Ask MetaFilter questions tagged with hosted

E-mail Newsletters Auto-Populated Via RSS

MaxVonCretin — Wed, 10 Jun 2009 12:53:03 -0800

Can anyone recommend a hosted newsletter delivery service (like ConstantContact.com) that offers the ability to automatically import headlines and links from RSS feeds into HTML e-mail newsletter templates? Or some other mechanism whereby I can use a feed to eliminate the need to manually assemble website update newsletters? Yes, I know that Feedburner will e-mail feeds, but Feedburner does not offer enough flexibility in customizing the e-mail template (no branding, non-feed content, etc.)

Any tips appreciated.

Gmail/explorer 6 weirdness

spyke23 — Fri, 16 Jan 2009 13:21:11 -0800

Gmail Hosted Apps attachment weirdness. I administrate a hosted apps account; recently a MS Publisher file was sent to everyone in the organisation, all were able to open it originally, bar one person, who for some reason, when attempting to download, could only download as a zip file. Tested the same situation in Firefox on XP at home (the situation occurs on IE6/XP) and it downloads fine. Tested with another account on XP/IE 6 and i find this is the same case, i.e. only able to download the MS Publisher file as a zip file. Has anyone else experienced this weirdness? is this due to Google withdrawing support for IE6?

Membership App (Hosted?) for Non-Profit / Club?

c0nsumer — Mon, 15 Dec 2008 16:03:28 -0800

I'm looking for a web-based app (free or otherwise) or a hosted app which will handle membership for a non-profit / club. It needs to provide different membership levels, handle payments (via PayPal or Google Checkout), and provide some method for allowing members to renew or upgrade their memberships, change their info as needed, etc. It does not need to be free, even though that would be nice. Currently we are looking into Wild Apricot, but I'm running into some odd weirdness with importing users, the way income is booked into it (importing our current member list records each member as paying again), and a few other things.

I found this question from a while ago, but it's a bit out of date and doesn't really answer the question.

So, does anyone know of some better way to handle this?

Can I build a 'real' website on googlepages?

jacalata — Wed, 02 Jan 2008 01:11:15 -0800

Can I store changing data in a googlepages setup? I'm trying to build a simple gift registry for my sister, to be hosted on a googlepages account. I was planning to do this in javascript, but I'm out of my depth. The basic requirements are a list of items she would like, and guests can mark an item as bought, but I can't figure out how to store and modify data. As far as I can tell, no changes I make to the javascript variables are kept beyond a single session, and javascript cannot read/write to other files on the server. Is this right?

I've never done web development and am learning javascript as I go, so I may be looking at this the wrong way. Can this be done with javascript, or is there another language I can use within the googlepages framework?

I know there are gift registries available online - this is more for the sake of doing it than the need for a registry.

Are there hosts that let you create a custom web form that accepts attachments and then lets you view the collected results on the back end?

kookoobirdz — Fri, 20 Jul 2007 07:35:13 -0800

How can a non-coder A.) make websites that are application forms that accept both text and attachments and B.) let me view the collected results on the back end instead of sending the results to email? Are there services out there that provide this functionality to mortals? Cheap is good, of course. My organization hosts trainings, gives grants, scholarships, etc. We invite people to apply for them. We've been doing this via e-mail and Word forever, which is absurd at this point. I've gotten us to move to basic web forms on public pages of our intranet or SurveyMonkey, but people then still have to email us any needed attachents. We have an IT department, but getting anything out of them is like pulling teeth. It takes forever, costs a lot, and usually lacks key features due to limitations of internal systems they want you to use. We often have tight turnaround, so it's just not worth it.

I want to be able to create small websites on the fly for these various events/awards. I want custom branding, a page or two of static background content, some images, etc. And then mainly I want to be able to create custom forms for the applications. SurveyMonkey can handle this in a pinch, though it's pretty rudimentary and not really designed for much else than surveys. The kicker is that I need for people to be able to upload files with their applications. We need various documents from them which can't be submitted as just text (e.g. scanned certificates, licenses, etc.).

So how can I, basically a non-coder with a handfuld of 1995-era html formatting tag knowledge, do this? Are there cheap services out there that offer site-builder tools that allow you to make custom forms, and which will accept attachments with the forms? I have used turn-key site builder tools on Network Solutions and another host, so I can make basic web sites, and now they even offer prefab feedback form building blocks, but no attachment function, and the results go to email.

Making the site with that form/attachment funtionality is the bulk of my question but what I'd really like is for the results to not go to email. Rather, like SurveyMonkey, I'd like for them to go to some hosted database with an easy viewing interface and export capability if needed. I'd like to be able to go to this site's back end, see all of the collected applications with their associated applications, and page through them.

I'd like to make a site like this and point a particular URL at it.

Are there any sites that offer services like this with builder tools for non-coders?

Document management on a shared hosting server?

sprocket87 — Tue, 27 Feb 2007 12:43:18 -0800

Help me find an online document management system / digital asset management system. I'm looking for a document management system (DMS) / digital asset management system (DAM) for my scanned documents. I plan to store all of my important documents, from credit card statements to bills to receipts to insurance info, etc, digitally. I'll be using a scanner with ADF & duplexing to digitize my papers. I need a management system to organize and archive them.

Ideally, I'd like to have some software that can be set up on Dreamhost for a hosted solution. However, to allow for more flexible responses, here are my overall stipulations:

1. Must be free or inexpensive. See 2.

2. Must be hosted online. I don't trust local copies (hardware failure/fire/theft/etc). This applies to portable (DVD, etc) media as well. It does NOT need to be a hosted system per se, in that Company X provides the DMS/DAM software and hosts it. I am willing / would prefer to use a 3rd party host, such as Dreamhost, for cost reasons. They are much more flexible in that they offer tons of storage and bandwidth and whatever else you want for a much lower cost. I don't want to pay $X/mo just for an online DAM. I am willing to pay $X/mo for a shared host that allows me to host anything else I want as well though.

3. Must be somewhat easy to install, configure and use, whether it is a provided & hosted service or a service I set up on a shared host.

4. Does not have to control my scanning experience; I can use a separate tool to get the files digitized but I'm looking for the DSM/DAM service to organize them. Obviously an online service wouldn't have much control over my hardware anyway :)

5. Should have the usual DMS/DAM features: File indexing for a wide array of filetypes (doc/pdf/all images/tiff/archives/etc), support OCR if possible, allow categories and advanced naming/file control, exporting, etc.

I love the looks of Linux DMS tools like DocMGR, but the setup looks somewhat overwhelming. I'm comfortable with basic Linux tasks, but configuring a shared host is a bit confusing to me. Is there any way to even set up such services on a shared host? For instance, is it possible to install DocMGR on Dreamhost? I suspect not, as it uses PostgreSQL and Dreamhost uses MySQL. But beyond this limitation, how does one go about installing their own applications on a shared host? I mean, Dreamhost provides a shell prompt, but not root - are you even allowed to install software? And what about dependencies, etc?

I know Dreamhost offers several "One-click" installable services, like MediaWiki, Wordpress, Joomla, etc, but I don't think any of these are exactly what I'm looking for. I'm assuming it's possible to set up some other service, albeit with more work, but I'm not having much success finding documented "How To's" for this. For instance, how to set up docmgr/doxfs/etc on a shared host.

Also, I know there are some basic Windows tools like PaperPort and Docsvault that do a great job of managing local copies of digital files, but I want them online. I understand I could simply backup a directory to an online host, but I'm thinking a hosted database would be preferable for advanced administration, etc.

Obviously I have a lot of "wants" so this is pretty wide open. Understand that I'm not a corporation and don't need any huge DAM solutions, but I'd like something a little more advanced than a basic client-side software.

Any advice on choosing a managed Exchange provider?

jeb — Thu, 09 Jun 2005 15:47:21 -0800

How do I choose an MS Exchange hosting company? Much like web hosts, registrars, and ssl CAs, there are ~ten million companies that do this and on the surface they look more or less the same (similar features, similar prices, etc). However, also like the aforementioned companies, I suspect that most of them are horrible and that a tiny handful are run by competent people who are pleasant to deal with. Any ideas on how to find the good ones without calling every single google result? Recommendations for specific providers are also much appreciated, as is any other advice surrounding Exchange (I've never really used it).