[NSRCA-discussion] Why did you join the NSRCA?

Sun Feb 1 06:13:53 AKST 2009

I agree that right now the IMAC site looks a bit more polished than our 
site. 
Marty has put a lot of time, I'll repeat a lot of time into the site and 
I think his answers might have sounded a wee bit defensive but I'll 
leave that as it is :) (no offense meant to either side)
It takes a lot of work to put together a quality site and then a lot of 
work to keep making updates.  This takes people willing to do the job.  
Not to make an excuse but the webteam has varying website, and 
programming skills, and time.
We are straddling two sites trying to make the new one work better and 
be more informative.  There are still a few hurdles to cross and it does 
take time.  I have been involved in spurts but just installed the new 
forum based on SMF.  Much more robust and will allow more options, plus 
it looks better than the one we had. 
In order to install it, bridge it to joomla so that all the users are 
the same, change the graphics to match our site, change and add the 
navigation buttons, work out the kinks so that it looks right when you 
get an email that the topic you were watching has a new response.  Then 
I had to change our template to allow the recent forum posts to go to 
the top of our website, moved polls there as well (our template had no 
provision for this) took the equivalent of 2 to 3 full work days.  Now 
if I knew more about programming and modifying php I might have gotten 
it done in a day, but I have limited knowledge of it. Just an 
illustration of the amount of work that this takes.

Hopefully we will start getting more contributions of articles, collate 
those that are already on the web and link to them or copy them to the 
nsrca site.  Hopefully our president, vice president etc (no pressure 
guys) will make frequent posts to keep us updated on what is happening 
on pattern as you see on the front page of the imac forum.
The webteam can convert their submissions or the site can easily be made 
so that they can simply type in from home right on the site what they 
want to convey.  This is one of the nice things about a CMS system like 
Joomla (many others out there)  Right now the front page has random 
posts of information but you are right some of it needs to be removed 
and or updated.

OK off my soap box :)
Stuart Chale

Martin X. Moleski, SJ wrote:
> davidmichael1 wrote:
>
>> ... 4) I think the NSRCA website needs to be more robust and be updated
>> more frequently if it is intended to attract and keep members.  I
>> thank all who have and are working on the site now- but I am
>> struggling to find a way to say this without offending or being
>> ungrateful- so I'll just say it- take a look at the IMAC site and
>> compare: <http://www.mini-iac.com>  ...
>
> 1. Robustness: we're straddling two operating systems and using
> two different databases (Access on nsrca.org and MySQL on
> nsrca.us).  If you or anyone else on list would like to help
> finish the transition, volunteers are most welcome.
>
> Here's the outline of what has been done and still needs to
> be done:
>
> http://nsrca.us/formfunction/design/190-database-gameplan.html
>
> 2. Updates: I'm willing and able to support the mechanics
> of the site.  I'm also willing to resign at any time and
> hand things over to a new webmaster.  I saw a need and
> volunteered to fill it a while ago.  I can be replaced.
>
> 3. The IMAC site is running on a content management system
> from <http://www.dotnetnuke.com/>.  We use Joomla.  Both
> are open-source (free).  If we want to scrap Joomla and go to
> DotNetNuke, we can.  I hauled all of the pages over from
> HTML into Joomla format.  I suppose I could haul them
> into DotNetNuke, too.  Or better yet--the new webmaster
> could.
>
> What does DotNetNuke provide?
> * user login
> * forums
> * news articles
>
> What does Joomla provide?
> * user login
> * forums
> * news articles
>
> 4. Adding content to the site more frequently is definitely
> something that would make it more fun and valuable.
> I've gone with a static front page because it's easy to
> do.  But we could turn on various modules that would
> let articles start on the front page with "more ..."
> links for those who want to read more.
>
> 5. It seems to me that I've asked several times for folks
> to help us give the site a better look.  I cooked up the
> home page logo when I first installed Joomla and put up
> an article asking for help from better graphics artists:
>
> http://nsrca.us/formfunction/graphics/188-site-logos.html
>
> The first line of the article from the day I wrote it
> reads: "We are interested in improving the graphics on
> this site."  We have received zero (0) responses to these
> requests for improving the site graphics.
>
> If you'd like to work on the .css for the site, it's
> explained here:
>
> http://nsrca.us/howto/css.html
>
> Lots of other articles on what the webteam has done
> and is doing:
>
> http://nsrca.us/webteamhome.html
>
> 6. If you don't like the looks or layout of the site,
> we have options.  There are other templates we could
> use.  If you browse this list, you may find one that
> suits your taste:
>
> <http://www.google.com/search?q=Joomla+templates>
>
> We chose ja_purity after using a couple of others on
> our test site.  The choice is not written in stone.
> We can change templates more or less with the click
> of a button on an administration page (graphics need
> to be adjusted for the NSRCA).
>
>                 Marty
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