Intermountain District Website

[Ryan Pugh]

I just got done yesterday with re-creating the Intermountain District's website. It was long overdue - the old one was built about 10 years ago or so.

intermountaindistrict.org (http://intermountaindistrict.org)

Let me know what you think. It is ran on Wordpress. I'm thinking about making myself available to other districts/churches, if anyone else is interested in something like this. I'm no expert but have created several websites on Wordpress and enjoy doing it.

[G R 'Scott' Cundiff]

Love the look.

Just a few notes from a first time visitor (and none of them rise above a 2 on a scale of 0 being a non-issue and 10 being a real big deal. (also just my opinion)

When I click on "Find a Church" why do I have to then click again to "view a list of churches" -- why the extra click.

I'm a little disoriented under the ministries tab when I'm unexpectedly taken off site for Trinity Pines and NYI

Same way under Resources with the Manual -- maybe the title should include (PDF) to warn people that they're about to download a PDF File

I didn't see the stuff at the bottom of the page at first -- perhaps the "About" "What we Believe" etc. is important enough to be linked in one of the drop down tabs at the top of the page? I generally think of items in the footer as copyright, or other things that only a really interested person would find.

All in all, good job on the side - attractive and lots of excellent information.

[Ryan Pugh]

Love the look.

Just a few notes from a first time visitor (and none of them rise above a 2 on a scale of 0 being a non-issue and 10 being a real big deal. (also just my opinion)

When I click on "Find a Church" why do I have to then click again to "view a list of churches" -- why the extra click.

I'm a little disoriented under the ministries tab when I'm unexpectedly taken off site for Trinity Pines and NYI

Same way under Resources with the Manual -- maybe the title should include (PDF) to warn people that they're about to download a PDF File

I didn't see the stuff at the bottom of the page at first -- perhaps the "About" "What we Believe" etc. is important enough to be linked in one of the drop down tabs at the top of the page? I generally think of items in the footer as copyright, or other things that only a really interested person would find.

All in all, good job on the side - attractive and lots of excellent information.

Thanks Scott.

Overall, I was in charge of placing things how and where the district office wanted them. I did make some suggestions, but things ended up how they wanted them.

Maybe "Find a Church" should simply be "Our Churches" and then the link to find a church. It would be nice to include all of the church information under that one tab instead of linking to a new page, but I'm not sure it's feasible with the long list of information.

Good thoughts on the external links and PDFs under the menus. I'll look into doing those differently. And the stuff in the footer.

Thanks for the thoughts. They're helpful.

[Bill Morrison]

[QUOTE=Ryan Pugh;97136]I just got done yesterday with re-creating the Intermountain District's website. It was long overdue - the old one was built about 10 years ago or so


10 years?! Yes, that is an eon (or two) in the computer world. Perhaps Al Gore was in on construction of your initial site:smile:

Seriously, I am not a pro like Scott Cundiff (but neither will be the average visitor to your website) but I liked what I saw. Easy to use, pleasant appearance.

BILL

[Gina Stevenson]

10 years?! Yes, that is an eon (or two) in the computer world. Perhaps Al Gore was in on construction of your initial site:smile:

....................

BILL

Or maybe even Bill Gates? :smilies1722:

[G R 'Scott' Cundiff]

Thanks Scott.

Overall, I was in charge of placing things how and where the district office wanted them. I did make some suggestions, but things ended up how they wanted them.

Maybe "Find a Church" should simply be "Our Churches" and then the link to find a church. It would be nice to include all of the church information under that one tab instead of linking to a new page, but I'm not sure it's feasible with the long list of information.

Good thoughts on the external links and PDFs under the menus. I'll look into doing those differently. And the stuff in the footer.

Thanks for the thoughts. They're helpful.

I redid a website for an organization a month or so ago -- tried to make it clean and easy to use and business like. However, they wanted a particular image n the masthead and some other stuff down the right side. Once I finished doing what they wanted the site was less than I wanted - so I know exactly where you are coming from on doing things the way someone else wants it.

I think you did a good job - if you can make the tabs into drop downs I think you'd improve the site by a bunch right there....the other stuff isn't that big a deal anyway.

[David Snodgrass]

Looks good. Are the any cost associated with a word press site? Anything other than a hosting fee?

[Craig Laughlin]

I like it. Very nice.

[Dana Grant]

Thanks Scott.

Overall, I was in charge of placing things how and where the district office wanted them. I did make some suggestions, but things ended up how they wanted them.

Maybe "Find a Church" should simply be "Our Churches" and then the link to find a church. It would be nice to include all of the church information under that one tab instead of linking to a new page, but I'm not sure it's feasible with the long list of information.

Good thoughts on the external links and PDFs under the menus. I'll look into doing those differently. And the stuff in the footer.

Thanks for the thoughts. They're helpful.


Love the look of the web site. Do you work with Vanessa Harmon? I think she works at the district office? she's my long-long-long time friend.......

Dana in AZ

[Ryan Pugh]

[QUOTE=Ryan Pugh;97136]I just got done yesterday with re-creating the Intermountain District's website. It was long overdue - the old one was built about 10 years ago or so


10 years?! Yes, that is an eon (or two) in the computer world. Perhaps Al Gore was in on construction of your initial site:smile:

Seriously, I am not a pro like Scott Cundiff (but neither will be the average visitor to your website) but I liked what I saw. Easy to use, pleasant appearance.

BILL

Probably not quite ten years but it was in serious need of updating.

[Ryan Pugh]

Looks good. Are the any cost associated with a word press site? Anything other than a hosting fee?

Nope, no fees required besides hosting. If you are able and willing to pay $20-$75, you can get a nice-looking theme with more support and options than most of the free Wordpress themes. But you can still find some adequate free ones if not. The theme I used for Intermountain was $30.


Love the look of the web site. Do you work with Vanessa Harmon? I think she works at the district office? she's my long-long-long time friend.......

Yep, Vanessa was the main person I worked with from the district office. Very nice.

[Lucas Finch]

Looks good. Are the any cost associated with a word press site? Anything other than a hosting fee?

Just the host and registrar fees. Wordpress is free software. I run four (I think?) websites, all with wordpress. I've played around with other things in the past, but for the combination of simplicity, customization, and appearance, I have decided that wordpress is really the way to go.

[Kevin Rector]

Did you make your own theme or use one made by someone else?

[Ryan Pugh]

Did you make your own theme or use one made by someone else?

It was made by someone else. I don't know how to create themes yet. I know how to edit them and change the styles of things, but not create them from scratch. I found this theme on themeforest.net (http://themeforest.net).

[Kevin Rector]

It was made by someone else. I don't know how to create themes yet. I know how to edit them and change the styles of things, but not create them from scratch. I found this theme on themeforest.net (http://themeforest.net).

What's the name of it, because I think I want to take it and use it for our district's website so that we can be just like yours :)

[Ryan Pugh]

What's the name of it, because I think I want to take it and use it for our district's website so that we can be just like yours :)

:) Go for it. It's called Light of Peace (http://themeforest.net/item/light-of-peace-wordpress-template/120416).

[G R 'Scott' Cundiff]

You might want to check out a freeby from wordpress called "weaver" - very customizable and easy to work with
http://wordpress.org/extend/themes/weaver

[G R 'Scott' Cundiff]

By the way, if any of you church web designers want to include a Google church calendar in your website and have it fill the page without side columns there's an excellent tutorial here: http://falcon1986.wordpress.com/2010/02/19/insert-google-calendar-iframe-into-wordpress-page-update/

Results can be seen here: http://www.alvinnazarene.org/index.php/church-information/calendar

[Zach Wingo]

You should definitely try creating your own Wordpress template ─ it's actually quite easy.

As a note of warning, keep it updated and make regular backups. It is a major target because of it's popularity and if you're using a major host, that makes you an even greater target. Usually when a vulnerability is discovered, hackers will write scripts that will try to inject code on all the websites of a particular host. About a year ago, Media Temple and Godaddy were the targets of some major attacks that infected thousands of sites with spam and malware. Customers blamed the hosts when in reality it was Wordpress. This is one of the primary reasons why I no longer use Wordpress or Joomla unless a clients specifically asks for them and even then I try and encourage them to use another application.

I have really been impressed with SilverStripe (http://silverstripe.org) and how powerful and yet easy it is to build websites. I am currently using on two websites for some clients and it's been the easiest system I've used in years. I also like Textpattern except it doesn't support static pages and sub-pages by default but it's still a powerful system. I used Textpattern on Avant Garde Floors (http://avantgardefloors.com). Textpattern is the easiest but not as powerful for websites that requires static pages with a hierarchical navigation structure (ie. Pages -> Sub-pages).