Ask MetaFilter questions tagged with web and website

Where to buy tea online, + pu-erh

k. — Mon, 16 Nov 2009 08:24:37 -0800

Tea Filter: what's your favorite online tea store? Bonus question: tell me about pu-erh. Stores I already know about, but haven't necessarily ordered from:
Adagio Teas
Tea Gschwendner (teamerchants.com in the USA)
TeazOnline.com
Upton Tea
Maeda-en (Japanese green tea only)

Which of these is the best, for quality or price? Is there a different one that you prefer?

Bonus: I'm interested in trying pu-erh tea. What does it taste like, in comparison to more familiar kinds of black/green/oolong/white tea? What kind do you suggest I try first?

I need a crash course in the current best-practice website accessablity standards.

anastasiav — Wed, 14 Oct 2009 06:42:45 -0800

Give me a crash course in making our nonprofit website accessible. What are the best practices/standards? What's the lingo? I'm not building the site, but I have a meeting with the developers who are, today. They are doing this pro-bono for us (we're a community nonprofit with a goodly number of disabled users). Its important to our CEO that the website be accessible, but she hired me because she doesn't really understand the web.

I get the web fine, but I've never had to deal with this particular issue before. My first meeting with the developer is this afternoon. Help me talk with them about this issue and not sound like a N00b!

Pros & Cons of bringing web development in-house?

MeatLightning — Fri, 09 Oct 2009 11:33:22 -0800

Pros & Cons of bringing web development in-house? Hi all -
I manage a mid-size e-commerce website. We currently work with an agency to build and maintain our site. We are considering hiring a dev (C# / .NET, SQL) and taking over development... or at least much of it (still may go out of house for UX, front-end dev).

Anyone have any advice, experiences, warnings, etc they can share?

Have you gone down this road? How did it go? What should we watch out for?

thanks in advance!

Updating my portfolio website and need help with web navigation, images, hosting and more.

mintchip — Mon, 05 Oct 2009 12:04:23 -0800

Updating my online portfolio and need help with web navigation, images, hosting and more. I would like to update my online writing portfolio, which is currently a blog hosted by Blogger. Each post is a thumbnail image along with some introductory copy. The thumbnails link to large jpg images
stored on Flikr. I want to spend a minimum of time updating my site, and I need to be able to make updates with ease. I have old versions of Photoshop and Dreamweaver at my disposal. Can you help me with these questions?

1. Navigation: On Blogger, new posts appear in date order rather than being organized by category. I am not happy with this navigation limitation. Is there any way around this without creating a whole new website independent of Blogger? I have been thinking about purchasing a domain name and then using an HTML template, but it would be easier if I didn’t have to do this. If I do need to move to a different site format, what would you recommend for a simple template and/or host?

2. Photo storage: My thumbnail images, which Blogger creates, link to Flikr photos. However, the type in these larger images isn't fully readable until the user clicks a second time (after clicking on the thumbnail), to enlarge the image to full size. I’m afraid some readers won’t do this. Is there a good solution to this? Where should I store my photos (if not on Flikr)?

3. Photo size and format: What are standard image sizes? If I abandon the blog format and create a new HTML site, how should I go about creating all of the JPGs I will need (full size, thumbnail)? What is the standard size for full size images and thumbnails and what do you recommend for a naming convention? Would PDF format be preferable? If so, what software should I use to create my PDFs, are there any standards to these, and where can I store them?

4. Should I allow people to download my writing samples, either as JPG or PDFs?

Researching website options

titanium_geek — Thu, 01 Oct 2009 07:03:04 -0800

Researching options for all things website: hosting, domain name registration and DNS. Can you help me narrow it down? Hello Mefites, this is my first ask.mefi question. I'm writing a report for a 'professional writing' course. We will be assessed on the quality of the writing, not the content.

Scenario: you say "I would like a website for my small company."
I say: "Well, you need content (I have this covered), a domain name, and hosting."

What do I say next? I know I can google web hosting providers, but there are lots! What are the good and/or popular companies out there?

I have on the list already: GoDaddy (my own domain bought through them, looking to change.)
nearlyfreespeech.net
mediatemple

These are companies I've seen mentioned on my journeys around the web, but I'd like more recommendations please.

Point me to the web...

gjc — Fri, 25 Sep 2009 07:48:24 -0800

Are there any Access-like tools for building data access pages in a web+sql format? Here's the thing. I have a few databases that I've done up in Access. That's great for when I have my computer.

But my needs are becoming such that I would like to have access to the data on any machine.

(I've searched the archives and saw a great many other answers, but none seemed to address what I'm looking for, or at least in a way I understood.)

I'm good on the server and the web space and the backend. What I'm looking for is basically something that works like Access's form builder: I drop the elements in and fill in the logic as need be. Publish it to the server, and disco.

I really don't want to run a "product" (like a CMS, or a knowledgebase, or forum software) where I'd have to wrestle with it to get it to do what I want. I would also prefer something that doesn't require oddball things to be installed on the client or on the server, like .net or frontpage extensions.

Partially because I don't really know what I'm doing (and that's OK, it's just for personal use/learning), and partially because that's just how my thought processes work- I like the idea of dropping pre-built elements in and making the connections work. And because the idea of writing html for a bunch of buttons and text boxes seems daunting.

I've tried all manner of searching, and while I know such a tool *has* to exist, I'm clearly not searching the right way.

Extra points for fancy ajaxy web 2.0 coolness. Thanks!

What great town Web sites are there? Or what should be on one?

wackybrit — Tue, 04 Aug 2009 17:44:19 -0800

I have an opportunity to produce a kickass community Web site for my town. What cities already have wonderfully interactive, community Web sites I can look at for inspiration, or what do you think a killer town Web site should have or be like? I recently bought my town's domain name (in its .co.uk variant) but despite having 15,000 residents, my town is not very well represented online, although the residents are heavy Internet users (on Facebook especially).

I have plentiful spare time and resources and I'd like to do it for a challenge, for something to do, and as a way of engaging in local life. In my previous life I sold a couple of tech businesses I developed, so I can do almost any sort of custom development for this.

I am at the very earliest stage. I have the domain and.. that's it. I'm figuring out what to offer. I have not yet done any local market research (although I'm sure that would be interesting, I think the local populace will need to be led by the nose..)

So I want to get some initial ideas by seeing other kickass community/town Web sites. Can you recommend any? Further, if you can't or if you were in my position, what would you put on or develop for a kickass local community/town Web site? What do you think I should be doing?

Just so you have a rough idea where my imagination is flying, I sorta want to get people posting and interacting.. so something like Craigslist mixed with a no-sign-in-necessary Twitter.. vague, I know.

Where to find vector graphic website backgrounds?

Merlin144 — Tue, 16 Jun 2009 13:54:46 -0800

Where can I find/buy great website backgrounds such as the examples below? Or, where can I find good vector graphics to tile and make my own? I want to download/buy/create a few backgrounds similar to:
http://ecozenboutique.com/
http://babybearshop.com/shop5-welcome.htm

Please let me know where to find similar, or if you have ideas for vector graphics sites where I could find something to tile-ize.

Thank you!

Drupal versions & themes

Salmonberry — Sat, 06 Jun 2009 10:17:44 -0800

Backpedalling from Drupal 6 to Drupal 5, should I do it just to save a theme...how often does a Drupal update screw up custom themes? Another Drupal question from me. Our site was on Drupal 5 when I inherited it. Got a new host and off I went, putting on Drupal 6. Now there's no theme and the designer is saying it'll take hours to recreate everything to work on 6. Are Drupal themes generally fux0red by updates or can they be generated to easily upgrade with the latest version? Also, should I downgrade our Drupal install to 5 or are there significant security/bug fixes that came with 6? I'm a Drupal newbie so I really don't know.

What are some examples of "classic" webiste design?

SouthCNorthNY — Mon, 01 Jun 2009 09:56:15 -0800

What are some examples of "classic" webiste design? I'm looking for examples of layouts that haven't changed much over the years (because they were good, not because they were lazy.) I'm looking for things like google.com, not timecube.com

What's the right software to maintain and display a calendar of relatively infrequent future events?

gleuschk — Sun, 22 Mar 2009 11:49:49 -0800

What's the right software to maintain and display a calendar of relatively infrequent future events, as well as blog-like news postings? I maintain a website for specialists in my field of mathematics, and one section consists of announcements for upcoming and recent conferences. Another is for news announcements: a basic blog-style list of entries. Both are currently run by our 7-year-old Movable Type installation, in combination with a good bit of chewing gum and baling twine. I'd like to redesign the whole schmear, including the back end. Is wordpress (plus more gum and twine) the right solution? Is there some other system that makes more sense? Link.

Here's the current setup, which hasn't changed since launch in 2002: Movable Type runs two blogs: "News" and "Conferences". The former is your basic blog, except that we only show one entry on the front page, and generally have only an entry a month or so.

Each entry in "Conferences" is added when we learn about it, and post-dated to the first day of the conference. This system works ok, since most conferences are just a day or two, but there are some that are a week, month, or even a semester long, and this causes problems. When first posted, they're in an "upcoming" category that displays in one place, then changed by hand to a "past" category that shows up in another place when they're past. Drawback: I often forget to change the category, which makes me look stupid. We average about 3 conferences a month, though they tend to cluster in March, June, and October. Lead time is up to a year.

I'd like to redesign and bring it up to web-2.whateverwe'reuptonow snuff, both in front and behind. Wordpress seems to be the default these days. I could do the same acrobatics to get the conferences into wordpress, I guess, but it sure seems like there should be a better way. Do you know of one?

I run this out of my pocket and in my free time, so free and drop-in solutions are best, but if you've got good ideas, lay 'em on me.

Who will send me TV listings like the ones in TV Guide?

reenum — Tue, 10 Mar 2009 08:42:50 -0800

I want an e-mail or RSS update that tells me all the shows I want to watch that day and give me a brief synopsis of said episode. Is there anything like this out there? Back in the late 1990's, I had an Excite account. At the time, I could select my favorite shows, and on the My Excite page, I could see a short synopsis for that night's episode. They had this for reruns too, so I could figure which reruns I wanted to watch. Ditto for talk shows.

I have this feature on DISH Network, but I want it in my inbox for easier processing.

I'm currently subscribed to crapimissedit, which e-mails my inbox whenever a new show is on for one of my favorites. It does half, but not the whole job. I like that the site notifies me when a new show is on, but I'm not happy that I can't get a synopsis or info on repeats.

I also have an account with Zap2it.com, but find it too unwieldy, plus no e-mail or RSS updates.

Are there any websites where I can have an RSS update or e-mail sent to me that lists my favorite shows that day and gives a brief synopsis of them?

Web design 101

nicolin — Tue, 10 Mar 2009 05:36:16 -0800

How can I learn to create a website, a server, get the tools themselves ? I've been asked to create a website for a non-profit organization. I don't know much about designing websites (I've tried dreamweaver a few years ago) which means that I have to learn almost everything about it. Could you provide ideas, links, advice about creating a website from scratch ?
I don't need a thorough course to be able to become a designer, I just need the survival kit, including where to get free tools, how to set up a server.
Thanks !

How do you disable access to a root directory on a web server?

jrholt — Mon, 02 Mar 2009 12:14:15 -0800

How do you disable access to a root directory on a web server? We have individual files that we're happy to let people download, but we don't necessarily want them going to the root directory to download all the files.

e.g.

http://www.example.com/files/filenumber1.jpg (okay)
http://www.example.com/files/ (not okay)

Can anybody point me in the right direction so that a user who tries the second URL is denied access? Should we be looking in httaccess? cpanel? Somewhere else? I was surprised to not find an answer after Googling around.

Gradient background?

nikkorizz — Mon, 09 Feb 2009 15:53:31 -0800

Is there a way to create gradient backgrounds on webpages without using images? I want something to the effect of this site such that the background is a gradient that extends from top to bottom. The catch is that I run a news blog website and posts sizes can vary significantly in length, so using a set image doesn't quite work out .

I'd really like to avoid using tables to achieve this effect and I really want the gradient effect to extend from top to bottom.

Any ideas?

This is for a Wordpress blog, by the way.

What reseller tools should I use to keep track of my clients sites?

xanderbeedle — Thu, 05 Feb 2009 15:10:48 -0800

I'm a web developer who has to handle a couple of my clients websites. Mostly small, static sites without much traffic, but a couple of Ruby on Rails websites too. I don't particularly want to get a full-on reseller account as my clients don't really need to access their control panels and be billed through a separate system etc. At the moment I'm just using a decent hosting account with all of the sites running in their own domains. I'd like to know what reseller tools you guys use to help you keep track of your various websites / monitor their progress and uptime / bill your clients for the hosting?

Credit card number stolen! How do I protect others?

attercoppe — Wed, 14 Jan 2009 09:33:47 -0800

My credit card number was stolen! How do I determine the most likely culprit (or at least how they did it) and try to ensure it doesn't happen again either to me or to someone else? I have a relatively new credit card. It lives in my pocket, I have never handed it to anyone else or given out the number except as described below. I've used it twice at the grocery store, swiped it myself. On 10 January I placed an order through a website, on 12 January they ran my card, and early this morning (14 January) I got a call from the fraud department of my credit card company. Someone had made three small (>$10) purchases with my card. The purchases were dated today, 14 January. (Capital One was right on top of it!) Classic fraud flag, the thief checking the card works with small purchases before using it for something big. I confirmed I did not make those purchases, I won't be liable, that number is cancelled and they're sending a new card. No problem there. The question is, how did someone get my card number? The only answers that make sense to me are (in order of likelihood):

1) The website I ordered through has been hacked;
2) Someone at the company I ordered from stole it;
3) Someone in my building, no more than two apartments away, has been sniffing my as-yet-unsecured wireless router (dumb, I know) and got it.

I rate #3 as pretty unlikely given my neighbors. I'm on the third floor, far from the street and parking lot, and it's cold here - a random wardriver/walker is even more unlikely.

I let the company I ordered from know about this. Of course I was speaking to a lowest-level CS rep, and she seemed pretty sure that couldn't ever happen - "We've never had a problem with that before." Then again, she seemed to think I was implying a #2 scenario, that an employee there was responsible.

Am I reasonable in thinking this was a failure of security either with the company website, or within the company? Should I call back and ask to speak to someone as high up as I can get? How likely is it that their website is compromised, and that they don't know, or haven't told the majority of their employees?

How can I employ someone to create a tribute site for a vanished community when I'm not really sure what I want?

Joe in Australia — Mon, 12 Jan 2009 23:33:44 -0800

The archivist of an exterminated Jewish community has asked me to make a tribute website (the modern equivalent of a Yizkor Book. I want to be evocative and moving and a useful reference for other people tracing their genealogy. The problem is that I have no idea how to create a modern website; or write the sort of material I want; or make it pretty. What sort of help should I look for, and where can I find it, and how much will it cost me?

Micropayment service?

msalt — Mon, 15 Dec 2008 18:25:33 -0800

I'm looking for a super-simple, low-cost system for micropayments for a website. My 8-year old daughter wants to set up a service where she asks users for a small payment, $1 or $0.50, money-back guarantee. This is a lark, so we don't want to invest a lot of money, and the money-back guarantee is crucial to the concept, and many users will probably test it. I'm old school -- is PayPal still a reasonable possibility? From my experience with credit cards 10 years ago, I'm guessing that their fees would make them impractical here. But I am very open to suggestion. My ISP is Network Solutions, basic cheap hosting account. Thanks!

Building a website/web Optimization

sharp2403 — Sat, 13 Dec 2008 14:04:44 -0800

I want to learn how to build and modify websites. I eventually want to look into selling things or writing books for some of the websites i build. Also would like to learn how web optimization works on a website, and learn how to optimize and link websites. I am computer savvy, but don't know any programing language. Any idea how I would get started?

Great student group web sites?

raf — Tue, 25 Nov 2008 08:32:58 -0800

Examples of great student group web sites?

Tell me about writing for the commercial web!

Miko — Sat, 15 Nov 2008 07:04:26 -0800

What do I need to know about writing for the web? I'm talking to some people who run a wonderful, small, independent web-development and design firm. They have had great success doing websites for regional and national companies and local businesses, updating image as they go with fresh design and new messaging. They do everything from toy stores and book stores to hospitals, advocacy groups, professional service firms, etc. Their business is increasing rapidly and they will probably be asking me to do some writing for them soon, on contract. They've seen my writing, which at this point is a very occasional moonlighting activity for me, in local newspapers (features, reviews) and magazines (food writing for the city mag). So they're confident I can put words together and deliver clean copy on a deadline.

However, I feel like there are some real specifics about writing for commercial web sites that I could stand to learn, and having some guiding principles going in would be really helpful.

So I'm asking a very, very open-ended question: what would you tell someone who has written for print, on mostly arts and culture topics, and for professional reasons (grant applications and museum labels and training manuals) about writing for the web on contract for a client who is trying to convey a specific image and message?

What jargon will I hear? What basic questions would I, as a content writer, need to ask at the beginning of a project?

What web resources would you direct a content writer to?

What is the range of fees for this service? How should I start the negotiations? I honestly have no idea what to offer here - print pays by the publication, usually a flat fee in a fee structure giving a range of compensation for type of article and word count. With web projects, do writers charge by the hour? By word count? By type of feature? By package? I have absolutely no idea what to ask. Of course I'm sure the range goes from 'peanuts/free' to 'sky high for the best companies,' but this company is doing very well and growing, they intend to pay, and I am a professional writer looking at this as an income source, not a hobby. So I would love some examples of fees and fee structures that web writers use for different situations and different levels. What are the industry standards?

What other advice do you have that I don't know enough to ask yet?

Thanks a lot. Writing/developing websites could be a really wonderful skill to add to my career bag-of-tricks, so I'm eager to be successful at it.

Help me and my friends keep broadcasting!

Citrus — Tue, 04 Nov 2008 11:45:30 -0800

So, what's a good replacement service for Yahoo Live? Yahoo announced yesterday that they're pulling the plug on Yahoo Live. Is there a similar service out there that Yahoo Live users can jump to?

1) web-site idea, 2) ??? 3) The Awesome

indiebass — Wed, 24 Sep 2008 10:52:23 -0800

Can the hive help me get a web site started? I have very specific ideas, but I'm a dinosaur when it comes to everything about the insides of websites. Back in the day when I set up a website, it was the late 90's and everything had to be coded by hand and ftp'ed to someplace. I realise we are in the 21st century and there are much easier ways to go about things.

I already have a domain purchased. What I want to make is a site that is very similar to the old Pajiba setup: graphic banner across the top, assorted goodies in one or two side columns (probably just links in one, at this point) and a main area in between. The idea behind the site is that I'll be reviewing things, but they won't necessarily be new things. That is, whatever my netflix might be, an album I listened to... things like that. So in the middle I'd like to have a photo, a title and one sentence, where you can click on the title and it takes you to a separate page that is cataloged as http:www.mydomain.com/review_title.html (or whatever) and looks like the front page, except the middle bit is just the extended article.

Further complicating things, is that I wanted to set up the website with free hosting, if possible, and if I actually start generating traffic outside my immediate circle of friends then I'd think about buying some space/bandwidth.

So how do I even start? I know you can use a unique domain name with, like, blogger - which is free - but do they let you structure the workings of it like I want to? (the title-link deal to pages behind the page) I feel confident that I would be able to make the page look like I want it to, it's more the workings and the hostings that I am unsure about.

I've put off asking this question out of embarrassment for a couple weeks, because of the n00b-ishness, and I've really tried to navigate it on my own, but put in "free web hosting" into the google and it's like the internet punches you in the face. Thanks in advance to anyone who can help!

How do I change the name and URL of my website without losing visitors and Google search placement?

rintako — Sun, 14 Sep 2008 07:39:15 -0800

How do I change the name and URL of my website without losing visitors and Google search placement? I want to change the name and URL of my website. It currently receives 3000 uniques a day. About 90% of my traffic is from outside sources such as Google, or others that have linked to my content. How do I change the name and URL so that my visitors can continue to come find my site, and so I don't lose my top 1-3 positions on the Google search pages for my terms?