted by besson3c View Post
vim,
For writing HTML? Are you serious? It pains me to imagine using vim for editing anything other than linux config files. And for that I use nano.
     
besson3c
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Aug 14, 2011, 05:31 PM
 
Originally Posted by iMOTOR View Post
I wouldn’t pay so much for DW either if Subethaedit had the split view that I like so much.



For writing HTML? Are you serious? It pains me to imagine using vim for editing anything other than linux config files. And for that I use nano.

I don't write HTML in vim myself, but I've seen some people that have gotten much faster at using one of emacs or vim than I am with any editor (I use TextMate). If you are willing to go through the learning curve, the keyboard only will probably almost always be faster than keyboard + GUI/menu hybrid.
     
Doofy
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Aug 14, 2011, 05:49 PM
 
Originally Posted by iMOTOR View Post
I’m not aware of any WYSIWYG software that lets you do that, I was just making a general comment about online vs. desktop based site building tools.
GoLive will let you do that.

Don't take any notice of Bess, kiddies. If you enter his world you'll be up to your arses in code and jazz instead of making money. Don't do it.
Been inclined to wander... off the beaten track.
That's where there's thunder... and the wind shouts back.
     
Doofy
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Aug 14, 2011, 05:50 PM
 
Originally Posted by iMOTOR View Post
For writing HTML? Are you serious?
Getting the idea yet kiddies?
Been inclined to wander... off the beaten track.
That's where there's thunder... and the wind shouts back.
     
besson3c
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Aug 14, 2011, 05:54 PM
 
Originally Posted by Doofy View Post
GoLive will let you do that.

Don't take any notice of Bess, kiddies. If you enter his world you'll be up to your arses in code and jazz instead of making money. Don't do it.

Says the guy who runs his own mail server? Okay...

You have some really interesting technological viewpoints.
     
besson3c
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Aug 14, 2011, 05:55 PM
 
Originally Posted by Doofy View Post
Getting the idea yet kiddies?

I liked you better when you were ignoring me. What happened to that?
     
iMOTOR
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Aug 14, 2011, 06:01 PM
 
Originally Posted by Doofy View Post
GoLive will let you do that.
And it integrates SSL certification into the code? ‘Cause lets face it, user/pass account management is worthless without encryption.
     
besson3c
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Aug 14, 2011, 06:08 PM
 
Originally Posted by iMOTOR View Post
And it integrates SSL certification into the code? ‘Cause lets face it, user/pass account management is worthless without encryption.

Likewise for encrypted storage of passwords so that they can be verified.
     
Doofy
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Aug 14, 2011, 07:07 PM
 
Has Bess started with his whiney passive-aggressiveness yet?
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besson3c
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Aug 14, 2011, 07:24 PM
 
Originally Posted by Doofy View Post
Has Bess started with his whiney passive-aggressiveness yet?
How would you suggest that I deal with your arrogant blowhard ways? I'm open to your suggestions!

You say something, I say that it is nonsense and I state in explicit detail why I feel that way, you do not address these points, instead make personal attacks and lose your shit...

Keep it together Doofy. I'm not interested in bickering...
( Last edited by besson3c; Aug 14, 2011 at 07:41 PM. )
     
   
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