Website help?

October 25, 2008 8:08 AM

Can anyone help me with my particular website dilemma?

I've been tasked with redoing my company's website. We need an area for our clients to be able to upload secure files, message boards and a shopping cart type of thing. Oh, and I can't outsource this. It has to be from me.

I think I am over my head here. If you need a great HTML site, I'm your man, but I have no idea of where to get started here. And I really don't have any internal help. This is my big project.

Are there web site templates out there that will give me a good starting point? I'm starting to worry for my future here.

(I went anon because I know there are people at my company who read this site and don't want to seem like I don't know my shit)

posted by anonymous to computers & internet (12 comments total)

Seems to me you're trying to find one complete solution to several different problems.

You can do the website. That's one job.

You'll also need a way for clients to upload secure files. That's another job.

You'll need a messageboard. That's another job.

You'll need a shopping cart. That's another job.

How do these need to interact with one another? Do they need to be seemless, or can they be separate entities?

You say you can't outsource it, but does that mean you can't use any third party solutions? If so, you very well may be in over your head, because things like shopping carts and messageboards require a pretty high level of advanced programming.

If you can use third party solutions, you will find many, many products -- both free and for a fee -- that will help you with individual jobs. But finding one solution-in-a-box for what you need is unlikely.
posted by nitsuj at 8:27 AM on October 25, 2008

Most hosting companies have options, often for free, that you can just "turn on" to use on your site for the things you need. Once activated, you can then customize the look and feel, and then you just create a link from the main site to the appropriate page.

If your host doesn't offer such things, there are open source solutions (Google terms like: open source message board), which you can install on the server and customize. You'll probably have to set up a MySQL database and customize the design through the css in the style sheet, but this isn't as intimidating as it sounds. Instructions are pretty good, plus there's tons of documentation of support on the web. Just make sure the boss know that this will take time.

Other services allow you to link to a third party site, perhaps for a fee, to handle the heavy-lifting of those functions. For example, Yahoo Store lets you set up shop pretty easily for a monthly fee.
posted by Fuzzy Skinner at 8:46 AM on October 25, 2008

If they are expecting someone who can write HTML to code all this by scratch, then they're going to be profoundly disappointed and you're going to get a pink slip.

There are a lot of packages out there, including a lot of open-source ones, that you can host on your own server.

You could probably do this all with a CMS like Drupal, which has modules for forums, shopping carts, etc, and I'm pretty sure you could make it handle the file-upload as well. Just getting Drupal configured to do all this will be a significant undertaking; theming it to look the way you want will also require a lot of learning and doing on your part. There are also single-purpose standalone apps that do each of the functions nitsuj mentioned, although it might make more sense to put all those functions under one roof, so to speak.

A good place to start looking would be http://opensourcecms.com/. It is not comprehensive, but it gives you an idea of what's out there.
posted by adamrice at 8:48 AM on October 25, 2008

I highly doubt they won't allow third party solutions. That's just crazy, and I wouldn't ask a question on here to help that kind of company, I'd leave and let them whither away or continue to suck 20 times as much money as they need from whomever pays their budget.

It would be nice to know more details about your situation. I doubt they're going to lock you in a room with a laptop, a PHP manual, and no internet connection and not let you leave until they have their message board, shopping cart, and the rest.

There's people that do know their shit at the company? Ask them questions. Do a bit of research, and then ask someone a question like "Hey Jenny, do you like the Zamtastic message board or the Flanger message board?" She Answers. "Why do you think that?" Then, grab a tutorial and install.

Oh, the major hurdle to climb over right now is databases. Search for mysql.
posted by sleslie at 8:55 AM on October 25, 2008

Personally, I would do it by starting a blog (Wordpress or Blogger) or a message board (vBulletin) and then just customizing the heck out of it. Add Paypal, move it to your own hosting, custom logins, and make it look corporate pretty. I needed to do this recently for a club I run, and I was able to do most of it through Google...creating accounts and integrating the Groups feature with Calendar, Reader, Blogger, chat, and email. I changed the layout to meet my needs, and it looks like I put a lot more work into it than I really did because it doesn't have Google or Blogger written all over it.
posted by iamkimiam at 9:05 AM on October 25, 2008

(On preview, the others have said a good bit of what I'm going to say, but I took the time to type it, so I'll post it.)

First off, unless you've misled your employer or there's more information we're not getting, it seems to me like you've been given a task that's exceeds your realm. An HTML designer is a big step from a web application developer, both in skill set and compensation. You may want to consider discussing whether or not your supervisor's expectations match up with your job description and your skills. That's my $0.02, anyway.

Ok, now that I've got that out of the way...

Assuming you're able to use third party solutions (and I'd have to say your employer would be crazy to do otherwise) they are a number of good tools (even free ones) available that might work for you. If it hasn't already been decided, the first thing you need to do is determine what OS and underlying applications are available to you. Is it LAMP (Linux, Apache, MySQL, PHP), Windows/.NET with IIS and SQL, or something else? From there, you can filter your list of tools...

What you're looking for is probably most commonly referred to as a Content Management System (CMS) and you'll want one that offers extensions or modules. I work in the Windows and .NET world, so the one I'm most familiar with is DotNetNuke. It's free, open source, incredibly customizable, and offers free modules that would cover the first three pieces that nitsuj listed above: the site, the file upload, and the messageboard. I know there are shopping cart modules available for purchase, and there may even be free ones out there as well.

Someone else in the community will undoubtedly be able to point you to a similar product for the LAMP stack if that's what you need. If you want to dig some for yourself, there's a pretty thorough list of CMS systems at WikiPedia.

A CMS like DotNetNuke will do a lot of the work for you, but there's still going to be a lot of work that will have to be done, and some of it may fall outside your realm. But if it were my project, that's where I'd start. Good luck with it. Email's in my profile if you'd like to contact me for a little more info.
posted by ElDiabloConQueso at 9:05 AM on October 25, 2008

Oh wait, what do you mean by 'can't outsource'? If you mean you can't hire somebody else to do it, then fine. If you mean that you can't use somebody else's software or app to help you along, then that's damn near impossible.
posted by iamkimiam at 9:07 AM on October 25, 2008

Just a note on the "HTML web designer" vs. "PHP web application developer" concept.

Many many people, your bosses and others in your company no exception, remain entirely clueless about the different areas of expertise in web work. I have had to re-do numerous horrible websites that were created by [employee / friend / neighbor] because he was "good with computers."

There is no shame in not knowing all of it. I would venture to guess that many, if not most, people who are experts in the programming aspect of web applications are terrible at the interface and design aspect. That's to be expected. There is no shame in such a person using a template for the front-end, and tweaking it for their own needs, just as there is no shame in being good at creating the design and interface, then using a pre-made back-end solution. No point in re-inventing the wheel.
posted by Fuzzy Skinner at 9:20 AM on October 25, 2008

If you've only built static sites, even just installing ready-made web apps would be a steep learning curve with plenty of potential for technical screw-ups, security issues, etc. You really don't want to be doing too much learning as you go along, it sounds like a potentially complicated extranet.

Explain the situation to your bosses and try to find the best way to get as close as possible to the ideal solution. Perhaps you could try out a hosted service such as Basecamp to cover some of the requirements? Could you maybe find a small local web dev firm and consult them informally to get an idea of what's involved and how much they might charge to help out with some of it?

"I'm starting to worry for my future here."
Look, maybe you naively took on too much, but everyone has limits to their skills and experience. Try to stay calm and confident, make practical suggestions, and don't panic!
posted by malevolent at 9:43 AM on October 25, 2008

Are you supposed to host it yourselves, or can you at least offload that to someone else?
posted by Civil_Disobedient at 10:49 AM on October 25, 2008

I would echo what is said above, it sounds like it would be difficult for you to meet their expectations with the resources that you have available. You need to be confident that this is a large job for even a very experienced web programmer creating from scratch.

I think that even though you are thinking that the best way to help your company right now is to try to meet these mistaken expectations, however you are in the best position to advise them about how much effort is involved, and what resources you are going to need to complete this work. You can be confident though that if they get a second opinion - it will match your own. Unfortunately if they refuse to believe this you are going to suffer, but eventually you will be proven correct. Downside is that your company will have wasted a year learning this.

It is all very well to expect you to do this on your own - however they should be prepared for a long wait. Also even good programmers will need assistance from outside resources that will advise on security for example. If your company is dealing with credit cards online - this represents significant risk for your company - you will need to make sure that you have a high level of security to manage this risk, on the application side as well as on the network side.

Best move right now is to have them figure out the priorities for these systems, for you to assess the effort involved and for both parties to assess the effort versus impact. You should choose to only proceed with one of message boards, secure upload or shopping cart for now, using this to learn what resources your company will need to produce the other two.

Good luck with this.
posted by clarkie666 at 12:16 PM on October 25, 2008

I really rarely recommend Drupal because it used to have a steep learning curve, but I think it's your best bet. It will give you everything on your list in one integrated package. It will also manage your member profiles, so you can set up a group for Client X, add all the people from Client X Company, give them access to specific forum areas, etc.

However, if you need a shopping cart to integrate into an existing website, you're hosed.

If you're really stuck, you can call me. I live in Ireland, I guarantee I do not work for your company, I am not looking for contracting work and would not touch this project with a ten foot pole - but I'd be happy to talk you through what your requirement actually is, the options available to you, and help you come up with A Plan.

MeMail if that's of any use to you. I'm around all weekend.
posted by DarlingBri at 6:21 PM on October 25, 2008