Forums

The forums ran from 2008-2020 and are now closed and viewable here as an archive.

Home Forums Other Where to begin?! Advice requested, please.

  • This topic is empty.
Viewing 5 posts - 1 through 5 (of 5 total)
  • Author
    Posts
  • #170945
    Zachcos
    Participant

    Hey all,

    First off, I’d like to give some background. I’m an actor in NYC and do freelance web design for other actors. Now, actor websites are SIMPLE — typically a home page with some text, a bio page, a photo/video page, a resume page, and a contact page. These sites really just need to be quick and clean.

    Here are the things I would like to be able to utilize:
    – Responsive Design
    – CMS (so my clients can update their sites themselves)
    – Attractive and easy-to-manage photo album
    – Contact Form (is building one from scratch easiest?)

    I have experience using Joomla, but am open to learning other CMS Platforms, and I’m well-versed in HTML & CSS, and making headway with jQuery.

    So to get to the point, I’m asking for suggestions for frameworks and systems that lend themselves to custom-layouts and could possibly be integrated with a CMS, if possible.

    Thank you all in advance, and I apologize for my long message!

    -Zach

    #170946
    chrisburton
    Participant

    I would recommend Kirby as a CMS. Very very easy to customize and comes with Panel (similar to WP admin).

    #171000
    nixnerd
    Participant

    @chrisburton loves Kirby like I love Arch :) He’s got his reasons and I have mine. For a lot of projects, it is my personal opinion that a CMS is way, way overkill. For projects this small, they will come with a huge performance overhead as well as security risks that you don’t really need… all so that clients can change they’re own site.

    Now, @chrisburton is right in suggesting something like Kirby. There is no database with Kirby, so you’ve eliminated that layer of complexity… which is great.

    But, I have to ask, why not just roll with static sites for these folks? They’re fast, simple and you make more money in maintenance/revision work. Just a thought.

    If you’re going to go with anything… I’d go with something in the ilk of Kirby/Ghost/Jekyll. Although, the last of the three probably won’t solve the problem of clients being able to do it.

    #171177
    Zachcos
    Participant

    Thanks for the responses!

    I had all the necessary files downloaded to begin playing around with Ghost and never got around to diving in. I took a peek at Jekyll and agree that it might not be best-suited for my current needs, but I appreciate knowing about it now.


    @chrisburton
    – Thanks, I’m definitely taking a look at Kirby!


    @Joe_Temp
    – I really dig what you’re saying about CMS being a little overkill for these projects. I can’t tell you how many features Joomla has that I really just don’t need for my current projects, and on one of my client’s sites, I had a little trouble with someone trying to gain access via the backend login page, and it’s really not worth dealing with all the security woes, just to have the uses update their own stuff. Even with Joomla in place, i still mostly all of my current clients emailing me to update their things, anyways.

    Thanks again,
    Zach

    #171178
    nixnerd
    Participant

    No problem… it’s all about options and adding tools to your bag o’ tricks. Kirby seems pretty legit for this project.

Viewing 5 posts - 1 through 5 (of 5 total)
  • The forum ‘Other’ is closed to new topics and replies.