Need new software for our website

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Hello to all:
Our Parish Church’s website is in need of new website software. The current software is so old and out of date and the comany that created it is out of business.
We have some problems with trying to update our calendar and a few other things on the webiste. Two of our parishners have looked at the calendar and
were afraid to try to change it, for fear of really messing up the website. The current webmaster is knowledgable and has cleaned up a few things, but we need new software that can be updated when a new version comes our or when there are updates to the current version. Our Parish Priest would like it to be user friendly.
So, any suggestions?

Thanks for your help.

Fastme75

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Welcome to the Lounge!!

Do you mean the software used to build the website?
What is the current software and version?

Joe

--Joe

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If as you say your Webmaster is knowledgeable I would suggest Expression Web 4 from Microsoft which is free and well worth a try. You will find the download at: http://www.microsoft.com/en-GB/download/details.aspx?id=36179

I take Joe’s point that you are not referring to the code on which the site is based.

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If as you say your Webmaster is knowledgeable I would suggest Expression Web 4 from Microsoft which is free and well worth a try. You will find the download at: http://www.microsoft.com/en-GB/download/details.aspx?id=36179

I take Joe’s point that you are not referring to the code on which the site is based.

Here’s the website if you want to download Expression Web 4 in the United States:

http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=36179

Not sure if it matters.

Group "L" (Linux Mint)
with Windows 10 running in a remote session on my file server

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Sorry for be so late in replying to Joe’s post. Am still trying to find out what version the software is that is being used for the current website. I have a call in to our Parish Priest and to the webmaster. So far, no replys from either of them. Thanks to all who posted. I think, and this is my own opinion, is that Father wants it to be easy for any who takes over the website, will not have any problems with making changes to it. It would also appear that if we get the new software, we would have to migrate what is on the old website over to the new site and then would be able to rebuild what need to be rebuilt, such as a new calendar, etc.

As soon as I find out about software (old and out of date), I will post it. Will make print the replies and this way I can so both Father and the webmaster what your suggestions are as to software to use and also, find out if our site is hosted by anyone.

Again thanks to all who replied. Will keep you informed.

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If as you say your Webmaster is knowledgeable I would suggest Expression Web 4 from Microsoft which is free and well worth a try. You will find the download at: http://www.microsoft.com/en-GB/download/details.aspx?id=36179

I tried this but it doesn’t seem to work with server side includes – at least I can’t find anything in the help about them. Dreamweaver (which is £££) does include these, so what looks like a good piece of software is IMHO fatally flawed. Back to Notepad ++ (which all decent coders use ;))

Eliminate spare time: start programming PowerShell

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I tried this but it doesn’t seem to work with server side includes – at least I can’t find anything in the help about them. Dreamweaver (which is £££) does include these, so what looks like a good piece of software is IMHO fatally flawed. Back to Notepad ++ (which all decent coders use ;))

What type of includes would those be?

Microsoft’s Web Matrix or Visual Studio Express 2012 Web are good tools and will get continued support, while Expression Web seems to have seen its last version.

Sorry to say it, maybe old fashioned coders use text editors, but no text editor can beat a modern editor with stuff like intellisense and a load of other nice features to help with coding. Been there, and sometimes I still use a text editor for ASP stuff, but if you haven’t tried one of the new editors, you don’t know what you’re missing, really.

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The includes are like

I’ve been looking for a good editor (having used Dreamweaver at work before I retired), but those I’ve found don’t meet my needs (well, I couldn’t get on with). Interestingly, when I Googled for a html editor, these two didn’t turn up (and aren’t in Wikipedia – http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_HTML_editors).
I’ll give Web Matrix a go though. I’m actually part of the team which is developing a website for our village (but currently the only one with any HTML/CSS experience). We’re starting simple and building it simple (because I’m simple:rolleyes:), so that if it goes belly up only my time has been used. If it takes off then we can think about how we can improve it with a CMS or similar.

Eliminate spare time: start programming PowerShell

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It sounds to me like you had someone build your web site and allowed you to make some basic changes. For us to suggest an alternative we will need more information about your web site.
1. Do you run the web server locally or does someone else host it?
2. Do you update the web site by pasting content into a browser or do you use software installed on your PC?
3. Is your webmaster able to write HTML?

cheers, Paul

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Try ZOHO http://www.zoho.com/ ZOHO SITES http://www.zoho.com/sites/

The applications they offer are free and paid. The free version are not crippled and they have a template base online website creation tool that is simple enough to create a website in minutes. It is template base so you don’t have to start from scratch and if you have a registered domain name you can use your own domain url. They have a free calendar apps that easy and very responsive to use. It can be share and embedded on your website if you need to. The website, calendar and other apps also have a mobile version so you don’t need to create a separate design for mobile user. As I said the website creation tool is online and you don’t have to install any software on your computer. Any computer with internet access will do. Website contributor could also signup and given access to edit the website. Single sign on will allow you to access all available applicable application for your account.
check it out.

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Thanks to all of you who replied to my question on the start of this thread. I have passed all of the urls that were suggested to the webmaster.
We are now using Joomla v1.5.25, paid web hosting. Domain is GoDaddy. This answer Joe’s question above.
The current webmaster is not too sure on how to back-up the website before installing any new software. This is one reason our Parish Priest wants it to be user friendly
incase the current webmaster shoud quit.
Me, I go back to the days of the punch cards and early computers, circa1960, when you needed big rooms and a lot of AC.
If any of you should hear about any new software for web sites, please let me know.

Again thanks,
Fastme75

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With a Joomla site, there are two things you would need to backup – the database and the code. You will need to use either a GUI front end to do the database backups and a FTP client for the Joomla code. There is really no way around this, if you want to be able to restore the website on your own.

Joomla and other popular packages require constant updating to apply security patches and bugs fixes. The former is quite relevant and of big importance to keep your data safe.

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I don’t understand your comment about server side includes. A server side include, as I see it, is relevant when you try to view the final page in question, so it’s not really important that the editor has the ability to show you the full page. You want to see the full page, execute it in your web server. Your text editor won’t support them either, so you contradict yourself regarding that very statement, nonetheless.

I have been doing web development since 2001 and I have never used an editor that supported that. I don’t like Dreamweaver – I actually don’t like any editor that messes with your code or markup in anyway. .Net technologies do not rely on explicit server includes anyway. PHP does, but I have used Visual Studio with PHP without any issues either, so I really don’t understand why Express Web would be flawed. Hey, from that point of view even Visual Studio would be flawed and Visual Studio is quite possibly the best IDE available in the market, at the moment.

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Thanks Rui, I only mentioned Dreamweaver as it is what I used, and indeed, I agree one had to take care in its use because of said messing. The thing with DW is its wsiwyg facility and that includes the includes. The agree that with Notepad++ I have to use the web browser to see what’s what, but I expect that with a simple editor. As I said before, I’m keeping with what I’m familiar with so I’ll probably stick with Notepad++ and a browser (I run Apache server) to create the village website, but I will try to get a handle on the two apps you recommend (but they do hurt my aged mind :blush: !).

Eliminate spare time: start programming PowerShell

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The editors I recommended are good for HTML / HTML5, .net based stuff (webforms, mvc using any of the .net supported languages), CSS and Javascript. I also like their ability to integrate with version control and ALM software, such as TFS, which you can use for free at http://tfs.visualstudio.com. For simple HTML, a text editor can do but as I said, intellisense can really be helpful and once you get used to using a version control system, you will never want to go back – it’s great to be able to access any version of your files – even those you deleted ages ago!

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I’ve been using wysiwyg web builder. It works for my business and home to build just about anything. It’s cheap and user friendly. The hard part would be importing the website you have now, then rebuilding it… which will take a bit of effort, but it’s doable.

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I believe that for simple sites it’s often easier overall to learn a bit of HTML/CSS and start from a free website template.

Joomla and WordPress are fine up to a point, but if you get stuck they can be a steeper and more specialist learning curve than simple HTML.

An option is to keep a fairly static HTML site which links to a simple blog or Facebook page where daily updates can be made without any significant expertise or skills.

‘Server Side Includes’ (mentioned in this thread) can help: you can have ‘full’ pages with ‘simple’ text-elements embedded as includes, so users need only ever edit the ‘simple’.

Other elements can be also embedded such as a Google Calendar, so events can be edited in the intuitive Google interface but will appear automagically on the site.

Of course achieving anything will require some kind of learning curve, the trick is to get the most benefit, long and short term, for the minimum cost in terms of time and effort.

As an aside to a parallel discussion on this thread:
I code using the sophisticated text editor Notepad++, which offers code-completion, Zen-coding shortcuts, tag/syntax highlighting and lots of other useful plugins. A Firefox plugin auto-refreshes every time the file I’m working on is saved – I view code and rendered page side by side. I have never found a WYSIWYG editor that did not create ugly messy code – and often find that whilst WYSIWYG it’s often not WY want! I’m sure successful use can be made of them, but I prefer to learn the quirks of HTML than the quirks of intermediary editing software… since on a bad day you are still left puzzling over the quirks of HTML anyway.

BTW for anyone learning web coding skills I very much recommend the Firefox plugin called Firebug. You can highlight any element of any webpage and see the corresponding code. You can also edit the code locally, even when viewing a live third party website, and see in your browser how the page changes as a result.

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I used to have a “principle” of only using freeware to build websites, but I finally caved and shelled out $40 for RapidPHP. I think it isn’t really for people who don’t have a decent working knowledge of the various tools (HTML/CSS/JS/PHP). Have used Eclipse and other IDE’s (but not DreamWeaver, etc.) but always return to RapidPHP, with Notepad++ filling in for certain tasks. But, I think the OP is more in need of a more friendly CMS than an editor. Although I’ve done a number of WordPress installs, I found Joomla to be more difficult, and more complex than necessary for what local charitable groups and clubs need. Unfortunately, although I’ve been experimenting with a bunch of other CMS’s, I haven’t decided on one I’d go so far as to recommend right now. I only do this website stuff as a hobby! But maybe others here have some CMS recommendations, that are easy to set up and update, with simple plug-ins for calendars and stuff.

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Joomla 1.5 is no longer supported and the recommendation is to upgrade to V3, but this is not a simple task.
If your web master isn’t sure how to backup the current site s/he will probably struggle with the upgrade to V3.

I suggest you stick with what you have in the short term and get it backed up.
Joomla 1.5 doco.
Backup.

If you want to upgrade to V3 I suggest you set up Joomla 1.5 on a local PC with a copy of your web site, then practice the upgrade on that.

cheers, Paul

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Look into perhaps using WordPress (http://wordpress.org/) for hundreds of great free and paid themes (templates). As of this writing, there are 1,764 themes to choose from. Your next problem will be having to decide which to use from so many good ones. There is a good forum to help those who need a helping hand also.

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For Joomla sites try using Akeeba for backups and restore. It’s free.

And don’t upgrade Joomla to v3 yet – use 2.5 as it’s the stable version.

DK

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For Joomla sites try using Akeeba for backups and restore. It’s free.

And don’t upgrade Joomla to v3 yet – use 2.5 as it’s the stable version.

DK

Akeeba is extremely easy to use – after you have installed it, which again is a simple task. I agree with dreamkid about upgrading to 2.5 rather than v3 too. As far as upgrading from 1.5 to 2.5 goes I used SP Upgrade http://cyend.com/extensions/extensions/components/5-upgrade-joomla-from-15-to-16 to do the heavy lifting. “SP Upgrade” costs around $40 and is in my view money well spent. You could also buy the upgrade service from them for which they will quote.

As you already have a site in Joomla it seems like a sledgehammer to crack a nut starting all over again with something else. Especially when no-one seems to know what they are doing; a good webmaster can set up Joomla so that users can easily maintain the site themselves. A user guide should be provided too for all that need it.

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I would recommend WeBuilder. Used it for 3 or 4 years now and it allows code management for HTML, CSS, JavaScript, PHP, Ruby, Python, ASP, SSI, Perl and many others. Not free but well worth the money. Try it free for 30 days http://www.webuilderapp.com/.

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