Is Drupal Appropriate for Our Site?
This may seem trivial, but all I read about Drupal, including the introduction in the ORA book that arrived today stresses the application of the Drupal framework/CMS for community-content based Web sites (or e-commerce sites). My very small consulting company doesn't fall in either category. Most of the pages on our site are static; I'll add new newsletters or white papers to the documents.shtml page, but that's about it. I would like to add polls, a form-based e-mail capability for those who prefer to ask for information that way rather than via regular e-mail, and -- perhaps -- the ability to comment on issues raised in newsletters and white papers. This is why I ask whether Drupal is really the appropriate tool for me to learn and apply. I don't know that any professional services consulting company's Web site actually generates clients. I know that a poor site can drive away potential clients, but in the 17 years I've run my business no one has hired us because they found our Web site somehow and decided they needed our services. Of course, if I can actually generate new business via a spiffy, Durpal-based site, I'll be very pleased to have that result. You can see the current site at http://www.appl-ecosys.com/. I'm completely open to suggestions to make it more of an attactant, and whether Drupal is appropriate for this type of site. Rich
Hi Rich, try http://www.buzzr.com/ it will fit your needs Cheers, Gustavo 2010/9/24 Rich Shepard <rshepard@appl-ecosys.com>
This may seem trivial, but all I read about Drupal, including the introduction in the ORA book that arrived today stresses the application of the Drupal framework/CMS for community-content based Web sites (or e-commerce sites). My very small consulting company doesn't fall in either category.
Most of the pages on our site are static; I'll add new newsletters or white papers to the documents.shtml page, but that's about it. I would like to add polls, a form-based e-mail capability for those who prefer to ask for information that way rather than via regular e-mail, and -- perhaps -- the ability to comment on issues raised in newsletters and white papers. This is why I ask whether Drupal is really the appropriate tool for me to learn and apply.
I don't know that any professional services consulting company's Web site actually generates clients. I know that a poor site can drive away potential clients, but in the 17 years I've run my business no one has hired us because they found our Web site somehow and decided they needed our services. Of course, if I can actually generate new business via a spiffy, Durpal-based site, I'll be very pleased to have that result.
You can see the current site at http://www.appl-ecosys.com/. I'm completely open to suggestions to make it more of an attactant, and whether Drupal is appropriate for this type of site.
Rich -- [ Drupal support list | http://lists.drupal.org/ ]
Rich Shepard wrote:
Most of the pages on our site are static; I'll add new newsletters or white papers to the documents.shtml page, but that's about it. I would like to add polls, a form-based e-mail capability for those who prefer to ask for information that way rather than via regular e-mail, and -- perhaps -- the ability to comment on issues raised in newsletters and white papers. This is why I ask whether Drupal is really the appropriate tool for me to learn and apply.
For a simple, relatively static site, I'd probably go with Wordpress, for more complex ones, Drupal or maybe Plone (I've used all three, played with others). The KISS principle applies to web sites, just like anything else - why eat administrative headaches if you don't need the extra functionality.
I don't know that any professional services consulting company's Web site actually generates clients. I know that a poor site can drive away potential clients, but in the 17 years I've run my business no one has hired us because they found our Web site somehow and decided they needed our services. Of course, if I can actually generate new business via a spiffy, Durpal-based site, I'll be very pleased to have that result.
These days, its more that the web site is a combination newsletter and brochure - to the extent that you do a lot of writing, someone might track down a paper and that can lead to a sale, but beyond that, the web site is where someone will turn to find out about who you are AFTER you've made initial contact through a referral, sales pitch, or more traditional means. (Having said that, I once retained an attorney, based on a web site that presented in-depth information about a very specialized area of practice.)
You can see the current site at http://www.appl-ecosys.com/. I'm completely open to suggestions to make it more of an attactant, and whether Drupal is appropriate for this type of site.
For what it's worth, and since you asked - the web site does not present a clear image of who you are, and what you do - it takes work to dig that out. My suggestion would be to really streamline the "who, what, where, when, why" message - one sentence that jumps out about what you do, and then make it really easy to find bios and case studies. If you want to add value, some how-to material, and maybe a blog that provides useful, current information (someone may not be a prospect today but might be tomorrow if you keep them on the hook). Having said all of that, I'm currently doing none of the above. I work in a primarily big-ticket sales environment, it's all direct sales followed by proposals. When I build web sites, they tend to be to support a specific project, mostly for internal communications. So take anything I say with a grain of salt. Two web sites that are pretty simple, but to the point, are www.millervaneaton.com and http://www.baller.com/ both law firms that specialize in telecom. law (an area I used to be involved in). No bells and whistles - just clean presentation of the firms, their practice areas, their key people, and some useful information that adds credibility. Not a bad model for a consulting firm's web site. Hope this helps, Miles Fidelman Miles Fidelman -- In theory, there is no difference between theory and practice. In<fnord> practice, there is. .... Yogi Berra
The Times They Are A'Changing. Use Drupal, man, and don't look back. When you say "for a simple site, use WordPress", for a complex site use Drupal (admin headeaches worth it then), for a (wet thumb stuck up in the air to feel the wind) not so complex site, use a half-assed CMS that has Apache writing to root. But now, your clients don't want websites. Nor do you if you want a decent professional blog, capable of creating a portfolio content type and listing it and theming it with views. They want website applications. Which means you need a development framework to develop with, not an off-the-shelf-solution to stick somewhere. Which means, to be productive, you need to get involved with a framework, make reusable components of your own with it, get involved in its community, know which modules to use, because you can't do this alone. Which means you need to solve once and for all your administration processes on all your customer sites, and teach your customers best practices on how to upgrade Drupal and modules, or provide maintenance services, etc. So, you can be a dilettant, and think in terms of half-assed solutions for half-assed websites, or you can be a website application developer who works with a CMS framework they have gotten to know well over the months and years, and with which they have become productive. Which is not to say you never whip up a few well formed A List Apart style HTML+CSS for a small static site, or that you never install WordPress for you uncle's blog (he's not going to update it tho). A website application developer is something to be. Victor Kane http://awebfactory.com.ar http://projectflowandtracker.com On Sat, Sep 25, 2010 at 12:11 AM, Miles Fidelman <mfidelman@meetinghouse.net
wrote:
Rich Shepard wrote:
Most of theu pages on our site are static; I'll add new newsletters
or
white papers to the documents.shtml page, but that's about it. I would like to add polls, a form-based e-mail capability for those who prefer to ask for information that way rather than via regular e-mail, and -- perhaps -- the ability to comment on issues raised in newsletters and white papers. This is why I ask whether Drupal is really the appropriate tool for me to learn and apply.
For a simple, relatively static site, I'd probably go with Wordpress, for more complex ones, Drupal or maybe Plone (I've used all three, played with others). The KISS principle applies to web sites, just like anything else - why eat administrative headaches if you don't need the extra functionality.
I don't know that any professional services consulting company's Web
site
actually generates clients. I know that a poor site can drive away potential clients, but in the 17 years I've run my business no one has hired us because they found our Web site somehow and decided they needed our services. Of course, if I can actually generate new business via a spiffy, Durpal-based site, I'll be very pleased to have that result.
These days, its more that the web site is a combination newsletter and brochure - to the extent that you do a lot of writing, someone might track down a paper and that can lead to a sale, but beyond that, the web site is where someone will turn to find out about who you are AFTER you've made initial contact through a referral, sales pitch, or more traditional means. (Having said that, I once retained an attorney, based on a web site that presented in-depth information about a very specialized area of practice.)
You can see the current site at http://www.appl-ecosys.com/. I'm completely open to suggestions to make it more of an attactant, and
whether
Drupal is appropriate for this type of site.
For what it's worth, and since you asked - the web site does not present a clear image of who you are, and what you do - it takes work to dig that out. My suggestion would be to really streamline the "who, what, where, when, why" message - one sentence that jumps out about what you do, and then make it really easy to find bios and case studies. If you want to add value, some how-to material, and maybe a blog that provides useful, current information (someone may not be a prospect today but might be tomorrow if you keep them on the hook).
Having said all of that, I'm currently doing none of the above. I work in a primarily big-ticket sales environment, it's all direct sales followed by proposals. When I build web sites, they tend to be to support a specific project, mostly for internal communications. So take anything I say with a grain of salt.
Two web sites that are pretty simple, but to the point, are www.millervaneaton.com and http://www.baller.com/ both law firms that specialize in telecom. law (an area I used to be involved in). No bells and whistles - just clean presentation of the firms, their practice areas, their key people, and some useful information that adds credibility. Not a bad model for a consulting firm's web site.
Hope this helps,
Miles Fidelman
Miles Fidelman
-- In theory, there is no difference between theory and practice. In<fnord> practice, there is. .... Yogi Berra
-- [ Drupal support list | http://lists.drupal.org/ ]
+1 on what Victor said :) Ryan LeTulle bayousoft.com <http://www.bayousoft.com> twitter.com/bayousoft <http://www.twitter.com/bayousoft> On Sat, Sep 25, 2010 at 3:00 AM, Victor Kane <victorkane@gmail.com> wrote:
The Times They Are A'Changing. Use Drupal, man, and don't look back.
When you say "for a simple site, use WordPress", for a complex site use Drupal (admin headeaches worth it then), for a (wet thumb stuck up in the air to feel the wind) not so complex site, use a half-assed CMS that has Apache writing to root.
But now, your clients don't want websites. Nor do you if you want a decent professional blog, capable of creating a portfolio content type and listing it and theming it with views.
They want website applications. Which means you need a development framework to develop with, not an off-the-shelf-solution to stick somewhere. Which means, to be productive, you need to get involved with a framework, make reusable components of your own with it, get involved in its community, know which modules to use, because you can't do this alone. Which means you need to solve once and for all your administration processes on all your customer sites, and teach your customers best practices on how to upgrade Drupal and modules, or provide maintenance services, etc.
So, you can be a dilettant, and think in terms of half-assed solutions for half-assed websites, or you can be a website application developer who works with a CMS framework they have gotten to know well over the months and years, and with which they have become productive. Which is not to say you never whip up a few well formed A List Apart style HTML+CSS for a small static site, or that you never install WordPress for you uncle's blog (he's not going to update it tho).
A website application developer is something to be.
Victor Kane http://awebfactory.com.ar http://projectflowandtracker.com
On Sat, Sep 25, 2010 at 12:11 AM, Miles Fidelman < mfidelman@meetinghouse.net> wrote:
Rich Shepard wrote:
Most of theu pages on our site are static; I'll add new newsletters
or
white papers to the documents.shtml page, but that's about it. I would like to add polls, a form-based e-mail capability for those who prefer to ask for information that way rather than via regular e-mail, and -- perhaps -- the ability to comment on issues raised in newsletters and white papers. This is why I ask whether Drupal is really the appropriate tool for me to learn and apply.
For a simple, relatively static site, I'd probably go with Wordpress, for more complex ones, Drupal or maybe Plone (I've used all three, played with others). The KISS principle applies to web sites, just like anything else - why eat administrative headaches if you don't need the extra functionality.
I don't know that any professional services consulting company's Web
site
actually generates clients. I know that a poor site can drive away potential clients, but in the 17 years I've run my business no one has hired us because they found our Web site somehow and decided they needed our services. Of course, if I can actually generate new business via a spiffy, Durpal-based site, I'll be very pleased to have that result.
These days, its more that the web site is a combination newsletter and brochure - to the extent that you do a lot of writing, someone might track down a paper and that can lead to a sale, but beyond that, the web site is where someone will turn to find out about who you are AFTER you've made initial contact through a referral, sales pitch, or more traditional means. (Having said that, I once retained an attorney, based on a web site that presented in-depth information about a very specialized area of practice.)
You can see the current site at http://www.appl-ecosys.com/. I'm completely open to suggestions to make it more of an attactant, and
whether
Drupal is appropriate for this type of site.
For what it's worth, and since you asked - the web site does not present a clear image of who you are, and what you do - it takes work to dig that out. My suggestion would be to really streamline the "who, what, where, when, why" message - one sentence that jumps out about what you do, and then make it really easy to find bios and case studies. If you want to add value, some how-to material, and maybe a blog that provides useful, current information (someone may not be a prospect today but might be tomorrow if you keep them on the hook).
Having said all of that, I'm currently doing none of the above. I work in a primarily big-ticket sales environment, it's all direct sales followed by proposals. When I build web sites, they tend to be to support a specific project, mostly for internal communications. So take anything I say with a grain of salt.
Two web sites that are pretty simple, but to the point, are www.millervaneaton.com and http://www.baller.com/ both law firms that specialize in telecom. law (an area I used to be involved in). No bells and whistles - just clean presentation of the firms, their practice areas, their key people, and some useful information that adds credibility. Not a bad model for a consulting firm's web site.
Hope this helps,
Miles Fidelman
Miles Fidelman
-- In theory, there is no difference between theory and practice. In<fnord> practice, there is. .... Yogi Berra
-- [ Drupal support list | http://lists.drupal.org/ ]
-- [ Drupal support list | http://lists.drupal.org/ ]
Victor Kane wrote:
But now, your clients don't want websites. Nor do you if you want a decent professional blog, capable of creating a portfolio content type and listing it and theming it with views.
They want website applications. Which means you need a development framework to develop with, not an off-the-shelf-solution to stick somewhere. Which means, to be productive, you need to get involved with a framework, make reusable components of your own with it, get involved in its community, know which modules to use, because you can't do this alone. Which means you need to solve once and for all your administration processes on all your customer sites, and teach your customers best practices on how to upgrade Drupal and modules, or provide maintenance services, etc.
So, you can be a dilettant, and think in terms of half-assed solutions for half-assed websites, or you can be a website application developer who works with a CMS framework they have gotten to know well over the months and years, and with which they have become productive. Which is not to say you never whip up a few well formed A List Apart style HTML+CSS for a small static site, or that you never install WordPress for you uncle's blog (he's not going to update it tho).
Jeez man - the guy wants to market his environmental compliance services, not build wizzy interactive web sites. It's about getting the right message across, in the most cost-effective way; not about bells and whistles. -- In theory, there is no difference between theory and practice. In<fnord> practice, there is. .... Yogi Berra
On Sat, Sep 25, 2010 at 10:48 AM, Miles Fidelman <mfidelman@meetinghouse.net
wrote:
Jeez man - the guy wants to market his environmental compliance services, not build wizzy interactive web sites. It's about getting the right message across, in the most cost-effective way; not about bells and whistles.
It's not about bells and whistles, it's about educating ourselves to base the functionality we create and propose to create for our clients upon best practices. It's not about the color of the stucco, it's about the foundations. " I'll add new newsletters or white papers to the documents.shtml page, but that's about it. I would like to add polls, a form-based e-mail capability for those who prefer to ask for information that way rather than via regular e-mail, and -- perhaps -- the ability to comment on issues raised in newsletters and white papers" This justifies Drupal perfectly, but more important than which CMS framework you use, or even if you hand-craft it, is respect for the 40% changes in these requirements that will occur before the site is finished, and respect for best practices to be observed in all that we do, and the belief that in order to do this, we need to be involved in the community around the tools we use. Victor Kane http://awebfactory.com.ar http://projectflowandtracker.com --
In theory, there is no difference between theory and practice. In<fnord> practice, there is. .... Yogi Berra
-- [ Drupal support list | http://lists.drupal.org/ ]
Rich, Have you checked out www.drupalgardens.com? You can build you entire Drupal 7 site online with enhanced tools at no cost. My understanding is that you are also free to migrate your site at anytime if you choose to host it on your own or elsewhere. Ryan LeTulle bayousoft.com <http://www.bayousoft.com> twitter.com/bayousoft <http://www.twitter.com/bayousoft> On Sat, Sep 25, 2010 at 9:16 AM, Victor Kane <victorkane@gmail.com> wrote:
On Sat, Sep 25, 2010 at 10:48 AM, Miles Fidelman < mfidelman@meetinghouse.net> wrote:
Jeez man - the guy wants to market his environmental compliance services, not build wizzy interactive web sites. It's about getting the right message across, in the most cost-effective way; not about bells and whistles.
It's not about bells and whistles, it's about educating ourselves to base the functionality we create and propose to create for our clients upon best practices.
It's not about the color of the stucco, it's about the foundations.
" I'll add new newsletters or white papers to the documents.shtml page, but that's about it. I would like to add polls, a form-based e-mail capability for those who prefer to ask for information that way rather than via regular e-mail, and -- perhaps -- the ability to comment on issues raised in newsletters and white papers"
This justifies Drupal perfectly, but more important than which CMS framework you use, or even if you hand-craft it, is respect for the 40% changes in these requirements that will occur before the site is finished, and respect for best practices to be observed in all that we do, and the belief that in order to do this, we need to be involved in the community around the tools we use.
Victor Kane http://awebfactory.com.ar http://projectflowandtracker.com
--
In theory, there is no difference between theory and practice. In<fnord> practice, there is. .... Yogi Berra
-- [ Drupal support list | http://lists.drupal.org/ ]
-- [ Drupal support list | http://lists.drupal.org/ ]
On Sat, 25 Sep 2010, Ryan LeTulle wrote:
Have you checked out www.drupalgardens.com? You can build you entire Drupal 7 site online with enhanced tools at no cost. My understanding is that you are also free to migrate your site at anytime if you choose to host it on your own or elsewhere.
Ryan, No, I haven't. But I will. The site is now hosted by my ISP, but a friend will provide space on his server if I migrate to drupal/sqlite. Thanks, Rich
On Sat, 25 Sep 2010, Victor Kane wrote:
It's not about bells and whistles, it's about educating ourselves to base the functionality we create and propose to create for our clients upon best practices.
I'm my only client, Victor. :-)
This justifies Drupal perfectly, but more important than which CMS framework you use, or even if you hand-craft it, is respect for the 40% changes in these requirements that will occur before the site is finished, and respect for best practices to be observed in all that we do, and the belief that in order to do this, we need to be involved in the community around the tools we use.
There may be value that will be identified later and more easily added with drupal than other approaches. Whether such value is revealed remains to be seen. Thanks, Rich
Victor Kane wrote:
On Sat, Sep 25, 2010 at 10:48 AM, Miles Fidelman <mfidelman@meetinghouse.net <mailto:mfidelman@meetinghouse.net>> wrote:
Jeez man - the guy wants to market his environmental compliance services, not build wizzy interactive web sites. It's about getting the right message across, in the most cost-effective way; not about bells and whistles.
It's not about bells and whistles, it's about educating ourselves to base the functionality we create and propose to create for our clients upon best practices.
" I'll add new newsletters or white papers to the documents.shtml page, but that's about it. I would like to add polls, a form-based e-mail capability for those who prefer to ask for information that way rather than via regular e-mail, and -- perhaps -- the ability to comment on issues raised in newsletters and white papers"
This justifies Drupal perfectly, but more important than which CMS framework you use, or even if you hand-craft it, is respect for the 40% changes in these requirements that will occur before the site is finished, and respect for best practices to be observed in all that we do, and the belief that in order to do this, we need to be involved in the community around the tools we use. The guy didn't ask if his job justifies Drupal, he asked if its the right tool for his job. Anybody who says that their preferred tool is the solution for any and all problems is a fanboy, not a professional.
I gave an informed opinion that it's not. I base that opinion on spending a lot of my career selling technical and advisory services into markets similar to the one he's in. It happens that I've ALSO spent a lot of time building web sites for both my own businesses and for clients, and along the way built a hosting company - and understand all too well what's involved in operating and maintaining content management infrastructure. I'll stick with my opinion that Drupal is overkill for a consulting business that's using their web site as essentially an electronic brochure. Drupal is great for supporting interactive communities of interest (though it's suffered a bit what with some of the organic groups list modules lagging way behind the mainline code). Plone is better if you're doing serious applications behind a web front-end (say an interactive compliance checklist), and some applications call for J2EE (though Java folks have a habit of thinking that Tomcat and Servlets are the answer to even the simplest problem - talk about over-complicating things). The more fundamental questions are: - who's going to develop and maintain the content - in this case, it sounds like Rich is managing his own content, so the question is: what's the easiest tool? - who's going to maintain the underlying platform - in a simple case, better to rely on a commercial hosting provider who supports the platform you chose, which leads to the question of... - Where to host: a lot of people would argue that Google Sites is the easiest way to go these days, and an awful lot of people seem to be going that way. Personally, I'd never open my business to vendor lock-in - big vendors tend to change their policies arbitrarily, small vendors tend to go out of business. For a simple situation, I'd go with a plain-vanilla Wordpress (or Drupal, or whatever) installation on someone like GoDaddy, using my own domain, with backup somewhere else - making it trivial to migrate. For more complicated situations, I'd rent a virtual host. For really complicated applications, I'd rent a managed machine. (In my case, I run everything on a couple of machines that live in a local datacenter - legacies of my previous hosting business, that I keep around to support some funded R&D work). Miles Fidelman -- In theory, there is no difference between theory and practice. In<fnord> practice, there is. .... Yogi Berra
Brochure sites are dead, dude. The guy didn't ask if his job justifies Drupal, he asked if its the
right tool for his job. Anybody who says that their preferred tool is the solution for any and all problems is a fanboy, not a professional.
I gave an informed opinion that it's not. I base that opinion on spending a lot of my career selling technical and advisory services into markets similar to the one he's in. It happens that I've ALSO spent a lot of time building web sites for both my own businesses and for clients, and along the way built a hosting company - and understand all too well what's involved in operating and maintaining content management infrastructure.
I'll stick with my opinion that Drupal is overkill for a consulting business that's using their web site as essentially an electronic brochure.
Victor Kane wrote:
Brochure sites are dead, dude. Right.
In the business-to-business world, 99% of the time, all anybody wants from a web site is a quick way to check out a potential vendor. For professional services firms, that translates to bios, customer referrals, case studies, and reprints of journal papers. For product firms, that translates to product specsheets and documentation, and maybe downloads. And, of course, contact info. By and large, investing in anything more may be good for developers, but doesn't have a particularly good ROI. For most business purposes, the KISS principle still applies. For that matter, the KISS principle applies to most purposes (Case in point: google's interface). -- In theory, there is no difference between theory and practice. In<fnord> practice, there is. .... Yogi Berra
Maybe, but I tend to look for the ways that I can integrate the business into the site and vice versa. Unity. Otherwise, it seems the site is always out of date amongst other things. So far, I have found Drupal extremely suitable for satisfying that requirement very easily. IMO Every business should constantly look for new ways to engage their online customers. Drupal is definitely not the only choice and isn't the best choice for everything, but I certainly wouldn't rule it out for very basic websites either. :) Ryan LeTulle bayousoft.com <http://www.bayousoft.com> twitter.com/bayousoft <http://www.twitter.com/bayousoft> On Sat, Sep 25, 2010 at 11:31 AM, Miles Fidelman <mfidelman@meetinghouse.net
wrote:
Victor Kane wrote:
Brochure sites are dead, dude. Right.
In the business-to-business world, 99% of the time, all anybody wants from a web site is a quick way to check out a potential vendor. For professional services firms, that translates to bios, customer referrals, case studies, and reprints of journal papers. For product firms, that translates to product specsheets and documentation, and maybe downloads. And, of course, contact info.
By and large, investing in anything more may be good for developers, but doesn't have a particularly good ROI.
For most business purposes, the KISS principle still applies. For that matter, the KISS principle applies to most purposes (Case in point: google's interface).
-- In theory, there is no difference between theory and practice. In<fnord> practice, there is. .... Yogi Berra
-- [ Drupal support list | http://lists.drupal.org/ ]
Forgot to ask. Will you be hosting the new site on Linux with CL access? Ryan LeTulle bayousoft.com <http://www.bayousoft.com> twitter.com/bayousoft <http://www.twitter.com/bayousoft> On Sat, Sep 25, 2010 at 11:43 AM, Ryan LeTulle <bayousoft@gmail.com> wrote:
Maybe, but I tend to look for the ways that I can integrate the business into the site and vice versa. Unity. Otherwise, it seems the site is always out of date amongst other things. So far, I have found Drupal extremely suitable for satisfying that requirement very easily. IMO Every business should constantly look for new ways to engage their online customers.
Drupal is definitely not the only choice and isn't the best choice for everything, but I certainly wouldn't rule it out for very basic websites either. :)
Ryan LeTulle
bayousoft.com <http://www.bayousoft.com> twitter.com/bayousoft <http://www.twitter.com/bayousoft>
On Sat, Sep 25, 2010 at 11:31 AM, Miles Fidelman < mfidelman@meetinghouse.net> wrote:
Victor Kane wrote:
Brochure sites are dead, dude. Right.
In the business-to-business world, 99% of the time, all anybody wants from a web site is a quick way to check out a potential vendor. For professional services firms, that translates to bios, customer referrals, case studies, and reprints of journal papers. For product firms, that translates to product specsheets and documentation, and maybe downloads. And, of course, contact info.
By and large, investing in anything more may be good for developers, but doesn't have a particularly good ROI.
For most business purposes, the KISS principle still applies. For that matter, the KISS principle applies to most purposes (Case in point: google's interface).
-- In theory, there is no difference between theory and practice. In<fnord> practice, there is. .... Yogi Berra
-- [ Drupal support list | http://lists.drupal.org/ ]
On Sat, 25 Sep 2010, Ryan LeTulle wrote:
Forgot to ask. Will you be hosting the new site on Linux with CL access?
Ryan, Linux is all we've used for more than a dozen years. The site is currently hosted by our ISP and I access it via ftp (ncftp, actually). When I add a back-end database and CMS I'll move it to a friend's server. I could build another host here specifically to hold apache and the web site, but that would take more administrative time to keep secure and that's not where I make money. Rich
Cool. I just wanted to make sure I wasn't commenting on a Windows environment because I use Drupal exclusively on Linux. Good luck with whatever you do. Ryan LeTulle bayousoft.com <http://www.bayousoft.com> twitter.com/bayousoft <http://www.twitter.com/bayousoft> On Sat, Sep 25, 2010 at 1:29 PM, Rich Shepard <rshepard@appl-ecosys.com>wrote:
On Sat, 25 Sep 2010, Ryan LeTulle wrote:
Forgot to ask. Will you be hosting the new site on Linux with CL access?
Ryan,
Linux is all we've used for more than a dozen years. The site is currently hosted by our ISP and I access it via ftp (ncftp, actually). When I add a back-end database and CMS I'll move it to a friend's server. I could build another host here specifically to hold apache and the web site, but that would take more administrative time to keep secure and that's not where I make money.
Rich -- [ Drupal support list | http://lists.drupal.org/ ]
Ryan LeTulle wrote:
Maybe, but I tend to look for the ways that I can integrate the business into the site and vice versa. Unity. Otherwise, it seems the site is always out of date amongst other things. So far, I have found Drupal extremely suitable for satisfying that requirement very easily. IMO Every business should constantly look for new ways to engage their online customers. Umm... why? It really depends on the business. If the business is an on-line publication, or other on-line service, sure. If the application is retailing - then it depends on whether your customers and products are amenable to online sales. If you sell big-ticket hardware (e.g., Cisco), then the web site is primarily about spec sheets and documentation (take a look), and the business is driven by traditional sales channels. If the product is environmental consulting (the topic that started this thread), people are paying for time and materials - the web site is incidental to anything that actually generates revenue. Drupal is definitely not the only choice and isn't the best choice for everything, but I certainly wouldn't rule it out for very basic websites either. :) Personally, I wouldn't use Drupal for simple sites - I have, and pretty much always ended up migrating to something else. But that's me. Your mileage my vary.
It all comes down to business goals, the most cost- (and time-) effective way of getting the desired result, and ultimately, ROI. Miles Fidelman -- In theory, there is no difference between theory and practice. In<fnord> practice, there is. .... Yogi Berra
Mr Shepard, You don't have to learn everything about drupal to use it for your site. To get a site to replace your current one, meaning you get the same information you have now, you could hire someone to set it up and tweak it for around $200-$300. The same person can teach you how you can add and edit the content you have on your site as part of the deal. Then as your needs change you could learn how to add features you want to add, or hire the person to do it for you for a small fee. The flexibility that drupal can bring to your web presents is tremendous. You would have the ability to change information on the fly. Add new content when needed. Have to ability to change the look down the road, and not having to do a completely new web site. If you want a way to know more about Drupal, so you can decide for yourself, check out www.lynda.com. This is where I found Drupal, and I was hooked. They have 3 video training courses on Drupal. Drupal 6 Essential Training<http://www.lynda.com/home/DisplayCourseNoTabs.aspx?lpk2=620>is the first one. After watching it, you should be able to decide if Drupal is for you, and if you want to build the site yourself. I hope this helps. Cory Gilliam imaaxa@gmail.com
On Sat, 25 Sep 2010, Cory Gilliam wrote:
The flexibility that drupal can bring to your web presents is tremendous.
Cory, This is why I decided to take a very close look at drupal.
If you want a way to know more about Drupal, so you can decide for yourself, check out www.lynda.com. This is where I found Drupal, and I was hooked. They have 3 video training courses on Drupal. Drupal 6 Essential Training<http://www.lynda.com/home/DisplayCourseNoTabs.aspx?lpk2=620>is the first one. After watching it, you should be able to decide if Drupal is for you, and if you want to build the site yourself.
I'll definitely do this. I'm used to building my own tools and having control over the tools I use. Most of my writing is done with LaTeX in emacs, vector graphics are written with PSTricks, and I much prefer the CLI to GUIs. While I'm not a fan of web-based apps I know that's where many are headed so I use them, too. Thanks, Rich
On Sat, 25 Sep 2010, Victor Kane wrote:
Which means you need to solve once and for all your administration processes on all your customer sites, and teach your customers best practices on how to upgrade Drupal and modules, or provide maintenance services, etc.
Victor, I saw the value of your points up to here. I don't have customer sites, it's just us.
So, you can be a dilettant, and think in terms of half-assed solutions for half-assed websites, or you can be a website application developer who works
I don't make money developing web sites. I interpret your suggestion as equivalent to advising someone to learn to become an auto mechanic if they ask where to find the jack in their vehicle. :-) Thanks, Rich
On Sat, Sep 25, 2010 at 11:52 AM, Rich Shepard <rshepard@appl-ecosys.com>wrote:
On Sat, 25 Sep 2010, Victor Kane wrote:
Which means you need to solve once and for all your administration processes on all your customer sites, and teach your customers best practices on how to upgrade Drupal and modules, or provide maintenance services, etc.
Victor,
I saw the value of your points up to here. I don't have customer sites, it's just us.
So, you can be a dilettant, and think in terms of half-assed solutions for half-assed websites, or you can be a website application developer who works
I don't make money developing web sites. I interpret your suggestion as equivalent to advising someone to learn to become an auto mechanic if they ask where to find the jack in their vehicle. :-)
OK, I understand. I still think you should use Drupal! It can be used off the shelf for what you need. Victor
Thanks,
Rich
-- [ Drupal support list | http://lists.drupal.org/ ]
On Fri, 24 Sep 2010, Miles Fidelman wrote:
For a simple, relatively static site, I'd probably go with Wordpress, for more complex ones, Drupal or maybe Plone (I've used all three, played with others). The KISS principle applies to web sites, just like anything else - why eat administrative headaches if you don't need the extra functionality.
Miles, Thank you. I can also fix the css menus since almost all pages are static.
For what it's worth, and since you asked - the web site does not present a clear image of who you are, and what you do - it takes work to dig that out. My suggestion would be to really streamline the "who, what, where, when, why" message - one sentence that jumps out about what you do, and then make it really easy to find bios and case studies. If you want to add value, some how-to material, and maybe a blog that provides useful, current information (someone may not be a prospect today but might be tomorrow if you keep them on the hook).
I've made changes based on others' suggestions quite often and I suppose that this time I lost some focus in the latest change. I'll definitely return the descriptions of what we do for what markets to the index page.
Hope this helps,
Yes, it does. Rich
On 09/25/10 00:25, Rich Shepard wrote:
This may seem trivial, but all I read about Drupal, including the introduction in the ORA book that arrived today stresses the application of the Drupal framework/CMS for community-content based Web sites (or e-commerce sites). My very small consulting company doesn't fall in either category.
Most of the pages on our site are static; I'll add new newsletters or white papers to the documents.shtml page, but that's about it. I would like to add polls, a form-based e-mail capability for those who prefer to ask for information that way rather than via regular e-mail, and -- perhaps -- the ability to comment on issues raised in newsletters and white papers. This is why I ask whether Drupal is really the appropriate tool for me to learn and apply.
There's 2 simple CMSs which may fit your needs better than Drupal. Firstly look at phpsqlitecms. It's almost trivially simple, the data base is part of it so install & admin is easy. It's not a full featured CMS but it works as far as it goes. Here's a little thing I knocked up for a friend http://www.asstec.co.uk. The other one I like is cmsmadesimple. This is more conventional but again is not fully featured but great for simple sites. Here's what another friend did with it: http://www.johnchivall.co.uk/ My experience with websites in a box it that they're not awfully good, but worse, you get trapped into their web hosting and domain management. If you find don't like like them you've got a hassle extracting yourself and starting again. ymmv Dick
On Sat, 25 Sep 2010, Dick Middleton wrote:
There's 2 simple CMSs which may fit your needs better than Drupal. Firstly look at phpsqlitecms. It's almost trivially simple, the data base is part of it so install & admin is easy. It's not a full featured CMS but it works as far as it goes. Here's a little thing I knocked up for a friend http://www.asstec.co.uk.
Dick, I'll look more closely at phpsqlitecms. I really like the wry humor on the accounting site you set up. :-)
The other one I like is cmsmadesimple. This is more conventional but again is not fully featured but great for simple sites. Here's what another friend did with it: http://www.johnchivall.co.uk/
This, too, will get a thorough look.
My experience with websites in a box it that they're not awfully good, but worse, you get trapped into their web hosting and domain management. If you find don't like like them you've got a hassle extracting yourself and starting again.
Very true. Thanks very much, Rich
Dick, Dick Middleton wrote:
There's 2 simple CMSs which may fit your needs better than Drupal. Firstly look at phpsqlitecms. It's almost trivially simple, the data base is part of it so install& admin is easy. It's not a full featured CMS but it works as far as it goes. Here's a little thing I knocked up for a friend http://www.asstec.co.uk.
The other one I like is cmsmadesimple. This is more conventional but again is not fully featured but great for simple sites. Here's what another friend did with it: http://www.johnchivall.co.uk/
Nice pointers. Any sense of whether either of them are any good at email and list integration (e.g., subscribing to content updates by email)? I tend to need that in a lot of the work I do - which tends to push me to WordPress and Drupal, though their respective email and list integration modules always seem to lag the main release (I miss the OG2list module). For some reason folks who develop CMS software don't seem to do email very well, and people who do list managers don't seem to do web interfaces very well. About the only good open-source combination I've ever seen is groupserver (http://groupserver.org/groupserver), but development is by a tiny group in Australia, and they've never really built a larger development/support community around it.
My experience with websites in a box it that they're not awfully good, but worse, you get trapped into their web hosting and domain management. If you find don't like like them you've got a hassle extracting yourself and starting again.
Can you say vendor lock-in? Miles -- In theory, there is no difference between theory and practice. In<fnord> practice, there is. .... Yogi Berra
On 09/25/10 16:55, Miles Fidelman wrote:
There's 2 simple CMSs which may fit your needs better than Drupal. Firstly look at phpsqlitecms.
The other one I like is cmsmadesimple.
Nice pointers. Any sense of whether either of them are any good at email and list integration (e.g., subscribing to content updates by email)?
I'm sure phpsqlitecms does none of that. The author has built a forum using it. This CMS is unusual in that it is focussed mostly on serving static pages. It's like an templating engine with a config GUI. Cmsmadesimple has plugin modules. There are modules for newsletters as well as a forms module, blogs, polls etc. I tend to need that in a lot of the work I do - which tends to
push me to WordPress and Drupal, though their respective email and list integration modules always seem to lag the main release (I miss the OG2list module). For some reason folks who develop CMS software don't seem to do email very well, and people who do list managers don't seem to do web interfaces very well. About the only good open-source combination I've ever seen is groupserver
Yes, I agree, there's some 'opportunities' there.
(http://groupserver.org/groupserver), but development is by a tiny group in Australia, and they've never really built a larger development/support community around it.
Interesting, I've not seen that before. At the moment I'm stuck with mailman - see below ...
My experience with websites in a box it that they're not awfully good, but worse, you get trapped into their web hosting and domain management. If you find don't like like them you've got a hassle extracting yourself and starting again.
Can you say vendor lock-in?
LOL :) I probably could but I wouldn't! Dick
Dick Middleton wrote:
Interesting, I've not seen that before. At the moment I'm stuck with mailman - see below ...
fyi - I run a lot of lists with sympa (www.sympa.org) - a very powerful, open source, enterprise scale list manager, very customizeable, at the expense of a bit of setup and administration pain (sort of like 'sympa is to mailman as drupal is to wordpress') Miles -- In theory, there is no difference between theory and practice. In<fnord> practice, there is. .... Yogi Berra
participants (7)
-
Cory Gilliam -
Dick Middleton -
Gustavo Orrillo -
Miles Fidelman -
Rich Shepard -
Ryan LeTulle -
Victor Kane