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How to create (professional quality) web pages efficiently?

Discussion in 'Other Off Topic Forum' started by tvrfreak, Nov 17, 2003.

  1. tvrfreak

    tvrfreak F1 Rookie
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    #1 tvrfreak, Nov 17, 2003
    To be honest, I am getting a little annoyed at all the work that goes into putting up a webpage--it's pretty convoluted and time-consuming overall...

    Any suggestions on how to make it go smoother/quicker? My process is as follows:

    Explorer
    ------------
    Create a work folder on hard disk.
    Download pics from camera.
    Download pics from ftp site if others have uploaded them there.
    Create backup folder.
    Create destination folder on local hard disk (Photoshop barfs if you use one folder for everything).

    ACDSee
    ------------
    Weed out bad pics.
    Rotate pics if needed.
    Edit any pics in editor and delete license plates if needed.
    Batch resize.
    Rearrange in time order or groupings as desired.
    Batch rename.

    Photoshop
    -------------
    Create watermark.
    Record macro for watermarking.
    Test.
    Apply watermark to all pics (takes a long time but at least it's automatic once you set the options and fire it off).
    Create web album (takes a long time but at least it's automatic once you set the options and fire it off).

    Dreamweaver
    --------------
    Edit the generated webpages and put in captions, links, etc.
    Put in captions (used to take very long, should be smoother now).
    Proofread and save.

    Browsers
    -------------
    Test local pages in browser.

    WS-FTP
    --------------
    Upload to website.

    Browsers
    -------------
    Test webpages in browser.

    Outlook
    --------------
    Send out email with link to people you want to inform.

    Browser
    --------------
    Post link on relevant forums.
     
  2. JOEV

    JOEV F1 Rookie
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    #2 JOEV, Nov 17, 2003
    Faisal,

    I may be exposing my ignorance (but what else is new) :), but I think that going to Blogger Pro will solve all of your problems. It is a WYSIWYG tool that takes care of all the admin/background hassles and leaves you free to do your site. http://new.blogger.com/

    Only reason I said "Pro" was I don't think you can add pictures to the basic version.
     
  3. richard

    richard Formula 3

    Nov 3, 2003
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    Richard Thompson III
    #3 richard, Nov 17, 2003
    Hi,

    I work in web (professionally) so maybe I can help you out a bit. There is nothing wrong with what you are doing, but you can weed out a few bad steps if you try. First, let's examine your "fundamental" process:

    1.) gather content
    2.) assemble content
    3.) publish content

    So long as you are doing things in this order you will not have any big problems. As far as streamlining your process, I would recommend revising your method for publishing content. Dreamweaver has some solid, customizable features for publishing content itself and there are other Macromedia products to finish the job if you do anything really in depth. Currently the most bulletproof combination of products for publishing and foolproof editing would be Dreamweaver MX and Contribute 2.

    For content gathering, if you use the new Photoshop CS it has some very powerful ways to explore image direcories that could eliminate your need to use ACDSee altogether. This allows you to sort of mold gathering and assembly together. Other than that there is not much to do unless you are using batch effects on images (thumbnails, etc) in which case I would use Photoshop droplets to handle processing.

    Hope this helps...cheers,

    richard
     
  4. tvrfreak

    tvrfreak F1 Rookie
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    #4 tvrfreak, Nov 18, 2003
    Richard,
    thanks for the tips, and the validation. I do use DreamWeaver's synchronization features to some extent. I guess I just need to get fast at it and it will become a 15 minute job to create nice albums. I would like it to be a 1 minute job at some point though, if I don't have to edit pics or add captions.

    Joe,
    Thanks, but I think blogs only help you publish to the web (with limitations, unless you do some heavy HTML editing, in which case you are back to doing the steps I want to automate or avoid). And you still have to assemble and prepare--I think. I will look into it though. Thanks.
     
  5. ForzaFerrari

    ForzaFerrari F1 Veteran

    Jul 25, 2003
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    #5 ForzaFerrari, Nov 18, 2003
    @Joe

    You CAN add pictures in the 'free' version of Blogger...just look at my site: www.forzarossa.nl. The weblog (the page where you start) is made by blogger.
    You can also see that I made the style completely personal and the site is hosted on my own server...not the one from blogger. This because now I don't get that terrible banner on top :)
     
  6. tvrfreak

    tvrfreak F1 Rookie
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    #6 tvrfreak, Nov 18, 2003
    Am I missing something? My understanding is that a blog enables you to create journal/diary entries. Basically paragraphs of text. Except you can tweak it to also include pictures and change the layout so it doesn't look like a diary.

    But how can it help generate photoalbums with thumbnails, put in watermarks, allow you to quickly put in captions for say, 200 pictures, and then display the thumbnails in a nice format links to the large pictures and with navigation buttons??
     
  7. Evolved

    Evolved F1 Veteran

    Nov 5, 2003
    8,206
    Pittsburgh, PA
    #7 Evolved, Nov 18, 2003
    If you'll be doing a lot of updateing you might want to use a CMS tool(content management) like phpnuke or mamboserver?

    They take a lot of the day to day stuff away from work. I much prefer spending two hours a week adding conent and then scheduling its release to updateing pages every day.


    Or if its just a basic site with photo albums just link your site to a MSN photo album. There's no shame in that.

    Or if you're really lazy you can write a utility that takes photos from your hard drive and uploads them to your site at pre defined intervals or with the click of a button.
     
  8. richard

    richard Formula 3

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    #8 richard, Nov 18, 2003
    I didn't realize what you were up to. There is software you can install on your server (middleware) that will be much more efficient than dreamweaver at managing libraries of photos. Sourceforge carries a program simply called "Gallery" that is amazing. I would recommend that if you can get your sysadmin to install it.

    "Blogging" software is not the answer -- that is for journals!
     

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