Help With Website Development

subfreq

I have developed the concept for a website as well as registered the relevant domain and sorted out a host.

My weakness is the coding side of the project and whilst there are some great platforms like Joomla out there i don't really have the experience to harness them in the way i want. I was wondering here if I outline the basis for the site if someone could either point me in the direction of a developer(or developer forum) or a road map of what software technology to deliver the concept.

The concept is to create a Gallery based social networking website. The basic user function is to have free web space to upload pictures into a gallery. the pictures are ones that in spire the user. The individual photos in the gallery are click-able so that the user can create a diary/blog of details as to why that picture inspires them. Each user will have 5 of these galleries. The Gallery look will be standardised globally across the website.

The community element to the site is that users will be able to search and connect to each other through either the common themes of their galleries or from their physical location in the world. This is similar to Bebo or Myspace format but specifically focused on the info from their galleries.

Please feel free to ask me for any more clarification or details on the concept.

I have looked at out of the box Social Networking scripts but they only integrate galleries as an incidental feature. I have also spent a lot of time looking at integrating Menalto Gallery with Joomla but I don't think that the bridging feature would be a smart structure for a site with a lot of users.

I am coming to the conclusion that someone will have to build it for me but I am not sure where to start.

Any help or info would be greatly appreciated. In fact thanks for even ready this far!!!

Cheers Sub

Laslo

http://www.rubyonrails.org/

subfreq

Cheers Laslo

That looks like an incredible tool/platform.

I think I am going to shy away from actual coding myself though no matter how smart the hosting app is.

When it comes to customising through the admin side of things I am fine but the writing of actual code is a step out of reach for me.

The biggest hurdle I seem to have come up against is getting the Gallery feature to run the way I want it to. I want to use the gallery a little differently than it is currently used on the web so there doesn't seem to be a straight line to what i want.

Webmonkey

This sounds like an interesting project. How soon you want this done? I may be interested in giving you a hand.
Maybe you could PM me more details on this.

Cheers

subfreq

If anyone has any good links to online web developers they would also be much appreciated.

Eoin

I've been looking into out-sourcing some design work, and came across
http://www.scriptlance.com/

You post up the specs of what you want, and people bid on the project. From what I can tell, ut can be all front-end, back-end or an entire solution.

I haven't used it yet, but it looks quite handy.

subfreq

Cheers

I will put up a project and see what response i get.

I have to thank the people that have sent me a PM as well. I have had a great response to the thread and am in dialog with a couple of people.

Eoin

subfreq wrote:

Cheers

I will put up a project and see what response i get.

Have a good read of the FAQ first, there is commission involved to at least one of the parties, and if it is on your side you may have to pay to just post it up. Let me know how you get on if you do go for it, it looks really handy for getting bespoke designs done.

Ms X

Is it www.nimble.ie as I've seen flyers around my uni advertising it? Looks pretty cool if it is! Congrats.

subfreq

No that's not my site. My site is a little different to the social get together type sites. I went with Scriptlance and a team of 7 developers from India in the end who had created a site with very similar functions to the one I am building. I had a very talented Irish developer run them very close.

Currently 1 week into a 4 week build.

Once it is finished I will put a link up.

subfreq

OK it's finished and up online. Please check it out and let me know what you think. I think it is pretty much bug free although I do need to get the blog working.

www.myvisionboard.com

In case you are not familiar with Vision Boards as a concept they are a visualisation tool. Typically you pin desires, ambitions, "visions" onto the board and use it as your reference to stay focused and achieve them. the range of people that use them is very diverse, from business execs to spiritual pursuits.

I use them all the time so decided to make a place to create and maintain them online. It's like a gallery, blog, diary with some small networking features to connect with people.

I went with a team of 7 developers from India in the end through the site www.scriptlance.com. The name of the team was Photoshop if you ever use the site and I could not give them enough praise if i tried. It took 4 weeks from start to finish and they built the site from the ground up making every single tiny change needed along the way.

Now the real hard work starts on getting the traffic in and getting all the search engine ranking up and the word out. If anyone has any pointers on that side of things please let me know.

Cheers - Sub

randombar

I'll give the site a good look when I get a chance as for the SEO (Search Engine Optimization) I'm getting going on that myself and found a good one (Thanks to boards)
http://www.jeeptransmissions.net/seo_madeeasy.pdf

subfreq

Great Link. thanks for the PDF.

I think my Meta's are in place but it will be a trial and error process of optimisation. Developing a site is hard but bringing and maintaining life/traffic to it is a whole other level.

Rollo Tamasi

GaryCocs wrote:

http://www.jeeptransmissions.net/seo_madeeasy.pdf

That's pretty good alright but it is dated at this stage. It will give a decent over view of SEO and it's purposes but if you want to know what *works* now then you're going to have to dig deeper.

subfreq

I have the Alexa toolbar installed in my browser and use most of it's tools. My meta tags are in and as far as i can tell correct.

I rank for a search of myvisionboard all one word but aren't on the radar for Vision Board or Visionboard which is what i want to achieve.

I have made sure my Meta Title and Description includes those variations but as yet no joy. I need to spend a bit more time on it to make sure I get up the ranks for those options or i wont get found when people search.

Rollo Tamasi

subfreq wrote:

I have the Alexa toolbar installed in my browser and use most of it's tools. My meta tags are in and as far as i can tell correct.

I rank for a search of myvisionboard all one word but aren't on the radar for Vision Board or Visionboard which is what i want to achieve.

I have made sure my Meta Title and Description includes those variations but as yet no joy. I need to spend a bit more time on it to make sure I get up the ranks for those options or i wont get found when people search.

Take a look at this search result for 'my vision board'
More importantly look at this - [SIZE=-1]Results 1 - 10 of about 630 for "my vision board". (0.12 seconds) - The 630 is your competition for that search term. There are only 630. It doesn't make sense to target such a small figure. What do you think people will type into Google/Y!/MSN in order to get to your website?

Maybe terms such as 'Social Blog' | 'Ireland Free Blog' | 'Community Blogging website' are better suited to your site?
[/SIZE]

You will naturally rank high for your domain name. Your domain does contain a relevant keyword so there is point trying to rank highly for it.