Shalom web site update

[Curtis Weaverdyck]

Is anybody interested in being part of an ad-hoc group of 3 to 5
people to work on re-design issues for the church web site?

Several people and committees have been talking about the need to
update our church web site. Kevin's addition of this group discussion
forum and the calendar are good steps in that direction. CLC has
discussed a more comprehensive makeover, with the hope that the site
can become more dynamic, meaning attractive, interactive, and easy to
maintain changing content, and is willing to pay for a well designed
site, if it means that we can maintain it easily and semi-automate the
updating of content. One of the problems with a dynamic web site is
the amount of work necessary for maintenance, and we need to keep the
required input time to be limited.

With that in mind, Roxanne contacted her brother in law, a web
designer. His reply is below. Follow the link to see a very
preliminary design, with some content copied form our site. It uses
Joomla! which is a 'Content Management System' which controls all the
content of a web site, like a librarian. "A CMS requires almost no
technical skill or knowledge to manage." Joomla is free open-source
software, so this looks promising.

So take a look, and let's see who wants to work on this. I already
put together a whole list of I-would-like-to-see and do-we-want
issues, but I want to have others to bounce ideas around.

So take a look at the site and speak up.

Curtis


http://shalomchurch.ballcgicom/home

Dave Ball
Consultant
(248) 894-6057
db...@ballcgi.com

[pver...@comcast.net]

Include me says Paul.  A fine idea.

[Scott Hein]

Curtis...
I didn't get the reply, and the link doesn't seem to work.

[Curtis Weaverdyck]

Ah, now I see there is a missing "." The site is http://shalomchurch.ballcgi.com/home
Curtis

> > db...@ballcgi.com- Hide quoted text -
>
> - Show quoted text -

[Scott Hein]

Okay that seemed to do the trick!
So, is Joomla a free/open source package? That would be nice to have
an admin interface to make ongoing changes easier.

[Kevin]

The website mock-up looks nice. Thumbs up from me.

Kevin

[Lropp]

Joomla is free, the ancillary programs required to make it work such
as apache and MySQL are not free and very pricy.

On Jan 29, 2:18 pm, Scott Hein <heinsc...@gmail.com> wrote:
> Okay that seemed to do the trick!
> So, is Joomla a free/open source package?  That would be nice to have
> an admin interface to make ongoing changes easier.
>
> On Thu, Jan 29, 2009 at 12:08 PM, Curtis Weaverdyck <cwe...@umich.edu> wrote:
>

> > Ah, now I see there is a missing "." The site ishttp://shalomchurch.ballcgi.com/home

[Scott Hein]

Where is the current site hosted? Assuming that it's not on a private
server, I would imagine that an Apache/MySQL hosting plan would be
very reasonable.

[Leland Ropp]

Mennonite.net doesn't support mysql
Leland

[Curtis Weaverdyck]

I see that Mennonite.net uses their own content management system
called Caravel. Leland, I think you looked into that when we first
moved our host to mennonite.net. It claims to offer the ease of
management that we were interested in. What would it take to check it
out?
Curtis

[Kevin]

Please see the PDF that I uploaded to our Files: "New Plans for
Customers 200811.pdf"

This came attached to our annual bill from Mennonite.net. Service
Outreach Committee already paid for the $99 Custom Web Hosting option
for 2009. However, I'm sure we could upgrade. The toll free contact
info for Mennonite.net is included in the PDF for anyone savvy enough
to ask the right questions in regards to our thoughts on redesigning
the church website.

Kevin

[Weaverdyck, Curtis]

Interesting.
I think we need to think about what we are willing to invest ($ and time) in the short term and in the long term. I am guessing that Caravel's $250/year is not unreasonable, but we would need to invest more at the beginning to get the initial set up and training.

I found this page (after a long time): http://www.learncaravel.org/Home
The video demo makes it look super easy, at least for doing minor changes in content. But logging in to the admin demo page made me realize that there is a significant amount of effort required to learn some of the intricacies. Scott, perhaps it does not look as intimidating to you?

Curtis

[Scott Hein]

I will take a look at the video, but I can't imagine that it should be
too difficult to get up to speed on considering its a PHP based
open-source system. I am assuming, also, that the support forums are
extensive and documentation good.
I certainly wouldn't (if it were me) pay any extra for training, As
for setup, though... I guess our hands are tied if we are committed to
this particular hosting environment. We certainly wouldn't have the
kind of access to the server that we would need in order to complete
the installation on our own.
I will watch the video sometime within the next day or so and see what
I can learn about Caravel.

Scott

[Kevin]

Just a quick note that we aren't necessarily committed to the
Mennonite.net hosting environment just because we renewed our service
with them this year. If we chose to go with another web-hosting
service then it might be good to have a period of overlap while we
transitioned to a new site address.

Kevin

[Leland Ropp]

Since we are a congregations of many chiefs but few Indians, I think one
of the key questions that should be asked, before any redesign is who is
willing to be the web master and be responsible for the mundane tasks of
downloading and updating content for the next decade. I have had people
previously offering to redo the website, expand our horizons, etc., but
never had anyone interested in taking on the routine tasks for the last
9 years.
Exciting, dynamic websites don't just maintain themselves. They require
not only regular updating, but also dynamic design and even more
important: content that either intensely interests the individual or can
be found no where else.
Leland

[Scott Hein]

I don't know a lot about what the whole purpose of the redesign is,
but, I assume that the Joomla (or Caravan for that matter) suggestion
comes from a desire to make the routine maintenance of the site
something that can be done by virtually anyone in the congregation.
Perhaps getting the site's initial design may take a bit of time,
though once a nice look is achieved, further content and future
updates should be a breeze to implement. I looked around (very
little) and found a Joomla hosting company that starts at around $5.95
per month, with no installation costs, setup fees, or database
restrictions. In fact, it even comes with free Joomla sample
templates, tutorials, and extensions. This hosting company also
provides an admin panel of their own that would allow for control of
email accounts, domain settings, etc. I'm assuming that nearly all
Joomla certified hosts will offer similar packages.
(http://www.siteground.com/joomla-hosting.htm)
Now, having said all of this, I do want to make it clear that I'm not
100% committed to Joomla by any means. I really know very little
about it. I do know, however, that moving in the direction of some
type of CMS is probably the best way to go. That way, we really won't
have to worry about who is going to be forced to perform the tedious
task of keeping content current. Open source is always a good idea,
too, for the sake of flexibility, affordability, and support.
As far as design, navigation, etc... I would be more than happy to be
involved in the process of getting something going for Shalom. I have
a good amount of experience with PHP, so neither Joomla or Caravan
should be too dificult to figure out.

Scott