[thelist] Clients up dating their site, no response

[rudy]

> I am guessing that they want to be able to upload
> either pdfs, excel spread sheets and word documents.
> I want to know what I am talking about when I explain
> to them their options for doing this.

hi lisa

there are no options -- don't let them do that!!

;o)

they need to convert their documents to something more web-friendly, like a
web page

(please don't anybody suggest that pdfs are web-friendly, they are just as
bad as excel sheets and word docs)

the problem is, clients want the convenience of uploading their copy
themselves, without having to go through somebody like you -- and that is a
most reasonable expectation (no reflection on you -- it's the same urge
behind people wanting to save a few cents per liter pumping their own gas)

you are right, this calls for a content management system (cms), and these
can range from the dirt cheap to the multi-million-dollar
IT-project-from-hell-unless-martin's-on-it

at the low end is a template-based system, like we have at evolt.org(*),
where content is submitted into a basic web page form, which stores it on
the server (could be a flat file, in our case it's a database), to be
served up on web pages in templates -- you can build one of these template
systems, or have a programmer build one, or find one on the web very
easily, but this kind of system won't allow the client to do much except
insert the occasional <p> and <b> tags, and they'll have to come back to
you for even the smallest changes...

* actually, to be fair to the guys that coded the evolt system, i wouldn't
call it low end, because it does other nifty stuff like convert some tags
automatically, etc.

a more robust cms solution like ektron (www.ektron.com) allows clients to
upload rich text (e.g. cut & paste from a word doc) -- this type of system
will cost some more, and take a while to implement, but it is probably the
best for your clients (a few documents a month but they want to do it
themselves)

the one thing you want to avoid is turning them loose with a wysiwyg editor

i'm sure we'll get a few people chiming in with other products besides
ektron, i only mentioned it because it's the only one i've worked with


rudy.ca