Pete Posted October 22, 2008 Share Posted October 22, 2008 I started to write some content for our Web Design services which started off like this - I need to complete it with all the reasons why they should choose us like how we're a synergy of designers and coders etc....but I've not got around to that yet. ----- We find that Web Development services tend to come from one of three types of people. Bargain Bedrooms First you have the budget bedroom outfit, the person who has learned a bit from articles they've read on the Internet or from playing around with some software they've downloaded from the Internet. They have no formal training or qualifications, but they're your friends son so they're cheap. Sadly you'll find they're not around after longer than 12 months, your precious domain name will have been legally registered in their own name using a bargain basement hosting company that can't keep your website running for longer than a day. More often that not there will be basic fundamental problems with the code, glaring security holes or other issues brought on by not understanding the fundamentals of security, systems design and data storage. Migrating away from this scenario is very difficult requiring official letters from domain authorities, presentation of invoices (you didn't pay cash did you?) and sometimes legal proceedings. The budget website suddenly has racked up a large fee in time and stress. Designers The second scenario is the design company which created your paper brochure or stationary which now makes websites. This isn't a problem if your aim is to have a shiny brochure style site without programming functionality. These kind of websites are always very impressive at first glance, but once you start to examine the user processes more often than not the usability has been sacrified for visual stimulus. Which button is the checkout? How do I find contact information? Is that big rotating wheel in the corner really a menu? If you do require some basic programming such as a price calculator or Content Managed System (CMS) often this work will be hastily coded by a Bargain Bedroom type (see above) as all the budget time went into the design or outsourced to a third party - Who are these people? Will they still be around to fix in 12 months time? Due to programming inexperience both groups will tend to use third party applications or free software and simply alter the visuals. There are a number of issues associated with this. 1) The design is usually constricted to the layout that the programmer has created. 2) Everybody on the Internet is running the same code 3) Unless managed and monitored for updates any security holes found will rapidly be exploited by opportunists and teenage hackers with nothing better to do than deface your website or steal your data to post on bulletin boards or boast to their friends. Hardcore Programmers Our third group of people are highly intelligent and skilled people with brains like encyclopaedias...aka The Geek. These people produce incredibly stable code using advanced design and programming methods, the visual representation will usually resemble that of an 1980's hole in the wall bank machine. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
chunk Posted October 22, 2008 Author Share Posted October 22, 2008 thanks for the comments guys.. [GRIN][/GRIN]... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Snooze Posted October 22, 2008 Share Posted October 22, 2008 Our third group of people are highly intelligent and skilled people with brains like encyclopaedias...aka The Geek. These people produce incredibly stable code using advanced design and programming methods, the visual representation will usually resemble that of an 1980's hole in the wall bank machine. That'll be me and my lot! Except maybe the intelligence. And skill. The brain bit would be an exaggeration and "stable" could probably be considered somewhat fictitious. Oh - and "advanced" is a very subjective term, you know. Aside from that, the description's spot on! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
chunk Posted October 23, 2008 Author Share Posted October 23, 2008 so what would this forum cost to build then? just curious to see the difference in price Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Snooze Posted October 23, 2008 Share Posted October 23, 2008 This forum is built using an off-the-shelf forum product called vBulletin. You get a company like GlobalGold to provide it - they provide hosting and the vBulletin installation itself for a monthly fee - anything from £10 to £100 a month depending on how busy the site is going to be (that's what the mkivsupra.net memberships pay for). Alternatively, you could find hosting somewhere independent and then buy and install vBulletin (£100 one-off fee) yourself. Then you need someone to configure it, install extension modules, etc. and then look after it going forwards. Probably quite a few days work (having never done that sort of thing I'd guess a couple of weeks?) to get it all sorted and working, I guess. And then on-going work is probably quite a few hours per month (probably at least a couple of days' worth of effort added up). Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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