It’s a Labor of Love
Posted on August 3, 2005 by Ching under Web.
That, and you know that I’m a nerd who enjoys creating websites and stuff. What am I talking about? I’m talking about the Mid-Kansas Military Vehicles Preservation Association website overhaul that I started last week. I’m almost finished and it so totally rocks! They can maintain the sight without having to code a lick of HTML. That’s how totally awesome I am!
Although, the endeavor posed a few challenges that I didn’t expect. For instance, I knew I was going to use a content management system (CMS) for the ease of maintenance aspect. I was leaning towards Drupal or Mambo until I realized that the 10G hosting package that the club has does not allow for any MySQL databases. So I had to look for something that uses flat files. I was stuck for a while, so I quit thinking about it and decided to tackle the photo gallery section instead.
My initial thought was to use SimpleViewer, which is what my friend Ritchie uses but I couldn’t get it to work to save my life. I sent him a plea for help via email but he was MIA. I was on my own and wasn’t getting anywhere. So I ditched the SimpleViewer idea and used SimplePhotos instead. It’s really basic, but it installed in like a minute. It works great and, best of all, Brian’s dad likes it.
With the photo gallery being a hit, I decided to bring my focus back to the search for a suitable CMS. The only flat file CMS I could find is ReloadCMS. Good thing it is pretty simple to install because the documentation is total crap. It’s written in Russian or some other language and the translation is horrible! So I’m pretty much jumping off a plane without a parachute on this one. I’m doing the customization and tweaking by trial and error. So far so good, though.
Tonight we are ready to start the overhaul of Brian’s website, which he’s really excited about. We were supposed to start it last night, but I got so wrapped up in the club website. You know how that goes.
Anyway, let me know what you think of the club website. It’s a work in progress, but all the sections are functional so feel free to register and play around with it.
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