Announcement

Collapse
No announcement yet.

Web Site Design Help or Advice Needed

Collapse
This topic is closed.
X
X
Collapse
 
  • Page of 1
  • Filter
  • Time
  • Show
Clear All
new posts
Previous template Next
  • #1

    Web Site Design Help or Advice Needed

    So I am pursuing an idea that an acquaintance came up with, in cooperation with that person. It's a crazy idea based on an offhand comment that just sort of resonated, but a crazy idea I think may just work.

    The idea involves the creation and maintenance of a website that will match or bring people together based upon a particular mutual interest. It's in the same idea as match.com or eHarmony, etc, but appealing to a particular subset of people, a niche market, if you will.

    Neither BT (my acquaintance and partner in this new venture) nor myself have any website knowledge or skill, but we have a lot of great ideas for making this a success. We need a nuts and bolts type tech person to help us make this work, both with web design and site maintenance, possibly looking to making it so we, as administrators, can do most of the work once it's up and running, relying on Mr. or Ms. Tech only if something we don't know how to fix goes wrong.

    We are not looking to make money on this project, though I do believe we will accept advertising to offset any maintenance costs. Any initial profit over costs we would make would go fully to our Tech person. Which, honestly, probably wouldn't be a lot.

    This idea is still in its infancy. Hell, it's still gestating. And I know what I'm asking is probably more than I realize. But if any of you tech type geniuses would be interested in helping out such a venture, it could be fun. Even any advice would be welcomed.

    I think this is a really good idea, and I'd like to see it come to fruition. But without someone with more knowledge than BT or myself, it never will. I never thought I'd say this, but I really need a Third Wheel!
    Last edited by EricKei; 05-21-2016, 01:02 AM. Reason: moved thread to TH

    "The Customer Is Always Right...But The Bartender Decides Who Is     Still A Customer."
    Tags: None
  • #2
    No one, huh? Well, crappo.

    "The Customer Is Always Right...But The Bartender Decides Who Is     Still A Customer."

    Comment

    • #3
      If I had more time in my day, I'd offer to help. I'm getting ready to return to work, though, after a medical leave, and I have some catching up to do.

      I do think there are services out there that basically have "templates" you can use. Although I don't know if you can tie them into a database or not (if that's even your plan).

      Some questions you should probably answer, too:

      1. How do you plan on collecting/storing data? And how much data?
      2. How "dynamic" do you want the site to be? How interactive, basically?
      3. How often (and with what mechanism) are you planning on changing the site (i.e. adding pages/updating content)?
      4. Audio/video?
      5. Hosting? Do you have/need/want a domain name? Where would you be hosting? Free hosting sites usually put ads on websites (or at least they used to).

      This is likely going to determine the complexity/scope of your site.

      The more complex, the less likely you're going to find someone who will do it cheap -- at least in a timely manner.

      Google does seem to have a "Web Designer" product here:

      https://www.google.com/webdesigner/features/

      That may be helpful for you.
      Skilled programmers aren't cheap. Cheap programmers aren't skilled.

      Comment

      • #4
        Ya this is out of my league, Server Administration is one thing maybe some basic coding but what your needing is more programming than web design.

        Comment

        • #5
          I'd offer to help but my knowledge of web design doesn't quite extend far enough yet. I still have another year of school to finish and there are some pretty important points we haven't worked on yet. For example, I can design a basic website with HTML/CSS, but we haven't learned how to actually publish them yet and I'd like at least a basic knowledge of JavaScript before attempting anything.
          The fact that jellyfish have survived for 650 million years despite not having brains gives hope to many people.

          You would have to be incredibly dense for the world to revolve around you.

          Comment

          • #6
            Quoth Aragarthiel View Post
            I'd offer to help but my knowledge of web design doesn't quite extend far enough yet. I still have another year of school to finish and there are some pretty important points we haven't worked on yet. For example, I can design a basic website with HTML/CSS, but we haven't learned how to actually publish them yet and I'd like at least a basic knowledge of JavaScript before attempting anything.
            Not to sidetrack this discussion, but publishing is probably one of the easier things to do.

            The main thing now isn't just pure JavaScript. It's JavaScript frameworks like jQuery and knockout.js.

            Not to mention tying it all into APIs and databases on the backend.
            Skilled programmers aren't cheap. Cheap programmers aren't skilled.

            Comment

            • #7
              Quoth mjr View Post
              Not to sidetrack this discussion, but publishing is probably one of the easier things to do.
              That may be, but my college doesn't have a practice server for us to publish to, so we skipped that part of the class. Supposedly, we're going to somehow learn how to do it later.
              The fact that jellyfish have survived for 650 million years despite not having brains gives hope to many people.

              You would have to be incredibly dense for the world to revolve around you.

              Comment

              • #8
                Yeah, it's a truism that the simple ideas often aren't really that simple, and it applies here. There's an awful lot of back end programming required to do this kind of thing and it's not the kind of task that'll attract someone willing to do it with no expectation of reward unless they're really bored or able to piggyback it off an existing project.

                My car club just had our website overhauled with a "new" look (just freshening what we had already using existing graphics & colour choices), PayPal integration for subscriptions, and a basic content management system installed, and it cost us ~$1500; that was a guy one of the club officers knew doing it in his down time between "real" contracts. The next cheapest quoting company wanted ten times that for the same work!
                This was one of those times where my mouth says "have a nice day" but my brain says "go step on a Lego". - RegisterAce
                I can't make something magically appear to fulfill all your hopes and dreams. Believe me, if I could I'd be the first person I'd help. - Trixie

                Comment

                • #9
                  Quoth Aragarthiel View Post
                  That may be, but my college doesn't have a practice server for us to publish to, so we skipped that part of the class. Supposedly, we're going to somehow learn how to do it later.
                  I think Microsoft Azure had a "test" thing you could set up once upon a time. And I think Google and/or Yahoo have free hosting things.

                  Just a thought.

                  Depending, too, on how you do hosting, some places have software written that looks a lot like a file system. You just select the files you want to FTP, click a button, and you're done.

                  DB stuff is a bit more complicated than files, though.

                  Quoth RealUnimportant View Post
                  Yeah, it's a truism that the simple ideas often aren't really that simple, and it applies here. There's an awful lot of back end programming required to do this kind of thing and it's not the kind of task that'll attract someone willing to do it with no expectation of reward unless they're really bored or able to piggyback it off an existing project.

                  My car club just had our website overhauled with a "new" look (just freshening what we had already using existing graphics & colour choices), PayPal integration for subscriptions, and a basic content management system installed, and it cost us ~$1500; that was a guy one of the club officers knew doing it in his down time between "real" contracts. The next cheapest quoting company wanted ten times that for the same work!
                  That's not a bad price. 10 x what you got it done for seems a bit excessive, unless there were a lot of pages and/or layout changes that couldn't be done through CSS. Could have probably been done for $3-$5K otherwise.
                  Last edited by EricKei; 05-21-2016, 01:02 AM. Reason: merged consecutive posts
                  Skilled programmers aren't cheap. Cheap programmers aren't skilled.

                  Comment

                  • #10
                    I know neither one of us has the technical knowledge or skill set to be able to do this. And you folks are basically telling me it won't be cheap to have someone with tech knowledge do it for us.

                    So I'm playing with perhaps the idea of doing it as a Facebook page. I know that such an idea would be within our abilities. I just don't know if a Facebook page would enable us to accomplish our goals.

                    Thoughts?

                    "The Customer Is Always Right...But The Bartender Decides Who Is                     Still A Customer."

                    Comment

                    • #11
                      Squarespace, maybe?

                      http://www.websitebuilderexpert.com/...press/#pricing
                      There's no such thing as a stupid question... just stupid people.

                      Comment

                      • #12
                        Quoth Jester View Post
                        I know neither one of us has the technical knowledge or skill set to be able to do this. And you folks are basically telling me it won't be cheap to have someone with tech knowledge do it for us.

                        So I'm playing with perhaps the idea of doing it as a Facebook page. I know that such an idea would be within our abilities. I just don't know if a Facebook page would enable us to accomplish our goals.

                        Thoughts?
                        I do believe some places have drag and drop templates that you can use. You basically pick colors, drag things around the screen, type your text, and save.

                        That's pretty much for a "static" site, though. DB stuff, I don't know if they do that sort of thing.

                        As far as FaceBook, I think it's going to depend on what your goals are. It may be difficult to really "brand" yourself without a logo, through FaceBook anyway.

                        Facebook, for being "social media", is essentially a multimedia blog, if you really think about it.

                        Wish I could be of more help. But best of luck to you with this, Jester! I hope you're able to be successful.
                        Skilled programmers aren't cheap. Cheap programmers aren't skilled.

                        Comment

                        • #13
                          Quoth Jester View Post
                          The idea involves the creation and maintenance of a website that will match or bring people together based upon a particular mutual interest. It's in the same idea as match.com or eHarmony, etc, but appealing to a particular subset of people, a niche market, if you will.
                          That is a great idea. Not trying to discourage you or anything like that. I wonder if http://www.meetup.com/ is what you are looking to do. I am sure you will come up with your own spin on it.

                          Comment

                          Previous template Next
                          Working...
                          X