Creating an intranet site?

[khunsanuk]

Hi,

Some very good advice from Bibblies (regarding participation).

And I just wanted to pipe in here and say that Frontpage sucks and I wouldn't touch it with a 10' pole.

But then again, I still build websites using a text editor

Sanuk!

[SoiledCowboy]

Maybe JCK could start with a web-design proggie such as NetObjects Fusion MX which contains some pre-built site templates that might come in useful to begin with and get the hang of things. If all that is too much to handle initially, then even a program like Microsoft Publisher 2002 that has very basic templates could get you started - I just think that templates etc are a nice way to enable someone without the experience get up and going without the headaches of design from scratch.

[Guest]

For website design purposes I have used different software programs. It looks like there is always something one program has that you will not find with the other programs. Recently, probably lately, I discovered 'namo webeditor 5'(found in BKK at the usual places), which has interesting features. It has a lot of prebuilt banner, buttons, paragraph titles etc. templates, which are easy to change(change colors,text). When done so, the newly created item, is saved as a separate gif file(one only), that of course you can use in other programs. I think this is extremely convenient. Similar features are present with the above mentioned Netfusions. However I noticed with this program, that the images are saved not in one, but many gif files, so a little bit more difficult to work with.

While I experiment around, I prefer by far Dreamweaver and its marvelous extension Ultradev, which allows to create ASP and SQL code really easy.

[ January 30, 2002: Message edited by: choopthai ]

[bibblies]

I'd say you'd have your work cut out to do all the jobs yourself but here's another piece of advice if you're determined to do everything:

It's about the way it looks and "hangs together":

Look at a load of sites, see what works and copy it. People at Microsoft, IBM, etc have already done a lot of work finding out what people find intuitive. Climb on their backs and use it. Don't re-invent the wheel.

[You can see inside a web page very easily (try right-clicking and choose "View Source"). That'll reveal the tricks of the pros..]

[adikgede]

Did you mean intranet or internet? If they want you to develop an intranet or Local area network (LAN) you might consider the e-smith server, now owned by Mytel Networks. You can dowload the manual from thier site e-smith.org or e-smith.com. e-smith is based upon Red Hat Linux 6.x can be downloaded as a disc image for free and runs on what would be considered obsolete equipment (586 75mhz 32m ram 1gig hd a cd a two nics or a nic and a modem. It offers windows and mac file and print sharing, email, apache webserver, and mysql (i think). Users have contributed PHP Nuke (which I think they use at Nanapong). It provides everything, if not more, that a Cobalt appliance offers, on commodity pc hardware.

[JCK]

Many many thanks for all your answers gents.

Maybe I sounded too grandiose in my first note! There is already a company internet and intranet. I will have support from an EDP department so my job will probably be mainly writing, designing and graphics. Whatever, it should be a challenge.

We do have a system called MS Dreamweaver which I am told (by a Thai with a Thai instruction manual) is quite straightforward. Should I use this Dreamweaver or ask my company to buy some other software?