I need help updating our town's website
June 8, 2009 12:24 PM Subscribe
Looking to move a FP2003 / Dreamweaver municipal website to a CMS or other solution and need design help!
I have a small town website that is quite robust in it's content (agendas, meeting minutes, contact forms, job postings & applications etc.) However, the site, for all of it's content has not been updated with web2.0 stuff and is stuck in the 00's. I've looked and re-looked and re-re-looked at Joomla and Drupal (and modX and CMS made simple etc.) but can't land on a square on what to change the site to, or whether it even should be.
The more I think about it the more I think I'm mainly looking to change the look of the site with good clean CSS, that is accessible for all including those that are on mobile devices or with disabilities - 508 compliance if possible. Just a small task!
The site currently has about 200 html pages and several more PDF documents of minutes, forms, ordinances, etc., that are currently searched by Google.
While I like the idea of a CMS, it seems counter-intuitive to have limits on the structure (3 levels in Joomla or whatever), but maybe I haven't figured out how to adapt the site correctly. Also, it appears to me a CMS is great for new sites, but moving large static sites over into one are a whole 'nother ball of wax.
Keep in mind that as the IT person, I have many other responsibilities, not just the website, so I cannot devote 100% of my time to it. The town does not have the money to sign up for something like civicplus.com, nor will it pay a graphic design firm to come up with a prettified solution - so it has to be an open-source, and something an IT person that can't devote all of their time learning and working on. Is there such a beast?
Things I see that needed and lacking in current site: an image / CSS makeover from text & tables, 508 compliance, ease of maintenance (department update-able?), breadcrumbs, "mail this page", "print this page" etc.
I have a small town website that is quite robust in it's content (agendas, meeting minutes, contact forms, job postings & applications etc.) However, the site, for all of it's content has not been updated with web2.0 stuff and is stuck in the 00's. I've looked and re-looked and re-re-looked at Joomla and Drupal (and modX and CMS made simple etc.) but can't land on a square on what to change the site to, or whether it even should be.
The more I think about it the more I think I'm mainly looking to change the look of the site with good clean CSS, that is accessible for all including those that are on mobile devices or with disabilities - 508 compliance if possible. Just a small task!
The site currently has about 200 html pages and several more PDF documents of minutes, forms, ordinances, etc., that are currently searched by Google.
While I like the idea of a CMS, it seems counter-intuitive to have limits on the structure (3 levels in Joomla or whatever), but maybe I haven't figured out how to adapt the site correctly. Also, it appears to me a CMS is great for new sites, but moving large static sites over into one are a whole 'nother ball of wax.
Keep in mind that as the IT person, I have many other responsibilities, not just the website, so I cannot devote 100% of my time to it. The town does not have the money to sign up for something like civicplus.com, nor will it pay a graphic design firm to come up with a prettified solution - so it has to be an open-source, and something an IT person that can't devote all of their time learning and working on. Is there such a beast?
Things I see that needed and lacking in current site: an image / CSS makeover from text & tables, 508 compliance, ease of maintenance (department update-able?), breadcrumbs, "mail this page", "print this page" etc.
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One of the main reasons a muni website tends to still be in the '00's is that they have to service a very wide range of constituents...many, many of whom probably don't have newer computers. For a municipal website to be functional to as many tax-payers as possible, it really does have to aim somewhere near the lowest common denominator, as far as compatibility goes. I'm not saying you need to avoid CSS completely. I'm just saying that you might want to avoid anything that isn't going to run well in a 3-4-year-old browser.
Aim for robust service over bells-n-whistles.
posted by Thorzdad at 1:56 PM on June 8, 2009