UnionSportsmen.org launched

Well…it’s been a few days since I’ve posted (alright…more like half-a-month). Not out of laziness or because I have nothing to say…I’ve been working my tail off on a website.

May I present to the world, UnionSportsmen.org…a website dedicated to the Union Sportsmen’s Alliance, a club for Union Workers with a passion for the outdoors.

The majority of the initial look & feel was coordinated in conjunction with BMA Media…a great shop for not only web design, but advertising and print media as well.

This site was built using Expression Engine as the basis, with a complete overhaul of the templating to get a unique look and feel with BMA’s help (Especially Bob Craig, BMA’s design guru).

There’s a learning curve to EE that I just didn’t have two weeks ago. I needed an orientation to the interface and some help in taking the look & feel from static HTML to the EE templating system.

Melissa from emtwo web studios became a very great resource. EE can be a bit intimidating at first. Not because it’s poorly put together, but because there’s so much it can do that it’s hard to know where to start. Mel not only helped in setting up the basic structure, but helped show me the ropes of templating, efficient ways to use the coding language, and threw out some great ideas for implementing new features I didn’t even know were possible. By the time launch date came about, I felt like I was a veteran EE programmer (and was able to share some new techniques with Mel once I got over the initial newbie phase). I can say nothing but good things about emtwo…so much so that I’ll be hiring them to help in the next phase of the site’s post-launch production.

From a development standpoint, EE does a great job of saving PHP-based developers like myself a lot of hassle when attempting to re-invent the wheel for a new project.

EE has its own proprietary coding that takes a lot of the hassle out of generating queries, keeping track of session variables, and having to code redundant things like “Forgotten Password” functionality.
The nice thing is that you aren’t cornered into their own coding language. If you need a particular page to jump through a hoop that the EE coding language can’t handle, you can escape out into PHP’s native language, do what you need to do, and then jump right back into EE markup later in the code. Talk about foresight on their part!

Aside from Expression Engine, I’m using a couple of other php-based pieces to make the site work.

First off, there’s the visitor tracking package. I’m using Mint and am enjoying most of the functionality it affords. Having worked with ActualAnalyzer in the past, there are a few features that I miss, but plenty more that I find much more convenient. The nicest part is the ability to integrate Mint tightly with Expression Engine. Using a couple of modules, I’m able to track visits not only by IP address, but if a registered user is logged in, I can tag them individually to follow the REAL people that matter and where they focus on within the site.

Second, and I loathed the thought initially…an advertising management package. I despise banner ads to a degree that only the people who know me can appreciate. The mere thought of placing a single ad on a site I develop leaves me speechless, beet-red in the face and seething in rage.

I talked myself down off the ledge on this one though…It’s not true advertising. We don’t charge anyone for ad space. We don’t even open it up for just anybody to be able to advertise. It’s strictly for our various corporate partners to gain a bit more exposure. Better yet, I control the placement and frequency of the exposures, so I can keep them within a tolerable level.
I’m using OpenAds (aka phpAdsNew) and aside from some crummy documentation that makes learning to get it set up and administer the darned thing an absolute pain in the ass, it looks like it’s going to fit the bill.

Third, and everybody needs to listen to this…the Expression Engine default set of tools for entering content into a text field sucks. It’s absolutely terrible. You get the basics of bold, italicise, and a crap-tastic URL linker. I needed something that would make it a bit more friendly for my Content Manager to plug new articles into the site.
Again, past experience came into play…then was modified. I initially had my heart set on using FCKEditor. Integration with EE wasn’t exactly the most easy thing, and with a severe timetable until launch, I didn’t have the time to hardcode my own way of forcing it in.
Instead, I found that TinyMCE worked well with Expression Engine. There’s even a plugin that integrates it seamlessly. Well…that took care of the majority of the toolsets, but image insertion was still a hurdle. Rather than pay a bit more for TinyMCE’s image manager, I found iBrowser to be the answer (okay…actually Mel from emtwo found it and got it configured.  I just watched and giggled with glee once it worked). Free is good. A bit of configuring later, and the toolset was finished.

Overall, I’m very pleased with the site. There’s still a lot of development to do for future enhancements, but the Phase I site is up and running. Here’s to the entire team who helped get this site off the ground…if I ever meet you in person, the first round of drinks are on me!